Writers in the Storm

The other day I was cleaning out some boxes in the basement and came across a gift from a design agency I worked with when I was in corporate. We were in the depths of annual report season and I was ready to pull my hair out from the back and forths and revisions and redos and oy! The agency sent over a “survival toolbox” that included a candy bar, a small jar of NyQuil, a packet of Advil, and a shot glass.

That toolbox was promptly put on a shelf in my office. And it got me thinking—what would a survival toolbox for writers look like? Coffee beans, an extra large mug, chocolate, wine glass & opener, Advil, gummy bears.

*scuse me while I go fill my coffee mug and grab another bag of gummies*

Yesterday I was whining (sorry, Kathryn Craft, I was all out of gold) to a friend about various frustrations. Her response was a kicker of a reality check: “You forgot to enforce your boundaries.”

*head slap*

Coffee and gummies (or chocolate, whatever floats your boat) are all great, but maybe that survival toolbox needs to also come with blueprints for solid boundaries.

Protect your writing time.

When I first started writing, I was also working full time as a freelance writer and editor. My days were mapped out and I knew I had x amount of time to write. And I wrote during that time. There wasn’t the option for “I’ll do it later.” Later was spoken for.

Then I started writing full time. Luckily my son was in elementary school so I had all of those hours to write. Except that I had “all of those hours” to write. And that meant I also had “all of those hours” to do all the other things that needed to get done – cleaning the house, social media, volunteering, blogging, beta reading. Because I had the time. Except, with each thing I said yes to, it took away from my writing time.

Your writing time should be sacred. Whether you have an hour or four or an entire day, set your boundaries and stand firm. Sure, sometimes you have to tuck your writing behind an emergency. It happens. But it should be the exception, not the rule.

Protect your writing space.

I have an adorable office that is affectionately known as the lemon room thanks to the neon yellow walls. There’s a white board on the closet door for brainstorming, a kick-in-the-pants reminder about my mission above that door, there are bookshelves all around, and inspirational quotes tacked where I can see them. I also write on the front porch when the weather is too nice to stay indoors (or the dust bunnies are too big to ignore). Those are my creative places.

When I’m working on a blog or on association things, I usually move to the kitchen table. Granted, there have been times I sat there and wrote on one WIP or another, or spread out with revisions when my office desk felt too cramped.

But my creative places are my happy places. When I’m there, I don’t have legos spread everywhere, I don’t have to look at a pile of bills that needs to be paid, and I don’t have to see a pile of dishes out of the corner of my eye.

Whether you have a room of your own or a corner in the house or you write where you can find a clean spot to sit with your laptop, that space needs to be yours (if only for that period of time you’re using it). The only “people” you should scoot over to make space for are the characters in your head (and maybe a cat or dog).

Protect your thoughts.

Think back to when you first started dating someone. The relationship is new and exciting, maybe you mention to your friends that you’ve met someone really cool but when pressed for more, you clam up. Why? Because it’s fresh and yours. Because you don’t want the opinions of others influencing your decision on the relationship.

A new story isn’t much different than a new flame. There’s the initial courtship time when you noodle story ideas and character traits, plot twists and sidekicks. The characters become friends and what happens to them becomes personal.

A year or so ago, I started working on a new project that had me bubbling with excitement. I was completely smitten with my main characters and the story between them and so excited that I couldn’t wait to share the idea with a writing friend. Her lack of enthusiasm and criticism for my baby idea was a major bucket of ice water. That story has become my “the one I think about,” you know, the guy/gal you wonder what could have been if only you hadn’t blown them off.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying never share ideas. I have a writing friend who I always run to with new ideas. She may think that one of my ideas has a big nose or needs to learn table manners but she’d never say anything to derail the budding romance.

I read once that the first draft should be for you, the writer only. The revisions are for your agent/editor/readers. Fall in love with your characters and their story first. When you’re secure enough in the “relationship,” then go public.

Protect your energy.

Someone recently posted an image on Facebook that disturbed me for some reason. The message was actually quite nice – “Do your thing & cheer for others.” That’s a good thing, right?

So what about that bothered me? The realization that I wasn’t protecting my energy to do my own thing. I was spending so much energy cheering and supporting everyone else, that I was too drained at the end to make that same effort on my work.

One of the things I admire most about the writing community is how generous people are. I love being part of this community and being able to support writer friends. But back to boundaries … know your limitations. Know how much time you have to commit beyond your day job, your family, your writing obligations, your you time. Know when you can take on a volunteer role or a request to beta or blog or whatever you’ve been asked to do. As founding president of the Women’s Fiction Writers Association, I’ve seen so many volunteers who genuinely want to help, to give back, then find themselves stretched too thin and unable to meet all their obligations (*raising hand sheepishly*).

Set your boundaries. Make sure you leave yourself enough energy (just for clarification, I don’t mean just physical energy; I’m also talking about emotional energy) to be able to do your thing and cheer for others.

Maybe with stronger boundaries, I’ll be able to wean myself off gummy bears.

I’d love to hear if any of you have stumbled over your own boundaries. What did you do to remedy the situation? Or maybe you’re willing to share your secret for holding fast to your boundaries? And what would you put in your survival toolbox?  :-)

About Orly

After years of pushing the creativity boundary in corporate communications, Orly decided it was time for a new challenge. Three women’s fiction manuscripts later (plus a handful of picture books), it’s safe to say she’s found her creative outlet. When she’s not talking to her imaginary friends, she’s reading or at least trying to ignore everyone around her long enough to finish “just one more paragraph.” Orly is the founding president of the Women’s Fiction Writers Association.

You can find her on Twitter at @OrlyKonigLopez or on her website, www.orlykoniglopez.com.

Sierra Godfrey

Flashbacks can explain a lot about your character. Adding them into your story often gives the reader a glimpse of the texture that explains why your character does what she does—and goodness knows, we spend a lot of time thinking about how our characters got to where they are when we start telling their stories.

But implementing those flashbacks is a tricky process. Who hasn’t begun writing a novel only to have a mad urge to start with loads of explanation of what happened before That Moment?

Like everything in writing, it’s all about using them well. And then there’s the placement and length of the flashback.

I asked the Facebook group for the Women's Fiction Writers Association (WFWA) about flashbacks, in particular about starting novels with them, and they responded in full force (it’s a terrific group!). I’m sharing some of their wisdom here with you with the four following guidelines for using flashbacks:

1. The flashback should relate to what’s happening now.

Flashbacks stop your current story; that’s their nature. They show what happened before. So how do you connect before with now?

WFWA writers weighed in.

“I don't mind flashbacks as long as going back and forth doesn't become too confusing.”

This comment sums up the biggest problem with flashbacks: they shouldn’t jar the reader. The reader needs to stay present in the story – no one wants to be confused. Don’t use flashbacks to explain, but rather to show information that has bearing on the plot.

“Flashbacks can be tricky - and fascinating when done well,” said another writer. “I suspect the key is whether or not we NOTICE there's a flashback or are so wrapped up in the story we don't.”

So what if you’re champing at the bit to start your start with flashback? You want to use it to explain why your character is about to do something. For example, what if a character did something in the past that she’s never let go of, and it directly influences the choice she makes at the catalyst point in your story? What then?

Incidentally, and perhaps not coincidentally, this was exactly the problem I was working through in my own manuscript when I asked this question of the group. I couldn’t see any way around explaining how my character would make the decision she makes without first showing where she’d been.

WFWA members had a lot to say about starting the action with flashbacks.

One writer said, “As a reader, I'm okay with it, but personally prefer it to be very short and only if I really need it to move forward. I'm good with flashbacks throughout a story, but it definitely can be iffy right at the beginning.”

Another writer agreed. “Two things I've learned: 1- readers like to be kept guessing and 2- readers are smart and must be kept in suspense. Consequently, the set up should not explain too much.”

One debut author said, “I wouldn't advise starting with the flashback. Try to put it a little bit further on in the narrative, once the reader is hooked.”

Your reader hopefully falls in love with the story in the first page or three,” said another writer. “If you open with a flashback, then it will be very easy to fall out of love when the story shifts to the present. It's like bait and switch, or at least that's the general thinking about no flashbacks up front.”

Yet another writer agreed. “Remember, your opening is your promise to the reader. You must make good on that promise.”

Margaret Dilloway, author of How to be An American Housewife, and a member of WFWA weighed in with, “For How to be An American Housewife, my first book, my editor had me start with an emotionally resonant flashback. I think it just depends. Like with everything. Is that vague enough for you?”

Dilloway’s novel starts with an arresting scene of the narrator as a young girl, and then eases into the present, but connects the two with the idea that the memory is significant to the narrative going forward. We sense that the memory, and the fact that the narrator had forgotten it for years, is going to have a big impact on what happens.

In the end, I put aside the flashback and ended up chopping it up into memories here and there. It definitely didn’t belong right up front. The transition between present and past was just too big a jump. My advice there is, if you feel the urge to stick it in up front, do it. Then write the rest of the story and then see if you still feel the same way. Chances are, you’ll see other places to use that flashback—or you’ll find you’ve colored the character with the salient points anyway.

2. Readers are more forgiving of flashbacks, but agents may not be.

Most of the comments I got from the WFWA members agreed on one thing: agents hate them. So if you’re a writer seeking representation, rethink a novel that starts with a flashback. One published author of the group said, “I think there's a lot more leeway with an established author and his or her publisher when there's a known readership.”

The issue of starting the story with a flashback is that it’s rarely handled well. These types of flashbacks are often backstory and info dumps rather than skillfully woven setup—easing into the action in a way the reader doesn’t even realize is difficult.

What about prologues, you might be wondering? Be careful here. The biggest rule of thumb is don’t make the transition between past and present jarring for the reader. If a reader has invested time and emotion into the scene of the flashback prologue, then jumping into the future should be handled in a way that doesn’t jostle your reader’s brain.

3. Keep an eye on the length.

Remember that the story stops when you slip into a flashback. That means the driving force behind your narrative takes a pause to go to the bathroom at a rest stop, and while rest stops can be interesting, they’re generally hot and boring with a shocking lack of decent snacks, so they darn well should be quick and they should relate to the main story.

If a flashback takes up half the word count of the novel, you’ve probably lost your reader. Short, powerful scenes of remembering are useful, but if the memory goes longer, then treat it as a chapter—or consider cutting it down to the key moments.

Other ways to handle flashbacks so they don’t bog down the narrative or blast it with too short a memory is to frame them as a letter, diary, dream, or even a conversation between two characters.

“Remember when you stuck a fork in that toaster?” Sally asked Marian.

“Do I,” Marian said, rubbing her scarred forearm. “You were such a jerk that day, goading me into doing something to impress Troy. You were wearing that ridiculous red hat and I had just come home from my swim lesson and was dripping water all over the kitchen floor.”

Sally laughed. “Yeah, the dripping water was, in retrospect, a bad idea. But it worked with Troy, right? He was impressed. The look on his face as your hair stood on end and the kitchen caught fire was priceless. I’ll never forget it.”

Marian stared at her scars and wondered where Troy was now. If he’d been impressed by the toaster incident, he’d never said a damn thing.

(Hey, did you get thrown out of the post while reading that? I kind of did! See?)

4. For all the rules, do what works for YOUR story.

It’s important to remember that although anecdotal evidence suggests agents will not only reject us but also make the sign of the cross and douse their keyboards with holy water if we submit stories that start with flashbacks, and that while flashbacks can be jarring and must not veer off the course of the narrative, every story is different. If you are writing something that simply can’t be told without jumping back, do it.

Author Kristan Higgins, whose novel If You Only Knew deals with a recently divorced woman whose ex marries her best friend (now there’s a drama bomb of a flashback waiting to be read!) said, “I think every single one of my books has flashbacks in them. I love backstory, and my readers seem to as well. I guess the answer is, do it if it works. No rules are absolute.”

What has been your experience with flashbacks? How do you position their length, their placement in the story, and how they affect the characters? Tell us in the comments!

About Sierra

Sierra Godfrey writes fiction with international settings and always a mention of football (soccer) or two. She is a member of the Women’s Fiction Writers Association and a quarterly contributor to the Writers in the Storm. Her non-fiction essays have been featured on Maria Shriver’s Shriver Report and Architects of Change website, and in the anthology, Nothing But The Truth So Help Me God: 73 Women on Life’s Transitions (Nothing But the Truth Press, 2014). She writes weekly for Football.com and other blogs, and is also a freelance graphic designer. She lives in the foggy wastelands of the San Francisco Bay Area with her family.

Come visit her at www.sierragodfrey.com or talk with her on Twitter @sierragodfrey.

Kathryn Craft

Turning Whine into Gold

Writers, like other artists, are among the most socially liberal people I know. The artist within understands that all human emotions and perspectives beg expression; the storyteller within understands that all humans face tough stakes if we can’t reach our goals.

As in story, our life journeys matter because of something that happened to us in our past that affected the way we see things. Beneath the mask we allow the world to see, this event tattooed our tender hearts.

Writers know: we all have a backstory.

So why do we forget that once we have left our fictional worlds and re-entered real life?

On the way home from a conference last winter, a fellow author and co-presenter—after talking story all day!—got stuck in the same traffic jam as the rest of us heading south. He posted a picture of his digital speedometer on Facebook, displaying zero miles per hour, with some snide remark about how wasn’t this just peachy [translation: after spending a day doing what he loves, he might be late for dinner.]

I, on the other hand, turned around at the first available spot with a lump in my throat and used the GPS on my cell phone to find an alternate route. From a parallel road up the hill, I passed the three-mile backup. Saw the crashed cars. The stretchers lying on the road. The ambulance and police. The fire trucks. By the time I got home, the breaking story about the two teens killed had hit the Internet.

I have to wonder about that other presenter’s backstory. Why he thought it was all about him and his inconvenience. Had he been through something so overwhelmingly horrific in his life that empathy feels too dangerous, and he can only tap into it when safely behind the keyboard? Was it so bad he feels the laws of statistics should guarantee smooth sailing? Or was he born to a family who provided for his every whim, and the worst that’s ever happened to him was that lukewarm shower he had to take because the plumber didn’t think their water heater coil was a true emergency?

Pretty sure he doesn’t have my backstory: my 21-year-old nephew was killed in an accident on that same stretch of road.

What if this presenter hadn’t stopped to answer additional questions, and had left a few minutes earlier? He might have been on one of those stretchers, so grateful for the emergency personnel who closed the roadway and made a priority of tending to his injuries.

A dreaded commute is full of strangers whose imagined backstories will save your sanity. Could the “idiot” who just cut you off on the highway be a woman who is finally running away from her abuser? Or a man on the way to the hospital, with a child who is bleeding out in the backseat? It doesn’t hurt to think that way. Anger will not get you there any faster.

I once read a Facebook post in which a bestselling author actually complained about the “pressure” she felt from fans who wanted her to write faster. Um, maybe she was missing the obvious, that this “public shaming” was meant as a compliment?

When all else fails, my favorite backstory: she would have been nice, she even wanted to be, but her nanny dropped her on her head when she was little and she’s never been the same since.

Once you step away from your work, don’t forget that compared to mere mortals, writers have empathic superpowers. When you’re faced with someone taking inexplicably frustrating actions, remember what you know about story: we’ve all been through some s**t. This fact alone can explain away a bad review, a snippy comment from a fellow author, or the sudden absence of expected support. And it wouldn’t hurt anyone if you assign this yahoo a backstory that will rid your day of anger and replace it with curiosity, imagination, and empathy.

You’ll be happier, and it just might lead to story.

Do you make up stories that help you get through the day? Please share!

About Kathryn

Kathryn Craft is the author of two novels from Sourcebooks: The Art of Falling, and The Far End of Happy (featured in Target until the end of August!).

Her work as a developmental editor at Writing-Partner.com, specializing in storytelling structure and writing craft, follows a nineteen-year career as a dance critic. Long a leader in the southeastern Pennsylvania writing scene, she hosts lakeside writing retreats for women in northern New York State, leads workshops, and speaks often about writing.

Kathryn lives with her husband in Bucks County, PA.

Twitter: @kcraftwriter
FB: KathrynCraftAuthor