Ten Word Tuesday

"A professional writer is an amateur who didn't quit."

Richard Bach

Word Games

I was playing a game with my family last night called Bananagrams. It's basically Scrabble, but everyone gets their own personal little game and you race to see who can exhaust the supply of tiles first. The first person to run out first, wins.

As I struggled to form words out of the mass of mostly vowel tiles in front of me (a consonant every now and then really does help), my husband came up behind me and said, "Oh come on. You're a writer! You should know all the words!"

I laughed at the time, thinking he was right...I mean, I do spend most of my days doing nothing but stringing words together. But later on, I thought more about what he said. Sure, I know a lot of words. But it's not really the words that make the difference.

Working on a WIP is just like that darn game. I may be able to spell a dozen different words with the tiles I have....but if I can't connect them to the existing words on my board in the right way, it doesn't matter. They won't work. It doesn't matter how many words I know if I can't make them fit together in just the right way.

Sometimes I'll get a pile of tiles and whip out a mess of words so fast it makes the other players' heads spin. And sometimes I stare at the few piddly words I've created with no clue of what to add. Other times, I know I can create other words if I rearrange a few tiles, but there is one glorious word that I just can't stand to break apart - but eventually do for the sake of the game. Sometimes, most times, another player will beat me to the punch and win the game. But that doesn't mean the words I created weren't awesome and it certainly doesn't mean that I can't win the next game :)

I just have to keep at it, keep playing, keep forming the words until I find a batch that will get me through the finish line. And it happens. Not always and not quickly, but it happens :) You just can't give up.

And play Bananagrams if you get the chance - it's really an awesomely fun game if you're a word nerd like me :D

Guest Blogger - Lisa Amowitz

The Four Ps and how I live by Them

It’s been five full years that I have been writing seriously (and I’m not even going to count the summers before when I secretly filled spiral notebooks with my mad ramblings). That’s five years of working with two online critique groups, attending conferences, querying, stopping, starting over ,WHINING, CRYING, threatening to QUIT..then starting again. Five years of thinking--THIS IS IT! This is the ONE! This ms is so ready—then finding out not. Five years of—if you would revise this, I’d consider it again. Then landing a big agent. Losing a big agent. Watching writer pal after writer pal get agented then getting a book deal. Feeling bad. Then feeling ecstatic that so many people I know have managed what I used to believe was impossible. Yay to all of you! You know who you are—my bookcase is filling up with your books with more on the way (four pals with books in print, nine with contracts).


Am I dying inside? Turning green with envy? Nope. Far from it. Let me be honest. I hate rejection. But it doesn’t have the edge it used to. I know it’s not personal. I know I can write! At the same time the thought of getting published doesn’t seem like the end all and be all, though I remain in dogged pursuit. I’m very goal oriented!


The way I see it is, I’ve got stories to tell. Lots of them. Characters that want to be heard. They just aren’t going to shut up, whether some one wants to put them in print or not. I don’t know the ending to this story. I may never hit it right—the right hook, in the right voice at the right time.

They can write it on my epitaph in poor English: She plodded until she couldn’t plod no more, (or maybe plotted until she couldn’t plot no more).

So now for those Four Ps.

Perseverance—continuing to write and better your craft, in the face of rejection, while not concerning yourself with who sold what and who is repped by whom. Realizing that everyone walks their own path and that the only ones who get there are the ones who just keep walking, even if the soles have worn off the bottom of their shoes.

Persistence—Hammering away at a manuscript, re-envisioning it, buffing it, hacking it if need be, but doing whatever it takes to make it the best you possibly can. Then finishing that one and starting your next.

Patience— The patience to wait until your manuscript has been critiqued, edited, revised until you KNOW it’s where it should be. Of course, with each new book, you set the bar higher. Patience to wait for agent responses—you CAN’T bug them! And, even still, I’ve learned from my contracted friends—you need patience to wait for your editorial notes. (Which I will frame if I ever get one.)

Perspective (this one is courtesy of Emily Murdoch from the querytracker forum)—You are writing because you love it and there’s no limit on what you can achieve if you really want it. So remember to enjoy the ride, savor those words, and never compare your successes to others. Getting published is not the reason to write. Writing is the reason to write.

You see why I love her? :) Find her online!

Lisa's Blog
Lisa on Twitter

Wait...it's not Tuesday?

(Since tomorrow is my turn on the fabulous Blog Chain, we'll have our Ten Word Tuesday today :D )

There's no substitute for persistence...Also, a vow of poverty helps.

~ Phil Mushnick

Cole Gibsen - The Day I Learned to Take a Hit

The former step-dad was not a nice person. I spent most of my childhood and teenage years trying to avoid him. When I was a senior in high school, I often fled my house in the middle of the night and met up with my boyfriend who kept a sleeping bag stored in his camper shell because my midnight phone calls became so regular. We’d park in the middle of a cornfield and sleep in the bed of his truck because I had nowhere else to go and his parents wouldn’t let a girl sleep over (understandably). In the morning, I’d dust myself off, comb the tangles out of my hair with my fingers, gargle with Listerine, and go to school. Just another day…

The step-dad was fond of calling me lazy. He’d laughed and told me I was dreaming when I said I wanted to go away to college. He’d bully, taunt, and belittle me with his words and size to the point that I began to believe him. I began to think I was stupid, lazy, and would never amount to anything. That was, at least, until the day I got kicked out of the house.

I was seventeen and sitting at the kitchen table eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. The sun was out and the screen door was open allowing a warm breeze to sweep through the kitchen. My twelve year-old brother had just run in the house after a swim in the pool. He was wrapped in a towel and talking to me – though I can’t remember now what we were talking about.

Enter the step-dad. But this time, instead of attacking me he went for my brother.

“You’re dripping all over the floor!” he had screamed. “Are you stupid?”

My blood began to boil. This had never happened before. Normally I was the target not my kid brother.

“No, you’re not stupid,” the step-dad continued. “Stupid would imply you have a brain. But you don’t, do you? You’re brainless.”

My brother shrunk back as I had so many times before. As if he could will the floor to open and swallow him whole. My own fear was mirrored back at me in his eyes and it made me sick.

No.

I wouldn’t let step-dad to this. Not to my brother. My vision clouded over in a haze of red and I leapt from my chair with enough force to knock it over. “Shut up!”

The step-dad looked over at me, stunned, for I’d never, in the seven years he was married to my mom, spoke to him that way.

“He’s not stupid!” I’d screamed at him. “He’s smarter than you’ll ever be.”

At this point the step-dad’s eyes had dilated and he lunged. With his hands twisted in my shirt he shoved me against a wall with enough force to knock the wind from my chest.

And then, after several gasps for breath, I screamed the words that to this day make me smile every time I think about them, “Do it again! I dare you! Do it again!”

And of course he did and I was roughed up pretty good before being tossed from the house and having my belonging set on fire. But that’s not the point. The point is, I finally found the strength to not only defend my brother but to stand up for myself as well.

If that day never happened, I wouldn’t have gone to college and received my degree. I would have kept dating losers instead of finding my husband, a man who is convinced there is nothing I can’t do, and tells me so daily. If that day never happened, I wouldn’t have survived querying agents, submitting to editors, and wouldn’t have my book deal.

You see, I queried KATANA and another novel for two years before landing my agent. Each rejection (and there were a lot of them) was like the step-dad. “You’re not good enough,” they’d whisper. “You’re never going to make it. You’re writing sucks. Just save yourself the trouble and give up now.”

I could have done just that; given up and spared myself the pain of rejection. But that’s the thing – yeah rejections suck ducks, but they’re just pieces of paper. Take it from someone who takes martial arts – I’m not gonna lie, getting punched in the face hurts like a mother. But an email? A letter? Not so much.

If you believe in yourself, if you can take a hit, nothing and nobody can knock you down.

You got a rejection?

Do it again. I dare you. Do it again.

Linkage!!

Cole's Blog
Cole's Website
Cole on Facebook
Cole on Twitter

Awesome Cole Youtube Video

Owning My Insanity

First, for your Monday viewing pleasure:

Ever feel like that? :D Annnywho......

They say the definition of insanity is repeating the same action expecting different results...or something along those lines.

It got me thinking. Are we, my dear writers, insane? Sending out query after query, revising over and over, plowing on despite the rejections and accidental deletions and manuscript fails and revision dead ends....

Or are we just persistent? Driven? Determined? Plain ol' stubborn? :D

I'm inclined to think it's a mixture of all of the above. I think it takes a certain amount of insanity to put yourself through the wringer that is the publishing industry. But at the same time, that wringer weeds out those who have a true passion for what they are doing from those who might have been trying out a passing fancy.

Because, let's face it, unless you absolutely love what you are doing, this game can really get to you.

The thought of querying both chills and excites me. It's daunting, to say the least. A seemingly never ending cycle of emails and snail mails and requests and rejections. Incredible highs followed by crushing lows....we seem to be our own special type of adrenaline junky.

Do I go jumping off cliffs?

Heck no!! I send a query letter, baby!!

Do I race a car around a track at 200 miles an hour?

No way! I go through my manuscript one more time and send that puppy off to the agent that I just know is impatiently waiting by their inbox.

I HIT SEND!!! WOOOOOO!!! What a rush! 

Did I curl up in the fetal position and cry uncontrollably when that tree fell on my car a few years ago?

Pshaw! I save that sort of devastation for REAL tragedies...like when that agent who LOVED my manuscript decides they just don't love it as much as they should. (just kidding....or am I?) ;-D

So, are we insane? Maybe. But you know what I love about writers? At least the ones I know, the ones who are so determined to make it they stick to their guns no matter what delightful particles of nastiness may be poised to smack them in the face -

They own their insanity.

They embrace, rejoice in it, and with a smile on their face and a song in their heart they put yet one more query letter in the mail, knowing that THIS time, the answer will be different. Despite the rejections that are literally wallpapering their office, they KNOW that eventually, someone is going to say yes.

And when that next rejection comes in, they simply say:

and do it all over again.

They are my heroes :D

And if that's insanity, well count me in. Sounds like a grand plan to me :)

How about you? Are you a proud, card-carrying member of the Insanity Club?

Dare to Dream

Quote of the Day:

There are people who put their dreams in a little box and say, 'Yes, I've got dreams, of course I've got dreams.' Then they put the box away and bring it out once in awhile to look in it, and yep, they're still there. These are great dreams, but they never even get out of the box. It takes an uncommon amount of guts to put your dreams on the line, to hold them up and say, 'How good or how bad am I' That's where courage comes in. ~Erma Bombeck

My husband has often asked me, as I sob over some rejection or drag my weary butt around the house after 3 hours of sleep because I’ve stayed up all night writing, why I bother doing this. And my answer…because it’s my dream. I do it for the same reason that gymnasts compete with broken bones, why actors go on stage even though they have the flu, why teachers teach even if the kids aren’t listening.

It’s my dream to see my name on my very own book on that shelf in the bookstore. I’ll always write, whether I get published or not, but the dream of being published…that is why I work my fingers to the bone, take rejection after rejection and continue to keep on sending queries, and writing blog posts and novels and non-fiction books and essays.

What are your dreams? Are you in this to be published? Or is that just a pleasant side effect of the writing?

When Garbage Inspires

(see more awesome demotivators at despair.com)

Quote of the Day:

If you are going to learn from other writers don’t only read the great ones, because if you do that you’ll be so filled with despair and the fear that you’ll never be able to do anything near as well as they did that you’ll stop writing. I recommend that you read a lot of bad stuff, too. It’s very encouraging. “Hey, I can do so much better than this.” Read the greatest stuff but read the stuff that isn’t so great, too. Great stuff is very discouraging. If you read only Beckett and Chekhov, you’ll go away and only deliver telegrams at Western Union.
~Edward Albee

I came across this quote and immediately thought, “Oh that is so true.” I’ve read books where I’ve just sat and shook my head at the awesomeness of what I held in my hands. I was filled with the desire to produce such incredible prose while at the same time knowing that I never would. And each time this happens, I have that moment of supreme discouragement. That thought of “I’ll never be this good, why do I try?”

That thought invariably disappears the second a new idea pops in my head, or the moment I sit down to write. Because whether I am producing a great novel or the worst sort of drivel doesn’t matter to me so much when I am in the grip of whatever story is clawing its way out of my head. All I want to do is write, get the story out, quiet the raging voices in my crowded mind.

But those doubtful thoughts will of course return the next time I have an unbelievably awesome book in my hands.

On the flip side, as Mr. Albee says, if I am reading something that isn’t so great, it is very encouraging. I was actually inspired to write the WIP I just finished because I was reading a book that, while I enjoyed it, inspired the thought of “Okay, I can do better that this. Or at least something just as good.”

And it spurred me to write, to start a project that would be better, more popular, and more successful than the book I had read.

To be honest, I’ve never read anything truly dreadful. If it starts getting too bad, I just put it down and move on to something else. My time is too precious and my spare time too limited to waste it on something horrendous. But it’s those in between books that encourage me to put all my effort into a project. Those books that are okay but that have you thinking through the whole thing, “Ooo, I wouldn’t have done that there, I would have done this instead. And this would have been so much better if this whole section was cut and maybe replaced with this.”

So, next time you start getting really discouraged…find a book that is complete garbage and bask in the knowledge that you can do better than that. Honestly, thinking of any book as garbage sends a huge twinge of guilt through my system, because I know how difficult it is to complete a book, any book, and I don’t like to negate the efforts of anyone. But, let’s face it, we’ve all read books where we sit in complete stupefaction that something like that could have successfully made its way through the maze of agents, editors, and publishers that exist to filter out the trash. I suppose that saying is true of all things…one person’s trash is another person’s treasure :) I am quite sure that someday, someone will be using my book to encourage them, knowing they could do better. But maybe another person will hold my book, shaking their heads at my awesomeness ;-D I’m not holding my breath on that one though :D

In any case, every book serves a purpose. Turn manure into a flower and let it be your inspiration :)