Work the Room

this past Saturday with my art on the walls...

The women were in the kitchen. The men were in the living room. It was a wine tasting party and I was there because I was related to the hostess. Otherwise, I didn’t know these women.

One of these women, an executive at Wal-Mart, was telling the other wives about how she screwed up her husband’s laundry so that he’d give her permission to quit work and stay home with the kids. All the women began talking about their husbands and the problems they had to get them to do one thing or another. They all had tricks to deal with these problems.

And I said, “The problem is that we’re in kitchen talking about them, but they aren’t in the living room talking about us.”

They quieted and looked at me. I took another sip of wine and looked at the countertop. They resumed their conversation as if I hadn’t said anything. I polished off that glass of wine and poured another. I said nothing else.

If you want to take your fiction or your art out into the world these days, you can’t play Salinger. You have to get out and socialize, network, pitch, and be on. Recently I had an artist–someone who makes his living with his art–tell me that when he meets people, he’s playing a role. He’s the artist they want him to be. “Some people want to know they are talking to an artist,” he said.

Do you think this is true? Can you network and socialize with anyone and everyone? In what social situations do you shine and in what situations do you disappear? Or dread? Do you say the right thing, the wrong thing, or nothing at all?

No One Understands What You’re Saying

grandma and jill

For years my grandmother worked at the edge of an orange grove in a wooden shack built on blocks and painted red. Spiders were always scuttling down the walls and grove workers milled about outside. She kept the books. Every morning she dressed for the office, sat with perfect posture all day long, and smoked.

She never complained, and the men all called her ma’am and someone made sure fresh flowers were on her desk.

At least, that’s the way it was whenever I went there with her. And she never said whether she liked this life more or less than her life as a dancing girl, walking down stairs on stage in feathers and beads.

As best I remember my grandmother complained about only three things, the waitress bringing her a full cup of coffee when she’d asked for a half, whether or not I was standing up straight, and my mother.

I couldn’t understand what the complaint actually was. She’d hear or see something my mom had done, and my grandmother would place a hand over her heart and mutter my mom’s name.

If my mom saw this, she’d start shouting, and every time I would listen. I’d take apart every sentence and try to understand. I knew they were fighting about something they weren’t saying, but try as I might, I couldn’t find the real problem.

When I was old enough to ask, their answers hide more than they revealed. People can hide so much in what they say.

Characters have to do the same. Miscommunication, hidden agendas, lies, twisted truths, hurt feelings, anger, love, secrets–all are in the dialog. But sometimes I worry my dialog is too opaque. Confusing, not intriguing. Unrealistic, not compelling.

How can you be sure you’re keeping your characters interesting–and not making them into a collection of verbal ticks and unbelievable ideas?

Everyone’s Listening But I Can’t See

posing

Professor X is the most popular professor in the English department. Students want his attention, but his quick opinions scare me. I try to stay out of his way. –which is easy since he isn’t aware I am in his class.

I am walking down the hall when he notices me. He calls out my name and marches over. His sweater is unraveling on the edges and he needs new loafers. I hug my books to my chest. “Yes, Dr. X?”

He tells me about the faculty lunch. Would I read three of my poems? He tears off a corner of one the papers and scrawls the day, time, & location down. I nod. You don’t say no to Professor X and I’m flattered anyway.

When I’m introduced to the room, I’m standing with a group of English majors. They aren’t really my friends. I don’t have many English major friends.

I take a step towards the podium. And a moment later I’m standing next to a classmate again. He says, “Great job. See? You had nothing to be nervous about.”

I frown. “What?”

“You did great!”

“Is it over?” I ask. “Did I read them? All three of them?”

He looks at me funny. “Of course you did. Just now.” The pages in my hand are shaking and he laughs. “You’re still nervous?”

I don’t answer him. I’m trying to remember reading my poems and all I can remember is darkness. Other people come over to me and say nice things. I nod and nod. “You didn’t even look nervous,” they say. “You were great.”

Twenty years I’m getting ready to read my work in front of a room of people again (though not poetry, thank god). Even when I practice in my living room, the lights go dim.

How do you feel about being up in front of people–with your own work? Do you look forward to reading your own writing for others or not?

This Conversation Needs a Writer

with dad & the third wife

“She’ll think you don’t like her,” my dad said.

I was on my way out the door. I had a date and I hadn’t had a date in a year. I bit the inside of my cheek. “What do you mean?” I asked him.

“A– will think you don’t like her,” he said. A– was his live-in girlfriend (and now she is his wife).

“She’ll think I don’t like her because I left my purse on the kitchen table?” I said. A– and I got along well. Everyday I reminded Dad of this.

“You don’t want her to think you don’t like her,” he said.

“What if,” I said, my stomach churning because I knew I was about to say something I wasn’t allowed to say. “What if my feelings were hurt because I wasn’t allowed to leave my purse on the kitchen table?”

My dad frowned. “That doesn’t make any sense. I just don’t want you to hurt A–’s feelings.”

“Fine. I’ll be more careful. Now, I have to go.” I head toward the door.

“Don’t forget to tell A– good-bye.”

In my dress shoes I stomped through the garden, around to the back of the house, past the pool, and to the shed. “Bye, A–,” I said. She was watering flowers.

“Don’t you have a date?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“Then what’re doing back here?” She shot water at her rose bushes.

“Dad, wanted me to be sure to tell you bye,” I said.

She tilted her head. “Why? What’s he thinking? You got a date–don’t listen to your dad.”

In your own life, what people really mean when they speak (and the words they actually use) can drive you mad. I thought I knew what my father really meant–prove to me you’re not going to ruin this relationship of mine like you did my second marriage. You know those veiled conversations you have with family that no bystander can grasp.

Maybe I was wrong about what he really meant. Not like I’ll ever know.

I love writing dialog in fiction. I know what every character means, and I can make them say what I want. They can be clever or obtuse. They can evade or be blunt. I can play with the line until it is missing just the right part to make the other character mad. Or fall in love. Or whatever I please.

I love power over words. Which isn’t to say I’ve come close to mastering that power, but I keep trying.

If you could hire any writer to write a dialog for your life, who would you hire? Do you think it would help to have a writer tell you what to say?

Throwing Dead Flowers

acting silly

The flowers he’d given me were dead. I hated to shove dead flowers in the trash. So, I pulled all the petals off the roses and put them in a bowl. I stepped outside the apartment without my shoes and in my peasant skirt. A tree blocked the view of our upstairs apartment from the street and the apartment across from us had been empty for over a week.

I flung petals in the air and spun around. The petals scattered around me in the breeze. I spun a little more and flung more petals higher. Then I heard the clearing of a throat.

Looking over my shoulder I saw our new neighbors. The couple stood on the landing with suitcases and bags. “Hi!” I said and brought my arms down to my side. “Um, I’m your new neighbor.” I brushed long strands of hair from my face.

They nodded.

I looked at my bowl of petals and reached for my door. “Well, I guess I’m done now. Nice to meet you.”

They nodded again. “I’ll just be going inside,” I said. “Welcome to the neighborhood.”

Who knows what they thought. They were quiet neighbors.

I feel like I’m scattering my novel out there and who knows what people will think. But at least I don’t have to live next door to any of you. Ha-ha-ha.

Summer Solstice Fashion & Other Foolish Things You Can Win

me in 4th grade

I thought it would look cool to wear my favorite white skirt over my favorite white and lavender pants. It never occurred to me that no one else in the 4th grade dressed this way. No one in school dressed that way. But the fabrics were the same and they had similar lines, and I was sure that this fashion statement would work. I don’t think I was teased. Some kids pretended not to know me.

So many times I’d do something with no clue that it didn’t work, that it wasn’t cool, and that it wasn’t supposed to be done that way. Afterwards I would see these things in their new light, curse my foolishness, and swear not to do them again. But there were always other foolish things to do.

Like this.

On the Summer Solstice–June 21st–I’ll send a lovely PDF file (complete with lovely cover) of my novel The Labyrinth House. If you happen to be one of the few souls who’ve read that, I’ll send you one of my other novels The Blue Jar or Drowning Karma instead. All the novels take place in the same town and characters do overlap–they aren’t so much a series as a set.

All you have to do is leave me a comment letting me know.

If you might be interested in a physical copy–handmade with real art on the cover–I’ll give one away. Just say so and I’ll put your name in a hat and draw the winner on the Summer Solstice.

Please pass the salt. I’ve got a wound over here that needs some.

my mom and my grandmother looking like I feel

You should read Betsy Lerner’s The Forest for the Trees: And Editor’s Advice to Writers.

Indeed, an editor enjoys nothing more than being startled awake by a particularly witty or moving letter or reading the fresh pages of an extremely well-written manuscript and finding that the world receded as she becomes more deeply involved in the pages. …

Too many writers, in trying to secure the services of a literary agent or publisher, simply do not do their homework. The best way to get an agent’s or an editor’s attention is to write an intelligent and succinct letter. And then send it to the right person.

… Many writers becomes agitated, and some turn hostile, as if those of us in the corridors of publishing were deliberately trying to sabotage their careers. Granted, nothing is more frustrating than waiting for a response for weeks or months and then getting only a form letter. However, a form letter is all that any agent or editor owes you.

In school I did my homework and got mediocre grades. I was an average student. Quite possibly I am mediocre at writing a query letter and finding the right person. I check Preditors & Editors, author websites, agent websites, google, Writer’s Digest, and Jeff Herman’s Guide to Book Publishers, Editors, & Literary Agents. I haven’t gotten an agent. We can conclude that my homework skills are not what they should be.

No one suffers as much as the rejected writer. If he isn’t beating himself up, he is expanding a fair amount of energy feeling slighted and neglected and in some cases downright robbed when a writer of similar age or background makes it. He doesn’t stop to consider that the other writer may be worthy; the very fact that others are able to get published is like salt in the wide-open wound of a writer’s psyche.

I read agent blogs and they seem like nice, smart people who love books. They’ve got to make a living too and taking on books that won’t sell doesn’t pay the rent. It isn’t their fault if my book isn’t marketable.

I’ve read 45 books on writing & publishing. I’ve spent years writing and rewriting. Maybe I can’t write a marketable novel. Just saying. All that salt pouring aside, maybe the industry isn’t the problem.

What books on writing & publishing do you recommend? How much can these books actually help?

Gagging the World

in London--2002

A friend of mine sent me this quote from Annie Dillard.

Publication is not a gauge of excellence. This is harder to learn than anything about publishing, and very important. Formerly, if a manuscript was ‘good’, it ‘merited’ attention. This has not been true for at least 20 years, but the news hasn’t filtered out to change the belief. People say, ‘Why Faulkner couldn’t get published today!’ as if exaggerating. In fact, Faulkner certainly couldn’t, and publishers don’t deny it. The market for hardback fiction is rich married or widowed women over fifty (until you all start buying hardback books). The junior editors who choose new work are New York women in their twenties who are interested in what is chic in New York that week, and who have become experts in what the older women will buy in hardcover. Eight books of non-fiction appear for every book of fiction. The chance of any manuscript coming into a publishing house and getting published in one in three thousand. (Agents send in most of these manuscripts. Most agents won’t touch fiction.)

I don’t know why a rich married or windowed woman would not want to read my novel, but I suspect that is not the demographic that would jump to an agent’s mind.

My friend included this other Annie Dillard quote too.

Putting a book together is interesting and exhilarating. It is sufficiently difficult and complex that it engages all your intelligence. Your freedom as a writer is not freedom of expression in the sense of wild blurting; you may not let rip. It is life at its most free, if you are fortunate enough to be able to try it, because you select your materials, invent your task, and pace yourself. In the democracies, you may even write and publish anything you please about any governments or institutions, even if what you write is demonstrably false.

The obverse of this freedom, of course, is that your work alone is so meaningless, so fully for yourself alone, and so worthless to the world, that no one except you cares whether you do it well, or ever. You are free to make several thousand close calls a day. Your freedom is a by-product of your days’ triviality. A shoe salesman-who is doing others’ tasks, who must answer to two or three bosses, who must do his job their way, and must put himself in their hands, at their place, during their hours-is nevertheless working usefully. Further, if the shoe salesman fails to appear one morning, someone will notice and miss him. Your manuscript, on which you lavish such care, has no needs or wishes; it knows you not. Not does anyone need your manuscript; everyone needs shoes more. There are many manuscripts already-worthy ones, most edifying and moving ones, intelligent and powerful ones. If you believed Paradise Lost to be excellent, would you buy it? Why not shoot yourself, actually, rather than finish one more manuscript on which to gag the world.

What do you think?

I think I’m going to make my own copies of my book–on real paper and in a PDF file–and I’m going to send it out into the world. If you’d like to be on the guest list, let me know. Remember, you can read a few chapters of both books at Lake Belle.

Do you have any writing quotes to share? Any words pinned over your desk (or your heart) that help you with this writing life? Pin them here.

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And thank you, Sophie.

Teach Kids to Read & They’ll Read Something You Don’t Like

my mom with the dog

Our local library wouldn’t allow me to check out books from the grown up section until I was 12. The librarian frowned at my grandmother when she realized grandma was checking out the Agatha Christie books on my behalf.

mom reading

I read while walking down the school hallways. I kept a book in my lap during class and read when I thought the teacher wouldn’t notice. I read Tess, Bambi, Forever, and Flowers in the Attic. I’d read anything. I liked everything. I had no judgment.

My dad’s second wife complained. “Larry,” she said to my father, “tell her to get her nose out of that book.” And to me my step-sister said, “That’s why boys don’t like you.” I suspected my step-sister was right, but I liked the boys in books better anyway.

What limits were put on your reading? What was the wildest, most daring book you read as a kid? What book shocked you? If you’re a parent now, what reading limits do you put on your own kids? Have you ever wanted a book banned? Why?

When adults try to ban a book, what exactly do you think they are afraid of? I don’t mean what they say they are worried about because that seems like only half the explanation. Sometimes I wonder if I’ve written anything someone would try to ban…how would that feel?

It was just like a movie!

a perfect day in Kew Gardens

My step-mother told us to get ready for bed. My step-sister ignored her, but I changed and brushed my teeth. We were 10.

“I’ve changed my mind,” my step-mother said. “We’re going to the movies.”

“But I’m in my nightgown.”

“It’s just the drive-in,” she said.

“A triple feature,” my step-sister said excitedly and rattled off the titles of three horror movies.

“I can stay home and go to bed,” I said. “I don’t care if I don’t go.”

But my dad wanted us to be a family. Families went together. To this day, I don’t remember the names of those movies but I remember the giant rats in one and the giant ants in another. Vampires were in the third. I hated sitting in the car in my thin and too short nightgown. Hated being scared. Hated being forced to watch movies I didn’t want to see.

With my step-mother I often got to feel like the star of my own movie. Her–wicked step-mother. Me–tormented princess about to be saved at any time.

It was like a movie. People usually say this after accidents, traumas, or surprising, emotional events. Have you ever said that? For what event?

But what did people say before movies? It was like listening to the storyteller in the town square! We use movies to define or explain our lives. What was the vocabulary before? It was just like when Tybalt killed Mercutio! Can a written story reach people like a film? Can your written story reach people like a film?