A Stop on the Pacific NW Writers Blog Tour

I've been tagged by the fabulous writer, Shannon Huffman Polson, to post for the blog tour today, and in turn, I'm tagging Claudia Rowe, Kitty Harmon, and Jennifer Murphy, three great and wonderfully diverse writers in Seattle.

The point is to share a bit about the writing life by answering these questions:

1. What am I working on?
2. How does my writing differ from others in its genre?
3. Why do I write what I do?
4. How does my writing process work?

The quick answers:
1. a new novel, 2. I have no idea, 3. because I want to, and 4. I wish I knew.

The more complex answers:

1. I've embarked on an idea I've had for twelve or so years about characters from the 1930s, during the Depression, and the very odd thing they do for a living.  I'm not yet ready to talk a whole lot about it, and historical fiction is new for me, but these characters have been pulling at me for so long. I'm in heaven writing right now, but it will be at least a year before I finish! This is the reality of novel writing. It just takes a really, really, really long time.

2. We all write how and what we write as individuals, and I never really think of it as how writers compare. Some writers delight us with their beautiful prose, the kind you can read over and over and take pure delight in. Some writers pack their stories with so much meat and muscle that you feel you've been taken on a thrill ride by the end. Some writers are quiet and introspective. Some are hilarious. Most writers don't know how to characterize their own writing. Now that I have five books in the world, I do feel fairly confident saying that I think my strengths are concision, ease of reading (which is important to me; I want readers to feel pulled through my pages as much as possible), creating real characters, and an attempt to get at the emotional truth. I hope so, anyway.

3. I write what I do because it's what bubbles to the surface. As it turns out, my stories are often about characters who do battle with emotional trauma or mental illness (in themselves or others). I'm glad for that, because it gives me a way to talk about my own issues with those things in a way that might help someone else and reduce stigma one tiny step at a time.

4. First, I do a lot of thinking. I keep my eyes and ears and heart open to what's happening around me in the world, in my life, even on my walks and shopping and visits with friends. Certain things will "glimmer" and begin to coalesce into characters, themes, plot lines, etc. I'll gather them all up and begin to write about these things, looking for a way to build something from it. I'll have a few false starts and adjust, and eventually, I will launch. From there, I draft every weekday morning for about a year, and then I will revise for another year or so. I get help from trusted readers and experts, including my agent. Every book works a little differently, but that's basically how it happens for me. And if you ask me this in a year or five, it may have changed. It's ever evolving.

If you are a reader, thank you. If you are a writer, bless you. We're all in this together!

In Bloom

Writers are a bit like gardeners. We plant seeds, lots of seeds, and hope they'll sprout and take hold in the muck that fertilizes such things and helps them grow. Like gardeners, we don’t always succeed. But when we do, and the result of our meticulous tending blooms, it’s a moment of such pride and satisfaction that it’s hard not to grin and gape and call out, “Hey, everybody! Look what I did!”

So, um, hey, everybody! Look what I* did!

Love Water Memory goes on sale Tuesday, April 2!

Please come celebrate with me at an event near you.

*And because of course I didn’t do this alone, big gratitude and huge hugs go to my fellow gardeners:

Stephanie Rostan, Karen Kosztolnyik, Jennifer Bergstrom, Jennifer Robinson, Mary McCue, Natalie Ebel, Ellen Chan, Christine Foye and everyone at Gallery Books.

Erica Bauermeister, Randy Sue Coburn, Garth Stein and all of the writers I’m lucky enough to write and work with and hang out with in the Seattle7 and everywhere.

Tim Mooney, Jay Miazga, Stan Matthews, Kaila and Scott Raiby, Lynne Kinghorn and Margaret Meineke for technical assistance.

My bandmates in The Rejections, who’ve worked hard to make my launch extra special with a live performance and a special download coming soon to my website: Matt Gani, Paul Mariz, Stevie Kallos, Garth Stein and Ben Bauermeister. And special guest in Denver, Peter Fletcher.

All of the independent booksellers who faithfully serve and support readers, writers, and books, without politics, agenda, or fail. If I listed all who have been especially kind to my books and me, this page would never end.

My family: my dad, my sisters and inlaws, my nieces and nephews, my aunts and uncles and cousins and second cousins. (I’m not kidding. They’re all amazing.)

And always, my dear, sweet husband. If you wonder why I write so often about love, well. There you go.

The Next Big Thing Interview Series

Authors are a creative bunch. One such creative type, Mary Biddinger (Prairie Fever, St. Monicas, and O Holy Insurgency) started a self-interview series called "The Next Big Thing," whereby writers administer the Q&A below to themselves, then tag others to do the same. It’s been zinging around the Internet, building a fine collection of interesting insights from a diverse group of authors about their books. I mean, self interview? Bring it on.

I've been tagged by two writers to participate: Laurie Frankel, author of the intriguing and brilliant Goodbye For Now (soon to be a major motion picture) and Atlas of Love, and poet Denise Banker, whose luminous book of poetry is called Swimming the Colorado. Both of these women are dear friends and exceptional writers, and I hope you will discover that for yourself by reading their books.

And now, for the self interview.

What's the title of your book?

Love Water Memory. That was not my first title choice. It was The Amnesiac’s Love Story. My publisher thought, and probably rightly so, that title sounded too much like a Lifetime TV movie or a thriller. In the midst of trying really hard to think of a new title, I woke in the night, twice, with these three words: love, water, memory. I ignored them the first time, but when they came back the second time, I jumped up and wrote them down, sent them to my agent and editor, saying, What do you think? And they loved it.

What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?

It’s a mystery wrapped in a love story about an amnesiac who remembers nothing, and her fiancé, who remembers too much.

What genre does your book fall under?

I would call it simply fiction. A novel. The publishing business has many categories, even for non-genre fiction ("genre" typically meaning scifi, mystery, romance, thriller, etc.) This particular novel is in the category of upmarket hardcover fiction. See? Means nothing. Let’s move past genres and categories, and just read good books.

Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?

This book is published by Gallery Books, a division of Simon and Schuster. I am represented by Stephanie Kip Rostan of the Levine Greenberg Literary Agency. I love them both.

Where did the idea come from for the book?

A Seattle Times article in February 2007. The headline was: “His memory fails him, but his heart won’t forget.” It was about a man who suffered from a rare condition that steals his memory and makes him flee his life, over and over, and about his fiancée, who goes to get him. It made me want to know what would happen, so I wrote a book to find out.

Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?

Hmm. I always try to turn this question around and ask readers, because they have such definite ideas. I already see Lucie and Grady and Helen and all the rest as real people, so it’s difficult. But, off the top of my head, how about Cate Blanchett for Lucie (with one of her brilliant American accents)? I can’t even imagine who might play Grady, who is half Native American and has the long lean body of a swimmer. Can you?

How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?

I think about 18 months? I lose track. Meaning, I don’t want to remember. But usually, it takes me about a year to a year and a half to do a first draft, then anywhere from a few months to another year or so to do revisions.

Who or what inspired you to write this book?

Love inspired me to write this book, the power of it, the difficulties inherent in it, and the sheer beauty of it when you let it in.

And now my tags:

When my first book was published by NAL/Penguin, I attended regional bookseller tradeshows and met the loveliest young woman working in the Penguin booth. Jeanine Cummins was kind and helpful and gave me a human connection in a big publishing world. She has since written three wonderful books, including her latest, just released novel: The Crooked Branch.

At another regional tradeshow, for another book (I don't remember which), I met the amazing author Susan Jane Gilman. What a lovely force of nature she is! She's currently on deadline for her new book, so she will post at a later date, but in the meantime,  check out Undress Me in the Temple of Heaven.

Heaven for Women Writers

As posted today by the good folks at Open Road Media Group, publisher of Hotel Angeline: A Novel in 36 Voices, a collaborative novel by the members of Seattle7Writers (my peeps).

 Hedgebrook, a Women’s Writing 

Community—Advantage, Female

Editor’s Note: Author Jennie Shortridge (When She Flew and other novels) speaks out on behalf of Women’s History Month. Jennie is a co-curator and contributor behind the epic, inventive novel Hotel Angeline: A Novel in 36 Voicesand a co-founder of the Seattle7Writers.

The conversation over wine in our seriously awesome (and mixed gender) Seattle7Writers group might go like this:

Female writer: “I just got back from Hedgebrook and it was incredible.”
Male writer: “Oh god, here we go . . .”

Another female writer: “Oh, I’ve always wanted to go! I need to apply next year.”

A third female writer: “It was the best writing experience of my life!” Male writer: “Why do women get a whole writers’ retreat to themselves? It’s 2012, for crying out loud.”

Yes, he’s jealous. Hedgebrook on nearby Whidbey Island is indeed a writing retreat and community for women only. It opened in 1987 under the direction and vision of Nancy Nordhoff and Sheryl Feldman. Hedgebrook provides six sweet, small, well-appointed cabins; forty acres of forest and farmland to wander; a rugged beach nearby; and a farmhouse kitchen for delectable family-style suppers using local Northwest ingredients. Each participant shares all this with five other women and can talk about writing together. In a word? It’s heaven. And to those female residents from around the world who are chosen from the ever-growing pool of applicants, it’s free.

Why women only? While the founders and staff feel a personal passion for supporting women writers in this very generous way, I know that others think our society should be beyond that by now. Women in 2012, after all, have taken their place alongside men in the working world (um, still for less pay), in the political world (in numbers still slim), and in the arts (again, still for less pay in most cases, and in terms of reviews and attention, nowhere near equal).

But that’s only part of the conundrum facing women in the creative arts. Forget that we don’t get the reviews and attention, the larger advances. We’re used to all that, as much as we continue to work to change it. What we don’t get in life (as many women will agree) is a wife! What we don’t get is someone who anticipates our needs well enough to leave our minds open to creative pursuit (though well-meaning partners often try). We still nurture and nourish our loved ones, fitting in our writing around them, and often a job to boot. It’s not in our biological makeup to ignore the needs of others, thus making it only our fault that we put our creative endeavors aside to help.

And that, Virginia, is why I believe in Hedgebrook.

At Hedgebrook, your small cabin has just enough of everything to maximize comfort and minimize housework: one plate, one bowl, one coffee mug, one wine glass, one pan . . . and yet the resident writers are also challenged to use a small wood stove for heat (with supplemental heat available), to visit a bathhouse for bathing (heated tile floors, two roomy showers, a clawfoot tub—it’s hardly a challenge), and to integrate with the natural world in so doing, walking from cabin through thick forest along old animal trails, often in complete darkness. And when it gets dark on Whidbey Island, it can feel like being in the center of a black hole for city slickers. (Yes, flashlights are provided, as are toilets and sinks in each cabin.) In the journals that record each resident’s experience, found in each cabin, the stories are rife with newbie anxieties and missteps, but more so, the final reflective thoughts on these writers’ last days at Hedgebrook. Even experienced and famous writers discover what it was they came for, whether they knew they were looking for it or not. In real life, women rarely get the time and space to even think in those  terms.

For me, the thing I didn’t know I went looking for was myself—my own authentic voice in my work, after nearly seventeen years of working in the world of “what it takes to get published.” It wasn’t that it wasn’t there, but my trust in it had grown shaky. The publishing world is a tough place to maintain your own creative vision, but if you don’t, why write? It came to me in so many small details at Hedgebrook: the way light broke through tall trees to spill across my desk, a cold wind-snapping walk on the beach in search of sand dollars, the laughter and wisdom of the other women in the room at supper. And finally, the two does who stood outside my cabin on the snowy morning I had to leave, just watching me with big deer eyes, saying, “Pay attention. Take this with you.”

It’s a gift everyone should receive, regardless of gender, of course. But I’ll revel in the fact that because I’m a woman who takes my writing seriously, Hedgebrook gave it to me.