Society for Children's Book Writers and Illustrators

I met so many nice people at the NESCBWI conference this weekend, and am ready to get down to work (as soon as I catch up on my sleep)! Here are a few notes I took at the conference that struck me as being applicable to both storytelling and life:

-Part of growing up is aligning desire with actions...kids often say and do things that are the opposite of what they want (I'm pretty sure I still do this on a relatively regular basis!)

-Think: Does this FEED me or does it COST me?

-Instead of "what does my character want": "what does my character care about?"

-Write to your strengths, revise to your weakness.

-What would you do if you knew that failure was impossible?

Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life

These days, I'm working on a rough draft of a new novel. The toughest thing for me is that I have a brutal inner editor. The needling kind who reads over my shoulder and whispers constant insults until I end up spending three hours on three sentences.

That's no way to write a novel. So this month, as part of my long list of New Year's Resolutions, I'm attempting to kick that little guy out of the room. As my inspiration, I've been revisiting Anne Lamott's book on writing, Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life.

Yesterday, I came across this quote that I particularly loved. It's helpful to know that all writers (probably all human beings) have that rotten inner editor. It also made me laugh...a helpful reminder to loosen up and have fun with the process.

“I know some very great writers, writers you love who write beautifully and have made a great deal of money, and not one of them sits down routinely feeling wildly enthusiastic and confident. Not one of them writes elegant first drafts. All right, one of them does, but we do not like her very much. We do not think that she has a rich inner life or that God likes her or can even stand her. (Although when I mentioned this to my priest friend Tom, he said that you can safely assume you’ve created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do.)”

Kris Asselin Interviews Me!

Young adult and middle grade author Kris Asselin interviewed me for her blog this week. Please stop by Writing. For Real. to read all about how I got my first check as a writer, how I got my agent, and how I love Phil Collins (but if you're a regular reader of this blog, you probably already knew that last bit).

Thanks, Kris!

Agee & Lopez On Writing

Here are a couple quotes I found scribbled in one of my notebooks today. Interesting food for thought on a gray Monday afternoon while I'm working on my novel and struggling with all these literal, clunky words. (Sorry, I don't know what books I found these in. Maybe Let Us Now Praise Famous Men and Arctic Dreams, respectively?)

James Agee:

Words cannot embody; they can only describe. But a certain kind of artist, whom we will distinguish from others as a poet rather than a prose writer, despises this fact about words or his medium, and continually brings words as near as he can to an illusion of embodiment.

Barry Lopez:

The mind can imagine beauty and conjure intimacy. It can find solace where literal analysis finds only trees and rocks and grass.

Jane Yolen: Take Joy!

This morning, I am working hard to finish up one more revision of my novel. Skimming through my notebook, I found a quote I had written down from Jane Yolen's book on writing, Take Joy: A Writer's Guide to Loving the Craft. Jane Yolen has been an inspiration to me since I was teenager, so I thought I'd pass this on to you.

"So here's a wish from the Winter Queen for all of you: May you choose well those things to carry you into the even tide of your own lives. Make a raft of those choices, a raft that will slip easily through stormy seas, where the waves are wild and bright with foam. And may you come at last, as I have, to safe harbor and a welcoming shore with many books to hand, those you have written and those you hope to have time still to read."

I love the idea of making a raft of our choices. It's an interesting way to think about decisions as we all head toward that even tide. Will this sustain me? Will this travel well? And the welcoming shore with many books to hand? Now, that's my idea of heaven!

Annie Dillard: The Writing Life

Well, it's a new year, and I'm getting ready to send out my manuscript (a novel for kids) to literary agents. I always need a little encouragement and inspiration for these things, so in preparation, I've been reading Annie Dillard's beautiful musings in The Writing Life. I love this passage about why we read:

"Why are we reading, if not in hope of beauty laid bare, life heightened and its deepest mystery probed? Can the writer isolate and vivify all in experience that most deeply engages our intellects and our hearts? Can the writer renew our hope for literary forms? Why are we reading if not in hope that the writer will magnify and dramatize our days, will illuminate and inspire us with wisdom, courage, and the possibility of meaningfulness, and will press upon our minds the deepest mysteries, so we may feel again their majesty and power? What do we ever know that is higher than that power which, from time to time, seizes our lives, and reveals us startlingly to ourselves as creatures set down here bewildered? Why does death so catch us by surprise, and why love? We still and always want waking."

This is the amazing thing about books. In 2009, I was swept away and shaken awake by The Hunger Games, The Book Thief, Olive Kitteridge, Robert Hayden's poetry, and Claudette Colvin. I can't wait to be inspired in 2010. What have you read that has caught you by surprise and pressed upon your mind the majesty and power of the deepest mysteries?