Radical Revisions

I promised to touch on some highlights of Lauren Groff's seminar, "After the First Draft." The three-hour seminar on Sunday was sponsored by the Writing Room and the Emrys Foundation. Lauren is the author of the NY Times Bestselling novel The Monsters of Templeton and the prize winning short story collection, Delicate Edible Birds. But you knew that, right?

Lauren had some terrific things to say about revision-- re-visioning-- your draft.

For example, she recommends several "radical ideas" for seeing your work in a new light. From her lecture and handout:

--Turn over your finished stories and start anew. "This is what I do with at least two drafts of everything. Believe it or not, it makes your work stronger, and teaches you to not be attached to the individual text. If there is a metaphor or moment in your first draft that you love and want to hold on to, it may not be necessary if you don’t remember to put it into the second draft. Plus, you can go through the first and cannibalize it for the good stuff."
--Get out the scissors, and cut each paragraph out. "Put the paragraphs in order on the floor, so that you can see your work as a whole, and then shift them around, so that they’re in the proper order. Flannery O’Connor used to do this."
--"If you write by computer, on the draft that has all structural and character questions addressed (the draft in which you’re only concentrating on language), print it out and rewrite by hand, line by line, bearing down hard on your language. Then rewrite back onto your computer.

Sound time consuming? Lauren says these methods save her tremendous amounts of time, by forcing her to see her drafts in a fresh way, and letting the story that wants to be told reveal itself.

Lauren Groff and Deno Trakas read tonight

If you're in the Palmetto State [or even NC], don't miss two fine writers reading from their work tonight for the Reading Room, the Handlebar. 7 pm. In a BAR. With Q&A. Books available for purchase. btw, Lauren gave a great seminar yesterday, on "After the First Draft." More about that--and some great tips-- tomorrow.

Lauren Groff grew up one block from the Baseball Hall of Fame in New York. She graduated from Amherst College and has an MFA in fiction from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her short stories have appeared or are forthcoming in several journals, including The Atlantic Monthlyand Ploughshares, and in the anthologies Best AmericanShort Stories 2007, Pushcart Prize XXXII, and Best New American Voices 2008. She received the Axton Fellowship in Fiction at the University of Louisville and has had residencies and fellowships at Yaddo and the Vermont Studio Center. Her first novel, The Monsters of Templeton (February 2008), was shortlisted for the Orange Prize for New Writers. Her second book, Delicate Edible Bird, is a collection of stories. Both books are published by Hyperion/Voice.

Deno Trakas has supported and been supported by Hub City since its first project and is featured in Hub City’s New Southern Harmonies, a collection of short stories. He has published fiction and poetry in more than two dozen journals, including The Oxford American and The Louisville Review. He is the author of two chapbooks, The Shuffle of Wings and Human & Puny. His novel, After Paris, was a finalist for the James Jones Award for a First Novel, and his play, The Old Man and the Tree, won Harvey Jeffrey’s Original One-act Play Contest at Lander University. Trakas has a master’s degree from the University of Tulsa and PhD from the University of South Carolina. An English professor at Wofford College, he serves as director of the writing center and coordinator of the creative writing program.

On Handling Criticism...

My guest post on the assigned topic of "criticism" at A Good Blog is Hard to Find:

Criticism?

Avoid looking for it.

Stop Googling yourself! Especially late at night when you think no one is looking. You won’t go blind or grow hair on your palms—well, probably not—but it’s habit forming…and after a while, the thrill is gone, anyway. Save your blocks of isolation for writing--not reading about your writing. ...CONTINUE READING...

Ode to Book Clubs

I met with three book clubs this week, three days in a row.

It's a great gig-- meeting with people who read and talk about books, ask intriguing questions, ask you to sign their books...and [often] drink wine.

Pictured here is a book club from Anderson, SC. They drove all the way to the Coffee Underground in Greenville to meet with me on Wednesday. The nice waiter took this photo so I could be in the picture, too. [That's me in front with the circle necklace--it's made of recycled cobalt bottle glass from the wonderful "outsider art & funky jewelry" Christopher Park Gallery...TMI I know.]

Homer & Langley

Finished E.L. Doctorow's latest novel, Homer & Langley...and it's around here somewhere, among the stacks of newspapers, under the magazines, grand pianos, baby carriages, cardboard boxes...kidding. Kidding.

Loosely based on a pair of famous hoarders, the Collyer brothers, the novel is sad but intriguing, a study of eccentrics [with a fiction writer's eye], and how they fascinate. Especially wealthy eccentrics who hoard, or opt out of tradition and BIG ASS QUOTE "normal" BIG ASS UNQUOTE life. If you're a fan of the documentary Grey Gardens, the biography, The Secret History of the Lonely Doll, the novel, Housekeeping, as I am, you'll want to read Homer & Langley.

On an interview on CBS News about his latest novel, Doctorow mentions that he still finds writing difficult. "I try to write 500 words if I can. That's an enormous achievement usually."

The Inherent Intelligence of Wildness

In last week's Novel Writing class, we focused on creating compelling characters. I encouraged everyone to note how telling details, yearnings, inner conflicts help build complex characters.

Trolling for character sketches? The obituary pages never fail to offer up fascinating characters....I mean people.

Case in point: Today's obit from the NYT about a Zen abbot and photographer:

He set up an institute to apply Zen principles to environmental matters, hoping to bring people closer to “the inherent intelligence of wildness.” He also began a program to teach Zen to prison inmates...
The monastery [he helped found] fit right into a Catskills spiritual scene that already included Zen, Hindu, Tibetan Buddhist, yoga and various New Age centers. Abbot Loori decreed that 80 percent of the 230 acres he had just bought would have to remain “forever wild,” which meant no manicuring of the landscape.

How to Introduce a Rock Star

The scene: yesterday's Book Your Lunch author series. A sold-out crowd.

I had the honor of introducing Ron Rash, whose prize-winning, break-out novel SERENA is just out in paperback.
Besides the usual "he was born in....he holds a degree from...he's the author of..." yadda yadda stuff, I wanted to add a little zip, especially because I've known Ron since way before he up and got famous.

An excerpt from my intro of said lit rock star:

SERENA has been described as "a gothic tale of greed, corruption, and revenge with a ruthless, powerful, and unforgettable woman at its heart, set amid the wilds of 1930s North Carolina."

Ron has said SERENA was the most challenging of his novels to write. I believe his quote was “it about killed me.” About SERENA, he has said, “While there have been many novels about women who have wielded great power within a family, how many have been about a woman who is a ‘captain of industry,’ especially in novels set in the past? This aspect of Serena made her even more intriguing to me.”

And intriguing to a slew of readers and critics, too:
SERENA was a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award, the largest peer-juried prize for fiction in the United States.
The Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance (SIBA) named it Book of the Year in July.
SERENA Made New York Times literary critic Janet Maslin’s list of her 10 Favorite Books of 2008—no small feat.

For those of us locally, regionally, who have for decades admired Ron’s work as a poet and fiction writer—the fact that he is is being recognized nationally—internationally—well, we say finally. For the yankees to fawn over him—The New York Times no less— we say what took ya’ll so long?

After reading from SERENA, Ron took questions from the audience. A few highlights:

ONE FOOT IN EDEN, Ron's first novel, has just been translated and released in France, to high acclaim, although just how Appalachian-speak gets translated in French is, shall we say, curious. One French critic referred to Ron as "the bumpkin writer"... the term "bumpkin" apparently used with no disparity, but with sincerity... like "mystery" writer.

Serena, the character, is based in part on Lady Macbeth and Queen Elizabeth. You many have noticed she speak in iambic pentameter.

Serena is a villainous character, even evil, as Ron admits. Like most villains, HOW they chose evil is not important, and Ron notes that exploring why-- childhood incidents, for example-- diminishes them. Evil characters are mysterious, because evil is beyond description. Ron pointed out that when Thomas Harris wrote about Hannibal Lecter's past, and how it drove him to his murderous deeds, Hannibal became less interesting. You can't humanize evil, perhaps.

Ron thinks of his first drafts as clods of clay-- awful at first, barely readable-- to be shaped with subsequent drafts. I was happy to hear this...it's my process, too, and one I recommend in my classes-- the whole $%#$@! first draft thing.

All in all, a splendid event! A looooong line of readers to sign Ron's books, too. Even the $8 parking ticket waiting for me on my ancient Volvo wagon outside did not dampen my spirits.

Fall Garden equals Middle-Age

The harvest is in, the full bloom is near fading, seedheads rattling.

The hummingbirds have stopped buzzing through, loading up on nectar for their migration to Central America... a few Monarchs flutter by.

Autumn is poignant.

Shown here: swamp sunflower, cosmos, gourds

SIBA Panels and Spicy Readings

The Southern Independent Booksellers Association held their annual trade show in my fair town over the weekend. I was lucky enough to be on a panel--South Carolina Writers--with novelists Nicole Seitz [Saving Cicadas, out Dec. 1] and Mary Alice Monroe [Last Night Over Carolina]. That's us pictured here: from left, Mary Alice, Nicole, moi. If we look ecstatic, it's because this was AFTER the panel when we headed downtown for some Caribbean fusion and adult beverages.


And speaking of South Carolina... Last night's Emrys Reading Room series featured authors Sue Lile Inman and Robert Inman [NO relation believe it or not] who read from their works, both poetry and prose, and answered questions from the audience. It was a very satisfying evening,by all accounts.

Bob, who lives in North Carolina, read from his work in progress, a novel called The Governor's Lady. The title elicited snickers of course, and he said he might revise part of it-- setting part of it in Argentina. Several of us in the audience were tempted to yell, "You lie!" but we have impeccable manners, we were raised right, and would never do anything so vulgar.

On Being and God's Gardners

Can't wait to read Margaret Atwood's newest novel, THE YEAR OF THE FLOOD-- what she calls "speculative fiction," aka literary science fiction. The story includes God's Gardeners "a religion devoted to the melding of science, religion, and nature, which has long predicted a disaster. " Atwood has always been smart about the promotional aspects of novel writing as well. [I hear she invented a kind of pen that allows authors to virtually autograph books.I kid you not.] She is on Twitter and has a stunning website for THE YEAR OF THE FLOOD.
There, you can nominate a "flood saint."

And now on to "Being" in the moment.For those of us who find writing a spiritual practice:

I love this quote from Virginia Woolf [thanks to Dani Shapiro's terrific blog about writing, which features this quote]:

Every day includes much more non-being than being. This is always so. One walks, eats, sees things, deals with what has to be done; the broken vacuum cleaner; ordering dinner; washing; cooking dinner. When it is a bad day the proportion of non-being is much larger.-- Virginia Woolf

Two Good Reads

Book report day. From the towering stack of TBRs on my bedside, two recommendations this week.

Last week I finished reading Alice Hoffman's The Story Sisters. I loved it. Hoffman, as usual, is such a fine storyteller, you'll lose sleep reading just one more page, one more page...

In honor of the late John Updike, I'm reading Rabbit at Rest. It's the last of the Rabbit books, the one I hadn't yet read. I'm reminded what an accomplished writer Updike was-- his prose is elegant, fresh, richly visual; the scenes unwind and flow with ease. Updike is one of those writers who takes his time describing his characters, even minor characters. Example: Rabbit's point of view, taking in his golf partner:

Joe Gold owns a couple of liquor stores in some city in Massachusetts called Framington. He is stocky and sandy and wears glasses so thick they make his eyes look like they're trying to escape from two little fishbowls, jumping from side to side.

Win Something! But Don't be a Deadhead[er]

This is the posting #200 on Novel Thoughts! Yeah! Let's celebrate.

Comment here or email me [but I prefer you comment so we can all, you know, share.] In one week--that's by next Tuesday, Sept. 15--I'll draw a name and mail you something cool...like a galley or a book or some seeds.

Meanwhile, you're not a dead header, right? don't go deadheading your coneflowers. Pleassssse don't. In fact, in the fall garden, you can sit back and enjoy the show-- the birds and butterflies. They'll feast on the seeds-- coneflower, butterfly bush, black-eyed susan, sunflowers, Joe-pye weed...leave 'em. Hands off, hubby. Clippers away, Pedro. It's feasting time for the critters. And a neat garden-- is a hungry, sad place this season. On the other hand, a big ol' seed-filled, rattling pods, undead-headed garden is so fun and generous and filled with critters. Goldfinches galore!