Writing Wednesday - Sexy New Idea

I'm a flighty person by nature. I am easily distracted by internet browsing, bribery involving food or fun, and shiny objects. If there is something interesting happening out in the world that seems better than what I'm doing right now, I switch focus. You can imagine that this does not bode well for my writing projects.

This tendency of mine to quickly bop from one thing to the next means that I am particularly susceptible to the Sexy New Idea. The SNI is a dastardly foe to writers. It distracts us from our current projects, and if not carefully managed, can lead us along a path littered with the unfinished scraps of many a manuscript.

One of the most common solutions to the SNI affliction is to keep a notebook where you can jot down Sexy New Ideas as they come to you. This way you won't forget them, and you're free to let them go and get back to the project at hand. Oh, if only that worked for me.

Sexy New Ideas that take root in my brain tend to demand at least a few scenes before I can let them go. I can't just jot down a few notes and leave it be. I have to spend some time with it, develop it ever so slightly, and construct a couple of characters having a moment. This gives me the best sense of what this story wants to be. Otherwise, I come back to a half-cocked idea scribbled on my bedside notebook and have zero recollection of where I was going with it. I can't seal an SNI in my memory without putting some real imaginative effort into a scene that will allow me to jump back into its world later on.

So there are Those That Say you shouldn't pursue those pesky SNIs because of their penchant for encouraging procrastination and unfinished business. But sometimes those SNIs show up to give you a message. Maybe you're not fully invested in your current project. Maybe it's not working. There's no use in struggling to finish something that may not be worth your effort.

My current project is still worth the effort, but I have been struggling mightily with it nonetheless. At first it was gentle resistance, with me passive-aggressively refusing to play well with it. That soon spiraled into outright resentment, however, and I began hating everything from my lead character's name to its complete inability to turn into something fun.

At that point, I went back to a Sexy New Idea I had put together when I started last November's NaNoWriMo. Though I failed early on to complete anything close to 50,000 words, I did really like my character and thought her world was loads of fun. So to distract myself, I spent some time editing and re-writing a good chunk of it and sent it off to my writers' group with the caveat that this was, indeed, a Sexy New Idea.

And they loved it. They still love my work in progress, and feel there's even room for them both, but they also really encouraged me to consider my SNI as a possible new current project. My SNI may have accidentally usurped my WIP. (Fun with acronyms!)

One of my group members made the point that lots of writers go back-and-forth. Maybe it doesn't have to be one OR the other. Maybe it can be one AND THEN the other AND THEN the first one again. Given my aforementioned flightiness, I feel this may be the way to go. I'll work on one WIP until I get bored or frustrated, then turn to the other. Or I'll work until I get inspiration for one or the other. I think I can handle two simultaneous projects without them bleeding into each other. They are very different.

Do you have to multi-task to succeed? I do this with books as well, and constantly juggle competing reading interests so it shouldn't surprise me that I do it with writing too. Do you read multiple books or work on multiple projects to stave off boredom? Or for other reasons? Or are you best when focusing on a single thing?

Writing Wednesday - You Need a Notebook

Flashes of inspiration are not few and far between for me. I'm constantly inspired by the world around me - things I read, things I see, things I hear. Ideas fly at me from all over the place. I'm an ideas kind of person.

This should be great news, right?

Except.

Except that this flow of information always comes in...and then flits away into the recesses of my brain, never to be heard from again.

I'll be reading a passage in a book and start analyzing what's going on and think "WAIT! I have an idea! What if the world is dying, but it's because of x. And y is the only one who can fight x. And if y does z in this really interesting and unique way...I could make a really interesting story." Then I'll nod to myself, acknowledge my genius, and file it away for a more convenient time when I can flesh out the idea, returning my attention to the book or task at hand.

Except.

You know where this is going don't you? Of course you do. Because unlike me, you are not an idiot. You are a smart, organized, "with it" guy or gal who knows better than to let ideas sink into the deep, dark parts of your (presumably human) brains without jotting a backup note to yourself.

I, however, am an idiot. I let these ideas roam unchecked through my grey matter, and hardly ever never take the time to write them down. I assume that my addled, aging mind will miraculously change course and start remembering more than it forgets, so OF COURSE I will remember every single one of these amazing, fleeting ideas and OF COURSE they will take precedence over the far less important list of Things To Remember like mere work or family engagements.

After struggling for the past two months with crippling writer's block, on Monday I was hit with an idea not just for a vague project in the future, but for the book I'm working on now. And as much as I wanted to just keep reading my book on the train, I decided that since my purse was right in front of me, I should grab a scrap of paper and a pen and just WRITE IT DOWN.

So I did.

And then I went back to reading.

When I got home, got myself and the dog fed, I whipped out that piece of paper and my laptop, and BOOM. The scenes started flowing. The words poured onto the page. Before I knew what hit me, I had 1,600 words down, and a solid sense of direction for the next few scenes to follow.

An obvious lesson, yes, but an important one nonetheless. When I have these ideas, I need to write them down. Immediately. It doesn't matter what I'm doing - eating, reading, sleeping, talking on the phone, writing a blog post - just WRITE IT DOWN.

Logan. You need a notebook.

You need to write it down.

Writing Wednesday - This is my year!

 
I have a feeling that 2012 is going to be a good year for my writing. I've gathered up a healthy toolbox of knowledge and I'm ready to get to work. School is behind me, the hubs and I have stable jobs, and I just feel...settled. At ease. Reflective.

Even years seem to be better for me, and odd years not so great. I graduated college, moved to a new city, and got married in even numbered years. I lost my uncle, my grandmother, and my father in odd numbered years. This year I'm taking up the triathlon baton again, and have made a real (this time) commitment to my health and fitness. I'll have a new niece born this year - the first on my side of the family.

As for my writing life, I have four meetings left in my monthly YA Fiction workshop. This Friday I'm meeting with a new weekly YA writers' group that includes at least two published authors. And tonight I start my first work/study shift at my local writing studio. If these tools can't help me get my manuscript into a query-ready place, then I don't know what will.

I've struggled over the last few months with where to take my story. I think I need to give myself the freedom to play a little bit, and trust that with the guidance of this network I'm building I can get there eventually. This year will probably not be the year I get an agent or sell a book, but I think this will definitely be the year that I can get a manuscript finished and ready to start querying.

That's the goal for this year: finish my book and get it ready to sell - or get as close to this goal as possible. I'd like to be able to start querying within the next 12-18 months. I think that's a reasonable goal, and maybe if I keep saying it aloud I can make it happen. I no longer want to think about this as a hobby or a pastime, but as a professional goal that inspires me to take my work and myself seriously. I wouldn't have been asked to join a writers' group unless I had potential and it's time to start realizing it.

So you hear that, 2012? You're mine.

NaNoWriMo, Round 2

November is officially upon us, boys and girls! I can hardly believe it. November is National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) and this is the second year in a row that I will be participating. Although last year I procrastinated for much of the month and finished in a down-to-the-wire sprint, I'm hoping to be a bit more on top of things this time around.

I highly doubt that I will be posting regularly around here over the next 30 days, but I hope to give updates on my progress as I suffer through this crazy endeavor. I'm going for my first steampunk story, which I'm very excited about (even if I don't know exactly where the story is going yet). The plan is to try and front load my word count as much as possible so I don't wind up spending my entire Thanksgiving break holed up in my room glued to my laptop. My goal is 2,000 words a day. Fingers crossed!

Any other NaNo participants out there? Want to be my writing buddy? Or maybe chat with me on the NaNo forums? Then check out my NaNoWriMo profile page! I'll also be tweeting my misery (@loganturner) and getting in on those excellent @NaNoWordSprints motivational writing sprints.

Basically, don't worry if you don't hear much from me this month. It means I'm holed up being creative...or crying in a corner at my failures. Either way, it's bound to be interesting.

Writing Wednesday - The Struggle to Revise

 
As mid-October rapidly approaches, I am starting to get inundated with reminders about the upcoming National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). Message boards are lighting up with new posts, my writing studio is advertising prep classes to generate ideas, and Twitter is full of folks practicing their daily word counts.

I participated in NaNoWriMo for the first time last year and made it - barely. I finished with a pitiful draft of a half-cocked idea and perhaps only a handful of scenes that would actually work. When I faced the prospect of trying to revise this messy, disorganized pile of words, I got so overwhelmed that I simply turned my back on it and started to write something else.

Once again, I got stuck with nowhere to take my plot and only a vague concept of where I wanted this story to go. But never fear! To the rescue is the month of November, swooping in to occupy my mind on a new story, new characters, and no fear of revisions!

It's an escape tactic, you see. I always struggle with revisions. Despite an entire shelf of helpful writing books and tools, many pages of helpful critique notes, and a laptop loaded with the handy Scrivener program to help me sift through the story without getting lost, I can't ever manage to get over my fear of revising.

What if I start making changes and the entire thing shifts into something new? What if I start making changes and I hate the whole project? What if I lose the essence of the characters?

The issue is staring me directly in the face. I need to focus on the heart of my story and not drown myself in self-doubt. I often think of the arts as an exercise in false confidence. When I was a theater student, sometimes to get over your fears you had to "fake it 'til you make it" so to speak. If I allowed my doubts to get the best of me, I'd never succeed, and sometimes I just had to take a leap of faith and trust that I had the goods to get it done.

In the fall of my senior year in college, I took on the role of Puck in our production of A Midsummer Night's Dream. As most people know, Puck closes the show with a monologue delivered to the audience. It's a beautiful speech, and an endearing moment between the audience and the character. It's also a very important and powerful moment, which was not lost on me.

Despite months of rehearsals, weeks of performances, and thousands of recitations, every night I turned to my castmate, Zack, and asked him how the speech started. It didn't matter how many times I'd done the speech myself. I knew Zack knew the speech, and as we huddled in the dark backstage, waiting to go out for the final scene, I could never think of the first few words. "If we shadows have offended," he'd whisper, and I'd nod and start mumbling under my breath, "if we shadows have offended if we shadows have offended," right up to the moment I took a step onstage.

It wasn't that I didn't know the speech. I did. Backwards and forwards. But as the exhaustion of the production started to set in, and I waited in the wings for my entrance, the weight of the delivery of that speech started to bear down on me. I would get so worked up about the magnitude of the task that I forgot that I actually had the skills to bring it home. Until the moment I stepped on stage and had no choice but to get through it, the speech became greater than me and not the other way around.

This is how I feel when I write. As I'm entrenched in the task of getting the story down on the page, I'm ecstatic. It's when I have to step back and examine what I'm doing that I go from "let me get this cool idea down on paper" to "OHMIGOD I'm writing A WHOLE BOOK!" In order to try and combat this, I've tried just focusing on scenes, but that also doesn't seem to help. My next step is to try putting together an outline to keep me aware that this is just many small parts that add up to one greater idea, and that it doesn't all have to be tackled at once.

Anyone else have this kind of revisers' block? How do you prevent yourself from getting overwhelmed?

Writing Wednesday - Scholar v. Natural

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Welcome to Writing Wednesday, my weekly feature where I discuss my works in progress, project ideas, editing struggles, or anything else related to the world of writing. Feel free to grab my button and post your own thoughts on writing! Leave a link to your post in the comments and I'll stop by.

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As I've mentioned on here 1,043,972 times, I'm in my last quarter of grad school. You know what that means, right? Thesis writing! (Or in my case, capstone project writing!)

I've been in school part-time since January 2009, which means for the last 2.5 years I've spent a good portion of my writing life trying to sound very scholarly and proper. I try to avoid terms like "snooty" and "smartypants" but sometimes it all feels very much like in my efforts to write a quality paper I'm really just trying to sound smart.

Don't get me wrong. My GPA is thanking me for those efforts. My snoot-tastic writing self is really paying off when it comes to school. But how is that translating into my other writing?

It's hard for me, between school and work, to shut off that professional/business writing self and open up to my creative side sometimes. I sit down to try and write a review here and it feels so stiff and formulaic. Most of the time I want to delete the whole post and just write, "Four stars. Pretty awesome. You should read it. I'm tired."

The perfectionist control freak side of me (read: all of me) will never let that happen. What's the point of writing a review if you're just going to say, "Meh. It was okay." What would I do with all of these opinions?

The stiff side also struggles to really let go in my fiction. My sluggish, stress-addled brain slumps down against my skull, shakily pours itself a shot of espresso, and starts rambling about research methods and literature reviews and grant applications. I end up staring at the blank word processing document for about 12.3 seconds before clicking open Safari and checking Facebook again.

Le sigh.

I need to find a way to get in the zone and shrug off the business suit mentality. Nobody wants to read boring, scholarly Logan. They want to read fun, casual Logan! And if they don't, I do, so I vow to try and be more fun in my reviews and in my fiction.

Somewhere in here is a funny, lively, non-Eeyore-sounding person. I promise.

Writing Wednesday - Making It (Too) Personal

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Welcome to Writing Wednesday, my weekly feature where I discuss my works in progress, project ideas, editing struggles, or anything else related to the world of writing. Feel free to grab my button and post your own thoughts on writing! Leave a link to your post in the comments and I'll stop by.

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As the saying goes, "Write what you know." Inevitably, writers transfer some of their own experiences onto the page. What we know may become the basis of the setting, the plot, a line of dialogue, or maybe even just a character's gesture, but it's probably in there somewhere.

How far is too far? At what point does that mantra become a crutch, giving us the freedom to pull from ourselves instead of making it up? Does it even matter?

I struggle sometimes with how much "me" to allow into a novel. Is that my subconscious poking around on my pages? I will sometimes write something really dark and messy and scary and think "Whoa. What's going on there?" I'd like to think it's just my imagination going someplace interesting, but perhaps I'm really just a sick and twisted person.

(I'm not. I don't think.)

On the flip side, what if what you know is a story that needs to be told? What if real life presents a situation so absurd, so fantastically unbelievable, so incredibly poignant, that it would be a shame not to use it? I think sometimes that it's not fair to share those bits of myself in my fiction. Those are the things I should treasure and hold on to as my own, yet the story aches to be written.

I think that's why journaling has always held an appeal for me. It's a chance to write those stories and get them out, even if they never see a vast audience. In acting, pulling from experience to get to real emotion can be both a blessing and a curse. On the one hand, you're able to access real, honest feelings. On the other hand, with time those memories will lose their emotional gravity. In writing, however, it seems like emotions can find deeper resonance the more you explore them.

The bottom line for me is whether the story is benefiting from the pieces I use. If something seems off, it's probably because there is too much "me" bleeding through and not enough of the character. As much as I want the story to be personal and meaningful, it has to remain the character's story, and not mine. Still, if an experience of mine makes a perfect plot element, I feel like I should use it.

Am I the only one that struggles with this? How much fiction needs to be in our fiction? How much of ourselves can we get away with incorporating into our stories?

If you're not a writer, what about as a reader? Do you find that you put your own personal experiences upon the character? I definitely do this as a reader as well. My experiences will color my perceptions of the books I read, for better or for worse. I can't help it.

What about you?

Writing Wednesday - Q1 check-in and Q2 goals

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Welcome to Writing Wednesday, my weekly feature where I discuss my works in progress, project ideas, editing struggles, or anything else related to the world of writing. Feel free to grab my button and post your own thoughts on writing! Leave a link to your post in the comments and I'll stop by.

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I realized today that I haven't checked in lately about my writing projects. It's time to face the music. Remember a few months back when I made some writing goals for the first three months of the year?

Yeah. Me neither.

Life got the better of me, and until this weekend, I hadn't devoted much time to fiction writing. I've been doing a lot of writing for school, and with my capstone project this quarter, there will certainly be a whole bunch more coming down the pipeline. I think it's safe to say that my books will need a little bit more of a hiatus before I can really commit the time to them that they deserve.

I did start a new project, however, and it's one that is really exciting me. I wanted to step away from the fantasy world I created and start somewhere fresh. I needed new inspiration, and this story has been pulling at me for some time. I still can't believe that this story hasn't already been done (it has to do with the Macbeth theater curse), but I decided to just go for it anyway and banged out around 3,500 words.

It's a contemporary YA novel with some supernatural elements. But it could go anywhere, which is the beauty of it. I was so excited just to be back in the theater world and writing about something I know inside and out. I haven't put in the time to really build the fantasy world in my other manuscript, and it's so much easier right now to just pour my heart into these contemporary characters.

I know, I know. Easier isn't better. Right now, though, with so much on my plate, I want to stick to what I know. So it's time for Q2 goals! I'm going to keep this conservative so I can make them realistic while still having time for my thesis.

April: Write 10,000 words for new project.
May: Write 5,000 words for new project.
June: Revise old project using input from critique group.

I'll try to keep you posted about my progress. I'll check back in early July with new goals for Q3. Wish me luck!

Writing Wednesday - The language of Teen Text

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Welcome to Writing Wednesday, my weekly feature where I discuss my works in progress, project ideas, editing struggles, or anything else related to the world of writing. Feel free to grab my button and post your own thoughts on writing! Leave a link to your post in the comments and I'll stop by.

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Today we're going to pretend that I am most certainly not freaking out about my final papers due next week. We're also going to pretend that I did not ask for an extension in my writing class because I *cough* haven't written anything *cough* to turn in just yet because I *cough* also haven't done any editing *cough*. Ahem. I must be coming down with something.

So instead I'm going to talk about this condition I have. It's somewhat serious. It's not life-changing, but it can impact my life negatively. It has been known to cause comparatively sluggish text responses. It often results in excessive use of the backspace key. It also can impair my enjoyment of Twitter.

What I mean to say is, I absolutely, positively cannot speak what I will affectionately term "Teen Text."

Call it text shorthand, call it simply slang. Call it whatever you want, but don't ask me to write it. Hell, half the time I can't even read it. This coming from a girl at the ripe young age of 29.

Every time I get a text from a friend with "u" where I should read "you," I cringe. I cast no judgment, because I get that it is infinitely easier to communicate in the finite limits of texts and tweets with abbreviated forms. I simply lack the ability to use it.

I've tried to adopt this shorthand for myself from time to time, but each new venture ends in hurried backspacing and glances over my shoulder to make sure the Grammar Police didn't catch me. It just looks so wrong, and after spending nearly two decades practicing correct typing, grammar, and spelling, I just can't bring myself to use Teen Text.

Is it really that much harder to type in sentences? To me, this small act of rebellion is my way of refusing to acknowledge this trend as some kind of game-changer for language. Language will always evolve in ways both strange and economical, but by refusing to make Teen Text a part of my every day life, I like to think I can keep English from making the perilous leap from "you" to "u."

Because I am the great and powerful Oz. My influence knows no bounds.

This is not to suggest that I can't throw around a good "lol" every now and again. (Never "LOL" since, as my sister pointed out, What, are you shout laughing?) And I canz lolspeak with the best of them. So why my irritation with Teen Text? I guess it must be this (perhaps) misguided fear that language could take a turn for the worst if we all adopt this manner of communicating. I am the lone holdout, burying my head in the sand as the world evolves around me.

Or perhaps Teen Text is just the Riggs to my Murtough, and I'm just getting too old for this $*@!.

Do you speak Teen Text? Lolspeak? Have any hangups about using either? Talk to me, Goose.

Writing Wednesday (9) - Blogging Personality

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Welcome to Writing Wednesday, my weekly feature where I discuss my works in progress, project ideas, editing struggles, or anything else related to the world of writing. Feel free to grab my button and post your own thoughts on writing! Leave a link to your post in the comments and I'll stop by.

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Lately I've felt like there wasn't a whole lot of "me" shining through on this blog. It's a bit of a balancing act, isn't it? On the one hand I don't want to blather on about myself when you came here to read about books or writing or whatever silly thing I feel like bringing up on Sundays. On the other hand, it is so boring to read dry reviews, bare-bones posts, and frivolous content, which is where I fear I'm headed.

I didn't start a blog to exorcise my personal demons, pouring my every thought into the blogosphere. I didn't think this would be an exercise in cold banality either. Yet still I struggle to find the happy medium. Some days I go on frenetic commenting sprees where I leave witty remarks and dazzle myself with my own brilliance. (Shh, just go with it.) Those are the times when I wonder, Why can't I write posts like that?

It's so much easier to engage in repartee than to just mouth off to potential silence. Blogging sure has a way of feeling like that sometimes. What if no one visits today? What if no one comments? There's nothing worse than feeling like you are talking and nobody's listening.

That universal writing fear can strike all of us, whether we are bloggers, authors, or scholars. That thought can paralyze us and keep us from achieving our dreams. When we do connect with readers, via comments, letters, or conversations at conferences, it validates the feeling that we have something worth saying. Not only that, but we say it in a way that someone likes. How awesome is that?

I want to share myself with all of you so that we can make that personal connection. I'm not sure I'm accomplishing that here just yet. I want my voice to shine through so you can decide whether you think I'm kind, funny, interesting, and most importantly - readable. I'm contemplating participating in fewer memes, or at least less frequently, so I can open up my schedule for less rigid posts.

What do you think? Want more of me, or should I keep on keepin' on?

Why do you read the bloggers you do? What do you expect of them?

Writing Wednesday (8) - I Am Number Four

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Welcome to Writing Wednesday, my weekly feature where I discuss my works in progress, project ideas, editing struggles, or anything else related to the world of writing. Feel free to grab my button and post your own thoughts on writing! Leave a link to your post in the comments and I'll stop by.

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James Frey and controversy go together hand in hand. In fact, I'm fairly certain he doesn't know how to publicize himself or his projects unless they are portrayed in a negative light. When I caught wind of the New York Magazine piece on Frey and his "fiction factory" a few months back, I wasn't exactly surprised to see him roiling in a grave of his own digging.

I fell victim to the A Million Little Pieces fervor, devouring the book and singing its praises to the world. I was convinced Frey was an amazing soul who had endured much and lived to tell us the glorious but disturbing details. When the castle came crumbling down around him, and he was eventually forced to admit to Oprah that the story wasn't exactly memoir so much as it was fiction, I felt a little angry, but ultimately who did he hurt? I sort of laughed him off, shook my head in judgey judgment, and ignored the sequel, My Friend Leonard.

The Full Fathom Five publishing venture he created is a little different, however. I won't go so far as to say that people were hurt, because like many have pointed out, Frey signed legal contracts with willing writers. Nobody forced these desperate artists to sign away their lives for the possible opportunity of a lifetime. Should we really feel sorry for them, even if they were stupid and exploited?

Much of the controversy around this issue is derived from the contract the writers sign. Essentially, for a small upfront fee, they agree to write a marketable novel with a plot they may or may not have sole control over, and give Frey the right to use a pseudonym for the book, as well as ownership of the final product. They are able to collect a percentage of the profits related to the project, but it is at Frey's discretion to use them again for any sequels. Also, they can never disclose that they were the actual author of the material.

It was at this point that I decided I would not read I Am Number Four, which if you hadn't heard, was one of the first Full Fathom Five projects. I have no desire to read a book derived solely as a gimmick. Yet Alex at Electrifying Reviews makes a good point. Aren't these stories and ideas just a little bit exciting?

I'll be the first to admit that the trailer for I Am Number Four made it look great, and I kind of wanted to see it. Until the reviews poured in, at which point, I was doubly okay with my decision to boycott the project.

Lots of people have enjoyed the book, though. I feel torn between my desire to boycott Frey and the equally strong desire to help the author, Jobie Hughes, make as much money as possible. The fact of the matter is that I don't really care to help Frey expand his ideas. He was too lazy to just write the concept himself, so he preyed on vulnerable debt-ridden students to do the work for him, but ultimately kept all of the prize for himself. That doesn't sit well with me, so for now I'm sticking to my decision not to read or see I Am Number Four.

What do you think? Did you read the book? See the movie? What do you think of Frey's publishing company?

Writing Wednesday (7) - Animal Violence

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Welcome to Writing Wednesday, my weekly feature where I discuss my works in progress, project ideas, editing struggles, or anything else related to the world of writing. Feel free to grab my button and post your own thoughts on writing! Leave a link to your post in the comments and I'll stop by.

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I don't know if it's coincidence or part of a larger trend, but lately I have read a lot of books that feature pretty graphic scenes of violence toward animals. I hesitate to call them "animal cruelty" since none of these scenes involved torture or neglect, but the scenes did disturb me almost as much. Recently Small Review sparked a little conversation about this very topic, and it got me thinking. What is it with animal violence in books?

At first I thought it was a genre thing. Take, for instance, Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater. It's a book about werewolves, so you kind of expect some wolfish violence. Still, I was quite surprised when the dog fight scene appeared. Sam "trains" on how to kill the neighbor's guard dogs by watching dog fights and ripping apart fryer chickens. Then later, he gets into a fight with the dogs while trying to protect one of his pack. It was pretty brutal, but then again, violence is a common theme throughout the entire book.

Today I finished Huntress by Malinda Lo, and wolves were the brunt of violence in this one as well. Here, a traveling party is attacked by the wolves before retaliating in kind. Though it's easier to justify in this scene, the violence was still pretty gruesome. I just kept thinking, "Really? Do we need to read about jaws snapping through flesh and arrows slicing through eyeballs?"

Then there's scenes like the one Small Review reminded me about in Delirium by Lauren Oliver. I can guarantee you that the reason I couldn't remember this scene from the book is that I had blocked it from my memory. Lena hears a guard next door beat a dog, and later she finds the bludgeoned and dying animal lying in the street next to the garbage. She ends up watching the dog die while trying to decide what to do. It's horrifying.

I think what disturbs me the most about scenes of animal violence is that they tend to include so much more detail than your average human fight scene. Perhaps it's natural in that animals have teeth and claws to fight with, which can get a bit messier than swords or guns. That was my thinking with Shiver anyway. I mean, it's wolves versus dogs, so things are bound to get ugly and ferocious.

I know that the scene in Delirium was telling us about Lena. It was a moment of clarity for her, when she had to come to terms with the underlying brutality of her society that had been out of sight/out of mind. She was forced to recognize that things were not as great as everyone pretended they were, and no one cared enough to help a defenseless animal, because that empathy was taken away when they were denied the ability to feel love. I'm not saying that difficult scenes shouldn't be written, particularly when they serve a purpose.

As a huge animal softie, however, these types of scenes really pull me out of the world of the book. They make me disengage with the material, however briefly, and the author really has to work hard to win me back. Scenes like these are a real challenge. How do we, as writers, address difficult scenarios without losing our readers? Many readers will check out of the scene entirely, skim it, or worse yet, put the book down and never pick it back up.

You can never please everyone, and we don't all have the same comfort level with violence. I just wonder if this same level of violence would be tolerated with human characters. Sometimes it seems like writers can "get away" with heightened violence if it's happening to animals, and that's not something that sits well with me. I don't want to get into a whole animal rights argument here, but suffice it to say that I don't find violence any less offensive when it's perpetrated against animals. This makes it hard for me as a writer to find appropriate levels of violence, particularly if what is expected is something outside of my personal comfort zone.

How do you feel about animal violence in books? Does it bother you more or less than human violence? Am I seeing a pattern where there is none? Do you writers find it hard to write scenes that make you uncomfortable? Leave me a comment with your thoughts.

Writing Wednesday (6) - To Review or Not to Review?

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Welcome to Writing Wednesday, my weekly feature where I discuss my works in progress, project ideas, editing struggles, or anything else related to the world of writing. Feel free to grab my button and post your own thoughts on writing! Leave a link to your post in the comments and I'll stop by.

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A big kerfuffle hit around the blogosphere the last couple of weeks after a #YALitChat on Twitter developed into some well-written blog posts about whether writers should be reviewing books. Stacia Kane and Susan Dennard put up some great posts about the matter. Stacia also wrote some great follow-up posts. Some bloggers defended the art of writing negative reviews. Tabitha at Writer Musings and Izzy at My Words Ate Me have particularly thoughtful posts.

All of this talk really got me thinking. As a writer, the last thing I want to do is jeopardize my future chances of getting published, but this idea that I shouldn't post negative reviews is a tough pill to swallow. I've really enjoyed setting up this book review blog and sharing my opinions. I feel like I'm doing myself and my readers a disservice by ignoring any books I read that I don't completely enjoy.

So what's a girl to do?

Well, I did go through Goodreads and delete books that I hated. Because really, what is the point? If I really despise a book, does that need to be shared? Do I need to go into the reasons I didn't like it? I mean, if it's a one-star book for me, that means there are no redeeming factors. I decided that in the interest of respect, I should get rid of those books. I felt bad about those really negative opinions floating around.

The tough area for me is the in-between. What if overall I liked the book, but I had some issues with it (my three-star reviews)? I don't want this to end up as a blog that only celebrates 4 and 5 star books, because that seems a bit one-sided. I also don't want to offend authors, agents or editors. Three star books are still books I want to recommend, I just had some reservations about them.

This is the very crux of the debate. At some point, you have to decide if you want to be a reader or a writer. Reviews are for readers, not for writers. A great analogy that one of the above posts mentioned was that Roger Ebert reviews movies because he is a movie reviewer and consumer - it's his job. Nicole Kidman does not review movies, she makes them. It's not appropriate for her to publicly judge the quality of other films or performances because that is not professional. That argument really resonates with me.

At this point in my life, I'm more of a reader. I'm reading and reviewing books not just as a consumer, but as a tool to help me learn more about YA writing. I want to pay attention to what works and what doesn't, so I can learn. So I'm considering changing my "negative impressions" section of my review template to focus more on learning opportunities or what things in the book worked for me as a writer.

But is that even more negative or pretentious? Do those thoughts even need to be shared?

If I can't write reviews for fear of damaging my future career, I don't know what to do with this blog. I'm still in the early stages of writing, I don't have an agent, I'm not seeking an agent, and I don't even have a finished manuscript close to being ready to query. Like I said, I'm still more of a reader at this point. I don't have enough writer knowledge or tips to fill a blog right now.

For now, I'm going to continue reviewing. I'm going to be more cognizant of my tone and what I say. I'm going to try to lean as positive as I can. When I get to a place where I'm ready to even think about querying, I will address this issue again. Yes, the internet lives on forever, but I'm not likely to be the same person in a year or two as I am now, and at that point, I can change my perspective. I can stick to the positive recommendations and write more about the querying process.

The point of the whole debate, really, is to be professional. I can be a reviewer while I'm a reader and still be professional. When I'm ready to start moving forward as a writer, I can temper my online presence to suit the level of professionalism required then. And if I ever get so lucky as to get an agent and a published book, that online presence will have to adapt again.

Until then, I'm going to carry on and hope for the best. What do you think? Should aspiring authors avoid reviewing books? Does it matter if they are actively querying or submitting?

Weigh in with your thoughts!

Writing Wednesday (5) and Giveaway Winner!

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Welcome to Writing Wednesday, my weekly feature where I discuss my works in progress, project ideas, editing struggles, or anything else related to the world of writing. Feel free to grab my button and post your own thoughts on writing! Leave a link to your post in the comments and I'll stop by.

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I've mentioned here before that I take writing classes from time to time with a local organization, StoryStudio Chicago. Last Tuesday, I started a new term, repeating a Writing for Children and Young Adults class. I loved this class so much last term that I had to take it again. The instructor is about my age, about to be published, and absolutely amazing. She's very knowledgeable about the kidlit industry, and hilarious to boot, so her classes are functional and entertaining all at the same time.

In this term, we are able to workshop 2-3 times, which is a great opportunity to get feedback and critiques from our classmates and our instructor. Since I had an entire crappy NaNoWriMo novel to pull from, I decided to go ahead and sign up to get critiqued first. Bite the bullet, so to speak. It wasn't until I got home and started actually reading through the manuscript for the first time since writing it that I realized it was just as crappy as I had feared.

It's always scary sending art out into the world and asking for feedback, but in this case I'm extra scared. I ended up pulling two sections of the book for critique that seemed the most developed. All I can do now is cross my fingers and hope for the best. I can't help but think that perhaps getting work critiqued that hasn't been polished to death is not so bad after all. I'll certainly be more open to change at this point (since, quite frankly, I could change the whole damn thing and be fine with it), and I may get a suggestion that sends me off on a brilliant new path with the story.

Though it is nerve-wracking, I'm really looking forward to the comments. To me, there's nothing worse than doing art in a vacuum. Does art have value if nobody experiences it? Does a tree falling in a forest make a sound if no one is there to hear it? (Etc., etc., ad nauseum.) When I danced, acted, sang, and even now, when I write, I have to share it. Isn't that why we do it in the first place?

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Okay, enough lollygagging. I know why you're really here - to find out the WINNERS of my first giveaway! So without further ado, the winners (chosen through random.org) are:

Lacey @ Lacey in the Sky with Books (U.S.)

and

Aylee @ Recovering Potter Addict (International)

Congratulations Lacey and Aylee!!! Winners have been notified by email. Thank you to everyone who entered and I promise another giveaway soon!

Me and these writing fingers of mine

Jessica of The Simple Pleasure of Reading asked, nay, challenged me to talk about my writing and what I'm working on now.  And since part of my tag line is that I am a challenge accepter, I must accept said challenge.

(BTW, I love that I got to accept a challenge from a commenter.  What else you got?)

Let's first start with why I write.  I skimmed the first few chapters of this book and one of the things that caught my eye was the idea that reading is considered necessary for the masses while writing gets elevated as a fine art for the privileged few.  What an interesting contrast!  If you think about it, it does kind of exist that way.  We like to think that reading and writing are both signs of literacy, but writing does get the prestige where the two are concerned.  If you read well, you may read faster or gain more content than the average reader.  If you write well, you can make a good living and receive tons of accolades.

This concept was not lost on me as a child.  My mother worked at a university press for nearly her entire career, and both my sister and I spent years working there while in college.  Books were a given in our family.  They were squeezed onto bookshelves, lined up under desks, stuffed into boxes, or simply waiting to be read on a coffee table.  Reading was something you did with your free time.  It was omnipresent in our lives.

My mother also happens to possess an MFA in Poetry from an Ivy League institution.  She devours words almost as quickly as she can write them.  And today she's writing her own novels and querying and doing all of the things I want to be doing.

Reading and writing are in my blood.  But that still doesn't answer why I choose to write.

The first creative writing I can remember doing was a project in elementary school where we had to write a book.  Mine was about a ballerina.  Since I was also a dancer, it made sense, and I didn't write again for some time because I was so busy at 8,453 dance classes a week.  But I still remember vividly how proud I was to see that book in all of its laminated construction paper glory and know that those words were mine.

When I was in junior high, I began to write poetry.  Really terrible, angsty, dark teenaged poetry.  Truly awful stuff.  Still, it was a nice outlet for my emotions at the time and it taught me the power of using words to communicate what I was feeling.  Many of the things I scribbled in those notebooks I could never have spoken aloud, but getting them on the page was a way of acknowledging those feelings and giving them a voice.

I took a creative writing class in high school that I adored.  It was during summer school, and we got to sit outside among the trees and write to our heart's content.  I really enjoyed fiction writing, and just writing in general.  Between the poetry and the class, writing became a part of me, and it's something I kept coming back to.

In college I was a theater major, and spent most of my time there.  Writing became an outlet for me to manage my stress.  I started writing daily at an online diary community.  I wrote about my life, my struggles, and also the occasional fiction piece.  I still write there today.

When I moved out of state and got a big girl job, I nearly left writing entirely.  I couldn't figure out who I wanted to be, or what I wanted to do.  I knew I liked to write, but all of the things I tried to do that involved writing never fit.

I saw an ad on the L platform one day for StoryStudio Chicago.  I signed up for a Beginning Fiction class with a friend of mine in 2008 and fell in love with the place.  Shortly afterwards I was admitted to graduate school and didn't have the time to take another class there until this past fall, when I signed up for a class dedicated to writing for children and young adults.  It's where most of my work leans, and the class only proved to me that this was a perfect fit.  Writing is, and always has been, my passion.

I'm currently working on a novel completed for NaNoWriMo that is a fantasy involving a 16 year old girl and her magical cougar with which she shares a special bond.  I also got a lightning bolt of an idea this weekend and want to start working on a middle grade novel about two kids, a theater, and time travel.

What I know when it comes to me and writing is simply this: I love it.  It makes me happy.  I get to flex my creative muscles that I spent years honing in dance and theater, and tell amazing stories that hopefully mean something to someone.  I write so that some teenager can someday pick up a book, get taken away from their daily life, and experience something that touches their soul.  I write so that all of this love for words and life and experiences can be communicated eventually, whether through a published book or simply for my friends and family as I go.

For me, writing is an art, an elevated form of communication that transcends everything.  Writing challenges me and lifts up my soul and moves me to tears.  I couldn't exist without it.

So who am I?  Well, I'm a writer.  What about you?