I've written before about my great writers group--SWAG, Staunton/Waynesboro/Augusta Group of Writers--about how supportive everyone is, and how I've made lifelong friends from being a part of it. Wednesday evening was our monthly social hour and open mic night. This was also the first meeting after we got a nice spread in the Living section of our local Sunday paper. We had a full house of readers and listeners--and lots of first-time-at-SWAG readers. It was probably the best night we've had with lots of thoughtful work and lots of laughs.

Why are open mic nights important? I'll admit when SWAG's founder, Cliff Garstang, suggested last year that we start doing readings--out loud, in front of people--I was nervous. That's a tough thing to do, to stand up amid acquaintances and a few strangers and read what you've written. And that first time last April, my knees were shaking, and my throat was dry. Afterwards, I remember wishing I'd had a writers group ten years ago when my collection of short stories came out. I did three readings and book signings back then, without a clue as to what I was supposed to do, and the feedback I got was that I read too fast for people to understand what I was saying. At SWAG, I've learned to slow down and get across what it is I'm trying to say, and that's an experience I wouldn't have had without SWAG.

So, doing open mic readings among friends can help build your confidence for when you're on that book tour you dream about being on one day.

The other good thing about open mic is you pay a good deal of attention to the exact piece you're going to read. We get five minutes, so the passage has to be tight, succinct, which means, beforehand, you'll do some needed editing and revising you might not normally do. That's always a good thing.

And here's the best part--it's great when open mic is over and someone in the audience comes up to you and tells you he or she enjoyed what you read and begins to ask questions about your work. You feel like an honest-to-God writer when that happens. It's great.

Building confidence, honing your editing skills, and boosting your writer ego--that's what you get from a writers group. Find one. Join one.
 

Yesterday, I had a long talk about writing--its joys and frustrations--with another local writer friend of mine. She was talking about a character she created and a certain aspect of his life and how she didn't set out to write him that way, that it was just "there."

"He told you who he was," I said. (No, I'm not usually that profound.)

I've had this conversation with other writers or heard or read other writers who say the same thing--a character you create somehow becomes his or her own entity and proceeds to tell you, "I'd really do it this way. No, no, no, I'd never say/do/believe/want that." That character leads you down plot paths you never anticipated, but that's the way it's supposed to be. Merely, our constipated brains need the liberation provided by creating a fictional character who is our alter ego.

My main character--an Englishwoman who is a spy--gets to say things I'd never say, and I'm known for being outspoken. When your character can let loose with something society and propriety require you to keep quiet about, that alleviates a lot of pent-up frustration and keeps it from exploding at an inappropriate time. See, having your characters talk to you can be a good thing.

How do you know they're speaking to you? When you've written something you think is the way you want the story to go, but then you're pulled back to the keyboard and end up rewriting or revising or tossing out words until that story has set off in a different direction, and it's for the good--that's when your characters tapped you on the shoulder and said, "I think you need to reconsider."

I struggled for a long time to find the ending for my trilogy about a domestic terrorism event, and it just didn't come. Oh, the various attempts were good endings, but none of them was The Ending, the way the series was supposed to conclude. Then, the death of the person on whom one of the characters in the trilogy is based gave me that ending. It was as if the fictional character finally got through to me and said, "You've been avoiding the reality that this was the only way it could end." And he was right.

We think we create our characters from whole cloth, but the truth is we take pieces--the good and the bad--from every person we've ever known or loved or disliked. We stitch them together and give them our own life-force, and they are as real to us as any flesh and blood person. They have to be. Otherwise, a reader would never be interested. They come from within us. They're our "children." We speak to other writers of them as if they were real and sitting around the table with us. We defend them and their actions to members of our critique groups/agents/editors. We think of them at odd times. We anticipate getting back to the story so we can see them again. We see something happen and know how our characters would react to it. They are our waking and sleeping companions, often our best friends and harshest writing critics. We are the ones who shout in triumph, as they rise from the laboratory tables in our minds, "It's alive! It's alive!"

How about it? Do your characters speak to you? If so, leave a comment and tell me about a time when they did.

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Writing Work Schedule Update:

Things are actually still going according to schedule, even with having had a nasty cold last week. On "Submission Friday" I send in two book reviews and two author interviews to a fiction magazine. This week, on the Editing/Revising days, I'll concentrate on proofreading and finalizing the re-typed (and edited) manuscript of my collection of short stories, Rarely Well Behaved, which I'm re-releasing as an e-book this spring--or earlier.
 

Aren't you lucky? Today, you not only get a 100-word flash fiction, but, at no extra charge, you get a little writing lore as well.

Yeah, I wouldn't do well writing for infomercials, would I?

To see today's Friday Fictioneers inspirational photo go to http://mymusings-maggie.blogspot.com/2012/01/two-for-one.html

And here's a piece I call, "Winter Wonderland."

I wasn’t sure if it were safe to go out yet, but the dog, cooped up for so many days, was insistent. I tried to keep him close, but dogs wander. Still, I understood. Cabin fever had grasped me, too.

The blanket of snow seemed muted beneath the still-gray sky but was so beautiful compared to the four walls where we’d hunkered down. There were no tracks except ours.

The dog bounded toward the road. I slogged after him, my cries loud in the still air, echoing off the trees.

You don’t go far from home in a nuclear winter.

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Yes, I'd gone a few days without any apocalyptic writing. Now, here's your bonus--a brief discussion about a writing tool I can't be without.

Even after teaching English, being a journalist and an editor, and writing since I was ten, there are certain aspects of English grammar where I still falter. Lie versus Lay. Which versus That. Those are my particular downfalls. I'll write them one way, decide they're wrong, write them the other way, then discover I was right the first time.

Who wants to go pull the dusty, old English Grammar Reference off the shelf? Not I. I use a small tome that has been on or near my myriad writing desks for the past forty years--The Elements of Style by William Strunk, Jr., and E.B. White, or as it's colloquially called "Strunk and White."

"Make every word tell," was Cornell English professor William Strunk, Jr.'s advice to his students, one of whom was E. B. White, of Charlotte's Web fame. Strunk wrote the first The Elements of Style in 1918 and made it obligatory for his students. It wasn't until after Strunk's death that E.B. White, writing in The New Yorker, told the world about the "forty-three page summation of the case for cleanliness, accuracy, and brevity in the use of English." White was asked to edit a re-issuance of the volume to bring it into modern usage. That was about sixty years ago, and this "little book," as White called it, is still an indispensable aid to writers from high schoolers toiling over term papers to the rest of us who hope to be considered accomplished.

My well-thumbed copy, which helped me write features and editorials as a reporter and countless government reports, is still packed away with my work "stuff," so I had to replace it with a fresh copy (same link as above). Strunk and White pares down the sometimes vague structures of English grammar to the basics of language usage and composition.

It has almost doubled in size from the forty-three page volume White extolled in The New Yorker and now has a glossary and an index. It's original outline remains much the same as Strunk's version from the early part of the previous century: Elementary Rules of Usage, Elementary Principles of Composition, A Few Matters of Form, Words and Expressions Commonly Misused (my personal favorite), and An Approach to Style. (I love the perfection of those section titles.)

Strunk and White is great for writers who hate grammar--notice they don't use the word--because it has condensed the whole, arcane grammatical schema into a pocket-sized reference. You could call it "Style Basics" and be accurate, but "The Elements of Style" is just, well, stylish.

My new copy cost me ten dollars in a book store, but consider it an investment. Big box and independent book stores will order you a copy upon request. You can get a used copy from Amazon for as little as seven dollars or from free to $2.99 in the Kindle Store--though the Kindle version is the original Strunk work. Go for the Strunk and White version. If you're a Nook person, the price and the version is the same. A used copy from Barnes and Noble can be as low as three dollars.

Considering the state of some of the indie published books I've been reading to review, every person who calls him- or herself a writer should own one of these and use it. Then, you won't be disingenuous when you call yourself an author.

I have no financial interest in The Elements of Style or with its publishers. It's just a darned good writing book.

 

It was coincidence that my writing work plan sets Wednesday as politics blogging day, and the first such blog of 2012 comes the morning after the Iowa Caucuses. Coincidental but serendipitous. That throwback to the days of smoke-filled rooms, the caucus, left plenty to talk about.

First, Willard M. Romney got a win he can't really puff his chest up about, and he appeared to be somewhat muted on the Wednesday morning gabfests. I believe that eight-vote margin is one of the smallest in election history, especially for a national office. The other bad news Romney has to take away from this is that, after essentially four years of campaigning, he won the same percentage of Iowa Caucus votes as he did in 2008. On paper, it's a victory, but it must leave the taste of ash in Romney's mouth.

Though he came in second, Rick Santorum is the real winner. He did in a few weeks what Romney took four years to accomplish--get twenty-five percent of the votes. A month ago, Santorum was in the low double digits, and he gained a lot of ground and even led by more than 100 votes on occasion throughout the evening. Of course, he gained that ground by appealing to the basest instincts of the white voter--by fronting that stereotype that black people don't want to work and by doing his best imitation of Tim Tebow without bending a knee.

Ron Paul. What more can be said about him? He wants you to have the right to drink raw milk if you want. I grew up on a farm. I've drunk raw milk, and, Mr. Paul, you don't want to know the crap (literally) that's in raw milk. Paul wants to withdraw within our borders, have no foreign entanglements, and let everyone within those borders fend for themselves. He's no fan of Lincoln because Lincoln got us into an unnecessary war. WTF? I say that a lot about Ron Paul. Yes, he's grandfatherly. Yes, he sounds like the eccentric uncle who only comes to visit on holidays and upsets everyone, but one-fifth of the Iowa voters like his vision for America. And that's scary.

And, can you imagine, Newt Gingrich got relegated to a somewhat distant fourth place? How dare they? How dare they ignore someone of his self-declared intellect? But you just wait. He's not going negative. He's just going to tell the truth. (Cheers and applause) His truth, of course, which is somewhat detached from our everyday reality. As a former federal employee, I remember Newt's fit of pique when he and other members of Congress had to exit Air Force One from the rear stairs--he shut the government down because President Clinton wouldn't acknowledge Gingrich's odd notion he was the co-President, not Hillary. His suck-up to Santorum and his "watch out, I'm coming to get you" riff to Romney was pure, nasty Newt.

The Village of Texas is getting its other idiot back. How nice for them. It's hard to believe there is actually a Texas politician who can make W look like a Rhodes Scholar, but, good old Rick, he proved there was. Perry brought nothing original to this campaign, and it serves no point to waste any more blog space on him.

I wonder how Michelle Bachmann feels this morning after all that praying for a miracle from the entity she knows makes miracles. I guess she didn't pray hard enough because the miracle didn't happen. She essentially came in dead last, since Huntsman, Cain, Roehmer, and "No Preference" together garnered less than one percent of the votes, and none of them campaigned in Iowa. As of this writing, she has canceled her trip to South Carolina for that upcoming primary and will hold a press conference later today. At least I won't have to listen to her carping about being disrespected because she was a woman. The hypocrisy of someone who has done all she could to reverse or disdain the accomplishments of the women's movement who then uses sexism as an excuse for her personal shortcomings just astounds me. I hope she's back in Minnesota for good.

The real winner in my opinion--and others more knowledgeable than I agree--is, ultimately, President Obama. Many people think Romney is the "most electable" Republican choice when paired against the President. I think the square jaw and the whitener-enhanced smile only go so far, especially for someone whose profession was to shut down companies and move jobs overseas, for which he received tremendous remuneration. When it comes down to the person who represents my values, it's President Obama. Mind you, I'd like to have a talk with him about a few things, but the hope and the change still do it for me.

Here's the most telling thing. If you haven't noticed, none of the candidates refer to the President by his title--it's Obama or Barack Obama. Now, trust me, I had trouble uttering the words "President" and "Bush" together, but I always tried to say "The President." (Or President Shrub when I was really pissed.) This refusal to acknowledge the President's status is indicative of a privileged (because they're white) section of society--they just can't wrap their heads around the reality of someone in the White House who is not white.

What I took away from the Iowa spectacle was a post-caucus interview with a white man in his fifties. When asked why he voted for Romney, he said, "He's the best one to beat [slight hesitation and the beginning of a sneer] Mister Obama."

That says it all. Unfortunately.

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Writing Work Schedule update:

Monday afternoon:

- Edited the review for Linkage: The Narrows of Time Series (Volume 1) and sent interview questions to the author
- Drafted a review of Loki and Sigyn: A Love Story

Tuesday:

- Morning: edited a short story called "The Drink" and sent it to an on-line critique group I'm in (got very constructive comments so far)
- Afternoon: pulled out my 2009 NaNoWriMo manuscript and reviewed it to see if, with a few name changes, it could be a good candidate for a Kindle Publication

Wednesday:

- Morning: Blog on politics (see above)
- To do for the afternoon: work on editing/revising a novel (depends on how tired and sore I am from coughing)

 

I've been doing a lot of reading of indie published books lately (or, if you're a stickler for terminology, self-published books, but terminology adapts, by the way). I have a list of eight of them I'm going to review, and, unfortunately, it's been a mixed bag of quality. Oh, the stories have been decent; getting to the story through the morass of bad grammar and punctuation has been the hard part. Part of the problem is I've been both an English teacher and a magazine editor. What, to some apparently, may be unimportant details, to me are essentials of language. If those fine details--commas, word usage, grammar--aren't present, I get distracted--and frustrated--by what I consider elementary school-level errors.

It's too easy to attribute this to lack of education, but the authors involved--on their blogs or on social media--seem to have had a decent education. Then, it hit me, as I was helping a friend with a manuscript, these works read as if the authors had published their first drafts.

That's the seduction of indie publishing. It is very empowering, on one level, to eliminate all those filters (agents, editors) who don't get your fiction, who don't see you as a money-maker, who have to take a cut of your royalties, etc. I believe publishing is evolving, but for indie publishing to get any sort of professional acknowledgement from traditionally published authors, you can't publish your first draft.

First drafts, of course, are necessary. First drafts are the place where you finally get on the page that story that's been rattling around in your head for a long time. It is an accomplishment in and of itself to do that--one of the reasons I like National Novel Writing Month. I can come up with something completely new at least once a year. Have I published any of the manuscripts I wrote the past four Novembers? No. They're first drafts of what will be good works later. After proofreading and editing. When I finish a NaNoWriMo project, I set that draft aside for a good six months or more before I pick it up again. In the meantime, it's never far from my thoughts, but I'd never, ever see the holes in the plot or the un-obvious typos if I started the edit immediately after finishing the first draft.

Whether you're pursuing traditional publishing or indie publishing, the process is to set the first draft aside for the amount of time it takes to make it fresh when you look at it again. When you publish your first draft and start seeing those five stars on Amazon (which your mother and all her friends have put there) and read the comments like, "We need more of [insert character name here]!" resist the temptation to write a sequel in a weekend and publish it raw.

Cultivate a friendship with a local high school English teacher or newspaper editor or even a friend from school you know got good grades in English. Let them proofread your work for the typos, punctuation problems, grammar, etc. You can accomplish some of this yourself by reading your work out loud--at home, preferably, unless you like people at Starbucks staring at you and wondering if they should call the cops. (In reading this post aloud, to this point I've found a half dozen typos, now fixed.) But nothing beats a "fresh" set of eyes.

Then--and this has been something hard for a lot of indie authors to accept--hire a developmental editor. Yes, you get a higher percentage of royalties if you self-publish without all that traditional publishing detritus, but you'll get better reviews and more sales if a reader/reviewer can't tell the difference between your book and a traditionally published one. That takes work. That takes commitment not just to telling a good story but presenting a good story.

I have an indie writer friend who consistently produces a good first draft--in the sense of proper punctuation, grammar, and usage--and the story is decent as well. Recently, she sent a copy of her first draft of a new novel to her editor, and now she's in the midst of a total rewrite. You may say, "See, that's what's wrong with editors, and that's why I don't want one." However, this writer understands the editor's purpose--to make it better--and she's excited about the major revision because she knows she'll have something beyond a good, first draft. She'll have an outstanding novel.

So, set that first draft aside for a while. Resist the temptation to publish it until it's polished. Get a tougher skin when your proofreader/editor suggests changes (being part of a critique group helps with this). Don't be suckered in by seeing your words in print until what you're trying to say is in its best shape.

Be a writer, not a hack.

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I set out my writerly resolutions for the new year in a recent post: http://mymusings-maggie.blogspot.com/2011/12/resolved-to-write.html. So, periodically, I'll provide an update because I know you're just dying to know.

Writer Work Schedule Update:

Sunday: Started reading one book to review (which inspired this post) and finished another
Monday morning: Blogged on writing (see above)
To do Monday afternoon: Edit/Revise a review of Linkage: The Narrows of Time Series (Volume 1) by Jay J. Falconer and get it ready for submission to eFiction Magazine
 

"Final Statements" by A. J. O'Connell (Independent Ink Magazine, December 20, 2011, 2,286 words) is something of a psychological study. A late-thirties divorcee has moved back in with her mother--no surprise there--but the daughter, Roxanne, has a fascination with a Web site that lists the final words of executed criminals.

Roxanne has taken over her slovenly mother's house and begun renovating it without her mother's permission. The only off-limits place is the door to the basement, the site of her long-dead father's workshop, which Roxanne's mother still forbids her access.

At first, it's easy to see Roxanne's mother's concern--her adult daughter makes a ritual of reading the words of executed murderers when the Web page gets updated every month. Roxanne curls up on the couch, a pint of Ben and Jerry's in hand, laptop open, and don't you dare disturb her. She studies the executed man's picture and rolls the last words over and over in her mind, noting that the ultimate words are usually, "I'm ready." Her mother sits at the dining room table playing Solitaire the old fashioned way, with a deck of cards, and tosses barbs over her shoulder about her daughter's odd obsession. By that point in the story, you begin to wonder just what Roxanne's issue is with the dying words of the executed.

Then you find out, and I'll never hear the phrase "the apple doesn't fall far from the tree" the same way, ever again.

This is a short, tight story with a good twist at the end--very Hitchcock-esque--and I recommend it.

To read the story, go to http://www.indinkmag.com/
 

Take a look at my review of Weimar Vibes by Phil Rowan here: http://mymusings-maggie.blogspot.com/p/book-review-weimar-vibes.html
 

Today's post uses pictures to illustrate some points, and I haven't figured out how to imbed photos in the posts here at Writing.com, so, if you're interested about writing spaces, take a look at:

http://mymusings-maggie.blogspot.com/2011/12/whither-to-write.html

Happy new year!
 

Last week I guest-posted on Madison Woods' blog about reviewing books, as in, I would like to review more. Three people contacted me right away, and I've purchased their books to review.

As other writers follow me on Twitter, I've identified several of their works I'd like to read and review. Then, a high school friend of mine pops up on Facebook with a link to her series of books, and I decided I wanted to read and review that as well.

So, I've managed to commit myself to review seven books by mid-February. What was I thinking?

However, just the other day, I blogged about establishing a writing/reading schedule for myself in the new year, and I hope that structure will help me keep my promises.

And, in the order I'm supposed to read them, here are the seven books:

Weimar Vibes by Phil Rowan, a thriller (love the thrillers)
Linkage: The Narrows of Time Series, by Jay J. Falconer, sci-fi (love the sci-fi)
The Lucky Boy by Caroline Gerardo, literary fiction
Admissions by Michael Ribisi, a romance (not so into the romance genre, but this intrigued me because it's a romance written by a man)
Loki and Sigyn: A Love Story, by J.L. Butler, fantasy (again, not a big fantasy fan, but if it's unique, I'll give it a try)
Red Mojo Mama by Kathy Lynn Hall (a mashed genre of romance, thriller, and paranormal)
Scorpio Rising by Monique Domovitch, a romance

Some of these--I'm not sure which yet--I'll review and submit the review to eFiction Magazine, which publishes indie fiction and likes book reviews of indie-published books (or self-published books, if you prefer; to me, six of one, half dozen of another). Others I'll review in my blog on a separate page.

Yes, I've always been an over-achiever, or, better put, a take-on-more-than-I-can-chew achiever.

Wish me luck.
 

Busy day with the holiday shopping and general "stuff" around this time of year. Yesterday, when I got the picture for today's Friday 100-word flash fiction, something came to mind almost at once. Finding the time to put it in words was another matter.

I guess the holidays bring out the sappiness in all of us, so here's the inspiration photo: http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-mbDipw0gBd4/Tuvuqv89hLI/AAAAAAAAALs/u7FunOZrJX8/s1600/...

And here's a little story I call:

You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown

She frowned. “What is that?” she asked, still gripping her suitcases..

“Remember our first Christmas in the apartment over that Chinese restaurant? We decided at the last minute to get a tree and all that was left was a scraggly one,” he said.

“Please. Do not remind me of that stinky dump.”

“We bought a bottle of cheap wine, turned on the Fireplace App on the iPod, and recited the Charlie Brown Christmas Special from memory.”

“Yeah, so? That doesn’t explain this raggedy-ass tree.”

“I was trying…” His throat tightened.

“Yes, you are trying. Trying my patience.”

“I thought you’d remember and stay,” he murmured.