Writers in the Storm

Christina Delay

I recently finaled in the Kiss of Death’s Daphne du Maurier contest in the Mainstream category. I’ve gotta be honest, it’s been a while since I had a win. It felt good. It FEELS good. Real good. I’ve wanted to final in this contest for years, so yes, when I got the news, I may have done the laughing-crying thing.

My husband took me out to celebrate but, ever the realist, said, “Be careful of this high on the roller coaster.” After I shot him the stink-eye, I had to take a deep breath. He was right. (I hate when he’s right.)

It’s a conversation we’ve had many times over the years that I’ve been writing with the goal of publication.

The Writer Roller Coaster. Worst. Ride. Ever. That is, if you’re living for the wins.

Living for the Win

When you’re living for the next win, you keep your sights set on the high points, on those relative two seconds of when you’re at the highest tip of the roller coaster. And when you’re living for the win, the low points aren’t the thrill dropping, stomach plunge of real roller coasters. Nope. They suck. The low points are the times when nothing’s happening, or you’ve received 22 rejections over the course of four months, or you’ve watched every single one of your writer buddies soar on to publication, contest wins, book sales, and more.

When you’re living for the win, or the next high, it can make the lows seem so much lower, and the drop to the lows so much more dramatic. It makes the time you spend in the lows stretch out, never seeming to end.

Learn to Live for the Journey

I’ve had to learn over the years how to refocus from “excitement for the win” to “excitement for the journey.”

Even though I’m super-excited about my contest final, it’s not as important to me as the journey that I’m on. Not just the journey to publication, but the journey to deeper self-understanding because of my writing path, the wonderful discoveries I’ve made in finding my people, my tribe, and how, at the end of the day, I place a greater value in the relationships I’ve formed because of this journey. More so than any contest final or win.

That puts things into perspective.

Am I saying no to celebrating the wins? Definitely not. Celebrate them. But then move on. Don’t let them consume you.

Same rule goes for the losses. Grieve them. But then move on. Don’t let them consume you.

I give myself until midnight. Whatever happens, whatever’s needed, allow yourself to sink into that emotion until midnight. Eat ice cream from the tub, pop open the champagne, cry with your best friend, binge on Netflix, wear the tiara. At 12:01AM, the clock starts over, and so do you. The glass shoes come off, and it’s time to get back to work.

For me, every contest final or high point on this journey has provided me a good vantage point to look back over where I’ve come from and a little bit of where I’m headed. From up here, I can see my lows were the building blocks that I had to stack to get to the high points. It helps me remember what’s important to focus on.

“Focus on the journey, not the destination. Joy is found not in finishing an activity but in doing it.” ~ Greg Anderson

“Aim for the sky, but move slowly, enjoying every step along the way. It is all those little steps that make the journey complete.” ~ Chanda Kochhar

“Sooner or later we must realize there is no station, no one place to arrive at once and for all. The true joy of life is the trip.” ~ Robert J. Hastings

Passion Is a Lifelong Marathon

When you find your passion and purpose in life, you start on a lifelong marathon with no finish line. There will be rest stops along the way, high and low points in the road. Some areas will be easier, some will be harder, but you keep running. You keep improving. You keep seeking new ways to sink more fully into your life’s passion. You keep doing the thing that makes your soul smile.

And that’s really what it’s all about, right? Doing the things that make our souls smile and add beauty to the world.

Tonight, I’m raising my glass. Not just to my final, but to all the high and low points of this journey, and to you, my fellow lover of words and stories and magic. Thanks for being on this journey with me. No place I’d rather be.

Is your writing journey a search for the wins, a sprint, a marathon...or something else entirely? Describe for us why you do this job down in the comments!

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About Christina

Christina Delay is the hostess of Cruising Writers and an award-winning author represented by Deidre Knight of The Knight Agency. When she's not cruising the Caribbean, she's dreaming up new writing retreats to take talented authors on or writing the stories of the imaginary people that live in her heart.

Cruising Writers brings writers together with bestselling authors, an agent, an editor, and a world-renowned writing craft instructor writing retreats around the world.

Cruise with us to Grand Cayman this October with Kristen Lamb (Bestselling Author and Marketing Jedi), Rachel Caine (Bestselling Author of 50+ books), Deidre Knight (The Knight Agency), and Alex Sehulster (St. Martin’s Press).

Or get ready to Dive Deep and join us on a 7-day Immersion Cruise with Margie Lawson this December to Jamaica, Grand Cayman, and Cozumel!

This is a true story: 

I looked out my window this morning, as I always do while drinking my breakfast protein shake.

In the heavier than usual wind, the prayer flags flapped loudly.

Through the narrow gaps of brightly-colored material I saw a profusion of blooming tropical flowers.

Behind them, a mermaid sat on her rock. Surrounded by water. Unconcerned by the wind. Blowing through her conch shell.

Beyond her, an angel stands, arms wide, watching the tiny decedents of millenia-dead dinosaurs perform their morning sun salutations, ignoring the war machines flying overhead.

I write science fiction. Do you have a feeling for this place?

But this is not a setting from anything I'm working on. This is how I look out my kitchen window, mug in hand, while I down 10 ounces of water blended with grapefruit, ice, protein powder and spinach, while a military helicopter flew overhead. It's how I look at the world. Different from non-writers. Different from anyone else. 

And you look at the world differently than anyone else, too.

That's the beauty of being a writer. We have a license to see our world through whatever lens we want, whatever lens our characters see their world.

I'm always surprised when one of the first things other writers say when I tell them I write science fiction is, "Oh, you have to do world building. I could never do that." News flash! Every writer must build the world their character inhabits so readers know how that world operates. Even contemporary genre writers must world build.

Think about a story with a cowboy, or a short-order cook, or a doctor. We have to see—and feel—what the characters do, how they live. Otherwise we can't connect with them. This requires world building skills.

World building traditionally means describing the character's physical surroundings and societal influences.

What better way to do this than to use deep POV for your characters? If they are seeing their "usual" world and walk past the burnt out husk of a tank, sand blowing so hard they've pulled up the scarves they wear around their necks, guns slung over their shoulders, you might be reading a book about today's soldiers in the Middle East on a routine patrol in an area they are familiar with.

How do you know they are familiar with the area? From the details given through the character's POV. The "common" details are glossed over. Only enough essentials to ground the reader are shared. Something out of place or different will be noted and examined either from a distance or close-up. Danger or interest can be conveyed in the tones, attitude or physical approach or the dialogue between characters or the thoughts of one character.

A writer of historical fiction takes great care to describe the style of furniture, the material and cut of the curtains, a rug, a silver tea service—all to show you the opulence of a duke's home.

If the view is through the eyes of someone who is courting the favor of the duke, different details and a different tone will be used than a an outdoor servant who is called into the duke's study for an unknown reason and is waiting for the worst to happen. Again, tone and the careful selection of details can perform double duty by "world building" the setting and conveying the emotions of the character. For example, someone who thinks they are going to lose their position or be accused of something will definitely notice the miniature guillotine on a shelf in the study, while someone in love will notice a book of poetry lying open on a table.

Try an experiment: Pick a genre in which you don't write. Look around the room you're sitting in and describe what you see for that genre. Extra points for being a character with an agenda as you look around the room.

See, you can world build, even in a different genre. How much easier will it be in your own genre?

World building is most important at the beginning of your story, but you've got to be careful not to info dump. Using your character's POV not only shows the setting, but also the character's "take" on the setting and their overall feelings about being there. Whenever your words can do double or triple duty, your writing is more powerful.

I wrote a series on world building a while back. You can read about World Building Techniques with examples from my upcoming Winter 2018 release, Keeping Athena, here , or World Building: Social and Cultural Aspects here , or World Building: Physical Setting here. These posts were written with all genres in mind.

Do you have a question about world building (in any genre)? What techniques do you use to show the world your characters live in?

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ABOUT FAE:

Fae Rowen discovered the romance genre after years as a science fiction freak. Writing futuristics and medieval paranormals, she jokes  that she can live anywhere but the present. As a mathematician, she knows life’s a lot more fun when you get to define your world and its rules.

Punished, oh-no, that’s published as a co-author of a math textbook, she yearns to hear personal stories about finding love from those who read her books, rather than the horrors of calculus lessons gone wrong.  She is grateful for good friends who remind her to do the practical things in life like grocery shop, show up at the airport for a flight and pay bills.

A “hard” scientist who avoided writing classes like the plague, she now shares her brain with characters who demand that their stories be told.  Amazing, gifted critique partners keep her on the straight and narrow. Feedback from readers keeps her fingers on the keyboard.

P.R.I.S.M., a young adult science fiction romance story of survival, betrayal, resolve, deceit, lies, and love.

When she’s not hanging out at Writers in the Storm, you can visit Fae at http://faerowen.com  or www.facebook.com/fae.rowen

Fae also blogs at YA Outside the Lines on the fifth of every month.

 

I’m editing my novel. Again.

I don’t feel like telling you how many agains I have done in the course of turning out the best story I can deliver. But suffice it to say that when I received some wonderful feedback that convinced me I needed to go another round, I started off with determination!

And ended up huddled under my bed covers with a glass of wine, a box of tissues, and a romance novel where people actually get happy endings.

What I hadn’t counted on was a phenomenon I should easily spot by now: editing grief.

You’ve heard of the five stages of grief, right? It’s the notion that when you experience a deep loss, you go through five phases of emotion: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and finally acceptance. Editing can awaken all of these emotions as well.

Denial. I don’t need to do no stinkin’ edit!

Perhaps you believe that your book is just fine as it is. After all, your best friend, your mother, and your hamster, to whom you read your manuscript aloud, all adored your story. Besides, your book is better than the drivel you read in that bestseller you bought and tossed aside.

Or perhaps you don’t want to believe what your critique partner or group is telling you, because they just don’t understand your characters like you do.

Anger. Dang it, I do have to edit this book!

Now that you’ve admitted there are problems with your story structure, your characterization, or your prose, you’re committed to doing the edit. But why didn’t you catch all these issues earlier? Given all that you’ve learned about writing, not to mention all the reading you’ve done, you should know better by now!

Or why didn’t the contest judges, critique partners, agent, editor, etc. tell you exactly what was wrong? It could have saved you a lot of trouble if someone had helped you to see the plot and character problems earlier on. And now, you have to find time you don’t have to fix mistakes you never should have made to begin with!

Bargaining. I can accomplish my goals by just making some tweaks.

You’re convinced that if you add a little depth here and there, slip in an extra scene or delete those two scenes that weren’t pulling their weight, you can make this story work. In fact, it’s not as bad as you originally thought, because—being the savvy author you are—you should be able to breeze through the book and find just the right places to fix the minor problems.

Soon enough, this novel will be in great shape, and you’ll have it back to your ______ [critique partner, agent, editor] within no time at all. You’ll probably beat the deadline you gave yourself, thus showing just how much of a pro you are.

Depression. Dear God, this is a total rewrite! [sob]

Once you began making changes in Chapter 1, you realized that also changed Chapters 3, 8, 14, 18, 23, and 30. And this realization has happened with every change you’ve made. You might as well throw the manuscript in the nearest fire pit and start over. I mean, wouldn't that be easier?

Or what would be easier is to be a toll booth operator. No one really demands much of you there, certainly not three hundred pages of brilliance. Why did you decide to write this book anyway? You should have gone with the other story idea. In fact, what if you just wasted the last six months on an unworkable novel?

Acceptance. I’ve got this.

You’ve rolled up your sleeves and now recognize:

• Yes, this is the story you want to tell.
• You know what needs doing.
• You have all the talent and perseverance needed to turn out a fabulous book.
• You will love the final result.

As you dig further into the edits, you feel renewed hope and excitement. You actually enjoy hanging out with your characters, making sure they appeal to readers, getting their story just right. And when this edit is over, you’ll get to put on your Wonder Woman cape. Because yeah, you’re a kick-butt writer.

What stage am I in now? I’m at acceptance. But I went through all the other stages, and if you’re in one of those, hang in there. Maybe there are shortcuts through the stages, but I haven't found them. I seem to go through grief every time I have to do more editing than I originally expected.

But I'm always—always, always, always—glad in the end.

Do you go through the editing stages of grief? If you're editing now, what stage are you in and how can we talk you through?

ABOUT JULIE

Julie Glover writes cozy mysteries and young adult fiction. Her YA contemporary novel, SHARING HUNTER, finaled in the 2015 RWA® Golden Heart®. When not writing, she collects boots, practices rampant sarcasm, and advocates for good grammar and the addition of the interrobang as a much-needed punctuation mark.

Julie is represented by Louise Fury of The Bent Agency. You can visit her website here and also follow her on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.