On Seeds of Ideas and Outlines

This weekend, I was asked, "When you started writing LitD, did you do any prewriting or note taking or any system for organizing your ideas first? Or did you just jump write in and start writing? I only ask because...I started getting little seeds for a novel...trying to figure out a way to develop turning those seeds into a basic plot line is sort of tough right now. So I just wondered how you started out initially in the planning/writing process."

This is actually something I talked to the hubby about recently. Those of you who follow me on twitter and Facebook know I've been working on another novel, which I have tentatively titled WINTER ON BRIMSTONE HILL. It's a **very** fictionalized version of my life growing up on the farm. I was telling  my hubby that I'm having a harder time plotting it than I did LitD. His response was, "Well, LitD was inspired, right? This one is more...work." And it's true. LitD was the story I had to tell because it wouldn't leave me alone until I told it. I did minimal plotting. My characters introduced themselves to me and--it sounds cliche--they made everything in my novel happen.

That's not to say there wasn't any pre-writing. It took me a wicked long time to learn my MC Celia. Unlike the other characters, she had to spend much more time explaining herself. It look me somewhere between 3,000 to 5,000 words (which eventually all got cut) so I could get to get to know her. You know, this. I already wrote about it here.

The funny thing is I hadn't a plot in mind when I started writing LitD. I had a setting. I knew I wanted Celia in the Woods, but that was it. To me, the Woods would be where Celia came of age. So at first there was this big empty gap from the first fifteen pages until she got to the Woods. It wasn't until she spent some time in the Woods that I finally figured out a way for her to get there.

I tend to be organized. I like lists. Except, none of those propensities came out when I wrote LitD. I never once thought I'd be a "pantser" when it came to writing a book. Even by the time I got to the final chapters of LitD, I hadn't known exactly how it would end. When I wrote the last page, I was in disbelief. Could LitD possibly be over?

Now that I'm working on WINTER ON BRIMSTONE HILL, I'm finding that each time I attempt to plot, it gets lost, and the writing doesn't come as naturally. I've got about 20,000 words written, but right now their basic sketches of the characters instead of plot. My working outline has changed a lot since I originally started it. It's still very much taking shape.

WINTER was similar to what the person who asked me this question posed. It started with two sentences; I started to explore them. That's how I discovered Sarah (although, I might change her name). I took the two lines--"She rolled over to check if the milk was frozen. It was."--and played with the scene the two lines offered me. After I had about 3 pages typed, I changed it to first person and saw what happened. I liked it better. I had to alter some things, but it felt more genuine. Then I wrote some more, and as I kept writing, I kept slipping into first person present. So I went back and changed it to that. 

Each time I did this, I'd get this little nubbin of an idea of who Sarah is and what her world entails. I keep getting a better sense of plot. My current manuscript has all those pieces scattered between paragraphs and chapters and added to the end. Sometimes they're just lines that I've since elaborated upon, and sometimes they're tiny bits of plot. 

I wrote this way with LitD, but with LitD it felt more organized, less fragmented. I'm definitely not organized with WINTER, and it's certainly fragmented. I only have a couple scenes that have transitions into other scenes. I'm still learning about Sarah's life. I've got a good idea what I want to have happen to her, but I haven't made it "fit" yet.

I guess the whole thing I've learned so far is that I'm a pantser. I can't seem to stick to an outline; I prefer to let my characters decide what's going to happen. When I do that, the writing feels more natural. And hey, if it feels that way, it's gotta come across that way in my writing, right?

Blogging at YA Highway Today

I'm blogging at YA Highway today about writing, depression, and gaining control.

Here's a preview:

The first time I sat in my soon-to-be counselor's office, she asked me, "Why are you here?"

Why was I there? Was it because I couldn't stop crying? Was it because I couldn't rise from bed? Or, when I managed to go to class I fled halfway through, professor and classmates staring, to have my panic attack in the girls' room? Yeah, I guess it was all those things. But what I said was, "I'm losing control."


To read the post in its entirety, go here:
http://www.yahighway.com/2013/11/guest-post-by-april-c-rose-on-writing.html

Blog post fail

Happy Halloween! I'd like to apologize to the family who came trick-or-treating to my door. This is my fourth Halloween in Middle of Nowhere Central Massachusetts and the first year I didn't buy candy. It was also the first year I had trick-or-treaters. 

I was going to post something about feeling like I'm in the twilight of writing, but I've lost it. My two-year-old insists on tickling my feet, and who am I to deny her the pleasure? My post was going to be something about being in between books--the whole I'm-querying-my-novel-and-waiting-to-hear-back-from-an-agent-who's-reading-it-while-trying-to-get-beyond-the-beginning-of-two-other-novels. But it's gone. Post fail.

Now my daughter is playing with a dead lightbulb. I need to rescue said lightbulb before my daughter breaks it.

Still here.

I feel I need to post just to say I'm still here and kicking. I'm here. I'm kicking.

It's also harvest time. I spent the past three days canning applesauce and tomato sauce, making cider, and putting up peppers and beans. Tomorrow is a sauerkraut day.  This is why I haven't updated.

Don't worry. I had help.

There are perks to being a wallflower?

For the longest time, I balked any time someone would call me shy. I still don't think I'm shy. I'm an introvert. Unfortunately, I'm an introvert to the point where it's sometimes socially crippling. Good-meaning people tell me I must practice being social, that the more I socialize with people the better at it I will become. It hasn't happened yet, so I'm beginning to wonder in my over-think-everything way if it's me.

Some things about me:

1.) During social engagements, I usually go to the bathroom for the sole purpose of locking myself behind a door long enough to feel human again. If it's longer, it's usually because I can't breathe. After I leave a party, I need a solid hour alone, preferably in a turn-into-boiled-lobster shower. If I don't, I generally fold into myself. If I'm at a party too long, by the time I get home I'll cry.

2.) People misinterpret my comments as overly educated or snobby. Okay, so maybe I'm a little educated. So maybe I try to speak properly and that comes across as educated or snobby. I don't know. The truth is, I'm so afraid that what I say will be misinterpreted (few understand my jokes) or that what I say will be boring, that I don't say anything. I don't want people to think I think I'm something special. I'm not. I'm just one of billions of people out there. My thoughts aren't unique. Unfortunately, I guess that's snobbery.

3.) By the time I think of something to add to the conversation, the conversation has usually moved on. I have to internalize everything first. If I don't think through my words, I have this horrible tendency to stumble over my words because I can't find the right ones to articulate my thoughts when the pressure's on. Then everyone's staring at me and I can't handle it, and then I get embarrassed and can't remember what words I was looking for until all eyes are off me again.

Sometimes I wish things were a little more like (some) fiction--where the introverted wallflower finds a friend who picks her up and introduces her into the world of fast-moving friendliness, where the conflict comes quickly and is gone overnight.  Not the one where she builds her walls higher and higher, hoping someone will see the mountain and choose to climb.

Rejection and Fantasy

Update on rejection: I received a very nice tweet informing me I should not post about rejection in any form. I understand the concept behind it. Someone might mistakenly believe I don't got the goods ;) if she reads my manuscript has already been rejected. I can't say I like it--writing is a lonely place, and I find solace in blogging about my triumphs and struggles--but I understand it. No more posts about rejection. Cross my heart. :)

On a completely different note, I recently noticed I spend a lot of time dreaming up opening lines to books I'll never write. I don't intend to write them. I just want to write their first lines. It happens in those in-between moments when I'm drifting into sleep or driving to work, times when I'm free to think about nothing. In my "nothing" times, I fantasize about writing. How about that?

On Rejection

I've finally begun querying, and like everyone else who's in this stage, I received my first rejection letter. I thought I'd be more upset about it. But I'm not. Actually, I'm not upset about the rejection at all. Actually, I'm shocked with myself that I'm not bothered by it. Seriously.  When that letter came in my inbox a few nights ago, I had to dig through my mental file cabinets just to make sure I wasn't lying to myself. I'm not. It doesn't bother me. Wow.

I don't know why it doesn't bother me.  Maybe I've done a sufficient job convincing myself that rejection is part of the job, which it is. Maybe it's because I've been turned down through so many writing and pitch contests that I'm beginning to become desensitized to rejection. Maybe it's because it wasn't a form rejection. I'm searching through those file cabinets and I can't pinpoint the reason. Huh.  Go figure.

It's like I almost want to be upset, and I'm trying to find a reason to be upset but can't. This isn't me. I worry. I overthink. I get upset. Except not this time. Who are you, and what have you done to April?

So that was my first response--or lack of response. My second response was: YAY! I mean, how cool is that? I've joined the same club all my favorite authors have joined. And yeah, I'm kind of official now. I'm not just playing around at being a writer anymore. I'm out there, making the make, doing the do.

And so, along with this YAY! was a, how cool is it that, out of all the rejection letters for me to first receive, it wasn't a form rejection? This agent took time out of her busy life to reply to me! Kudos to awesome agent Suzie Townsend. So, you won't be my agent, but that's okay. You rock. You didn't tell me my query letter was crummy. You didn't even tell me that you didn't think my novel wasn't a good fit for you. You told me you didn't think LitD would sell given the current market. And that's cool. You've got to make a living. That is something I can totally respect. So a great big huge sincere thanks. You're awesome. :)

So yeah. I'm overly pleased with this whole thing. It doesn't make sense, but I am.

I'm actually floating on some sort of weird distorted cloud. The cloud should be cliche, because everyone floats on clouds, but it's not because I shouldn't feel this way about rejection.

So yeah. That's all I've got right now.