I own a Kindle!

I got it!
I got it!
I got it!
I got a Kindle for Christmas!
Yes, yes. I know. Kindles are the demise of the publishing world.
With these electronic gadgets in hand, no one will ever buy a physical book again.
All kinds of literary geniuses will be out of work--big publishers, indie presses, authors, editors, agents, bookstores.
Amazon will have the corner on the e-publishing market and will dictate prices, terms, everything, putting all other publishers out of business. It will be the end of an era. No more freedom of written speech.
Gone.
It will all be gone.
As a writer, I should be screaming.
But I don't believe it.
A Kindle, for me, is for the books I would normally read and then pass along.
It's for the fast-reads.
The pure entertainment.
The books that I read simply to get to the end.
And thanks to the Kindle, I will be unable to pass these books along.
My friends and family will have to go out and buy these particular books themselves because they are not getting their hands on my Kindle. Maybe they will get Kindles too, and then they will be unable to pass their copies along.
Who benefits from that?
Yes. The right to share and resell books is something that we have cherished as a culture from the beginning of printed time. But here's what will happen: e-book prices will have to come down, way down.
Buying an e-book will be cheaper than buying a used book.
And guess what Amazon?
Eventually, you will have to share.
Just like physical books, e-books will become available through all e-book publishers, which will pop up all over the place. Our capitalistic society will not allow this monopoly to continue. It will start with the black market, just like it did in the e-music industry.
Pirates will hack into Amazon's book files, convert its books into formats compatible with Sony readers and other e-book devices, and either give them away or sell them cheap. It will all come to a head in court and the industry will be forced to change.
And people will still crave physical books.
I know I do.
And I got plenty of real books for Christmas: the latest from John Irving and Philip Roth. Immigrant, Inc., a nonfiction book co-authored by my dear friend Robert Smith.
Another novel with a title that escapes me.
And I will still buy physical books.
A novel by a new friend, Beth Hoffman, is due for release Jan. 12. I will be at her first book signing that same day with five copies in hand of Saving CeeCee Honeycut, waiting in line for her autograph.
No, my Kindle could never replace the real thing.
It will simply make reading more fun and more portable.
It will allow me to read while my twins play at Jumping Joey's or while I'm waiting in the parking lot for the older kids to be released from their Architecture by Children club or while my oldest son is practicing basketball.
It will allow me to read more books and read them more often.
And I will pay for it.
I will probably pay lots for it because I will be reading lots more.
No.
The Kindle is not the demise of the publishing book.
The Kindle is the answer for the publishing world.
And the answer for time-strapped, stay-at-home, writer moms like me.

I am a coffee addict, or am I?

Winds are gusting at about 50 miles-an-hour so far today and the weather folks are warning us to prepare for power outages. The last time we had gusts this strong--the effects of Hurricane Ike---we lost power for four days.
My first thought?
I'd better brew fresh coffee.
Quick.
Four kids, and that was my first thought.
I'm an addict.
It's time I admitted it.
In my defense, we do have gas heat and a gas stove. Even without power we will be warm and I can cook. So really, all I can do to prepare is to stock up on batteries and candles and maybe get some ice to keep the milk cold. I could do that now. The twins are at the sitters' house for another half hour.
But I don't want to.
I just keep thinking about that coffee that will done brewing any minute.
Coffee with milk and one Splenda.
Drinking it at the kitchen table with today's newspaper spread out before me.
Maybe it's not so much a caffeine addiction as it is an addiction to what that cup of coffee stands for. I rarely wrote on deadline without coffee beside me in my full-time journalism days. I walked to the cafeteria for coffee whenever I needed to think.
I met my friends in coffee shops.
I wrote good chunks of my novel in an Arizona Starbucks.
My husband and I often end date nights in coffee shops.
So maybe that's it.
Maybe coffee stands for an identity that started to fade when I had my first two kids and that sometimes seems forever lost now that I have the twins.
But I don't have time to think about that now.
The coffee is done.
The clock in ticking.
The newspaper is waiting.

Christmas the online way

I almost did it.
I almost bought book 6 of the 39 Clues series at a mall book store the other day for nearly $13.
Full price.
Then I stopped myself.
Wait, I said.
Wait for Cyber Monday.
The wait paid off.
Today, I ordered the same book online for $6.50, about half the price, and book 7 for $8.76.
I love Cyber Monday.
And even more than that, I love online Christmas shopping.
I first became familiar with online Christmas shopping when my oldest children were four months old and 22 months old. My infant daughter was allergic to milk protein and had an intolerance for soy.
She could drink only breast milk and she refused to take it from a bottle.
I don't mind nursing in public, but nursing in a crowded mall at Christmas time while trying to entertain a toddler was just no fun. So, one day, I put my son down for a nap and my daughter in her vibrating infant seat and started clicking.
I couldn't believe it.
In about an hour's time, I was done.
Not only had I finished my shopping, but I was easily able to comparison shop, and most online retailers offered free shipping. I saved a bunch of money. I knew then and there that I would never fight the Christmas throngs at a mall again.
That doesn't make me a Scrooge.
I know that the whole mall-battle thing is part of the holiday tradition.
I still enjoy wandering its halls on a weekday evening (never on a weekend) during the holiday season, checking the displays and the quirky novelty items that retailers somehow convince us everyone needs (How about a hand deodorizer? Or maybe a fancy set of nose hair tweezers? That will impress your significant other.).
Sometimes, I pick up a few stocking-stuffers, or wander into a book store and spend way too much money (I'm addicted to book stores). Or maybe I'll just have a slice of pizza in the food court and buy a Far Side calendar for my husband from a kiosk.
But I don't have to buy anything.
I feel no pressure.
And I don't have to stand in line for a register.
I can just leave if I want to.
I can take the twins on a Monday afternoon, let them ride the carousel or the train (with the money I saved online), let them play in the kids' play area, then slather their little hands with sanitizer and buy them some ice cream (with some more of the money I saved online).
Or I can take the older kids to the temporary game store (You know. The one they set up for Christmas with all the cool stuff you usually see only in catalogs.) and let them peruse the aisles as long as they want.
Maybe I'll take them to Hallmark, where they'll wistfully examine all the Webkinz and press the buttons on all the silly little talking ornaments that cost a fortune. We can even wave to Santa and pass by the line that snakes down past the customer service desk, knowing they'll get a chance to chat with him at an upcoming Cub Scout pack meeting.
Better yet, thanks to Cyber Monday and to this whole online shopping craze, I can stay home if I want to.
I can tickle my twins, play board games with my older kids, or settle on the sofa with my husband after they've all fallen asleep, watching A Christmas Story for the zillionth time and sipping on juice glasses half full of Baily's.
All this, while my friends, neighbors and relatives are at the mall.

Like your agent

An author-friend signed with a big agency.
His agent sold his novel within two months.
To an indie press.
Now, this particular independent publisher has an excellent reputation. His novel might have ended up there eventually. But he will never know, and his is the story I tell most often when writers ask me for advice in searching for an agent.
From what I understand, this agent submitted the manuscript to several large houses at once. And the author's novel was rejected by all of them.
His agent immediately argued that the same scenario would play out if they continued to submit to larger imprints. Why waste time? The author had misgivings. But his agent persuaded him that the indie presses were the best option, even though the novel was well-received by the big publishing houses.
It just was not what those particular editors were searching for.
He finally agreed.
Then along came novel number two.
The agent submitted the manuscript to only one publisher: the same independent press that published the first book. The author was thrilled because he has developed a good relationship with the folks at the indie press.
All is well.
But is it?
Was his agent really looking out for his best interests as a career novelist?
Or did he quickly realize that selling this novel would be hard work, and did he "sell him out" for the sake of a quick commission?
My own agent has been submitting my novel for four months. He is moving slowly, submitting only to editors he knows and respects. He has kept me informed, telling who has passed and why; who still has the manuscript; and who he will submit to next.
At the very least, I am confident that wherever my manuscript eventually lands, he will have found the best fit. I know that because I trust my agent and because, well, I like the guy.
That's important.
You have to like and trust your agent.
So often, writers start the query process with the biggest agencies, believing that bigger is better. But people are people no matter where you go. The big agencies have great agents and lousy agents. The small agencies, or the loners, might take a great personal interest in their clients, or they might take on too much and "sell out" a few for a quick buck.
My point is this:
Lots of books and Web sites explain the mechanics of finding an agent.
But there are two things many will not tell you.
First, educate yourself. Know how the submission process should work and then talk to your potential agent about how he/she does things. If something doesn't feel right or if she/he is too vague, trust your instincts.
Move on.
Second, sign with someone you like.
Why would you put your career in the hands of someone who rubs you the wrong way?
Your agent is your connection to the publishing world, your representative with the people who might buy your book. Your choice in agent is reflective of you and your work. Your agent doesn't have to become your best buddy, but don't selective a representative whose personality hasn't even impressed you.
Sure there's more:
Choose an agent who represents your genre, find someone who is well-established the literary world, who has continually represents the same clients (If all the agent's other clients ditch him/her after the first book and find someone else, that's not a good sign.)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
There's all that.
But there is so much to be said for intuition.
Go with your gut.

Slump. Please help.

I am in a reading slump.
And it's disappointing.
Until recently, I'd always had two or three books going at once. I kept one on my nightstand, one on the kitchen counter and one near the treadmill in the basement.
Now, only the nightstand holds a book and it's gathering dust.
I just haven't had time to pick it up.
Time.
Maybe that's the problem.
I haven't used the treadmill since summer.
I'm always on the defensive in the kitchen these days, trying to keep our very-independent twins from emptying the fridge, pretending to cook on the stove and pushing chairs up to cabinets to get the van keys out of my purse.
I never seem to sleep anymore.
I have too much to do.
But I love to read.
I crave a good novel.
I enjoy the escape.
This is a place where I cannot remain.
It is time to map a new course.
The trouble is that I don't know where to begin.
Do I try to get more sleep, foregoing the measly hour a night I get to hang out with my husband, cuddle, watch silly sitcom reruns and talk uninterrupted?
Do I climb on the treadmill more often, ignoring the editing, writing, cleaning and cooking that tear me in other directions? And, oh yes, our four kids?
Do I remove all glass and hot sauces from the fridge, disconnect the gas from the stove and disable the horn button on my key chain so I can just set the twins loose in the kitchen while I read?
Or am I looking in the wrong direction entirely?
Is it the novels?
Is that the problem?
It seems that over the summer, the novels I picked up were impossible to put down. They pulled me out of my world with so much force that I couldn't resist. Not even four kids, a messy house and a pile of unedited interviews could keep me in reality.
Nothing I've read lately has done that for me.
So, perhaps, it's not the time constraints at all.
Maybe, what I really need is a good book.
Any suggestions?

A new friend. a new inspiration: fighting inflammatory breast cancer

I had dinner last night with a woman who, according to all the statistics, should have been getting her meal through an IV at a Hospice center.
Instead, she was scooping up cheese and beef with tortilla chips from a platter shared with a friend at Cheeseburger in Paradise.
Ashley has inflammatory breast cancer, the deadliest of breast cancers and among the most deadly of all cancers.
She was diagnosed in May and, by then, it was already in her lungs, bones and liver.
She is married and has two children, a 3-year-old and a 7-year-old.
About the same time she was diagnosed, I'd had a scare.
A red circle, following the pattern of my veins on my breast, appeared out of nowhere.
My OB said that if it progressed any further at all, even the tiniest bit, he was sending me to an oncologist because it wasn't an infection and the only explanation he could find was inflammatory breast cancer.
The redness diminished with the help of Motrin and disappeared, thank God.
But in that short time, I'd done enough research to be scared when I met Ashely last night.
No.
Terrified.
I'd learned that IBC generally appears as discoloration (red, pink, orange or general darkness) or irritation on the skin of the breast; spots that are warm top the touch; thickness of breast skin with an orange-peel-like texture; swelling of one breast; or nipple retraction. Sometimes, it's painful, but not always.
Most women simply figure it will go away.
By the time they see a doctor, it's too late.
"Stage doesn't matter with inflammatory breast cancer," Ashely said.
And it's true.
The disease spreads like wildfire. By the time symptoms appear, the cancer has spread so far that chances of survival are slim. About 40 percent of women with IBC survive five years, according to The American Cancer Society. That compares with 87 percent for all breast cancers combined.
Yet there she was.
Ashley.
Scooping cheese and beef with tortilla chips.
Laughing with friends, new and old.
Saved, so far, by research and awareness.
Ashely just finished round five of chemo. She has been drained of estrogen because this type of cancer feeds on it. She takes a drug that rebuilds her bone tissues as chemo destroys it. She will have her uterus and ovaries removed in a few weeks as a preventative measure.
A recent scan showed no discernible spots in her lungs. The masses in her liver and breasts had shrunk. They couldn't see the bone tissue because of the drug, but the doctors believe chemo is working on that too.
She's had a new scan on Wednesday and was still waiting for those results.
Ashley is living, and she is improving.
Against the odds.
October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month.
Ashely and another friend, my neighbor Kristy, persuaded me to demand an MRI instead of a mammogram this next time around because of my extensive family history of breast cancer (My grandmother died of it and my mother and sister are survivors) and because of the fact that, so far, I've had two scares.
After meeting Ashley, I've decided I will do that.
Like I said, October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month.
But why wait.
Even just a few days.
I am going to take charge.
Now.
How about you?

Big Purple Mommy

For the past few months, I struggled to breathe.
I was under water and I'd lost my focus.
I couldn't find the surface and I was running out of air.
I was dying.
As a writer.
Okay, so maybe that's a little dramatic.
But that's how it felt.
Like the daily duties of life, the needs of everyone in my life, the needs of the household, mine own less glamorous needs (dental visits and doctor visits and a glass of red wine at the end of the night) were closing in around me.
Confusing me.
I had lost my focus.
I couldn't find my laptop.
I couldn't breathe.
I couldn't figure out how or when to write.
I thought maybe I was getting too old, wearing down, losing my creativity, losing my mind.
Then I saw it.
Sitting right there on the bookshelf in the basement across from my desk.
Big Purple Mommy by Coleen Hubbard.
And I remembered the last time Coleen Hubbard saved me from drowning.
We were living in Arizona.
My older kids were 18 months old and almost three.
I had written a few chapters of my novel, but not much.
I just couldn't seem to figure out how to write any more.
Somehow, I stumbled upon her book.
I read it and, a few days later, hired a sitter.
Two actually.
They were sisters (Thank you Andrea and Amanda!) and they insisted on coming together.
Two days a week for four hours a day, I sat in a study room in the local l library and wrote, finally completing the first draft within a few months.
I went back to teaching as an adjunct when I finished, something else I enjoyed, and I didn't worry about my writing. I knew it needed a rest, I knew I need some distance from my novel and I knew my creativity would come back.
We moved, we settled into our home in Cincinnati and I picked up the novel again a few years ago and revised it.
It felt good.
And it was all because of Coleen Hubbard's book.
Big Purple Mommy is all about balancing creativity and motherhood. She helped me realize, with lots of testimony from other creative moms, that I needed to, first, give myself a break when my kids were young, and second, make a huge effort to carve out time for creative work without guilt.
I did that and I was happy.
I began rereading the book again the other day.
And I found myself in its pages.
I'd lost my focus because the twins have stopped napping and because the twins are 2.5 years old. But time will pass, they will get older and they will be less demanding on a minute-by-minute basis. I will not lose my creativity during that time because stuff is always swirling in my head.
If anything, I might just mature as a writer because of it.
The twins will start going to a sitter three days a week for three hours each time next week.
I'll need some of that time to do ordinary things I can't do when they are around--clean, doctor appointments, run errands--but at least one of those days will be mine, all mine.
And I will write.
Thank you Coleen.
Thank you Big Purple Mommy.
For rescuing me again.

Everybody's dancing but me

This is the week of the happy dance in the Cincinnati area.
School starts Aug. 24 in our district. Some schools started last week. Others start this week.
Parents all over the region are clicking their heels high in the air.
They are doing jigs, popping their joints, sliding gracefully across the kitchen floor.
Not me.
I haven't even bought school supplies yet.
I'll be dancing away Sept. 9 when my twins start preschool. I adore those little guys and they are a blast, but I get nothing done when they are around. They will go for only four hours a day, two days a week.
We'll all benefit from that.
But I'm finding it hard to let the older kids go this year.
I'll be honest.
I have great kids.
My oldest son is nine and my daughter will be eight this month.
Eightty percent of the time, they get along beautifully. They are each other's best friend. When they do argue, it's never because one was intentionally cruel to the other.
They don't do that kind of thing.
And they are really smart: book smart and people smart.
I can talk to them about grown-up stuff and they understand. I can explain the impact of their own behaviors and they understand. They are sensitive and empathetic, so much so that I often have to remind myself that they are children.
And when they are gone, I miss them.
Two weeks ago, they went to Pennsylvania for seven days with my husband for their grandfather's funeral. I'd never been away from them for so long before and I quickly came to appreciate how much they help me around the house and with the twins.
Yes, they have their moments.
Sometimes, they are so whiny I just want to scream.
Sometimes they decide to do "experiments" and they destroy my kitchen.
Sometimes they find every reason possible to avoid going to bed and when 9 o'clock turns into 11 o'clock, I'm ready to tear my hair out.
But there is one other thing that tips the scale in their favor, no matter what else my older kids might do:
When their friends ask them what I do, they don't say, "She makes us dinner." They don't say, "She drives us to school." They don't say, "She cleans the house, takes care of the twins or does the dishes."
They say, "My mom writes books."
My mom writes books.
That's what they say.
Nope.
I just can't feel the rhythm of that happy dance.

Waiting

The Waiting Place ...
... for people just waiting.
Waiting for a train to go
or a bus to come, or a plane to go
or the mail to come, or the rain to go
or the phone to ring, or the snow to snow
or waiting around for a Yes or No
or waiting for their hair to grow.
Everyone is just waiting.

--Dr. Seuss: Oh, The Place You'll Go!-

Including me.
And it's killing me.
I thought the hardest part of this whole publishing thing would be finding an agent. So when I did, I figured I was relieved of the stress, that my agent would take that load off me and I would be free to pursue everything else.
But it doesn't work that way.
I was naive.
I had no idea just how hard it is to wait.
Yes, I had to wait when I was sending out query letters to agents, but that was active waiting. I never knew when I checked my email whether I would find a rejection; or a request for a partial or full manuscript; or a request for my nonfiction proposal.
And, if I got a rejection, I didn't let it get me down.
I just whipped off another query letter and prepared to wait again.
I'll admit it; it was kind of fun.
It was even kind of exciting.
This is different.
Don't get me wrong.
I appreciate being in this situation.
And I have a great agent who will do great things.
But, while he is submitting to publishers, I am simply doing everything I possibly can to distract myself. I'm trying not to get my hopes up every time the phones, trying not to check my email every ten minutes, trying not to imagine a whole bunch of editors saying, "Nah."
I'm really trying.
I've written another chapter of my second novel. I'm working on a freelance piece. I'm tearing wallpaper off bathroom walls. I am concentrating on my four children and on making their summer a good one.
But it's not enough because I still have time to think.
Think.
Think.
Think.
Sigh.

Twilight: why even literary snobs are in the author's debt

I did not want to read it.
I am not a fan of romance.
And I generally dislike the paranormal stuff.
I have a backlog of books I'd prefer to immerse myself in.
But the intrigue finally got to me.
I had to know how one book could could enrage so many writers and, at the same time, convert thousands, at least, of people who had not picked up a book in decades into passionate readers.
So when a friend offered me a copy of Twilight, I couldn't resist.
And I was surprised.
Very surprised.
The answer to Stephenie Meyer's success is simple, but it is also quite complicated.
It's not the writing that makes Twilight a best seller. It is a combination of psychology, seductive descriptions, simple language and skilled storytelling. And that combination is too perfect to argue that Stephenie Meyer simply got lucky.
Let's start with the psychology.
Like any good romance writer, Meyer' chooses a girl who believes herself to be ordinary, who has never even had a date, who is so much like so many of us, especially when we were in high school.
She takes this girl and makes her the object of a highly desirable man's obsession. She gives every ordinary girl or woman out there hope. She feeds her fantasies. She helps her feel good about herself and feel good about her potential self.
Next, she draws vivid and fascinating portraits of these vampires.
I want to watch them walk. I want to breath their scents. I want to experience their powerful arms, their speed, their bodies in sunlight. I want to watch them play baseball.
They are spectacular and original.
Somehow, Stephenie Meyers makes me want that.
Add to that the seduction. The way Edward touches Isabella is almost pornographic.
It's hard to remember that they do nothing more than kiss. I want to find out what happens to them. Does it work? Does she become a vampire?
The plot and it's pacing are enough to pull me through.
Otherwise, I have to admit, the writing is pretty lousy.
If I had to read that a character's eyes, face or expression was "unreadable" one more time, I think I might have burned that book. I quickly grew tired of lengthy descriptions of Isabella's every mundane move. Do I really need to watch her climb each and every stair? Brush her teeth? Pee?
Over and over again?
And how quickly her characters leap to rage. I could never be friends with these people. There is no warning, no build-up. One wrong word or move and they clench their fists, turn purple and refuse to speak to each other.
Seconds later, they are best buddies again, of course.
This lack of emotional transition is the mark of an impatient writer. Someone who is too lazy, too unobservant or too lacking in literary talent to get it right. I found it unforgivable. So unforgivable that, despite the awesome vampires, I could not like this novel.
But, I'm not her market.
I'm not important and that's okay.
The elements of writing that I find annoying in Twilight are among those that make the language accessible for nonreaders or hurried readers. I don't want to be told how someone feels. I want to be shown. I want to feel myself growing angry with the character, or calmer or happier.
More readers than not don't want to work that hard.
From Twilight, they want two things: seduction and action.
The rest is irrelevant.
But, as a writer, there are two things I get from Twilight: more people who are turned onto books, people who might start off with Twilight, but then, later, become more sophisticated readers; and more money for the publishing industry, money that allows editors to take chances on novels like mine own.
So, how can I complain? How can any writer complain? How can anyone deny Stephenie Meyer the right to her success?
I felt it in the beginning, before I read Twilight, before I formed informed opinions of my own.
Her critics--the hard-core unyielding critics who accuse her of single-handedly triggering the demise of literature--are jealous.
Their complaints are, as I suspected, sour grapes.

The Canadian professor from Sri Lanka

I knew the small man with the smooth dark skin the moment he walked in the door.
This was The Canadian Writers Festival at the New York State University College at Oswego.
The year was 1987.
I was the student director (and the bartender).
As far as I knew, only one author was not native to Canada.
A Sri Lanka-born professor.
A man I'd never hear of.
A poet who'd written two novels.
I served this man a drink and spoke with him briefly.
I don't remember much except that he seemed kind, humble and thoughtful.
I bought his latest novel and got his autograph.
Despite my heavy class load, despite two part-time jobs, despite my editor position at the college newspaper, I read Coming Through Slaughter in two days.
It was unlike anything I'd ever read and anything I've read since.
A blend of poetry, fiction and interviews, all telling the story of Buddy Bolden, a real-life musician said to be the originator of jazz. A genius whose career was cut short by madness.
It was and is beautiful.
For more than a decade, I pushed that book on professors, friends and acquaintences with little luck. I just couldn't get them to understand. This wasn't just a novel. This was art. A multi-dimensional work of art.
Except for the woman I met in Arizona.
She understood. She was from Sri Lanka and her daughter attended preschool with my son. One day, she brought me a novel. Anil's Ghost by the same author as Coming Through Slaughter.
I devoured it.
And I wanted more.
But I got busy.
And I forgot.
Until one day, in 1996, I was perusing the movie section of the newspaper.
I spied a review for a new movie, The English Patient.
The movie was based on the book by a Sri Lanka-born writer named Michael Ondaatje.
The man whose drinks I poured.
The man whose novel, published two decades earlier, was a masterpiece.
The man who forever changed the way I think about fiction.

Message to Amazon: moms are Kindle people too

Hey you!
Amazon!
Kindle makers!
Over here!
Look at me!
Okay, so I'm not a business traveler looking for a good airplane read; I'm not a corporate something-or-another perusing stock quotes while racing to yoga class; and I'm not a techie who needs the latest gadget.
I'm a mom, a mom of four young kids.
And I am your market.
You just don't know it yet.
Think about it.
I had a career once. I was a journalist. I was in the know all the time and it was great. I was childless too and, in my spare time, when I wasn't running or hiking or barbecuing or taking classes, I was reading novels.
I miss it.
I still read the newspaper every day, or at least some of it.
I read magazines in the kitchen while I'm cooking, or in bed at night when I can't fall asleep.
I still read novels.
I need novels.
Sometimes, I keep one on each floor of the house so I can pick up a book whenever I get a few minutes.
What I don't have is something small and convenient that I can pull out of my purse (or diaper bag) on a rainy day while the twins are watching Blues Clues on the DVD player and I'm waiting behind the wheel for the school bus, which seems to always be late on rainy days.
I don't have anything for traffic jams, or for Jump Joey's when the twins are having so much fun on the play mats in the fully enclosed room that I actually find I have a few minutes or maybe even an hour to myself.
I don't have anything for the doctor's office (the grown-up kind) when I'm so engrossed in giving directions to the sitter as I slip out the door that I forget to bring a book. I don't have anything for those days when I finish a novel and I can't get to the library or the bookstore immediately to pick up another.
And I need another.
Now.
I don't want to read news shorts on a Blackberry or check my email from my cell phone or sing along with Blues Clues.
I don't want to chat on my cell phone with a friend.
I want to choose a novel, download it immediately and read it right away.
I want a Kindle.
Are you listening?
Are you looking?
Please?
Can I have a Kindle?

When kids are screaming and an editor calls

A fellow writer fretted loudly on an online forum the other day. She was a nervous wreck.
Her agent had just told her that an editor from a publishing house would be calling her within the next "few days."
No specific day.
No set time.
Nothing.
She has children.
What should she do, she wondered, if the kids start acting up when the editor calls?
The tone of her post was apologetic, embarrassed, like she felt she should hide the fact of her motherhood from the editor and she didn't know how. What she wanted, it seemed, was advice on how to pretend she is not something that she most definitely is.
But here's the reality:
With the exception of John Grishman, Jodi Picoult, the "other" Lori Foster and a handful of other wildly successful authors, most writers either have day jobs or they are home taking care of children, writing on scraps of paper while cooking dinner, helping with homework or hiding in the bathroom.
Editors, if they are experienced and good at what they do, should know that. They should know that if they call unannounced, they are taking their chances. And the author should know that the editor knows he or she is taking a chance.
So why get the jitters?
Now, I have not had the good fortune of chatting with an editor from a publishing house just yet, but I have received important calls while caring for my four children. The older kids can usually be controlled with a stern look, but the twins, like most toddlers. tend to get in certain uncontrollable "moods."
Sometimes, they want me to hand them the phone so they can say, "'ello" about 50 times in a row. And they won't let up. They follow me around, both of them together, tugging on my legs saying, "'ello? Please?" and then screeching when I try to shoo them away.
Other times, they are in the fighting mood--cranky and tired, and tired of each other.
Still more often, they are in the "I want" mood. In this mood, they want something, I give it to them and then they want something else. It doesn't end until either they nap, someone takes them outside or Diego comes on the TV.
So I've developed my own rules for handling such situations.
I start with a bribe--a movie, a Popsicle, a lollipop--artfully and quietly handed off or popped in the DVD player while still talking, uninterrupted, in an adult manner with the caller.
If that doesn't work and I get the feeling that things will be okay if I just have a moment to get them under control, I ask the caller whether I can dial back in a few minutes. If he or she can't agree to that, then why calling in the first place?
What's two or three more minutes?
We could have killed that with awkward silence at some point in the conversation.
If I know it's just going to be one of those days, I ask the person on the other end whether I can return the call at a later hour or on a later date, and I make arrangements for someone to help me with the kids.
Then, when I return the call, I hide in the garage or the basement.
I don't mind chatting with the kids around if the caller doesn't mind.
But there is one thing I will not do: I will not give into intimidation.
No call is important enough.
I have a passion for writing. I keep a notepad in the kitchen because I can't help scribbling down my thoughts throughout the day. In fact, I wrote this post between 3 and 6 p.m. on an old steno pad and here I am typing it in at 12:39 a.m.
But my passion for my children is, and always will be, greater.

I have an agent!

My God, it finally happened.
I signed with an agent.
And he's even a really nice guy.
Roger S. Williams of Publish or Perish Agency is new to the agent world, but he arrives with an impressive resume. He has worked in publishing for 30 years as a book seller and as a sales director at some of the big publishing houses.
He also represents his wife, Gina Cascone, who has sold 30 YA novels as a ghostwriter (more than 2.1 million copies), two memoirs (both published by Simon & Schuster) and more.
Writing must be in his genes. Not only did he marry a writer, but he is surrounded by relatives who are successful authors. They include two sisters, a niece and a brother-in-law, all of whom have published (or have contracts with) with major houses.
Mr. Williams comes from a different direction than most agents. He made his connections with editors by marketing and promoting the books they acquired, a big plus in my book. Lots of agents can sell books, but this guy knows how to market them. He knows, not only what editors want to buy, but what readers want to buy.
He's also witty and honest.
Can't beat that.
It's still a long road.
He still has to persuade a publisher or two that my books are worth a few sheets of paper.
But at least I have a driver now.
I'm no longer sticking out my thumb on the publishing highway, scrutinizing every car that slows down as the driver studies me and we both try to decided whether it's safe or wise to take a chance on each other.
And if I keep writing corny analogies like that, I'm going to make his job a whole lot harder.

The "other" Lori Foster

They were closing in on me.
I felt it.
I felt it the moment I introduced myself at the Fifth Annual Readers and Authors Get Together Friday night. I heard it in their murmurs to each other. I saw it as they moved forward, toward the two of us.
Toward me.
I had forgotten that some of those people are obsessed.
Maybe even a little crazy.
And so I got out of there--fast.
It was a dynamic I had not anticipated.
I thought I would waltz into the Marriott 20 minutes from my home, drop off my donation for the raffle and say a quick "hello" to the other Lori Foster, the hostess of the event and the one who really gets paid to write.
I had never met her before, though she lives nearby and folks often mistake me for her.
Not the right folks, I'm afraid.
According to Publishers Marketplace, the "other" Lori Foster recently signed a 7-figure deal for her next romance/erotica series. The people she signed with seem to know where to send her paychecks. They are not at all confused.
It's the others.
My son's former teacher was certain that I was the famed romance writer. She was under that impression for more than a year before she finally got up the nerve to ask me. A literary agent once apologized for not getting back to me on her request for the manuscript for my novel. Her assistant had moved my email into the "other" Lori Foster's file.
A few good friends emailed me years ago, shortly after my first son was born. They had seen a novel on the grocery store shelves. It was written by Lori Foster and the title was the same as my son's first name.
Now really, would I write an erotica novel with a main character named after my son?
The other Lori Foster and I have exchanged a few emails over the years. I had thought about going to the get-together even though I don't read or write romance. More than 100 authors were scheduled to attend along with a few agents.
Writers are writers, and it would be nice to share their company, I thought.
But I couldn't go.
My daughter and husband had already planned a rafting trip with a YMCA group.
And I didn't want to spend money on a babysitter. My husband's company recently executed a round of furloughs and we have no idea what will happen when the next quarter begins at the end of June. I just couldn't justify the cost of the registration and the cost of a sitter for the three other children.
So I decided to donate a gift basket full of writerly things from my business, http://www.exclusivewritergifts.com/, instead. The woman who took my donation laughed when I gave her my name and pointed to the other Lori Foster, who was standing just a few feet away.
She was busy.
The buffet dinner was underway.
The fans and authors had gathered.
Things were hectic.
So I introduced myself and said a brief "hello" to this kind, petite woman with whom I share a name, a city and a passion for writing. I had to speak loudly over the din, loud enough for others around us to hear. I began to stutter a bit when I noticed the odd reaction.
I'm sure the novelty would have passed quickly.
I mean, what was there to say?
But it was too strange to be stared at that way.
And so I left, happy to have finally met her, but relieved that I had not registered.

The Great (Writers) Depression

It seems that this recession is quickly giving way to a great depression.
And I'm not sure how to stop it.
Today, a woman posted on a writing forum that she is giving up writing for good. Her husband is unsupportive, her kids are unsupportive, the rest of her family is unsupportive.
She might as well focus on scrubbing floors, she said.
A good friend who has spent the past 20 years working full time as a playwright, posted his laments recently on a social networking site. I was surprised. He always seemed to be doing so well.
But he doesn't feel that way.
He's bumming.
I went through my own slump last week. The querying process had me down. Way down, even though I've had plenty of requests recently for partials and proposals. It just seemed like I'd been working at this for so long and getting nowhere.
Thankfully, a virtual intervention on a writers forum was successful.
I am much more cheerful now.
I hadn't noticed this much negativity in the writing world before.
Maybe I'd just never opened my eyes.
Maybe it's because the adrenaline rush is wearing off, kind of like it did after my first marathon 16 years ago.
I ran that first marathon on a dare.
I couldn't resist the challenge.
I had run only 25 miles a week prior to the race and my only long run was a 19-miler three weeks before. I was out with an injury for the two weeks before the race, so I didn't get any running in then either.
Yet I ran it in 3 hours, 58 minutes.
I ran on pure ignorance.
Pure bliss.
Pure stupidity.
I ran the last two miles on legs of lead.
Blood soaked through my sneakers as I crossed the finish line.
I lost nine toenails over the next couple weeks because I'd worn cheap cotton socks and 5K running shoes.
I didn't care.
Not then.
I was gleeful.
I was ready to run another.
Imagine my surprise when, a week later, I was too sore to run half a mile.
My toes were too sensitive for sneakers.
My knees were a mess.
That adrenaline rush was gone.
But something else happened. As the rush subsided, my eyes opened. I began investigating all the things I did wrong. I started looking for ways to do it right. I read books. I developed a training method. I bought new sneakers and socks with Coolmax.
I ran another marathon.
This time, I finished in 3 hours, 42 minutes.
So maybe this is a good thing, this loss of adrenaline.
Maybe I was so blissful and so ignorant when I began this querying process that I didn't notice all the writers struggling surrounding me. I didn't see how hard it could be, how disappointing sometimes. Maybe, I was doing it all wrong.
Maybe it's better that my eyes are open now because I find myself focusing more, targeting the right agents, working on my platform, freelancing, submitting short stories, starting another novel.
I was doing okay before.
But maybe now I'll do better.
Maybe that great depression is always there for all of us, always threatening. Maybe that threat is part of what keeps us alive and hopeful and motivated. Because I sure as heck don't want to fall prey to it.
Nope.
Not going to do that.
I am going to work hard and work smarter.
And someday I might even run one last marathon.

Still Alice

I had always thought that, should I ever develop cancer, I would forgo chemotherapy. Chemotherapy is poisonous and barbaric, I believed. It brings us to the brink of death and then drags us back and, some folks never do return.
I'd rather take my chances on clinical trials and new treatments, I thought. And I firmly believed that these decisions should be made while we are healthy, when our minds are not clouded by the subjectivity and irrational passion that comes with disease.
Then I read Still Alice, a first novel by Lisa Genova.
Now, Alice does not have cancer. She has early-onset Alzheimer's Disease. But, like me, the healthier, rational Alice believes that she knows what is best for the Alice to come. She creates a quiz for herself that she takes daily, thanks to the reminder technology on her Blackberry. If she can't answer all the questions correctly, she is directed to a file that will instruct her to take a lethal dose of sleeping pills.
I won't go into the rest of the story because I don't want to ruin it for anyone. But I will say that the novel has altered my perspective on terminal disease. The author, Lisa Genova, has a PhD in neuroscience and works with Alzheimer's patients. She clearly knows her subject and almost seems to crawl into the Alzheimer's mind.
Her depiction of the progression of Alzheimer's is, admittedly, a bit too rosy at times.
Alice isn't anything like my husband's grandmother (Well, she wasn't really his grandmother. She was his step-grandmother and, also, his aunt by marriage, but I won't go into that here.). Alice doesn't confuse real life with soap operas and accuse her husband of cheating on her.
She isn't like my good friend's aunt, whom he found strapped to her bed in a nursing home when he visited. He was told that she had lashed out violently and that they had no choice, but to restrain her.
But the author's decision to leave out the nasty stuff doesn't matter.
We do have an Alice in our neighborhood who lives with her son. She is sweet, kind and completely unaware of her surroundings. Alices do exist. All cases are different and the author doesn't have to rely on the worst-case scenarios to get her point across.
And her point is more universal for me than it is, I think, for most.
Sure, she deepened my understanding of Alzheimer's disease with her well-informed fictionalization. She helped me understand that we are more than our memories and that no disease can change our souls.
But, for me, the lesson was broader.
Through Alice, I came to see that I cannot make rational, informed decisions for myself before I face the possibility of death or terminal disease. I don't know enough yet. I am ignorant, just as Alice was ignorant in the earliest stage of her own disease.
I am ignorant because disease is more than science.
Treatment is about more than medical cures.
And living is about more than being physically or mentally whole.
I am ignorant, but am happy to embrace that ignorance.
Thanks to Alice.

Sniffling gets you nowhere

To pass the time while waiting for the next round of cuts in the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award, many of us 500 quarterfinalists chatted on an ABNA online forum. A common topic was whether we would be upset if we made it no further.
Most of us agreed that we'd be thrilled regardless.
Our novels had been selected from a pool of up to 10,000 first-time novelists. That earned us critiques of our excerpts from two Amazon reviewers and, we would soon be receiving full manuscript reviews from editors at Publishers Weekly.
The reviews alone, we said with skin thicker than armadillos, were worth it. We couldn't wait to read the critiques from Publishers Weekly, we wrote. And most all of us agreed that harsher was better. What good was a pat on the back? We wanted to know how to make our novels better.
Bring it on, Publishers Weekly editors.
Bring it on.
So they did, and virtual lips started quivering.
Not all of them.
Most folks took it well and vowed to move forward.
But the volume of the sniffling few hurt my ears.
One woman wanted to throw in the towel because, amid all the compliments, a reviewer wrote that her novel suffered from disorganization. Gee. A disorganized first novel? Writing takes skill and talent. Organization is simply hard work.
My advice to her?
Get working.
Disorganization is fixable.
From what I read, every criticism by the Publishers Weekly reviewers focused on an issue that could be addressed: organization, depth of characters, pace. Now I didn't read them all, but I didn't find any that bashed a writer for lousy writing.
A successful writer needs thick skin and an open mind. And, for that reason, I have a feeling that the loudest of those rejected and dejected contestants will never be successful. That's a shame. They had some good stuff there.
My own review was everything I had hoped for.
Before entering the contest, I had shelved Spring Melt for further revisions. Too much back story, especially in the second chapter, I figured. I had wanted to rip those parts up and incorporate the same information more smoothly and at a faster pace throughout. But I wasn't sure I was doing the right thing.
Then I saw the announcement for the contest. Entry was free and, with each round of cuts, contestants got more reviews.
Why not?
With the first cut, I learned that my pitch (the general storyline) and my first 17 pages were good enough to attract professional attention. That was, for me, the validation I needed that my novel was worth my time and effort.
(As the rejections pile up, you start to wonder, you know?)
On April 15, I learned that I did not make the semifinals, where the field was trimmed to 100, but I did get that Publishers Weekly review last week. That single paragraph consisted mostly of a well-written synopsis.
But, in that paragraph was a one-sentence gem.
A precious one:

"At times muddied with flashbacks and digressions, this is still a solid story with believable characters and a pleasant and surprising resolution."

Those words --"muddied with flashbacks and digressions"-- were the words I was looking for. That meant that I was on the right track. That meant that If I could just resolve that issue, I would probably have a pretty good book on my hands.
I wasn't just guessing any more.
Now I have to admit that my skin is not thick all over. I'm more like a well-frozen river. I'm super thick-skinned in most areas of criticism, but my skin gets dangerously thin in those few areas where currents run fast underneath.
I'm human, afterall.
But the folks at Publishers Weekly knew just where to skate.
My lips didn't quiver. I didn't start sniffling. I didn't throw any towels.
I did, immediately and with renewed enthusiasm, started tearing my novel part.
So thank you Amazon.
Thank you Create Space.
Thank you Penguin.
And thank you friends, family and strangers who posted encouraging reviews.
I lost.
And I feel good.

Giddy

For 11 years, I saw my name in print most every day.
Sometimes, I had several stories in one edition; I believe my record was eight.
I loved it, not because people knew my name, but because I believed in the power of writing. I believed in newspapers (and still do). I believed I was changing lives, even if sometimes that change was barely perceptible to most.
But none of that compares to the rush I got today when I received an email from an editor at Aethlon, a literary sports journal centered at East Tennessee State University. My short story, "Conquering Iwo Jima," has been accepted for publication.
I was giddy.
Really giddy.
(Okay, so I'd had a little wine before I checked my email!)
This is different.
Different because this is fiction.
And this is my first.
I had stopped writing short stories soon after I finished my thesis for Binghamton University in 2000. My first son was two months old when I earned my degree and I had started teaching as an adjunct English instructor four months later. Then along came my daughter and, after she was born, I started the novel.
I freelanced (changed diapers), taught (changed diapers), and freelanced some more while I worked on the novel. Five years later, after a weekend of revisions, I was finally done.
Then I learned I was pregnant again.
No biggie, I thought (after the shock wore off).
Nothing was going to stop me.
Nothing except maybe twins.
They kind of brought things to a crawl.
But now they are two and, slowly, I am started to emerge from my mommy fog. One day in November, through that fog, I spied a folder on my laptop marked "short stories." I read through a few of them, made a some minor revisions and started searching for appropriate markets on Duotrope.com.
Within 30 minutes, I found Aethlon.
I submitted "Conquering Iwo Jima" in November and forgot about it.
Then came the email.
And the giddiness.
Just a few weeks earlier, I learned that my novel, Spring Melt, had made the quarterfinals for the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award. I'm competing against 499 other writers, so my chances are slim. But I get at least one professional review of my full manuscript out of the deal and validation that I've got something good going here.
That makes it worth it.
I still love writing nonfiction.
I still love interviewing, investigating, creating.
But writing fiction is, for me, like that second child that you love with the same strength as the first, but you love differently. It offers a different path to change. Not better. Just different.
Fiction is a passion for me and one that I have not had the opportunity to pursue as fully as nonfiction. The giddiness comes from the realization that I might, just possibly might, finally get my chance.

Good agency goes bad

Originally posted March 19, 2009

Objective Entertainment is a big agency that deals with lots of celebrities, so I really didn’t expect much when I queried agent Ian Kleinert a few months back.
I was more ignorant then too.
I thought my journalism experience and my years as a stay-at-home mom were a strong enough platform for my nonfiction book.
My eyes are open now.
The proposal has changed and it’s much stronger.
So is my query letter.
So I expected rejection this afternoon when I found a response from Objective Entertainment in my inbox. But Objective Entertainment surprised me. The e-mail was not from Ian and it was far more appalling than a rejection.
It was from a woman named Tracey Ravenelle.
This is what she said:

“Thanks so such for querying us, but we are unsure that this premise would work in this tight market. All said we would encourage you to do what many of our clients have done prior and self- publish with a reputable, and recommended, publisher. This is a new age in publishing, and as evidenced time and time again, neither The New York Times bestsellers list nor major booksellers discriminate against the self published. Oftentimes, authors choose to get proactive in order to build a sales record and boost their chances of being picked up.
I would like your permission to pass along your information to someone who can help you get started on your path towards getting published. If you are ready to become proactive about your career we will let them know more details about your manuscript and how to get into contact with you. There are a lot of publishers that seem to have gotten the better of new authors, the two that we refer you to are not of that ilk, they have had a number of successes.”


Needless to say, I was floored.
This person has decided that she has the authority to speak for every agent and publishing house out there. Since she believes the market is too tight, apparently every agent will feel the same way. And I am supposed to accept that.
Hmmm.
Now, I don’t want to reveal too much about my agent search, but I will say that I have every reason to believe that I will get a contract sooner or later and that I will publish in the traditional way.
Fortunately, I am not so easily deterred.
But I worry that other writers might be.
A little searching on Absolute Write proved that I am not the only writer who recently received communications from Tracey after querying Ian. In fact, other writers received precisely the same note.
I can assume only one thing.
Tracey, Ian and maybe some other folks at Objective Entertainment, are making money off these referrals to self-publishing houses. They are making money and they are preying on the ignorance of writers who might be inexperienced with publishing, and on their potential lack of self confidence to do it.
There is nothing wrong with self-publishing if that is what a writer wants.
But this is not friendly guidance.
This smells fishy.
Very, very fishy.

The karate scam

Originally posted March 11, 2009

My 7-year-old daughter became interested in karate through a short introductory course, which was promoted as a fundraiser for her school. She was hooked, so hooked that she quit dance and gymnastics to join.
I had the twins with me when I registered my daughter and they were screaming to get out of their stroller. So I didn’t pay much attention when one of the owners explained the six-month contract and the automatic deductions.
I just signed the papers.
Fine.
A six-month commitment was probably a good idea anyway. It would force her to stick with it long enough to know whether karate was really her thing.
And it is.
She loves it.
But now we must quit.
It’s a matter of principle.
It’s a scam.
For the past several months, the folks at the karate school have lured her deeper and deeper with tips on her belt, new belts, more tips, more belts and lots and lots of games. She has anxiety issues and she loves the fact that the instructors simply take control.
They tell her what to do and she does it.
They tell her not to cry and she doesn’t.
They tell her to be respectful and she is.
But two weeks ago, she received a letter. The letter informs me that she is nearing her testing for lime belt and that’s time to make a greater commitment. My daughter may continue only if I sign a three-year contract, agree to let some outside company continue to withdraw funds from my account, pay double the tuition I’m paying now and give 90 days notice for cancellation.
I’m not stupid.
This is about money.
This is about hoping that, if my daughter stops going, I won’t get around to cancelling for a month or two, and then I will still have to pay for another 90 days. This is about using outside companies who have can easily send those who oppose this system to collections, possibly ruining their credit.
This is not about karate.
One of my daughter’s best friends joined about the same time. Her mother, a single mom, recently lost her job. Two months remained in her six-month contract. She tried talking to the owners. They offered to let another family member fill the slot (She has no siblings), but they refused to cancel her automatic deductions.
I have left two messages, asking to talk about the 3-year contract. They have not called back.
Since then, I have learned from others that they will not call back and they will not budge if I approach then face-to-face (which I will do this week). Fortunately, my daughter is very bright. I explained the situation and she understood.
She’s going back to gymnastics, where I pay tuition every eight weeks by check.

Writing friends

Originally posted Feb. 26, 2009

I am used to meeting perfect strangers, to learning the intimate details of their lives within the first 30 minutes of conversation.
I’ve made a career out of it.
But as I drove to Panera Monday night to meet yet another person I’d never seen before, my hands suddenly froze on the wheel.
This wasn’t the same thing.
This wasn’t an interview.
I was meeting a fellow writer with whom I had connected online. We didn’t even know what we would talk about. Neither of us has writing friends in the area. We thought it would be nice to get together and to, maybe, form a writing group.
I had never been in this situation before.I felt socially inept.
I forced my fear down my throat with the greater fear that I would crash if I kept focusing on the issue. I parked and grabbed a book from my van. If things got really awkward, I figured, I would always have my book.
I had just sat down with my coffee when she walked in.More than two hours later, when we got up to leave, an employee had to unlock the doors to let us out. My cell phone rang. My husband was worried because Panera was supposed to close an hour earlier.
Conversation just happened and I realized on my way home how much I crave that interaction with other writers. Just last week, Susan Heim, an award-winning author and fellow mother of twins, agreed to write the foreword for my book. I was anxious and excited to tell someone.I told my husband, a former journalist and an author.
He shared my excitement. I told my sister, who has let me lean on her throughout this process even when she probably had much better things to do.
She was thrilled. But I couldn’t think of anyone else who would understand what this meant to me.
So I told the woman I met in Panara, a writer of young adult fiction whose first novel is in the hands of an editor at Harper Collins. She understood, really understood.
And that felt good.

Know the source

Originally posted Feb. 5, 2009

I have learned a great deal from the folks on the forums of Absolutewrite.com, but a recent thread bothered me. Someone had written an intriguing query letter and had posted it in the “Share Your Work” forum, hoping for advice on improvements.
The responses came quickly: other writers confidently tearing it to shreds.
After the first few replies, some voices of reason began to emerge, published authors or those with agent contracts who suggested that the writer simply polish a few sentences and go for it. It really was good. It just needed a little tweak here and there.
I can only hope that the original poster read beyond those first few replies.
The lesson: know your sources.
The Internet is flooded with forums, blogs and private groups for writers. Absolute Write is one of the good ones. If ever I actually sell a book, I will make a donation. Those folks saved me from doing such crazy things as paying fees to agents, sending silly query letters or signing with publishers that are nothing more than self-publishing companies in disguise.
But every forum has its less-than-credible members and it is important to take advice from their members with a healthy dose of cynicism. Helpful writers will be in tune with your needs and your goals. They will ask questions. They will give answers with confidence, but not with arrogant confidence. They will make you feel good about their replies even if they’ve just suggested that you are going down entirely the wrong path.
I belong to another online writing group that is private. I have found wonderful advice and support there from women who face similar obstacles with their writing, but one fellow writer stood out among the rest. Her advice was often loudly written and left me shaking my head. She always punctuated her harsh words with her experience as a published author.
So I bought her novel (It was out of print, so I had to buy it from a used book dealer.). Her book was awful. The publisher went out of business long ago. When I Googled them both, I found that they had worked together previously. The publisher was likely a friend.
Worse yet, the copy I purchased had been autographed, a gift to a person who had helped her with her research.
Now, when I see her responses, I skip them.
I know the source.

Homesick

Originally posted Jan 11, 2009

If I took the long way home from school—out the front entrance of St. Bernard’s elementary instead of cutting through the church parking lot—I could see them working.
Volunteers from the village and inmates from a nearby minimum-security prison worked side-by-side each day for weeks, lifting 2-by-4-foot blocks of ice from Pontiac Bay with giant tongs and then sliding them onto a large conveyor belt. Depending on how deeply cold the winter had been so far, the bricks could be up to three feet thick.
I tried not to look too often, maybe twice a week. I didn’t want to spoil the effect—the surprise at the appearance of yet another layer of slushy mortar and crystal bricks; the recognition as the architecture began to make sense and the random bricks became towers or castle walls; the thrill of counting down the days with each brick that the crews sawed, pulled and jiggled, dripping, out of the dark water.
Before my eyes, it rose.
Slowly, methodically, majestically. Until one afternoon near the beginning of February, I would step out of school, walk down the street just a bit and realize that it was done. The crews had slipped the last block of ice into place and the ice castle was complete, somehow even more awesome and more spectacular than the year before.
It is during this time of the year that I get homesick, when I know that the ice castle is under construction and that Winter Carnival is only a few weeks away in my hometown of Saranac Lake, N.Y.
The ice castle is the icon, the foundation, the symbol of the weeklong celebration deep in the Adirondack Mountains. It is a week of sled races and cross-country ski races; a week when prominent grown-ups rule as king and queen, college students reign as prince and princess and the popular clique in high school is elected as the royal court.
It is a week of snow sculptures on front lawns and in the park; of parades and fireworks; of snowmobiles storming the ice castle; and, in the old days, of ice skaters competing to see who could jump the greatest number of barrels.
And a week of alcohol, of course.
Nothing is celebrated in my hometown without lots of alcohol.
I miss my hometown in the spring when the sight of concrete through the hard-packed snow where the sidewalk had been the previous October could send a thrill through me. I miss the gulch in the summer and the natural water slide and Champagne Falls. I miss the smell of wet leaves in the fall and the long hikes free of mosquitoes and tiny biting black flies.
But those are memories I have to myself or with small groups of people. Winter Carnival is different. Winter Carnival pulls everyone in from all income levels, age groups, professions. It brings people back, even those who believed they had torn up their roots and vowed never to return.
It is the truest sort of community celebration, the likes of which I have never experienced anywhere else. Locals even get along with the tourists for a bit: no giving false directions; no selling pine cones for $5 a piece as souvenirs; no lying about the names of the peaks when they assume you know all that stuff just because because your mom gave birth to you there.
Heck, what other community enlists prisoners to help build its ice castle? So I’ll be missing Saranac Lake Feb. 6 when the king and queen are crowned, kicking off the festivities. But don’t worry. I will be back someday with four kids and a husband in tow.
And, maybe, with a little peppermint schnapps in my purse.

Readers are the best critics

Originally posted Dec. 31, 2008

When I finally completed my novel, I took the next appropriate step. I sent copies of the manuscript to nine or ten willing readers and then paid an editor to review it for style, grammar and content.
The readers were great.
The editor was a mistake.
He did an excellent job copy editing and he gave me some useful advice, but I hired him because he was a friend. That is where I went wrong. I should have done my research first.
Now, I love criticism—brutally honest, constructive criticism. Those writers who can’t take and appreciate criticism shouldn’t attempt to make a career of writing for public consumption.
And the criticism I received from the readers was excellent. It resulted in the elimination of two characters, a few changes in the minor plots and many, many smoother transitions.
The editor’s criticism led to a faster pace in the earlier chapters and the correction of several errors that had slipped past me. But his content advice, his take on the novel as a whole, was problematic.
If I had not had 11 years of journalism experience and a master’s degree worth of workshop experience, I might have done one of two things: I might have cried and given up, or I might have taken all his recommendations to heart and ended up with a novel that was a Grisham rip-off.
As it turns out, he is a huge fan of Grisham and doesn’t much like literary fiction. My novel does move rather fast, especially through the courtroom scenes. But I am not Grisham and I don’t want to be (Well, I wouldn’t mind his paycheck.).
My style is what it is. The book is an historical novel that is primarily literary fiction, but with a bit of mystery and suspense.
In my years of workshopping and in my experience as a freelance editor, I have had to work with many genres that I find somewhat unappealing. I’ve had to get past my prejudices. I have had to edit or critique the work within its genre.
He couldn’t and, in fairness to him, I never asked.
So here is my point.
I was careful when I selected my readers. I should have been careful when I selected my editor. I should have hired someone who came recommended by other fiction writers and who reviewed the work primarily for copy errors.
I should have simply let the readers do the rest.
The reality is that the readers are the market. They are the people we should be writing for, not the editors, not the fellow writers. Teaching them to critique is easy. Simply give them a few questions to ask themselves when they are done and request that they mark places in the manuscript where they have either stumbled or flown through.
So hire a copy editor. But instead of hiring a content editor or a “book doctor,” contract with a book club. Offer to pay for lunch one day if they will agree to read your manuscript and fill out a questionnaire after.
That’s what I should have done.

After 20 years, I heard her laugh

Originally posted DEc. 1, 2008

When I think about what kind of mother I want to be, Sylvia Bouchard comes to mind. She has been on my mind for nearly 20 years, ever since the day a jury declared her son guilty of murder.
I covered the case. I stood near her in the courtroom. She cried no tears that I could see. She simply clutched her purse and walked up to her son, who had laid his head on the defense table.
Her son, Steven Barnes, was 23.
So was I.
I was a reporter for The (Syracuse, N.Y.) Post-Standard. I was just barely a year into my career. Sylvia Bouchard and I both knew that Steven Barnes did not kill 16-year-old Kimberly Simon, a cheerleader from the small Oneida County community of Whitesboro.
He did not rape her.
He did not strangle her.
Many in the community knew that too, and they rallied behind him. They raised money for his defense when he was indicted more than three years after the 1985 homicide. They filled the courtroom during his trial. They offered his mother a shoulder to lean on, but I never saw her take it.
What I saw was a woman who was focused and determined. A woman who knew she could not afford to break. She was determined to prove her son innocent, but she was also determined that he would be a model prisoner and that, if all efforts to free him failed, he would serve as little of his 25-year-to-life sentence as possible.
She succeeded on both fronts.
On Nov. 25, Steven Barnes received a call in prison. He turned to tell anyone who could hear him that he was going home, thanks to the Innocence Project and DNA analysis. The guards cheered. The prisoners cheered. They loved Steven. He had all the privileges any prisoner could have. He was good. He was honest. He was the boy his mother had raised him to be.
Steven Barnes was a victim. I am generally forgiving of jurors and even of prosecutors. They are people, just like us and they can easily be wrongly convinced. But the trial of Steven Barnes was a joke. The jurors should be ashamed and remorseful. The prosecutor should be investigated. The police who investigated the case and testified should be on trial themselves.
Their evidence consisted of tire treads, soil samples, hair samples and a 35-year police force veteran who said he saw Steven Barnes driving away from the murder site at about the time Kimberly was killed and that he could clearly identify this stranger as his pickup truck passed at 25 mph.
The expert who presented the soil and hair samples made it clear that the tests were not reliable. The police officer and two other witnesses who claimed to have seen Steven Barnes that night gave grossly conflicting testimony to the grand jury, testimony that was presented during the trial.
No one saw Steven Barnes with Kimberly Simon. No one presented a valid motive. No reliable physical evidence connected him to the crime. No witnesses gave reliable testimony.
Yet the prosecutor pursued the case and the jury found him guilty.
It was enough to make any mother crumble.
In the face of it all, Sylvia Bouchard stood her ground. She did not cower with fear. She did not collapse in despair. She did not let down her guard, at least not publicly.
She was strong.
She was reactive and proactive.
She was mother to her son through two decades of imprisonment.
I talked with her and her son on the phone this evening. It had been 18 years since I’d spoken to her. Throughout the trial and the appeals and the fund raisers, I had never heard laugh. I don’t recalled ever seeing her smile. All I saw was that focus, that determination.
This evening, I heard her laugh.

Why self-publishing is not for me

Originally published Nov. 16, 2008

Even before I started querying literary agents, the queries came pouring in from friends and family.
Why go through all that?
Why not self publish?
Well, here is my answer:
I still have faith in the gatekeepers.
Self-publishing has its place.
Some people want full control of their written work. They want to retain all rights; They want to retain all profits. Other folks don’t have the time or the patience for agents. They see the flaws in the system and they are discouraged. And who can blame them? Some agents will toss manuscripts in the garbage for reasons as simple as margins that are too big or too small.Then there are the people who write only for limited and personal audiences. They write for themselves, their families and their friends. Retaining agents make no sense for them. It’s not worth the time or the effort.
But this is my career, or the career I want.
I want to be writing novels and non-fiction books when I am 80 and I want people to be confident when they go to a bookstore and pick up one of my books that it has passed certain tests—the tests of the industry.
The industry is not perfect, but agents and publishers do the best they can in a world in which paper prices are rising and the competition from electronic media is ever-increasing.
I have read some awesome self-published books and I have been saddened by the knowledge that those books will never reach their sales potential. That saddens me, not because the author is missing out of fame or fortune, but because I know so many others would enjoy reading those books as much as I have.
But those books will never get the distribution and exposure of an industry-published book.
I have also read some self-published novels that left me embarrassed for the author and wishing for a refund. Not only were they poorly written and poorly plotted, but they were riddled with errors.
That’s where the gatekeepers come in.
Sure, some lousy books slip through the gate. But 90 percent of the novels and non-fiction books that make it to the presses through non-vanity publishers are pretty darned good.
And yes, I’ve encounter some agents who were egotistical jerks. I even hung up on one. But 90 percent of the agents that I’ve queried or spoken with have given good, solid and well-intended advice along with their rejections. Some have rejected me with form letters, but the letters were constructively written and professional.
So I will plod on.
I will continue taping my favorite rejection letters to the wall above my desk. I will continue honing my novel, my query letter and my non-fiction proposal based on the constructive criticism of those agents who have nothing to gain by spending time addressing me individually, but who do so out of a passion for the industry.
I will continue to have faith in the gatekeepers.

Writing

Originally posted Nov. 8, 2008

I am a mom.
I am a wife.
I am a stepmother, a daughter, a daughter-in-law, a sister, a sister-in-law, a niece, a cousin, an aunt, a great aunt, a friend. I’m sure I am even an enemy to a select few.
But no matter who I am to others, I am always a writer.
It is as a writer that I see the world even when I am too steeped in laundry and dishes to reach for a pencil and paper or to tap away on my laptop.
There was a time when I didn’t believe that, when I didn’t believe that writers perceived things all that differently than others and I didn’t believe in myself. Even during my years as a full-time journalist.
But I was over-thinking, and isn’t that what writing is all about?
Writing is about thinking. It’s about perception, analysis and vision. It’s a constant craving to understand the complexities of the world and of human nature and to convey that understanding through written words in a way that excites, energizes and entertains.
When I finally understood and accepted the distraction of that craving and the strength of that lure, when I finally caved in and called myself a writer, other things became clear to me and I began to accept them as well:
That’s why my house is a mess.
That’s why the walls need painting.
That’s why I have no garden and the flowers by the mailbox always die prematurely.
That’s why my older kids roll their eyes when I try to explain the dynamics of their friendships and the various points of view in their arguments.
That’s why my toddler twins grin, cackle and run when they see my laptop.
That’s why I can’t bake a decent cake, knit Christmas gifts, wrap a present with style or learn the art of scrapbooking.
That’s why I don’t get enough sleep.
So I’m sorry PTO.I’m sorry Dr. Sears, Martha Stewart, Suze Orman.
My house is a mess, my desk is a mess, my bills are a mess and I don’t dress well.
It’s not my fault.
I’m a writer.
I write to think; I think to write.