Holly Cupala: Don't Breathe a Word

My friend Holly Cupala's debut Tell Me a Secret is one of my favorite all-time reads. I'm really excited about her new release, Don't Breathe a Word. So when she asked me to be a part of a video that she put together on the power of words, I was thrilled.

Okay, so I feel a little embarrassed by my own serious take on the subject in the midst of such a clever batch of responses; but nonetheless feel that Holly's message is the important part of her vlog. Words do have power, and we girls need to empower our younger tribe, male and female, to use their words for good.

I'm super-proud to be in the company of these writers: Justina Chen, Melissa Walker, Stephanie Kuehnert, Sarah Stevenson, Denise Jaden, Lish McBride, Beth Kephart, Lisa Schroeder, Cynthia Jaynes, Tara Kelly, Joelle Anthony, Stasia Ward Kehoe, Tina Ferraro, and Janet Lee Carey.

Guest Post: "What's Wrong With Me? - Reflections of an Indie Pubber"

This week I'm hosting Daree Allen, who is self-publishing a book for teen girls on issues of self-esteem: What's Wrong With Me?. She's written a wonderful post about her process and the need for books like hers - and how indie publishing is, frankly, helping to fill a big hole in the book world.

There is a girl... she's trying to make sense of her life.

She's ashamed of her looks (why am I so flat-chested?) and compares herself to other girls--especially the popular ones.

She doesn't feel the love at home, doesn't see her value, and gets depressed because girls don't like her.

She wants attention.

She needs direction.

She asks over and over again... What's wrong with me?

That girl was me, and it's millions of kids and teens all over this country who identify with those same issues. My debut memoir/self-help offering, "What's Wrong With Me?," launches on Valentine's Day 2012. But it's been a challenge publishing it myself, and I admit that I made the decision was made with a lot of forethought and reluctancy.

After months of struggling in 2009, I talked to a successful literary agent about my book's concept of self-esteem and self-help from a Christian perspective. She told me that no agent would touch it. She told me it's difficult to convince the houses to publish people with a decent platform and following. They want to have a guarantee of sales.

YA fiction is a big deal, but not non-fiction. And I let my progress stunt in the beginning of my book project by focusing on these kinds of underwhelming responses from literary agents and traditional publishing houses. 

Despite the overwhelming response I get from adults of the desperate need for self-esteem and empowerment resources for teens and young adults, I let this information depress me and doubt my ability to produce a book that could be used to not only share my story, but mentor teens through the problems and discouragements they face today. When girls finish reading my book, I want them to understand themselves better, feel more assertive, make better choices, and be on their way to discovering and living in their purposes and destinies. They will realize that they're not alone in the way they feel, that they don't need approval from others to validate their worth, and the importance of a personal relationship God.

It took me a long time to realize that my book sales would not be for publishing houses or large chain bookstores, but for organizations, companies, and my own speaking engagements. I started to build my confidence by thinking about the lives that would be touched, the parents I could help, and the girls for which I could become a source of hope. While still finishing "What's Wrong With Me?" the book, I also created and completed the "What's Wrong With Me? Reflections Journal," which is a hybrid journal/workbook that digs deeper into the reader's personal thoughts about the topics in the book.  

I created Kharacter Distinction Books in 2011 and began hiring my staff of editors, graphic designers, web developers, and a project manager. I found some of these contractors through referrals, and hired a few people from Elance. The experience of managing other people's work for my book project was very disheartening and frustrating for me. Self-discipline is one thing, but in dealing with a lack of accountability and responsibility in others is quite another. I've had several quitters (one proofreader, one designer, and one web developer), and a couple of flakes. I'm a self-described goal-getter and somewhat ambitious, but I know my limits. However, many people get in over their head with work tasks and didn't fill me in until it was too late.  I've learned a lot about time management, people management, and interpersonal communication, and I'm still learning.

But look--here I am, with not one, but two books ready to go. And I won't stop now.

Daree Allen is an authorpreneur, young adult esteem advocate, speaker, and goal-getter in Atlanta, GA. She has published articles on a variety of topics as a freelance writer and blogger, and is the author of the new teen mentoring book entitled, "What's Wrong With Me?" in which she discusses her own childhood dealing with self-esteem, premarital sex, family and personal relationships. Find out more about her work at www.dareesinsights.wordpress.com and www.DareeAllen.com.

Debut Writers of the Class of 2k12: Caroline Starr Rose

Welcome to 2012! 

I'm delighted to be able to introduce readers to authors from my sister Class of 2k12, just as I did for previous 2k classes. I continue to be impressed by how many of our class members have crafted novels that have won awards, garnered fabulous reviews, and won devoted readers to their great books.

That is certainly true of the first of the 2k12 novels, MAY B. Rave reviews have accompanied the launch of this wonderful story. I'm so pleased that Caroline Starr Rose is here today.

Congratulations on the publication of your novel, MAY B. Can you tell us a bit about the story and what inspired it?

MAY B. is the story of twelve-year-old May Betterly, who must survive a blizzard -- alone -- on the Kansas frontier.

I’ve always had an interest in the women of the frontier, stemming from my love for The Little House on the Prairie collection. As a child, I’d talk about Laura as if she were someone I personally knew. I’d devote a lot of time wondering about her world: how she’d never seen a town until she was five, how she didn’t go to school until she was seven, how a penny in her Christmas stocking was such a big deal.

Looking back, it seems inevitable I’d develop my own strong prairie girl.

How long have you been writing for children/teens? Have you written other books or is this your first effort?

I started writing in 1998, during summer vacation (I was teaching at the time). By the time MAY B. sold, I’d written four novels and seven picture books.

Four novels! That just shows the importance of experience. Can you describe your path to the publication of MAY B?

I made the crazy decision to stop teaching at the end of the 2008-2009 school year and write full time (crazy because I had no agent, no book offer, and no real prospects). MAY B. had just won first place for a novel excerpt at a local writing conference, and I decided it was the time to take a chance.

I queried frantically and signed with my agent, Michelle Humphrey of ICM, at the end of September 2009. MAY B. sold at auction in March 2010. Lest this journey sounds easy, here are my stats:

200+ direct rejections from editors over 11 years

75+ agent rejections

10 or so more rejections once on submission with my agent

3 bids

1 sale

I love those stats, because they show the value of persistence. Do you have any advice for beginning writers?

Read broadly, remember you have something unique to say, be willing to fail.

Can you tell us something about your personal life – inspirations, plans for the future, goals, etc.?

I’ve just started running again after many injuries in the last few years. I’m not fast, and I can’t cover more than a few miles, but it feels so wonderful to be able to come back to something I love. Hopefully I have a race or two in my future.

Since Caroline sent me her interview answers, she added this: "I've run three half marathons since then -- slow and steady, but my gosh, 13.1 miles is nothing to sneeze at."  Clearly Caroline knows about persistence.

My family has just moved back to my hometown, Albuquerque, NM, so my husband can start a new Presbyterian Church (PCA). I’d love to see this beautiful city loved on and bolstered by this future congregation.

Do you have any new writing ventures underway?

My picture book, OVER IN THE WETLANDS, focuses on the animals and plants of Southern Louisiana. If it sells, I’d like to donate a portion of sales to wetlands restoration.

I’m in the process of researching for an eventual verse novel about a Gitano (Spanish Gypsy) girl.

Do you have a website where readers can learn more about MAY B? 

Yes! 

Please stop by!

www.carolinestarrrose

Thanks, Caroline!

Welcome to Guest Doris Fisher

To kick off the New Year I invited picture book author and puzzle mistress Doris Fisher to write a guest post, and she has chosen to talk about humor - which we all know is the best way to engage readers, especially beginning readers - most especially when those books attempt to teach concepts, which as you can see is Doris's special gift.

I love humor in picture books for beginning readers. Learning to read is hard work. There are twenty-six letters in the alphabet to recognize. And each one makes a different sound when pronounced. On top of that there are five vowels that each has a long and short sound. 

Now throw in punctuation marks to know…periods, commas, colons, apostrophes, question marks and exclamation marks! Not to mention the dreaded semi-colon that stops readers in their tracks, scratching their heads. What the heck does that dot and comma mean? Really, it should be outlawed. Just create two sentences.

Humor encourages the new reader and promises a few laughs along the way. Like Mary Poppins sang, “Just a spoon full of sugar helps the medicine go down.” If I can amuse a child and sneak in a bit of information in the text, I think my writing is worthwhile. In Happy Birthday to Whooo??? the animal birth announcements I created relay all kinds of details about baby animals, each written with a touch of wordplay to attract the reader.

Likewise I call my other three picture books, math with a laugh. One Odd Day, My Even Day, and My Half Day all introduce number concepts, but in a way that engrosses the reader. Along with great illustrations by Karen Lee, these books contain a “seek and find” element for the number concept detailed in each book.

A puzzle creator to the max, my word puzzles, mazes and codes also contain humor, tongue-in cheek references and funny clip art to decorate the pages. I was fortunate enough to speak about creating work for magazines at the Brazos Valley SCBWI Conference in November. I had a great time remembering all my magazine articles and puzzles to include in a power point presentation.

My website has puzzles on it to print and solve. And I always have a monthly book giveaway on my website. So click on over, enter and become a winner of one of my books in paperback. And remember, laughter is the best medicine, so they say.

Doris Fisher

www.abcdoris.com

Happy Holidays!!

To all my friends, fans, and readers...

From our "house" to yours...the happiest wishes of the season!

Voices You Should Hear: Leda Schubert

In all fairness, I should say up front that not only is Leda Schubert one of my most favorite people on the planet, but she also was my mentor for my second novel, Forgiven, when she was my last advisor (creative thesis semester) at Vermont College of Fine Arts. So any gushing you may sense from me is warranted. Even more so because Leda is supremely smart, funny, and talented, and hey - she loves dogs. I was thrilled that she agreed to answer questions for me so that I can bring you her answers.

Let’s start with your latest picture book, The Princess of Borscht (Bonnie Christensen, Illus.; Roaring Brook, 2011). Congratulations on all the terrific reviews (and they are terrific!!) I love the idea of food as cure-all (especially borscht) and as a centerpiece for the character interactions. Are you a cook? Do you think food holds “magic” properties? Please tell readers something about how this book came together for you.

Thanks, Janet! To answer this question, I have to order my few remaining brain cells back almost ten years and visit some ancient computer files. Most of you know that picture books can take a very long time, but this one took even longer. The short version: I started it in 2003 when my husband said offhandedly (I think) that someone should write a book about borscht. So I did. It went through many, many, many, many drafts. Many. Even some VCFA faculty had things to say about it (“Start over.” “No one in his right mind wants to read a book about borscht.” “What the heck is borscht?” Etc.)

Am I a cook? No. I hate to cook. I could live on bread, cheese, and salads, but I somehow suspect that is not an entirely healthful diet. So I do cook some things. About four. And I don’t eat anything that has/had four legs. (Once I thought chicken had four legs so I didn’t eat it for years. Maybe I am kidding.)

Does food have magic properties? Yes. It does. Somebody should bring me some; that’s what I think. Chocolate especially has magic properties. Especially dark chocolate with hazelnuts.

(Dark chocolate - we share another passion...) You also have an earlier fall 2011 release, Reading to Peanut (Amanda Haley, Illus., Holiday House). I happen to know you have strong feelings about dogs (which I share). Who are the current dog-members of your family? What do they think about Peanut?

How much time do we have? I’ll rein myself in. The current dog members are Pippa and Pogo. Both are mutts, but they are also so-called designer dogs, Goldendoodles. We did not pay goldendoodle prices for either one, and they’re both Vermont natives. Pogo is the sweetest person on the planet; he is pure love. Pippa—well, she’s a case. She’s the most independent dog I’ve ever had, and I’ve had several. It’s not that she dislikes us; she just has many things to do that don’t involve us.

As for Peanut, they both believe that more dogs are always a good thing. I’m sure they’d love to have another dog (Bob, husband dear, are you listening?)

You have six published picture books to your credit, including the multi-award winner Ballet of the Elephants (Robert Andrew Parker, Illus.; Roaring Brook, 2006.) Have you thought about writing something longer? What draws you to the picture book format? And...will the picture book format survive its current turmoil?

I’ve written a novel (actually I’ve written three novels) that’s set during McCarthyism and is about a girl growing up in a leftist family that’s under suspicion. It’s been roundly rejected, and I’m not sure I want to revise it any more. So it’s lurking around somewhere. So are the two earlier novels. Instead, I’m working on a longer piece of nonfiction for kids.

As for the picture book, I’d like to believe it will survive, because I love picture books with all my heart and soul. I cannot imagine a world without Horton, Ferdinand, Madeline, Max, ---   in fact, maybe one of the reasons picture books are in crisis is because characters as memorable as those aren’t being created as often.

You were a librarian for years and served on awards committees. How have these experiences colored your work?

Leda, hiding behind Pogo and snuggling with Pippa

It’s hard to describe the intensity of those experiences. My Caldecott committee was one of the professional highlights of my life. The quality of discussion, the brilliance of the committee members, the respect for artists and authors, and the leadership provided by our chair changed my life. I’m a better person for that experience, I hope. The Globe-Horn Book award committee has fewer guidelines and more books to read and I loved working with the other two women during that year.

For much longer periods of time I was on two of Vermont’s children’s choice awards committees: the Red Clover Award and the Dorothy Canfield Award. During those years, I read hundreds and hundreds of children’s/YA books every year. What an incredible privilege—and what an education. So much of what is published disappoints; so much of what is good doesn’t get “buzz” and disappears.

Most of my committee experience was before blogs gained the power they have now. I believe that blogging is changing the whole world of children’s books in ways that are both good and bad. I worry.

I’m eternally grateful to have had you as one of my advisors while I was a student at Vermont College of Fine Arts. What is the best thing about teaching? Can you share any fun stories about VCFA (trick question)?

The best thing about teaching, Janet, is the opportunity to work with students like you. I think all of us on the faculty learn as much, if not more, from our students as they learn from us. To read is one thing; to read and articulate responses is another; to read and articulate responses in a way that might push a student to a place she didn’t think she could go is pretty darned amazing.

Funny or fun stories about VCFA? Everything that happens there is fun, right? Guessing what’s for lunch, meeting all your friends in the communal bathrooms, waiting for the water to heat up, looking for caffeine---but you probably mean something more. I laugh more during residency than I do the whole rest of the year. And I suspect the students have even more fun than the faculty.  (We have a ton!)

Please tell us about the forthcoming Monsieur Marceau (Gerard DuBois, Illus., Roaring Brook, 2012).

Right after M. Marceau died, my agent, Steven Chudney, suggested I might think about writing a picture book biography. I rarely take suggestions from someone else (though this long blog post points to two such instances, hmmm), but this one resonated, particularly when I became immersed in research and learned about Marceau’s actions during WWII, which I had known nothing about. The more I learned of Marceau’s life, the more convinced I was to tell the story. Oddly enough, I studied mime in my senior in college with Jan Kessler, and a student of Marceau’s, Rob Mermin, lives close by.

Neal Porter accepted the manuscript in 2008; it will be published next fall (2012). I’ve recently seen the proofs, and I was completely overwhelmed by the gorgeous art Gerard DuBois has created. He’s French and lives in Montreal. Wait until you see it!

Want to share a favorite borscht recipe?

It’s on the back of THE PRINCESS OF BORSCHT! Simple as could be. There are more complex recipes as well. They’re all good. Beets are good.

What’s the best way for readers to find out more about you and your work?

I do have a website which I maintain myself through the Authors Guild. It’s nothing fancy, but I update it frequently. www.ledaschubert.com

Janet, thanks so much for interviewing me. It’s almost as good as sitting in Noble Lounge at VCFA and talking with you.

Likewise. Almost. Sigh.

And The Winner Is...

Drawn from the "random hat generator" the winner of my give-away is (drumroll...)



Kelly!



Congrats to Kelly and THANK YOU to everyone who stopped by. Happy Holidays and keep watching because I will do more drawings in the future. Plus cover reveals, teasers, and excerpts from works in the works.

Hugs! - Janet

Holiday Thank-you and Give-away!

I want to send a warm thank you to all my readers, fans, and friends. I’ve heard so many lovely comments from you about Faithful and Forgiven, and it means so much to me. I’m in the edit stage with my third historical YA, set in 1925 New York City, and featuring a gangster, a love story, a friendship, and a mystery that may have to do with a ghost (Moll was the tentative title but it may be in for a title change...coming soon. Plus, advance teasers...)

As a way of giving back to my loyal fans I’m running a holiday give-away. The prize will be your choice of one copy of either Faithful or Forgiven. The winner’s name will be drawn from among the entries.

If I receive more than 50 comments to this post, I’ll draw a second winner.

Here are the rules:

Comment on this post: 1 point

Tell me you’ve tweeted this: 1 point

Like my Author Facebook page: 1 point. (If you already have liked it, just let me know.)

Each point puts your name in the hat once.

Here’s a chance for you to win one of my books for yourself or as a holiday gift. The deadline is December 18^th, and I can put signed books in the mail directly to you or your gift recipient for a timely delivery.

Thank you all for your support and kind words, and the best of the season to you!

Voices You Should Hear: John Michael Cummings

Not long ago I received a collection of short stories under the title Ugly to Start With. Written by my guest today, John Michael Cummings, they feature a young man with a unique voice and clear-eyed view of the adult world, and I'm delighted that John, an accomplished award-winning author, agreed to this interesting and telling interview.

Please give readers a synopsis of your new collection of short stories, Ugly to Start With.

Here’s the synopsis the publisher and I came up with, which is pretty good: Jason Stevens is growing up in picturesque, historic Harpers Ferry, West Virginia in the 1970s. Back when the roads are smaller, the cars slower, the people more colorful, and Washington, D.C. is way across the mountains—a winding sixty-five miles away.

Jason dreams of going to art school in the city, but he must first survive his teenage years. He witnesses a street artist from Italy charm his mother from the backseat of the family car. He stands up to an abusive husband—and then feels sorry for the jerk. He puts up with his father’s hard-skulled backwoods ways, his grandfather’s showy younger wife, and the fist-throwing schoolmates and eccentric mountain characters that make up Harpers Ferry—all topped off by a basement art project with a girl from the poor side of town.

Your main character, Jason, is an appealing teen with a distinctive voice, and the thread of the stories connects through him. Did you intend to write a collection, or did Jason drive the narrative?

No, I didn’t set out to write a collection.  Some writers do, and it’s an admirable project—a unified body of short narratives. 

For years I’ve been striving to publish book-length works.  As far as I know, that’s how to offer readers something of prosy bulk they can hold on to; a story or poem in a literary journal is easily lost, I’m afraid.  A writer could publish seventy-five stories in seventy-five different literary journals and magazines and never be a blip on the literary radar.  I’m talking about myself!  Before I published my first novel, that was my fate.  I’m still largely unknown, but my first novel stands in the cosmos of print as a kind of point of light at least.  Call it a nano-star. 

So I’ve been striving for years to publish book-length works.  Believe it or not, even with 75 stories in print, I could barely scrape together 13 stories (that’s how many are in this collection) that glimmer in any sort of sequence and offer both a variety and a cohesion—so so tricky to achieve. 

The best way I can explain this trick is, think of songs on an album:  6 or 8 have the same flavor of voice, with one or two oddballs thrown in to keep it interesting. 

So initially I managed to come up a theme of self-image for about 15 stories, and with the help of the team at West Virginia University Press, we reordered and shaped them to make them more continuous, cutting some, adding others.  I should back up and say that of my 75 stories in print, the last 30 have been about Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, where I grew, and rendered in an open, unfussy youthful voice.  Those 30 tales gave me my best chance of finding a taut collection.  (The others were largely showy and scant, and a little off-putting with a disdainful hero).

But again, without editors and outside readers for WVU Press—suggesting which stories bounced them out of the theme and where the theme seeking lacking so that others could be added in, the collection would not have been created.  I myself just didn’t have the perspective.  They did, and they were very good about it.  They were also very good in line by line editing.

I should note that even though all the stories have previously appeared in literary journals, some changes were made to them for this collection, for the sake of cohesion.  (To toot my horn, “The Scratchboard Project,” a kind of anchor story for the collection and also the longest, first appeared in The Iowa Review.  It was both nominated for The Pushcart Prize and an honor mention in The Best American Short Stories 2007.)

So to answer your question, Jason ultimately drives the narrative.  His youthful voice has appeared in so many of my short narratives that eventually I came up with 13 jigsaw puzzle pieces to fit together into a collection.

I love the evocative setting. Please talk about what it means to you.

Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, was my early world.   Today it’s still the wallpaper in my brain; I can’t close my eyes at night without seeing the old historic town. 

But here’s where it gets dicey.  I love the place—I hate the place.   I’m gigantic there—I’m tiny there.   I’m happy, I’m despicable.  I’m ambitious, I’m depressed.  I’m healthy, sick.  You see, the town splits me in half.  Aesthetically, it defined me.  Emotionally, it traumatized me.

The short answer is, the town may be the most hauntingly beautiful place ever.  The other answer is, it’s a void, a hole of existential despair, a place where creeping emotions finish up in melancholy, where an aching emptiness clings to the mountainside, making faces in the rock as much grotesque as sympathetic.  It’s a town where a sensitive sort can go mad with desires repressed and memories imagined, with obsessive, exaggerated reactions to the insidiously sublime world around them. 

Do I sound strange?  Perhaps yes.  But this is my artist’s view of a town famous in history for the abolitionist John Brown’s 1859 raid.

Souls who live there today are unwittingly confused, menaced, and irreversibly changed.  The place laughs at time.  It’s original name was “The Hole.”  Need I say more. The place began and will end with an overriding hopelessness in its air.  Yes, life goes on there, quietly importantly, but human existence is without meaning and purpose. 

This I swear.  You would not want me writing its travel brochure.

I’m sure readers would love to hear something about your “writer’s journey” – your first publication, early experiences, or any start-up stories you wish to share.

Me Write?

In 1989, I was a 26-year-old art student who probably hadn’t read his first novel.  Secretly, though, I loved words, just not those written down, but sung.  Bruce Springsteen’s songs, in particular, had as much meaning as my ears could hear.  No artist put as much heart and soul into ordinary words as he did.

How could so much human meaning be captured on the page without music? 

During an elective poetry course at George Mason University, I tried to find out.  As an experiment, I typed out lyrics to a few of his songs, put in line breaks to make them look like poems, printed them out, and read them quietly. 

They were terrible!  I was shocked.  Nothing.  Flat.  Where was all the heartfelt feeling so richly steeped in the music? 

Whatever I would write in my poetry class, it would not sound like Bruce.

Around this time, by chance I opened a book by John Updike—and out poured sentences bejeweled with commas and printed in Technicolor: 

Now this was writing!  The visual artist in me was enchanted.  His sentences were endless and ornate, like fancy, curly, golden lines on sensationally green Victorian wallpaper.

As I went on to finish my degree in art, I found myself writing.  For years afterward, I referred to Updike’s Trust Me collection for technique and range in narratives.  As my stories written in his style began to be published, I grew bigheaded and overly confident.  I scowled at the idea of master’s program in writing.  And why not?  My undergraduate degree wasn’t in English or writing, but still I was getting published.  (In fact, not six months after graduating, I even got a job as a newspaper reporter with my art degree by putting together a few mock news stories and pulling off a certain moxie in my interview.)

I was all the more smug.  Writers aren’t made in classrooms, I told myself.  They’re forged out in the real world or in their hovels, alone. 

Over the next decade, leaving both formal education and journalism behind, I moved around, working odd jobs, writing creatively as much as I could:  photocopy clerk at night in D.C., office temp in Minneapolis, and innkeeper in Newport, Rhode Island.  I had few friends and romanticized my isolation.  I was a writer after all, fated to suffer.  Yet I remained highly ambitious.  When I published ten stories, I had to publish twenty.  Then thirty.  What little money I earned went, in large part, to stamps for submissions.    

Then I undertook a novel—and fell flat on my face.  Manuscript after manuscript, revision after revision, was rejected.  I was dumbfounded by the comments. What was meant by narrative arc?  Didn’t plot exist necessarily?  Rotating point of view—huh? 

My lack of reading was clearly exposed.  The fancy descriptive writing I had modeled after John Updike’s New Yorker stories, when spread out over a hundred pages, left a void where plot and action should have been.  My novel didn’t develop.  Worse, it repeated itself. 

I was left with questions that took me back to the starting point.  What makes a writer?  What’s in his heart?  Does he embody the truth?  More important, what’s his mission and what are his limits?  Then there were more specific questions.  What was my unique style?  Should I agonize over every word?  Or should I be frank and plainspoken like my father and others where I grew up? 

In my correspondence with publishers, I was referred to Strunk and White’s The Elements of Style, in the last chapter of which I found the commandment: “Write in a way that comes naturally…” 

While I understood the general idea, it gave rise to more questions.  What if nothing comes naturally?  Or what if what “comes naturally” is bad writing?

I decided I would take my questions to the source.  I drove up to Ipswich, Massachusetts, where, nosing around the antique stores, I came across a local lady all too willing to gab about the town’s most famous resident, American author John Updike, including where he lived.  Following her directions, I turned at the bridge outside town and took the snaky road through the trees.  I was brave and excited until I passed through a high gate and looked up to see a majestic white mansion on the hill overlooking the cold blue Atlantic.   My car lost its rev, and the courage in my chest turned to lead.  Meanwhile, the driveway was delivering me right up to the gleaming white Doric columns that stood on either side of Mr. Updike’s front door like well-uniformed sentries.  It was evening, and I was slipping in during the rose-tinted hour between day and night.  In an inglorious moment, I scampered out of my running car and up to his grand door, where I leaned my latest manuscript against the jamb so that the big envelope would plop down on the toes of his oxblood slippers when he emerged.  In a no less inglorious moment, I scurried back to my car and zoomed away, my head swirling in disbelief.  I had done it.  Not very magnificently, but I done it.

Updike, to my surprise, wrote to me: “There are many nice touches in these pages.  Try to generate more suspense the reader is curious about.  Keep writing.  But don’t keep bringing your work to me.  I’m a dead-end.  You need an editor.”

I’m a dead-end?  The man could move publishing empires around with a phone call. 

As I held his typewritten note in my hands, I could not believe what I was seeing.  His typewriter had flying caps.  He had left an “s” off “touches” and added the letter in blue pen.  He missed a comma too--though who was I to make this assumption?  He might be breaking a rule at his discretion. 

I was seeing something else.  He was polite.  He was brief.  He wrote in short, normal sentences.  Strange, of all the lengthy, elaborate sentences of his I had read over the years, these few short, plain ones were ones I understood best.   He was, for the first time, real.

At the time, I was working at a literary agency in New York, learning all about how big publishing is an unforgiving, money-driven business.  I had already been urged by agents to forget Updike’s exquisitely vivid adjectives.  Make me care, all the agents were crying.  Don’t write tortuous, snakelike sentences, they said.  Get in on the Toni Morrison style. 

Amid all this New York palaver of writing, I was realizing that my voice came from my West Virginia roots, not from Brooklyn’s parade of writers, not from pugs like Norman Mailer or upstarts like Rick Moody.  Keep it true, in other words.  All the artfully bundled phrases in the world, all the dense and sweetly rhythmic words, can’t say the sky is blue. 

Please tell readers where they can learn more about you and your books.

Here are three great sites:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Michael_Cummings

http://wvupressonline.com/cummings_ugly_to_start_with_9781935978084

http://www.johnmichaelcummings.com/

Waiting...Extreme Waiting

Recently I've heard lots of talk about something authors are all too familiar with: waiting.

In the old days (at least this is how I imagine things) an author working in a solitary aerie would pound the keys until completing a masterful tome, and three days after mailing a box of loose pages to Major New York Publisher, the MNYP editor would call with great news: "This is a best seller! It'll be out for the holidays!"

Today, we write for a year, maybe two; we share with our critique partners; we revise; we send to our agent; we wait; we hear from agent and revise again; we wait; we hear that agent has received "no's"; we wait; we hear from an interested editor; we revise for editor; we wait; the book goes to committee; we wait; the book sells; we wait; we revise; the book's launch is bumped; we wait....well, that's the idea. And that's if you're lucky enough to have an agent who eventually sells your book.

Recently Steve Mooser of SCBWI crafted an excellent editorial in the Newsletter asking editors to be mindful that the new policy of "if you don't hear from us in 3 months, we aren't interested" is, well, cruel. That policy is hard on authors who sit on pins and needles, waiting, hoping. What happens after 3 months? How should an author feel? It's disheartening and enervating. I agree with Steve, though I don't know that this policy will go away any time soon.

So I've learned to think of this in a new way. Personally, I don't wait well (part of my anal control-freak nature). So I don't wait. I work.

The minute a manuscript goes out the door, in whatever direction, I begin or dive back into a new project. My own MO is to work on a very different type of project - say, moving from YA to MG or from historical to fantasy. I have to put the other work out of my mind, and in fact I look upon the waiting as a gift. A gift of time to start something new, to be creative, to read things I wouldn't read otherwise, to go back to my pile of craft books for new inspiration, to meet with colleagues, to catch up on publishing trends, to improve my craft.

I propose a new author game. Let's call it Extreme Waiting. Extreme Waiting is energetic and thrilling, rather than tedious. Extreme Waiting is a time of growth, development, renewal.

What do you say? I'll meet you on the keystroke. Let's go for the gold!