Delacorte Contest for a First YA

You're a SCBWI member, aren't you? On p. 39 of their recent BULLETIN there's a Delacorte Contest for a first YA. If not, the info is at www.randomhouse.com/kids/writingcontests.

It's a long shot, but I bet those all the time. Tell your friends!

A Little Tense

I've been thinking about this issue of tense ever Liza posted last week. As Liza said, Philip Pullman's--whose Golden Compass is a formative book for me--essay against the use of the present tense in the Guardian got widely circulated among writing types. Pullman writes:

I want all the young present-tense storytellers (the old ones have won prizes and are incorrigible) to allow themselves to stand back and show me a wider temporal perspective. I want them to feel able to say what happened, what usually happened, what sometimes happened, what had happened before something else happened, what might happen later, what actually did happen later, and so on: to use the full range of English tenses.

The whole essay is worth a read, and I'd be interested to know your reaction. (Somewhere, there is irony in Pullman's avowed atheism and his narrative predilections, but I haven't finished all my coffee yet.)

The whole thing started when the writer Philip Hensher wrote a similar essay in the Telegraph because half the Booker finalists were present tense books. Hensher blames creative writing teachers for the trend, as they are the font of all evil. He says writers use it in pursuit of vividness, but "in a literary context, it quickly takes on a weird, transfixed, glassy quality--the opposite of vividness."

Sure. It can. The trick of course, as with any choice in writing, is not to do it badly. (Thank you. You can all acknowledge me in your books.) Laura Miller says as much in her response at Salon. (You may have to click through a pop-up ad for a Last of the Mohicans deluxe DVD, sending you into an instant state of temporal discombobulation. I am here to assure you that it will be all right.) "The present tense is one of any number of crutches clung to by mediocre writers," she writes. "The problem lies less with the tool than the workman."

For children's book writers, the immediacy granted in present tense is no small thing. In young adult fiction past tense gives you a narrator who is telling events from some future position in time and thus must have perspective on these events--whatever growth they experience in the novel will have already taken place. The present tense allows a narrator with no perspective, one who is exactly as evolved as the main character. Present tense has particular use in dystopian fiction--in which the characters can only live in the present, in which there's no guarantee there will be a future to narrate from. (The best example is The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness, the book I will not shut up about. It's "more interested in the possibilities of language," in Hensher's words, than any book I've read in a long time.)

There are fads in narrative, but also fads in what's considered the proper way to tell a story. Someday I'm going to get hopped up on Theraflu and come on here and rant about the opposition to point of view switches and intrusive narrators. I don't see the good in limiting the tools in your narrative workbench; the point is the mechanisms of narrative--point of view, tense, syntax--are a conscious choice, with meaning for and effect on the story. Choose consciously, wisely--and if anyone complains blame your writing teacher.

56 Picture Book Manuscripts

I have fifty-six undergraduate students this semester. We just finished the picture book section of Writing Children’s Stories 101. Following Ron’s post I can safely say that hardly any of these students decided to dress dangerously. Here are some of things I found myself repeating:

- If you begin a book with a bored character looking for something else to do, chances are your reader will look for something else to do as well.
- Rainy day activities (unless Cat in The Hat) are not fun or funny.
- Eliminate all mothers. They ought never be around to solve problems—it’s just not interesting.
- Aren’t we done with pirates yet? Though I suppose, if done well, everyone loves a pirate.
- No need to over-detail. There will be pictures after all.
- Read rhyme out loud to someone other than a kind friend, and PLEASE ask yourself—WHY MUST IT RHYME? (I totally understand editors’ request never to submit rhyming picture books)
- Make your character suffer more than you think they should.
- Don’t be afraid to exaggerate here and there.
- Do freckles really illuminate? (I did repeat this twice)
- Look for patterns everywhere.
- If there is a talking cricket at the end you might consider alluding to it in the beginning.

But in spite of all this, there is good in every piece—always something that can be taken and made even better. (And all fifty-six get to rewrite their manuscripts!) Now to find that germ of good in my own work, and treat it with nothing close to timidity. Suicidal lemmings anyone?

Music to My Ears

"Musicians practice to reduce the risk of catastrophe, but to play with complete safety is an insult to their art." Ben Fountain.

A lot of what I read is very safe. And predictability (a synonym for safety) may be due to trying to avoid catastrophe. Which is probably a bad review, an out-and-out rejection, or not even finishing the novel, story, or poem.

If I think about this quote, though, I remember passages in my books (passages I loved even if no one else did) that shook free of safety. I wrote these when they were least expected. Probably when the ego was busy looking at itself in the mirror and the other guards were smoking and talking about Saturday night.

I suspect recklessness is better tolerated in poetry where not much is at stake and the idiosyncratic can be rewarded by publication in an obscure journal. (There's a catastrophe of a different magnitude. )

I very much like the idea of not insulting one's art by playing it safe. It's a bit abstract, but still a useful tool to wield when someone is floundering. Are you stuck? Unhappy with your work? Ask if timidity might not be the problem.

Then dress up in something dangerous and go back to work.

writing in time

Well, here I am talking about time again (in my comments to Liza's entry). My forthcoming book is about time, so it is an obsession of mine.

In this case, though, I am thinking very practically. Is it necessary to write a novel chronologically, that is--in the order it will appear when it is finished? This is a question I've discussed lately with students.

My answer for that is no. Write the chapters that come to you. Write them in whatever way works for you. I have written chronologically on some books. On others, I've written chapters like a tourist map of a walking tour; the marked stops help direct the internal journey.

Specifically, on Hiroshima Dreams, I wrote the first two chapters, the middle chapter, and the last chapter at one sitting, and sold the book with that material. Writing the rest of the book was extremely difficult, but no doubt I was helped by my map. I've written beginning and ending chapters first on at least half of my books, then sometimes worked forward and backward as a way to trick myself into reaching that difficult middle territory.

The idea, as always, is to find your process. If you are stalled where you are, it's often helpful to write a later chapter, or maybe even chapters that you might toss. Never restrict yourself, or impose rules on "how things must be done." Within some structures, such as episodic you can shuffle and reorder chapters.

Find your way. Inspiration is precious. Grab it when it comes.

Tense About Tenses

A few weeks ago, Ellen Levine passed around an article by Philip Pullman about the use of the present tense. "What I dislike about the present tense narrative," Pullman writes, "is its limited range of expressiveness. I feel claustrophobic, always pressed up against the immediate." He compares writing in the present to the use of a hand-held camera in film. Writing in the present, he says, is "an abdication of narrative responsibility." (The Guardian, September 18, 2010.)

Really? Since I am 185 pages into a novel told in first person, present tense, my palms began to sweat when I read this. Is my novel claustrophobic? "Pressed up against the immediate..."--in fact, a sense of immediacy is exactly what I am looking for. I'm not sure if I should admit this, but I didn't think much about the choice of tense when I started the book. Instead, I heard Brandon spooling out the story and I wrote it down as he was telling it. Somewhere in the second or third chapter, I realized what I was doing--and just kept on.

My last two novels were written in past tense; one in third person, the other alternating first person voices. Past tense felt natural for both, especially since both stories took place a long time ago. Unless you're writing an epistolary novel (good luck, Gary!) you and the reader buy into the conceit that the narrator is telling you a story that he/she has not written down. First person, present tense requires a similar leap of faith. There's a gauzy scrim between you and the narrator.

When the Pullman article came in, I was reading a novel suggested by my student, Ann Schoenbohm, called The Velvet Room. It's an older book, one I missed when it came out because I was already in college and not, at that point, reading children's novels. The novel is narrated in the past tense, from a third person limited point of view. It's a Once Upon A Time tale that is satisfying and comforting, even in its most suspenseful scenes. So have I made a mistake, writing in present tense?

I went to my bookcase and pulled Ron's Strays off the shelf. It's a present tense novel. I never felt claustrophobic, reading it--just up close and personal with Ted, riding along with him as he deals with tragedy, girls, and talking animals.

So here are some questions: does the choice of tense depend on the story? On the narrator and psychic distance? On the mood you happen to be in when you start writing? Let me know.

James Ellroy

I was at a little get-together where JE talked about his latest book(s) and how he works. He's an interesting guy -- mega-Oedipal, sloppy, self-obsessed, potty-mouthed, and bellicose. His inamorata (See "My Pursuit of Women") values him for these very qualities. Which makes her even more interesting.

The point of this blog, though, is not his character, but his advice-about-structure. For a 600 page novel, his outline is 100-150 pages. He talked about filling the frame. He loves detail of every kind. It's well-organized bricolage, if you ask me. Way beyond many of us at Hamline who suggest back-story for characters -- favorite clothes, CDs, etc.

JE's outline might look like this for an opening scene-- "X watches TV where Kennedy's funeral is being telecast. X is just out of bed. He's in pajamas and one slipper. He's smoking filtered Camels and coughing. This scene begins the theme of death and public recognition. Or lack thereof. The hotel room is mid-range. Anonymous. The door to the mini-bar is open. Fast food wrappers from Wendy's on the desk." And so on.

I'm the sort who doesn't want to know where he is going in a book (even if that's a trick I play on myself). JE claims that all that detail frees him up to get to the heart of the scene when he writes it. For me, it would get in my way. I like to discover as I move the story on (horizontal); JE likes to discover vertically.

There's something in this extreme-sounding advice that it like, however. If someone wants to try it, I'd go as far as Ellroy himself. Very, very detailed. I'd add specifics from every sense -- touch, smell, taste, hearing, sight. The latter being least important. Everybody does sight. Few do taste.

If someone writes short books like mine, assume a draft of 150 pages. That'd make the outline 30 or so. Maybe a little less. I can see the outline turning into the/a book. And that wouldn't be a bad thing either.

Why aren't there bookstores like this here?

I'm just back from Paris where, of course, I had to visit the famed Shakespeare and Company bookstore. The original bookstore was owned by Sylvia Beach from New Jersey, and was the hang-out of Gertrude Stein, James Joyce, and Hemingway, among others. Hemingway wrote lovingly about it in A Moveable Feast. Beach helped struggling writers have an intellectual and (sometimes) literal home. She published Ulysses when no one else would touch it, and sent the work of talented writers to literary magazines. The bookstore was closed down during the occupation in WWII. The one I visited was created by George Whitman (originally from MA, so another ex-patriot), who was enamoured enough with Ms. Beach to name his daughter after her. He opened his own bookstore on the left bank, but it wasn't until after Ms. Beach's death that he renamed his bookstore, in homage, Shakespeare and Company. He lived in the bookstore, sleeping on a mattress on the second floor, which is still there, next to a piano, which I sat down and played for a while. There are murals of Stein, Hemingway et al. There's an alcove with an old typewriter, a reading room with lots of windows, and more books to borrow than to buy. During Whitman's reign, a new generation of writers hung out: Corso, Ginsberg, Nin, Henry Miller. Starving writers were fed and slept in the shop. In turn, they worked two hours a day and were exhorted to read a book a day. George, in his nineties, no longer lives in the bookstore, but above. His daughter, Sylvia Beach Whitman, currently runs the shop. She lived inside of it until she was seven, then moved to England with her mother. The only modern touch she seems to have added is a computer. I hung out there for a long time, and bought Human Croquet, by Kate Atkinson for five Euros. Of course there were many wonderful bookstores in Paris, seemingly on every corner. Another English one is called The Red Wheelbarrow. The owner was there. My husband offered that I wrote books, and she ordered them for the shop. This shop was organized and filled with literary translations and great literature. Michael picked up a book, and the owner said, "That author will be here in five minutes." Apparently, she also gives work to authors.

Thankfully, I have a lovely independent bookstore here, called Island Books. I am thinking of asking the owner, Judy, to lay a mattress down for cold nights when I am too tired to drive over the bridge. A piano would also be nice. But the mattress might not impress her other customers. What do you think?

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Happy National Punctuation Day, Inkpotters!

This is a beautiful day. Punctuation is what separates us from the animals. Just try to get a monkey to use a hyphen correctly. Don't even get me started on the semi-colons.

Go to the website and you can read all about your faithful friends, the punctuation marks. You can get the recipe for the Official Meat Loaf of National Punctuation Day. Normally I would question their use of the exclamation point there, but is some cases a little exuberance is warranted, especially when it comes to meatloaf. And--oh, is it my birthday?--there is a punctuation Haiku contest. There is also merchandise, with clever punctuation puns like "A semi-colon is not a surgical procedure," and "Jesus and the twelve apostrophes." ("Man," Jesus said. "Can you guys stop being so possessive?")

In celebration I am making my annual vow to stop abusing the poor em dashes--who have really done nothing to deserve what I do to them. And I am trailing off with ellipses, elaborating with semi-colons, scattering commas like breadcrumbs. I shall hug my words with parenthesis and put a firm period at the end of my day. For life is not a paragraph, my friends, but at least it can be well-punctuated.

CAT, CHIPMUNK OR BIRD?

I am gazing out my window trying to think a writerly thought. I see a squirrel run up the tree trunk. This reminds me of the chipmunk my cat brought in last week. They proceeded to play a wild game of chase and torture, though I don’t think the chipmunk was enjoying it. Finally the screaming chipmunk found refuge under the stove and I have not seen him since. I am hoping he was smart enough to slip out the open door when the cat wasn’t looking. This morning the cat brought in a bird—already dead—and used it for a game of toss and twirl. This is the nature of things. I got the cat a collar with a bell, but within a day he returned home collarless.

I check my email incessantly, as my editor has the latest draft of my novel. Actually she has had it since July but forgot she had it so I sent her the updated draft last week. Now I wait. Again. While waiting I have started something new, which I like but it’s way too early to show it to anyone. And then there is that picture book dummy that my editor likes but wants to wait until the first picture book comes out, to see if my sales warrant doing another. It’s the game of cat and mouse. But are we playing hide-and-seek or toss-and-twirl? And which am I--the cat, the chipmunk or the bird? I hope it’s not the bird.

I wonder how others play this game?