So...let's be honest here....I still haven't started my NaNoWriMo project. I have ideas rolling around in my head, I have a semblance of a plot in there, but I haven't opened a word document in a long, long time. Why?
In the last month, my entire world has fallen apart. Then, I've had two surgeries (one was actually today). I'm recovering from both (no worries, they were quick, expecting a full recovery from both). I've traveled from North Carolina to Maine...about 1,000 miles. I had a job interview, put my car in a ditch...etc. I'm trying to find a place to live up there. I'm stressed out...which means...
A lot of vegitating on the couch and rediscovering the show 24 on my friend's Netflix. Also--I'm homeless in North Carolina...which is terrifying. None of this is conducive to wanting to take on a project of another novel. Will I write another? YES. Do I have time for it now? Maybe.
The goal is to start tomorrow. But I'm going to give myself some leeway. Why? Because this is real life and it's not as neat as I'd prefer it to be.
Showing posts with label honesty. Show all posts
Showing posts with label honesty. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
Banned Books Week: September 24-October 1
I'm not really a person for rules and regulations, or being told what to do. I don't like that one of my three jobs requires that I to wear my hair down to hide my eyebrow rings and then stud my lip ring. I also don't appreciate being told that I can't wear an actual RING for my lip at another place of employment. I try to veer away from jobs that mandate "No visible tattoos" (mine is easily covered by my watch, but it still bothers me) or that I have to "Look clean" (What does that even mean, anyway? What ever happened to no shower Fridays?). It makes me feel like they're forcing me be someone I'm not..It makes me unGodly uneasy.
I like being able to make decisions for myself, be able to look the way I want to, do the things I want to. I don't think people should fit into certain molds that society creates, I don't like capital punishment or speed limits....I don't like things being off limits. It just kind of bugs me. One of the big ones that gets to me is banned books.
As Banned Books Week continues in full swing, I was kind of starting to wonder:
Do you ever find the list, and read books off of it just to feel rebellious?
I did (maybe still do :) ).
As a teen, I felt some form of vindication when I'd read the list and come find that a book that I'd loved was there, on the damn list. After that vindication, I'd feel anger. Overwhelming anger; who are these people trying to keep these amazing books out of kid's hands? More importantly, the question I kept falling back to was WHY? Why on earth are these pages so offensive to people that they wouldn't want them supplied in libraries, in schools?
To this day, I still don't really understand why people ban books, or burn them. (Okay, some exceptions....like...you know, hate literature. I'd burn that quick.) But books, wonderful, character evolving books. Sure, at the start of the story, they can be racist, and there may be awful words....but what if at the end, the character learns that people really are equal, that hate doesn't solve anything? Why would we keep this from kids? Why would we keep these lessons from PEOPLE? Even if the character doesn't arc well enough to learn their lesson, as a parent, teacher, person...why not engage with the person reading the book;
Did you like it?
Why?
Do you agree with the way this character thinks?
Why?
Dig deep, give advice. Books give a great platform for launching conversations. Every time I see someone with a book, I ask what they're reading, if they like it, what it's about, if they're on GoodReads..etc. (It might just be because I'm a huge nerd....)
But what if these stories help save someone? Why would we keep this hidden away?
Anyway, I pulled up the lists for the 90s HERE and the 00s HERE. Here are some of the books that either I've read or currently own and will read some day:
90s:
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, by Maya Angelou
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain
Of Mice and Men, by John Steinbeck
The Giver, by Lois Lowry
My Brother Sam is Dead, by James Lincoln Collier and Christopher Collier
Goosebumps (series), by R.L. Stine
Go Ask Alice, by Anonymous (My teacher, Mrs. Watchorn totally made me write up a permission slip for my mom to sign so I could read this book so she could have a clean conscious. It is an amazing book...)
Julie of the Wolves, by Jean Craighead George
Fallen Angels, by Walter Dean Myers
The Outsiders, by S.E. Hinton
To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee
Slaughterhouse-Five, by Kurt Vonnegut (Side note, may have almost cried the day I found out he died. I loved this man)
The Face on the Milk Carton, by Caroline Cooney
Where’s Waldo?, by Martin Hanford
The Drowning of Stephen Jones, by Bette Greene
00s (Without the titles mentioned above)
His Dark Materials (series), by Philip Pullman
Snow Falling on Cedars, by David Guterson
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, by Ken Kesey
The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini
Summer of My German Soldier, by Bette Green
Speak, by Laurie Halse Anderson
The Lovely Bones, by Alice Sebold
Cut, by Patricia McCormick
Grendel, by John Gardner
Moral of the story is, I love books...Like I love them. When I get published, I'd like to some day make it on the banned books list, because I will then I feel like it'd cause me to write more, and more. I'd be on a stupid list with a lot of other amazing authors and best yet, PEOPLE.
So, to those of you who read what's banned:
Keep reading strong.
I like being able to make decisions for myself, be able to look the way I want to, do the things I want to. I don't think people should fit into certain molds that society creates, I don't like capital punishment or speed limits....I don't like things being off limits. It just kind of bugs me. One of the big ones that gets to me is banned books.
As Banned Books Week continues in full swing, I was kind of starting to wonder:
Do you ever find the list, and read books off of it just to feel rebellious?
I did (maybe still do :) ).
As a teen, I felt some form of vindication when I'd read the list and come find that a book that I'd loved was there, on the damn list. After that vindication, I'd feel anger. Overwhelming anger; who are these people trying to keep these amazing books out of kid's hands? More importantly, the question I kept falling back to was WHY? Why on earth are these pages so offensive to people that they wouldn't want them supplied in libraries, in schools?
To this day, I still don't really understand why people ban books, or burn them. (Okay, some exceptions....like...you know, hate literature. I'd burn that quick.) But books, wonderful, character evolving books. Sure, at the start of the story, they can be racist, and there may be awful words....but what if at the end, the character learns that people really are equal, that hate doesn't solve anything? Why would we keep this from kids? Why would we keep these lessons from PEOPLE? Even if the character doesn't arc well enough to learn their lesson, as a parent, teacher, person...why not engage with the person reading the book;
Did you like it?
Why?
Do you agree with the way this character thinks?
Why?
Dig deep, give advice. Books give a great platform for launching conversations. Every time I see someone with a book, I ask what they're reading, if they like it, what it's about, if they're on GoodReads..etc. (It might just be because I'm a huge nerd....)
But what if these stories help save someone? Why would we keep this hidden away?
Anyway, I pulled up the lists for the 90s HERE and the 00s HERE. Here are some of the books that either I've read or currently own and will read some day:
90s:
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, by Maya Angelou
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain
Of Mice and Men, by John Steinbeck
The Giver, by Lois Lowry
My Brother Sam is Dead, by James Lincoln Collier and Christopher Collier
Goosebumps (series), by R.L. Stine
Go Ask Alice, by Anonymous (My teacher, Mrs. Watchorn totally made me write up a permission slip for my mom to sign so I could read this book so she could have a clean conscious. It is an amazing book...)
Julie of the Wolves, by Jean Craighead George
Fallen Angels, by Walter Dean Myers
The Outsiders, by S.E. Hinton
To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee
Slaughterhouse-Five, by Kurt Vonnegut (Side note, may have almost cried the day I found out he died. I loved this man)
The Face on the Milk Carton, by Caroline Cooney
Where’s Waldo?, by Martin Hanford
The Drowning of Stephen Jones, by Bette Greene
00s (Without the titles mentioned above)
His Dark Materials (series), by Philip Pullman
Snow Falling on Cedars, by David Guterson
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, by Ken Kesey
The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini
Summer of My German Soldier, by Bette Green
Speak, by Laurie Halse Anderson
The Lovely Bones, by Alice Sebold
Cut, by Patricia McCormick
Grendel, by John Gardner
Moral of the story is, I love books...Like I love them. When I get published, I'd like to some day make it on the banned books list, because I will then I feel like it'd cause me to write more, and more. I'd be on a stupid list with a lot of other amazing authors and best yet, PEOPLE.
So, to those of you who read what's banned:
Keep reading strong.
Sunday, June 5, 2011
In Responce To The Wall Street Journal Article
For those of you who haven't heard, the WSJ has written an awful article about YA and how it's just so horrible now. How it's all dark and curses and it's just not good for teens today. They claim that years ago things were different (I take it they never read Cynthia Voigt's Izzy, Willy, Nilly or Fat Chance by Leslea Newman, or any of the other various novels....)
But here's the truth, if you're ready for it. Are you ready? Okay....here is it:
High school can be a very, very dark place for some of us.
Some of us don't even make it out alive.
When I was a freshmen, the very, very hot boy who sat near me in my seminar class was killed in a drinking and driving accident. His name was Fred Horak, and I barely knew him...just the sadness that surrounded his death (oh, and a year or so prior, his sister died of meningitis.)
As the year went on, my sister's best friend, Kara died from cancer. Less than 4 months later, my best friend, Kellie, died in a car accident (non-alcohol related). After Kellie died, I fell apart and nothing was the same. I couldn't deal with life, I barely moved or got out of bed....things just stopped. Then the girl who sat next to me in my creative writing class tried to kill herself because of a boy and other issues....It was like a slap in the face. When she came back to school, we showed our scars to each other and I tried to tell her that there was something to hold onto, but I wasn't even sure if I was telling the truth...
Add in the fact I lived with my crazy mother and her alcoholic and mentally abusive boyfriend...and things were not so happy in my world.
Soon enough the boy who made my world start revolving again cheated on me. (I found out the day before Valentine's Day). Then shortly after I tore my ACL snowboarding and had to get surgery and was told I may never run again. My high school cross country coach treated me unfairly to the point my sister cursed him out at a meet, in front of the entire team (and parents). I had to meet with the principal, the super, and various other higher up figures in the school system.
And then when I was 16-17, I moved out of my mother's into my sister's and the boy's because if not, if I had stayed I would have killed myself.
But this is my own, personal story and even still, I'm leaving out a lot.
And I survived.
How?
Because I spent a majority of my time writing Confessions of an Immortal Heart, because I read books that kept me sane. Because I watched Soap Operas and stood up for myself and refused to be treated shittily ever again.
So here's to you, Wall Street Journal. For those of you who think that growing up is easy, or full of puppies and kittens and happy little rainbows, or whatever else kind of lies that you're looking for in our novels, it's not. If anyone tells you that it is, it's complete bullshit. Not all of us survive, and those of us who do are left with scars that will always be apparent, that will make future relationships difficult, staying alive even harder. And we write about these experiences with our characters because while, yea, they may be dark, they do happen in real life.
High school sucked for me, and I'm sure beyond any doubt that I am not the only one. So I write truth, and about friends who die, and mental health issues, and how deeply words can truly cut people because that is and that was real to me at the time.
YA Saves.
But here's the truth, if you're ready for it. Are you ready? Okay....here is it:
High school can be a very, very dark place for some of us.
Some of us don't even make it out alive.
When I was a freshmen, the very, very hot boy who sat near me in my seminar class was killed in a drinking and driving accident. His name was Fred Horak, and I barely knew him...just the sadness that surrounded his death (oh, and a year or so prior, his sister died of meningitis.)
As the year went on, my sister's best friend, Kara died from cancer. Less than 4 months later, my best friend, Kellie, died in a car accident (non-alcohol related). After Kellie died, I fell apart and nothing was the same. I couldn't deal with life, I barely moved or got out of bed....things just stopped. Then the girl who sat next to me in my creative writing class tried to kill herself because of a boy and other issues....It was like a slap in the face. When she came back to school, we showed our scars to each other and I tried to tell her that there was something to hold onto, but I wasn't even sure if I was telling the truth...
Add in the fact I lived with my crazy mother and her alcoholic and mentally abusive boyfriend...and things were not so happy in my world.
Soon enough the boy who made my world start revolving again cheated on me. (I found out the day before Valentine's Day). Then shortly after I tore my ACL snowboarding and had to get surgery and was told I may never run again. My high school cross country coach treated me unfairly to the point my sister cursed him out at a meet, in front of the entire team (and parents). I had to meet with the principal, the super, and various other higher up figures in the school system.
And then when I was 16-17, I moved out of my mother's into my sister's and the boy's because if not, if I had stayed I would have killed myself.
But this is my own, personal story and even still, I'm leaving out a lot.
And I survived.
How?
Because I spent a majority of my time writing Confessions of an Immortal Heart, because I read books that kept me sane. Because I watched Soap Operas and stood up for myself and refused to be treated shittily ever again.
So here's to you, Wall Street Journal. For those of you who think that growing up is easy, or full of puppies and kittens and happy little rainbows, or whatever else kind of lies that you're looking for in our novels, it's not. If anyone tells you that it is, it's complete bullshit. Not all of us survive, and those of us who do are left with scars that will always be apparent, that will make future relationships difficult, staying alive even harder. And we write about these experiences with our characters because while, yea, they may be dark, they do happen in real life.
High school sucked for me, and I'm sure beyond any doubt that I am not the only one. So I write truth, and about friends who die, and mental health issues, and how deeply words can truly cut people because that is and that was real to me at the time.
YA Saves.
Saturday, May 28, 2011
Write What You Know
Yesterday an agent tweeted, asking if writing what you know really is the route to take. Personally, I think it is.
If you'd asked me years ago (when the movie Never Been Kissed came out), I would have said no, because I didn't understand the value of the statement. I thought it meant to write what you know...like, what you learn in your algebra or physics class (or that time in my chemistry class when I got in a fight with my teacher walked out, threw my book across the hall and punched a wall)...I didn't understand at the time that writing what you know is writing what you've been able to experience.
I let myself off the hook a lot with my writing. Even when I have goals and deadlines I set for myself, if I miss them I don't mind all that much. Why? Because I'm out living my life and without these experiences, I wouldn't be able to articulate what some of my characters go through. In example, my main character right now is in the psych ward of a hospital...which I can speak about knowledgeably because of my experience there two years ago. From there I can build with characters I met there, things I wish would have happened, things that didn't happen, things that confused me, things that seemed so painfully obvious but weren't...things I really wanted to say or think. I can do this with my character because she's not me, she is having a completely different experience....but I know what it's like to be there. I know the anxiety, the fear, the want or need to get out when you've been committed against your will.
I can also talk about my best friend dying when she was only 17 years old, being cheated on, having a sister or two, having crushes, having a dog, being angry, having shitty parents, being hurt, being attacked by a friend's mom, going on adventures, kayaking, living, not wanting to live, being happy, crashing....these are all things I've been through, things I can talk about...and then I can fictionalize with my characters so their experiences aren't mine but I know the way they felt in certain situations because I know the way I felt in similar situations. (This is part of that whole there is more truth in fiction than we'd like to believe, and more lies in memoir than we'd prefer to recognize. See THIS BLOG.)
More of this blog is:
Don't feel bad when you don't have time to write, you're just doing research, gaining experience for your next novel or chatper :)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
