All posts by Amber

RIP Bones

Antics

IMG_2395Today we said goodbye to Bones, our four-year-old gerbil.  He was  good dude.  He loved it when he got a new house.  He cruised on his wheel.  All he needed to be happy was a toilet paper tube and some black oil sunflower seeds.  Bones mastered the simple life.

And though I know he was only a gerbil, I also know his death accumulates like falling snow upon the drift I carry with me.  His passing is but a whisper of bigger storms yet it brings the greater blizzards back full force.  It reminds me that loss accumulates, the weight of layer upon layer of snow builds.  It does not melt.  It births a glacier.

Glaciers sculpt the land and spawn rivers.  Loss is a force of nature, shaping me.

Sometimes it is enough

Antics

Sometimes a day starts with sunshine and coffee and tears.  Not chest wracking sobs, but the tears that spill from fullness.  From a night spent with friends who let you talk about your lost daughter.  From the day ahead, which will bring a novel—a work of time and grief and healing— to fruition.  From the way cottonwood seeds fall like snow but also rise on invisible thermals like tiny hawks.  Sometimes it is enough to love the ones who can not love you back.  To inhabit your body with its catalog of pains and pleasures.  To be on land that brings forth food.  And to remember.

The narrative difference between fiction and real life

Writing

You’ve probably heard some version of this saying: Fiction is real life without the boring parts.  I don’t know where this came from and am too lazy and under-caffeinated to google it but I agree with it.  I try not to write boring stuff.

Digression # 1  – Sometimes it is hard to tell what is boring or not.  A scene that takes me hours to perfect (and therefore feels tedious) can be read in under a minute and can feel exciting to the reader.  A friend working on a first novel recently texted me this:

Okay, so your narrative should not be boring.  It should also make an arc.  What the??   No doubt you’ve heard these fated words: narrative arc (the close cousin of a character arc, which might also make you shiver with dread).  The central conflict of the story must build in tension, come to a critical junction, and then resolve.

All the pieces (aka plot points, scenes, details, character choices) must fit this narrative arc.  Subplots as well as main plots weave together to form a cohesive story.  If you screw up the tension (peak too soon, have too many peaks, forget to have anything happen), the fictional narrative fails.

Digression #2 – I deeply regret that I can not tell you how to successfully do the aforementioned.  I muddle through with my own books.

But the point of this post was to point out a serious problem with real life not to tell you how to write a novel.  The problem with real life is that the pieces most definitely will not fit, and I so desperately want them too.  I want congruence.  I want a story that makes sense.  But shit happens–plot points that were NOT in my outline.  Then there I am, juggling multiple narratives that are most definitely NOT working together.

Digression #3 – Psychologists call this cognitive dissonance.

In my novels, I delete things that don’t fit my narrative arc.  (Actually, here is some solid writing advice: if it doesn’t work get rid of it).  In real life, the delete key is broken and I’m left with press enter to accept.  Then I get down to making meaning out of the hodge-podge.

Digression #4 – I put the mess into novels, where on occasion, the narrative behaves.

 

Fist Pump! I’ve been lucky in love and reading

My Reads

I went through a long stretch of books that were… meh… okay.  I was desperate for a book that would woo me and win me, a book I could love.  Since I’m a smarty, I checked in with my librarian buddies.  (They know all!)  Erin F-B shoved (metaphorically speaking) the first winner on my list.

Now I’m six for six with brilliant books, many of which I’ve gushed about here, but I thought it might amuse you to see the list and know where the recommendations came from.  (As you may know, a recent study showed that the primary way people find new books to read is through the recommendations of others.)

THE FAULT IN OUR STARS was in my TBR pile but was bumped to the top by Erin F-B.

CODE NAME VERITY also got pimped by Erin F-B, and at the launch of DAUGHTER OF SMOKE AND BONE, Laini Taylor said it was one of the best books she’d read all year.

AMERICAN GODS is not new but I’ve got this secret desire to be Neil Gaiman when I grow up and I was going on vacation and thought maybe I should branch out of kid lit a bit and then I saw a string of random tweets about the book…

IN THE SHADOW OF BLACKBIRDS is the newly released psychological thriller by my friend, Cat Winters.  I’ve been waiting eagerly for it and snatched up my copy at her Powell’s book launch.  It’s creeptastically wonderful and haunting.

THE ONE AND ONLY IVAN was book talked by Milly S., the librarian at my kids’ school.  Both of them came home demanding that I buy it immediately.  My son read it first and then promptly removed the book in my hands and replaced it with this gem.

WONDER was a read-aloud in my son’s class so he and his amazing teaching Ms. T get credit for this one.

And in case any of you were curious… yes, I am still trying to finish MOBY DICK.

In praise of Scriva Liz, kayaking, and straight talk about tough books

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I have this spectacularly epical (thanks MB for coining the best word ever) critique group called Viva Scriva and each and every member is someone I want to hug tightly and feed cookies for ever and ever.  Today, however, I must call out Scriva Liz for straight talk.

In the past few weeks, I’ve been trying to find my way back into a manuscript about a teen boy and an eleven-year-old girl thrown together by tragedy.  The lovely Kiersi B. calls it THE FAULT IN OUT STARS meets INTO THE WILD–an apt pitch.  Anyway, I worked hard on it during the winter and had made it to about 50K words.  The first two parts were in decent shape.  The last part was a hodge-podge of disconnected scenes and gaping holes.

As I re-read those 50K words, there was no glimmer or spark.  I felt flat and worried that it was crap.  I complained to Scriva Liz (who has read early pieces of it) about how unenthused I was to work on it (even though my agent wants me to finish it right away).  I wondered aloud if my poor response to it was because it wasn’t good or didn’t have the legs to carry a novel-length story.  She looked at me and restrained herself from a dope slap (I’m extemporizing here) and said, “You feel that way because it’s such a hard book to write.”

Face palm.

Yeah.

This book draws heavily on my own grief following the death of my first daughter, Esther.  It’s not a fun one to write.  No swash-buckling.  No make-outs.  Lots of pain, and I hope, lots of heart.  But it is a story I need to tell, and thanks to Liz, I got to work.  I’m making great progress.  I’m in the zone, and I’m even glad to be writing it.

What does this have to do with kayaks, you ask?  Well, also thanks to Liz, I jammed through my writing goal early this morning (1300+ words, thank you very much) and played hooky for the rest of the day.  We kayaked from Hayden Island up to a floating restaurant, drank margaritas, and gabbed.  It was 80 degrees and we were feeling the love.

As I send you off into the weekend, I hope you have a good one, and I hope you have a Scriva Liz!

 

Up with books and readers. Down with literary snobs. via @matthaig1

Uncategorized, , ,

This post by Matt Haig entitled 30 Things to Tell A Book Snob is too good to keep to myself.

There is something innately snobby about the world of books. There is the snobbery of literary over genre, of adult books over children’s, of seriousness over comedy, of reality over fantasy, of Martin Amis over Stephen King. And it is unhealthy. If books ever die, snobbery would be standing over the corpse.

So here is my message to book snobs:

1. People should never be made to feel bad about what they are reading. People who feel bad about reading will stop reading.

2. Snobbery leads to worse books. Pretentious writing and pretentious reading. Books as exclusive members clubs. Narrow genres. No inter-breeding. All that fascist nonsense that leads commercial writers to think it is okay to be lazy with words and for literary writers to think it is okay to be lazy with story.

3. If something is popular it can still be good. Just ask Shakespeare. Or the Beatles. Or peanut butter.

Read the rest here.

Two early morning things–Rumi and “flow”

Antics,

This now is it.
Your deepest need and desire is satisfied by this moment’s energy here in your hand.

-Rumi

I know I’ve written about the marvelous book FLOW by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi before, but as I sit here on Sunday morning, dazed by sleep-deprivation thanks to a daughter’s sleepover gone wrong, this quote by Rumi is bouncing in my brain.

THIS NOW IS IT.

I know flow–the state of being so focused and absorbed in an activity that everything else fades away.  I have known it while writing (best thing ever) and kneading bread dough and being in my garden and while running and while braiding my daughter’s hair…

I’m good at hard work and I’m good at focus.  What I suck at is contentment.  The part of flow that eludes me is accepting all the  things that circumnavigate my life.  Many things–all out of my control–slam against my consciously constructed life.

This morning, I remind myself THIS NOW IS IT and slip into the flow (yawning).

 

Calling All Young Writers – I’m teaching a free, transmedia storytelling workshop this Friday

Antics, ,

BOOK FAN FRIDAY – YOUNG WRITERS, BIG FUN
Book Fan Friday is a workshop for tweens and teens who love to write.

April 12, 2013 @ 4:30 pm

Powell’s Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
3415 SW Cedar Hills Blvd.
Beaverton, OR
503 228 4651

Transmedia storytelling refers to the delivery of story through a variety of media.  These forms can include film, graphic novels, traditional books, flash fiction, gaming, iPhone/iPad delivery of content, and various forms of audio.  Typically, story lines are interwoven and connected but not strictly repetitive.  Often, fan engagement and participation in the creative process are facilitated by social media.

Increasingly, all media forms—books, movies, games and TV shows—are looking for transmedia opportunities.  During this session, Amber will introduce transmedia storytelling and show how the Angel Punk team (www.angelpunk.co) delivers story via novel, feature film, comic books, and an interactive fan site with an emphasis on the creative process.

 

 

 

Wide Open Spaces (Required for Writers)

Travel, Writing, ,

My family and I spent spring break in a rented house on North Andros, the largest island in the Bahamas but one rarely frequented by tourists.  There are no large resorts or mega-hotels, no gift shops, no high end spas.  In other words, my kind of place.

I had a week’s reprieve from email (the wifi was down most of the time), to-do lists (other than: eat, read, kayak, swim, snorkel, bird-watching, sleep, repeat), deadlines, and the interwoven schedules of my family of four.

I re-remembered and re-affirmed that what I love and what I need is wide, open space.  I need the horizon so I can see where the moon sets each night.  I need the expansive sea so I can track the rise and fall of the tides.  I need the untrammeled sand, twice renewed each day, to find my path.  And most of all, I need the wide, open spaces of my mind once it is cleared of all the must-do, should-do detritus of daily life.  I can not create without  it.