The effectiveness of routine

My routine has been upended this year. Lots of interruptions between travel and other commitments. As with anything, being good at something requires practice. LOTS of practice. Want to play the piano well? Practice. Want to play a sport well? Practice. Want to write well? You got it. Practice.

Writing is hard enough without juggling several different things at one time. Producing the backlist in audiobook for EPITAPH was one of my goals for this year, and my narrator is doing a bang-up job. In addition, keeping up with the audio for the Elspeth Barclay series. Audiobooks require a "listening proof" to make sure the narrator hasn't missed something or missed my intentions in their interpretation. This is time away from writing.

I'm trying to write the next Elspeth Barclay novel (tentatively titled DARK SHADOWS), and I won't lie. I'm not very good at "multi-booking." I write a chapter. Listen to a chapter. The good news is I'm getting caught up in those Epitaph books all over again (which means I did something right while I was writing those!). The bad news is it distracts my train of thought on the current work in progress. I'm out of routine. 

Recently, my niece (shout out to Ashley!) went on a solo writing retreat. She's juggling the day job, multiple pet family, and friends and family on a regular basis, so I suspect she doesn't always get the writing time she craves. The good news is she wrote thousands of words while she was gone (congratulations, Ashley!). When routine lets you down, drastic measures must be taken. 

The good news for me - the penultimate audiobook for Epitaph is completed. I celebrated by writing thousands of words in the new book, and I told my narrator I need a couple of weeks to get back into routine before she does the final installment. Happily, I've been able to slip back into that routine, despite it being disrupted with distractions. 

The Most Haunted City...?

Let me start by saying I love Savannah. What a charming city. Spanish moss hangs from the trees like tinsel. The brick sidewalks are often uneven and treacherous, but they're beautiful. Gaslights welcome visitors to doorways, and the "haint blue" ceilings on the porches are meant to keep the spirits away. They have town squares every couple of blocks, for a total of 22 remaining out of the original 24, squares where the townspeople could muster if invaders threatened their peaceful lifestyle. Savannah is rich in history.

We did several tours, and I have to say we heard much of the same information on almost every tour. This isn't a bad thing for those of us who might not have been paying full attention, and it's interesting to hear the varying takes on certain aspects, like the Forrest Gump bench at Chippewa Square. It isn't there. Why not? Well, one tour guide told us because it was being defaced, so they moved it to the historical society. Two other tour guides told us it was a Hollywood prop and went back to California when production ended. They did note that because of the interest, the historical society had one to commemorate the movie. 

We walked through Colonial Park Cemetery, colonial because it dates back to civil war days when soldiers encamped there - soldiers who defaced some of the tombstones when they were bored. One of my favorite stories, a stone was altered to honor the mother of ... 117 children. Many of the stones were displaced and are now along an "orphan" wall because they don't know where the graves are. Oh, the graves are there, but with the stones moved, they aren't sure which one is which. That, and the tombstones are so weathered as to be almost illegible. The thing about the cemeteries in Savannah, though, is that they are parks. Families would go to the cemetery and have picnics with their dear departed. The green space is beautiful. Then, there's the dark side of the cemeteries. Some of the land was reclaimed to be built over - without moving the bodies buried underneath. This is where the haunted histories come from. Bodies buried under streets, under houses that were built when the boundaries of the cemetery parks were pushed back. 

One of my favorite ghost stories was about a young Irish immigrant named Mary Reilly. The Irish were sent to America to work off their debts as indentured servants. Mary had a very nasty master, and one day she and her boyfriend schemed to kill the old guy off. As she was giving him his morning bath, she held his head under water and killed him. She was the first person in Savannah tried for murder, along with her boyfriend. Her boyfriend was sentenced to hanging, but Mary got a reprieve due to the fact she was pregnant. When the child was born, they took the child from her and strung her up, too. Now they say Mary wanders the square looking for the child they took from her. 

Then we visited Bonaventure Cemetery, famous from Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. Our guide was very knowledgeable about its history, and relayed many stories, including the ghost stories, but he was also very fact based, i.e., he'd tell us "people say" and give us the alternate facts, but he had "true facts" to back up what really happened, and sources to check. The statuary and symbolism in the cemetery are things that always interest me (making me a taphophile of sorts, if you've read EPITAPH), and while they had a lot of interesting things to see, one of the statues most people come looking for (which was used on the cover of the aforementioned book) has also been relocated to the history museum on account of strangers traipsing over the graves the statue marked. The family wasn't happy about people trespassing on their family plot. Regardless, there are plenty of other interesting things to see, and a reminder that the plots - which are all clearly sectioned off - should be respected as private property. 

I have to say, for all the things we saw, I never had a sense of anything otherworldly lingering about. The Savannahians, however, are happy to exploit the tourism the two famous movies (and others) have brought to the fair city. Of all the tours we took, I was most disappointed by the "Ghost" tour, almost as if our guide was bored with it all. Her storytelling skills were lackluster, and she rushed through the tales she passed along. That particular tour also employs some theatrics, which were over the top for me and annoyed me more than they added to the experience. We stopped at one of the "haunted" locations, where they took us to a room, turned the lights off, and an actress came on a small stage to "frighten" us with more tales and special effects. Nope. Not what I was looking for, but probably fun for some people. Maybe I should incorporate something like that in one of my stories and have the actors "visited" during their performances. What do you think?

I enjoyed my trip immensely (did I mention the delicious food?), and while I learned many interesting things (Keeping Up With The Joneses, for instance, refers to the "fancy" houses on Jones Street and not a neighbor named Jones), the haunted history didn't do much to inspire me - which isn't to say some of what I learned won't end up in one of my books. 😉 

Low Country Boil

Tripping on air, and other talents

When I went on my writer’s retreat, one of the questions I continued to struggle with was what purpose do the MMs have in the current book? Do they have a purpose? Or am I forcing them where they don’t fit?

Without giving too much away, my editor asked about something in THE JANE DOE GHOST that wasn't neatly tied up. She suggested maybe it would be addressed in the next book in the series. This is one of those moments where I thought (at least in my mind - would have been nice if I shared that with readers) it was self-explanatory. So I've gone into this next in series with an eye toward explaining what was left dangling (what I'm coyly referring to as the MMs). I could easily have explained them away in Chapter 1, saying "well, that mystery is over, and the MMs went with it." But what fun is that? However, without a reason for them to appear in THIS book, I wasn't inclined to give them a storyline. 

Until I was.

I am NOT A FAN of books that don't finish a story line in one book. Where dangling threads remain, this reader's attention is lost. Don't play with me that way! Is that what I'm doing? No. Jane Doe's story is well and truly finished, but there are other things afoot in the universe that remain. Sort of like when a character is injured (no spoilers!) and the end of the book is the beginning of their recovery journey. You have to assume that will be continued in the next book, but it isn't a dangling thread, per se. Likewise, the MMs are more of something that wasn't front and center in the last book but are jumping into the spotlight in THIS book. Well, maybe not the spotlight, but definitely interwoven into the plot, whereas in the last book they were mysterious "what is that?" background characters. 

Now. Allow me to take a detour for a moment. Has anyone ever read a Jennifer Cruisie book? This woman is funny. I first read one of her books when my buddy Jennifer (no relation) sent me a box of books for market research. I rolled my eyes and said, "this isn't what I want to write, though." Until I read it. That market still isn't one I'd write for, or CAN write for, but some authors transcend genre. Fast forward about 20+ years. Jennifer Crusie is still writing books, and now she's collaborating with Bob Mayer. Has been for several years. In fact (completely irrelevant to this post, but I'm detouring, after all), I met them both at my first writers conference when they'd first started collab-ing. She's been posting regular updates on the progress of the series they're currently working on, and I'm in awe of the way she is so meticulous about plotting and planning the series. She leaves room for surprises, as one must, but I tend to fly by the seat of my pants and am always amazed when I find threads to pull through my series books. Almost as if I'd planned it that way! So why are we on this detour? Because I'm having one of those moments now with my MMs. An afterthought becomes a thread that moves this series forward. Flashes of unexpected brilliance.

But you're wondering about the subject line of this post, aren't you? I'm going to avoid another detour, but I'll ask a simple question. Do you ever have moments where you "trip on air?" Stumble for no apparent reason? What if there was a reason all this time and you just never realized it? Me? I'd like to blame my lack of grace on something other than myself from time to time, and my MMs have provided me that opportunity. "It isn't my fault, the MM tripped me!" But even mischief makers have a helpful side. And that's where I'm taking the question of "but what about..." from my editor. 

Stay tuned.

Sticking to the writing rules

I have critique partners who redirect me when I'm on the wrong path, who catch my errors through the writing process. We've been together a LONG time, and sometimes it's as simple as highlighting an error rather than pointing out why it's an error. I also have an editor who points out writing errors. With that being said, sometimes I argue my point. "It's in dialog, so it shows characterization." Or "it's there to call attention to what's happening."

I recently got back the audio for THE JANE DOE GHOST, and I sent back one sentence for her to redo. 

“Is that what you want?” I asked Laine. “What you think?” 

She read the sentence with "you" emphasized in the first sentence, and then the second sentence without much inflection. In my head, "you" should be emphasized in both. 

This, my friends is an example of redundancy. Elle and Laine are having an argument, and Elle thinks Laine's perceptions have been influenced by Laine's boyfriend. I did it deliberately, and I can argue the point all day, but as my narrator demonstrated to me, she missed the point, which is MY problem. As an author, I shouldn't have to point out my intentions. I should have made it clear to the reader. A reminder that redundancy isn't helpful. Yes, there are instances where it might make sense, but clearly this wasn't one of them. 

Sometimes, redundancy happens organically when I write, and I usually catch it in editing and remove it. In this instance, it was deliberate. Am I right? Am I wrong? Again, if I have to explain this to a reader (my narrator), it's wrong, and no amount of justification is going to make it right. Authors need to put their egos aside, "kill their darlings" sometimes. 

I've had books where I incorporated particularly "odd" phrases that I'd heard. Real life, right? My critique partners shot back with "people wouldn't say that." But they did! But if it doesn't ring true, I need to support why I've said it, let the character react to it and point out that yes, it's odd, but that's how it happened. You know the phrase, "truth is stranger than fiction?" Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. 

Which circles around to "kill your darlings." Figuratively, of course. You've just written the perfect sentence, and the perfect paragraph to decorate it. You LOVE what you've written. It's PERFECT. The problem is it doesn't belong there. Maybe its expositive. Maybe it's irrelevant. Maybe it doesn't move the story along. DELETE. 

An author has to set their ego aside sometimes. Reading is subjective, and there is always going to be someone who doesn't like what you've written. You can take it personally or understand that one size doesn't fit all in this business. I've had that experience myself, where I read a perfectly good book and didn't like it, mostly because of my own personal biases. Constructive criticism is just that - constructive. Consider the source. Consider their expertise. Consider your ego. Consider your audience. 

So what did I do with my redundancy? Well, the book is already published. The audio is meant to reflect the book. Neither my writing buddies NOR my editor commented on this particular redundancy, and since I can justify my position, I asked my narrator to read it the way I heard it in my head when I wrote it. Maybe I'm right, maybe I'm wrong in this instance, but for this one time, I'm going to let it slide on through.

Jane Doe is making its way to the retail outlets! Check here to see if it's at your favorite.

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