A GOOD PLACE to BE FROM

By Kasie Whitener

 

Hello, again, from my November madness. I’ve been NaNoWriMo-ing since the start of the month when I wrote this cheerful, optimistic blog about what a wonderful waste of time and effort this month will be. 

National Novel Writing Month or the bold attempt to write a full 50,000-word manuscript in 30 days is that delightful annual insanity that, like a military academy, is not a good place to be, but a good place to be from. 

“Follow me on this metaphor, will ya?” she asked, her voice muffled by the closed door. 

In the beginning, you’re thrilled at the possibilities. New characters! New settings! New drama and details! Hooray! 

As the novel swells and the crushing requirement of discipline is realized, you begin to doubt the merits of the idea. Not just the NaNo experience, but the novel itself. Is the premise strong enough to make it 50,000 words? Will people grow tired of my protagonist? Where is this plot even going? 

Toward the end, that period of systemically induced fatigue when you just want it to be over, when graduation is within view, but the pillowcases stained with tears and callused-over blisters hardly seem worth it, you bear down harder. 

“You’re the only one here,” she whispered. “You must help us escape.” 

Stephen King said to write the first draft behind closed doors and maybe that’s why I love NaNoWriMo. It’s the perfect excuse to lock myself in the asylum… er… institute. 

For over a year, I have struggled with writing my second novel, Before Pittsburgh, because I brought each scene as it was written to my writing group. Loving, supportive people though they are, the full novel was not envisioned let alone finished. Today, I’m ninety days from publication and Before Pittsburgh still feels broken and in need of serious repair. 

But the NaNo projects, all six of them, feel like five-dollar bills stuffed in the pockets of winter coats. They are all drafts and the beauty of a draft is that it can wait forever for its turn at revision. 

I love the frenzy of NaNo specifically because I know what I’m building doesn’t have to make any sense, or ever even see the light of day. My fingers fly over the keyboard crafting smallish scenes – 1200 to 2000 words at the time, meeting a daily word count goal and moving characters like strategic troop alignments. 

At the end of November, I’m a different kind of writer. One that perseveres. That that revels in creation but is scientific about revision. And revision comes later. Much later if my NaNo history is to be believed. 

In these last few days, when I’ve fallen so far behind in my wordcount as to need a serious effort (or a miracle) to complete the challenge, I know NaNoWriMo isn’t a great place to be, but it’s a great place to be from. Having generated, in that uncalculated frenzy, the first draft. Another winner. 

“And the fifth-in-line for revision,” she says, peeking out of her padded cell. “Queue ‘Taps’.”

  

THE LATEST ADDITION

Meet a New Columbia II Writer

SHARON A EWING

Sharon A. Ewing is a retired teacher with 30 years of experience, mostly in the elementary and middle school grades. Also she’s taught Language Arts skills at the high school level, as well as technical and junior college and worked as a library assistant in both public and college libraries.

In 2015, she wrote the text for The Historical Stained Glass Windows of St. Peter’s Catholic Church. In 2017, she contributed an article to The Word Among Us. She is currently working on her first historical novel based on her great-great grandmother’s experience of immigrating to America.

Sharon’s  family includes a son, a daughter and 5 beautiful grandchildren. She and her husband love to travel. Her other passions include sewing, gardening, refinishing furniture and, reading, especially anything to do with history.

Sharon's first post on this page follows.

 

 

 

A NEWBIE in HISTORICAL FICTION TERRITORY

By Sharon Ewing

My retirement goal was to write a historical fiction novel. In my naivete, I couldn’t imagine the path from essay writing to historical fiction being a difficult one. After all, I’d been complimented often on my writing skills. However, not long into the process my ego became as deflated as the unused blow-up mattress in my attic.  

Although the main character was based on my great-great grandmother, I had no idea what she looked like. Also, I knew precious little about daily life in the 1860s. The lure of writing this story was initially driven by the excitement of digging into mid-19th century history. Faced with fleshing out my characters, I realized I had downplayed the need for imagination and creativity. That observation sent me back to analyze characters in the novels I’d read and enjoyed.

Learning about the 19th century proved intriguing, but the facts in my head were nonfiction. To transform this information into a story with all the minute details of daily life required a change of writing style and a new mindset, another setback. I began imagining my characters in a movie. This helped me make the necessary transition.

Research, research, became my mantra. The more I wrote, the more I realized I needed to know. I composed on my lap-top, while my i-pad became my research assistant. I’d hit roadblocks and take hours reading about the election of a president in the 1800s. How did presidential candidates campaign at this time? What was the mood of the city? What issues concerned various ethnic groups? How did they resolve the tensions that arose? What did an ordinary day look like? I began to envy writers of science fiction and stories in present day. Maybe it would be easier if I quit and just wrote a fairy tale!

Antagonist? Oh yeah, I needed at least one to create tension and interest. I couldn’t forget story arc and those other story elements I preached about in writing class, along with grammar, punctuation, and word choice. I remembered reading once how a famous author edited his work 35 times before submitting it for publication. Although nowhere near that number, some days I felt I was on the grammar merry-go-round, praying for the music to stop so I could get off. I developed more sympathy for my past students than they would ever believe.  

My growth in literary skills and perseverance can only be attributed to perseverance and the writers who willingly encourage me along the way. While some days the process is painfully difficult, I know the end result will be worthwhile. I also know I will never again downplay the amount of sweat, tears, and research needed for producing a well-written piece of work. Nor, I hope, will I every overestimate my own skills and need to eat another piece of humble pie.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CREATING STORIES OR ARTICLES THAT PULL READERS IN. WOW, HOW CATCHY.

By J Dean Pate

One of my favorite writers, Columbia’s Bill Fox – Southern Fried — would bore-in and magnify and magnify again, peculiar traits of his characters. Then he would stretch them through misguided desires or conflict into hilarious episodes that kept readers turning the page.

For me, it is a struggle to bring my characters and story to life because of being stuck in exposition mode from my days as a broadcast news writer. This leads to results at times that read like I’m writing for speed readers because I want to get the story over with, because TV copy is short.  

“Once upon a time flip … everything was good flip … (oh my god, I must fix this so I’ll add in) . . .  and as she held him tightly Angelica knew in that moment she and Raoul would spend eternity …  sigh/throb…together.”  — Yay, Yahoo!!!

My writing group has been helpful with suggestions. And I have found several books to help me find my way. 

Mystery writer Jane Cleland recommends plot twists to keep readers wondering, “What happens next?”

Whether they be mysteries, a memoir or literary nonfiction, she says the story needs to pivot and turn to avoid boring readers. She says plot twists, reversals and dangers should be counterintuitive, grounded on emotion while utterly unexpected. The goal is to create intrigue and credibility by presenting evidence. Readers need to trust you are revealing emotional truths through believable incidents.

She offers the following questions as guides for developing effective TRDs:

· What does the reader expect to happen next?

· What else could logically happen? (Twist)

· What is the opposite of the readers’ expectation? (Reversal)

· Could something emotionally, physically, or spiritually frightening or dangerous occur (Danger)

· Does the TRD surprise the reader?

· Will it add tension or intrigue?

· Is it credible?

Plot Twists, Reversals and Dangers from Mastering Plot Twists, Jane K. Cleland, Writers Digest 2018 ISBN-13:978-1-4403-52331

A WRITER in QUARANTINE

By Jodie Cain Smith

 

Ah, writing in the time of Covid. Working in the time of Covid. Doing anything in the time of Covid. I won’t lie to you. Over the last 545 months (That’s how long the virus has been here, right?) I’ve been rather unpretty at times. Puddles of tears, not enough sleep, loads of rage and restlessness have wrecked my skin, my waistline, and yes, my writing life. 

Then, I remembered a couple of months ago that I am an optimist. What? Yes! In my opinion, writers are optimists. Who else would willingly throw themselves on the breaches of criticism, trial-and-error, publishers, agents, and self-publishing software designed with the singular goal of forcing the writer to smash her laptop with a sledgehammer? Only a cock-eyed optimist, that’s who. 

So, what does my optimism have to do with writing during a pandemic? Everything. And, to keep a tired cliché going, let’s see what hindsight 2020 has given me. 

1. I can’t squeeze blood from a stone. From March to July, I squeezed my then current project so hard, blood should have shot out in true horror gore style. I was stuck. Forcing words, plot points, and character development when the story just wasn’t in my head and heart proved to be an exercise in lunacy. Especially when I had an unedited dystopian manuscript saved on my hard drive and in the Cloud and in Google docs. And. And. And. 

2. Time and distance have their benefits. Staying away from friends and family has gone on too long. The physical distance of all these months, socially or otherwise, has resulted in unrequited urges to hug every person I see. However, time and distance in writing is helpful. When I pulled that old manuscript from its digital drawer, having sworn it off like this plague, I found a potential novel, a way forward, and a sense of urgency to write I’ve never felt before. In fact, I’d distanced myself so much from this story, revisions spewed out at break-neck speed. But, but, but… 

3. I had to stop pretending. This pandemic has taught me to write the story, not what I thought the story should be, what I had forced unsuccessfully in its previous iteration. Kitschy scenes? Cut. Plot points better addressed in a therapist’s office than in my novel? Cut. (And schedule an appointment with Mary.) Too many characters? Kill off a couple. Leading lady being polite in the middle of the apocalypse so my mother won’t take offense at vocabulary? Sorry, Mama, I’ve unleashed my protagonist. She doesn’t have time for sweet talk. (And, I’m not all that sorry.) So, all this honesty led me to my most valuable pandemic lesson… 

4. Allow for change. Once I dove into these brutal revisions, I opened this story for transformation. This space allowed for truth in storytelling and growth as a writer to one that can see now how her characters need to change and which scenes, old or new, best tell this story. 

How has this pandemic affected your writing life? Tell us in the comments, and who knows? Someone else may have the cure to what ails you.

GET BACK in the GAME: NaNoWriMo STARTS TODAY

By Kasie Whitener 

It’s that time of year again! November is National Novel Writing Month or NaNoWriMo for those of us in the know, and all over the country writers of every stripe are preparing to dedicate 30 days to generating 50,000 words. 

Of mostly unusable garbage. 

In repeated conversations on our radio show, Write On SC, Rex Hurst and I have discussed the merits and risks of NaNoWriMo. Specifically, that it’s a great habit-building exercise. Every year when November rolls around, I look forward to getting back to the habit of writing every day. But NaNo is such a frenzy and the goal of getting to 50,000 words is so difficult, that a lot of what I write will probably not be any good. 

I’ve completed five NaNoWriMo projects, getting to the 50k mark with four of them, and so far, none have become viable. 

I did take my original project, a vampire novel called “Seduction of an Innocent” – yeah, I know, terrible title – and use it as base stock to cook up Being Blue. This novel should have been my first one. I queried it, approached agents with it, even considered self-publishing it. But it’s still not ready. That was 2012. 

Last year, I tried my hand at romance. Listeners of the show know I binge read romance novels, sometimes as many as five per week, and yet that’s the only NaNo project I failed to finish in November. When I did finally stretch the pitiful work I’d done to its conclusion and gave it to a few beta readers in April, I swiftly tucked the 60,000-words-of-wishful-thinking into the proverbial drawer. Where it shall remain. I heard crickets from the betas which should tell you something about the merits of that work. 

In any case, I plan to try my hand at NaNo again this year and I’m excited (again!) at the prospect of playing the game. I’m a “pantser” in that I write by the seat of my pants beginning only with a general idea of where I want to end up. It’s usually a scene in my head, a concept, that I’ll chase all month, attacking it with a variety of word weapons. 

Instead of NaNo being a productive time for me, it’s more like an extended freewrite. An unscripted game in which I play, 2000-words at a time, scenes that are swirling around in my head. The dull scenes. The breakfast scenes. The ones that a writer needs to know but that never make it to the reader’s view. 

From those scenes, I’ll plan the novel. I’ll ask what I really want the book to be about. What story am I really trying to tell? I’ll decide what research I need and what books I should read to get me ready to really write that story. Then I’ll write it. 

NaNoWriMo is, for me, about two things: 1) getting back to practicing every day, and 2) establishing rules for the new literary project. Game on!