Things That Currently Interest Me, April Edition

1. This song from chanteuse Melody Gardot, which I cannot get out of my head (and don't want to)

2. French Milk by Lucy Knisley

3. A cup of vanilla tea, with Social Tea biscuits on the side

4. "In Treatment" and the über-foxy Gabriel Byrne, who can analyze me anytime

5. Saltwater sandals (I'm thinking yellow, but am equally drawn to the red)

6. Getting a pedicure, in the hope that I'll be wearing open-toed shoes soon

7. Pilot Varsity pens

8. A bird-in-a-nest on homemade bread with a side of bacon (if you don't want to make it yourself, and you live in the Park Slope area, a delicious version found here)

9. The rebirth of all things green

10. SCBWI New England and all the cool cats who will be attending. (I'll be there — will you?)

What's been interesting you this month?

Break Time

Just a little announcement to let you all know that Bluebird Works will be closed for the week of April 13th. I'm happy to say I'll be taking a vacation.

My little break from work and blogging has led me to think about my writing process, which involves a certain amount of self-imposed break time.  Taking a break from creative work is just as important as doing the work itself — allowing ourselves time away from a project enables us to come back with a different perspective, fresh eyes, and new ideas.

Today, for instance, I've been faced with editing a particularly thorny project.  In between my reading and note-taking and line editing, I have also accomplished the following:

1. Talked to my sister on the phone

2. Watched a forensic show about serial killers

3. Checked up on a friend whose grandfather just passed away

4. Downloaded some fantastic new music

5. Watched the story of Raymond Burr on the Biography Channel (when he wasn't acting, he hybridized orchids, bred Portuguese Water Dogs, owned part of an island in Fiji, and a vineyard in Napa.  Who knew?)

6. Gazed out the window at the torrents of rain washing down my street

Were any of these activities at all related to the manuscript I'm supposed to be editing? Nope. Were they all necessary? Abso-freakin-lutely. Without the distractions, I would have immersed myself in the manuscript to the point where it would have started feeling like forced labor.  Once I start getting that feeling, I know it's time to step away for a little while, whether it's to clear my head entirely or fill it with something completely unrelated. 

If we could just make peace with the fact that watching a "Law & Order" rerun, seeing what your friends are up to on Facebook, going for a run, taking a nap, rubbing your cat's belly, or just staring out into space, are all an inherent part of the creative process, we'd spend more time feeling good and on-track and less time feeling guilty and lazy.

Recently, I started watching "The No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency," and among many other things, I've fallen in love with the leisurely pace of the show.  One of my favorite scenes from the premiere episode is when Grace Makutsi insinuates that Precious hasn't been doing any work all afternoon.  Precious proudly informs her secretary that she's been working very hard, because she's been thinking, and thinking is a detective's most important job.  In fact, Precious most often comes upon the solution to the crime at hand while she's in the middle of thinking about something else.

We are, in many ways, like detectives. In writing (or editing) our stories, in figuring out who our characters are and why they do what they do, we are creating and solving our own mysteries.  As long as we ultimately crack the case, we should appreciate whatever we did (or didn't do) to get there. 

P.S. I also took a break today and wrote this blog. No regrets!

The Bird's on the Wing

A few announcements of my comings and goings over the next few months:

I'll be attending the SCBWI-NE annual conference from April 24-25, critiquing manuscripts and hob-nobbing with fabulous writers and illustrators. If you see me, feel free to introduce yourself — I'd love to meet you!

In addition, I'll be attending BEA this year in New York; I should be there for two days, exact dates to come. If you're a publisher or agent attending the show, and you'd like to get together, drop me a line at query@bluebirdworks.com.

And FINALLY, I'm very happy to announce that I'll be involved in two writing programs, one this summer and one in the fall.

In late June 2009, I'll be the editor-in-residence at the ASTAL (Alliance for the Study and Teaching of Adolescent Literature) Institute at Rhode Island College. Exact dates to be announced.

Also this June, I'll be lecturing on the fundamentals of editing at the summer residency for Lesley College's graduate creative writing program.  This will be the kick-off for the semester-long editing course I'll be teaching, which will be offered in the fall. Exact dates to be announced.

More news to come! Let me know if you have questions...

Inspiration Board

I've had a functioning home office for less than a year now, but it's easily my favorite room in our house. It's a lovely space on the second floor, tailored to my every need by my wonderful (and handy) husband, including plenty of natural light, extra-wide, extra-deep shelving for 11" x 17" layouts, built-in drawers for stationery and office supplies, and a big stuffed reading chair that rocks and reclines. In a word, heaven.

And yet, until recently, something had been missing. I'd feel it especially when sitting at my desk. Sure, I had a mug overflowing with pens, a framed photo or two, the requisite crocheted hotdog. But I needed something more. I needed inspiration.

I've spent a lot of time in the workspaces of my fellow "creatives" (editors, designers, et al), all of whom have an inspiration board of one kind or another. This is either an actual corkboard, or just the nearest wall, on which they've affixed all manner of ephemera — snippets of text, images downloaded from the web or clipped from magazines, funky postcards, movie posters, CD covers, successful (and unsuccessful) book jackets, and other evocative bits and bobs. In short, it's a bit like looking into that person's brain, at the creative potpourri whirling around inside. 

As we're doing creative work, it helps to have external stimuli to motivate and inspire us, especially as most of us spend so much time at our desks, away from the actual outside world. Hence, the inspiration board.

That's what I was missing. So, for Valentine's Day, ever-handy hubs took two vintage frames, some spraypaint, some foamcore, and some cork sheeting, and voila! My office was finally complete. (One of the two boards is pictured above.)

If you haven't already, I highly recommend assembling an inspiration board for yourself.  It could be a simple as taping your favorite quote to the wall over your computer or drawing table, or you could get yourself a little (or not-so-little) corkboard and go crazy. You could even tailor your board to whatever you're working on — images and quotes from an appropriate time period if you're writing historical fiction, photos from a particular locale to help you flesh out your setting, or photos of yourself as a kid if you're trying to get back in touch with your inner child.

So far, my own inspiration boards aren't as full as they could be — building them is a slow process. But here are a few things I've already put on display, to keep myself creatively-stimulated, not to mention amused:

1. A set of retro-80s ribbon barrettes, made for me by a particularly crafty author

2. A card featuring a dog standing on its hind legs while its owner awards him with a treat, under which another author of mine has written "The Editor-Writer Relationship"

3. A photo of my sister, age 8 or so, smiling while sliding headfirst down a slide, wearing a swimcap and goggles

4. A printout of my latest mantra, a quote by Octavia Butler: "Habit is more important than inspiration." 

5. A ridiculously lame toy from the 70s, in the form of an orange chenille worm with googly eyes, which I desperately wanted as a child, recently reissued (and renamed, inexplicably, "Squirmles") and bought for me by my sister at Target

6. A certain pithy fortune cookie fortune

What's on your inspiration board?

Words to Live By

I've never seen a more inspiring fortune. Have you?

Things that Currently Interest Me, March Edition

1. Seeing $1.99 movies at the Patriot 

2. Dove Dark Chocolate Promises with Almonds

3. Laurie R. King's Mary Russell series

4. "Damages" and the very kick-ass Glenn Close

5. The SXSW book publishing panel and the simultaneous mutiny/Twitter-fest of its audience

6. Making a big clothing donation 

7. What the writers of the "L Word" series finale were thinking

8. Whether I should opt for a Kindle or Sony Reader

9. When I might afford to buy a Kindle or Sony Reader

10. Fat Bastard Blushing Bastard Rosé, and the day, not long from now, that I'll be sipping it on my back porch

And you?

On Keeping a Writing Journal

If I could only give one piece of advice to writers (aside from back up your files), it would be to keep a writing journal. This is like keeping a regular diary, but you're specifically recounting your daily writing experiences and your emotional responses to those experiences.

I practice what I preach. I keep a little Moleskine notebook nearby at all times, and spend time each day jotting down story ideas and how I'm feeling about what I've written. More often than not, that feeling is crappy. But when I go on to articulate why I'm feeling so negatively, whether it's because a scene isn't working or a character doesn't fit or a dialogue exchange feels unnatural, I eventually and invariably solve the problem. There's something about figuring out a writing problem by writing it out that just works. 

For instance, I was muddling through a YA novel where the narrator's sister died in a car accident halfway through the story. After the accident, the story just fell apart. I was devastated. I wrote about it in my journal, about how everything turned to steaming doo-doo after the sister died. And then I wrote the question, What if she doesn't die? Whoa. That turned everything upside-down! Suddenly, I'd opened up the story to new possibilities, and opened myself up to a new sense of hopefulness. (Caveat: I still haven't finished the story. But that's another problem for another time.)

Also? It's valuable to keep a record of the ups and downs of your writing process. I may feel crappy and hopeless about what I'm writing most of the time, but at a certain point, a little more than halfway through, when I can see the end of the tunnel, I start feeling hopeful. When I'm working on my next story and I find myself in that crappy, hopeless mood, I can read through the journal of my previous experience and realize that A. I felt crappy and hopeless before, so this is all just part of my process, and that B. eventually, things worked out.

It may seem like a lot, to work in a routine of writing about what you're writing about, but it really is helpful. And if it helps the world's most negative, easily discouraged writer (aka moi), you should at least give it a try, don't you think?

P.S. Yes, I've used the word "crappy" a lot in this entry, and no, I'm not going to apologize for it.