Moved on . . .

My blog has moved on to http://www.jayceefox.blogspot.com/ . My new email is now jaycee.fox@hotmail.com if you want to contact me. New future books will be posted on this jayceefox blogspot.

Thanks!

Drama

We like drama, that’s what I’ve realized in this life. But drama in real life usually doesn’t equate to a peaceful, calm life. And isn’t a peaceful life somewhat equal to happiness? So in reality, that’s usually what we’re striving for, but when reading a book -- that’s what we call tedious and dull.

Our drama can be in the books and we all have such different tastes. Some of us love thrillers, some steamy romances, some of us enjoy heart-wrenching stories with an inspiring message. If you’re like me, it depends on my mood. Do I want to be scared? Do I want to think more deeply? Or do I just want to be swept away with Fabio? (Just for the record, I’ve never been swept away by Fabio). Usually exciting stories though are the exact opposite to what we actually need -- that’s why they’re thrilling to us. I mean -- really -- do I want to be bitten by a vampire, or live through an awful tragedy to learn some lessons, or even eat buttah with Fabio? No, I’d much rather read about it in the safety of my own home, enjoying the ride.

Writing really good stories means torturing our main characters. And that goes against all that we are. Are we sadistic human beings? I mean our characters are pieces of us; we’ve put our hearts into them -- developing them, nurturing them, raising them into hellions that are heartthrobs or homely creatures with bizarre habits and sometimes characters that we admire. But then the anguish and suffering really begins. Once we know who they are, where they’ve come from, we must go deeper. It’s the only way to reveal their true natures -- a bit like making friends. First impressions and surface friendships are great -- everyone’s wonderful and giving, but then add a little real life pressure and sometimes we witness even more amazing people or just the opposite. Stress and anxiety will reveal the true nature of human beings or at least our weaknesses because we all have them. It doesn’t really matter how polished we are on the outside because life and conflict scrape and chisel away the polish to reveal something even more wonderful -- authenticity.

So be kind to your real-life friends, but throw in some torture and heartbreak to your characters and you’ll be a happy person with some dramatic storytelling skills.

New Year's Resolutions: They're Not Supposed to be Easy

So before I write about finding hooks for our books -- which may in fact not be for several posts as I decided I wanted to write in some orderly way -- I thought this post would be better suited to New Year's Resolutions since it is January and all. I don't know about you, but I tend to make New Year's resolutions routinely and I rarely start with them on New Year's Day. In fact, I'm more used to NOT doing them on New Years. A bit like being repelled by the cutest guy in the room in high school cause you know he knows it and you're going to do everything but show him any of YOUR attention. So this New Years I enjoyed a junk food extravaganza as we were traveling back from Disneyland with the kids. January 2nd I ate cheesy nachos while watching a movie in bed. Just recently (in fact today) I grabbed a handful of milk chocolate chips from the freezer. Yes, pure decadence. Now I've indulged and now I'm ready. Obviously one of my weaknesses is that I love food . . . I must be hungry.
But New Year's resolutions aren't supposed to be easy. New Year's resolutions are resolves we work at, to better ourselves in some way. We would've already done them if they were naturally easy. So how does this all relate to writing? Writing is also a skill we must practice, just like exercising or learning a new instrument or adopting a healthier lifestyle. Even if you are the next Stephenie Meyer or J.K. Rowling, you need to keep practicing your talent. It's one skill that has an unlimited potential to continually improve upon. How exciting and vast is that? So to keep that passion fire of writing alive, keep on writing. Make it part of your resolution for the New Year, not as an arduous sounding task but more an unexplored adventure. But just like training for a marathon, or learning how to cook, we all need guidance. We can write our hearts out but we need some measuring stick, a lead somehow. I'm not an expert, but I heard a saying somewhere that a professional writer is an amateur that keeps on trying. So let's start this New Year by writing daily. We'll have wonderful writing days and we'll have the most painfully, frustrating days also, but the key is we keep going. We never give up. We can look to the future with hope while living in the moment, allowing our unlimited potential and creativity to flow.

In one of my previous entries; I talked about some crucial elements to writing a story. We need CONFLICT. So in our story we need a WANT and then an OBSTACLE that stops us or propels us forward. Many avenues are possible, as vast as our imagination. A happy novel is unfortunately a boring novel. We all want to be happy, that's our goal. That should be our character's goal also in some sense -- to obtain peace somehow whatever the obstacle is -- in other words they haven't arrived at that happiness yet, much like everyone, which then opens the door for us to have our readers identify with our characters. And that's my tip for this post. Our readers must identify. And how do we identify? Through emotion, through seeing. Not by plain statements. For example, what is easier to emotionally or visually identify with? Elaine was tired or Elaine rubbed her eyes, looked at the clock -- 6:00am -- and slammed the alarm off. She rolled over, wrapped the covers around her head, ignoring it was a Monday morning. The second version allows us to picture the scene, relate to those Monday mornings after the weekend. So practice writing through emotion, visualizing the scene and showing versus telling.

And of course Happy New Year!

Consistency

It's a lot easier for me to write because I want to, not because I have to. For me, that's the trick. As soon as I feel this prod that I just have to write another chapter or another blog -- I won't do it or I'll do it with great resistance. So even with this blog-writing, I'm sure it will be sporadic -- if it's to be authentic -- but it will be consistent somehow . . . So the magic is getting it done consistently because of desire, not guilt. I was consistent when I wrote my novel because I never went beyond the joy of the moment. Sure I dreamed that maybe by some stroke of luck my book would be an immediate hit. I'd already picked the actresses to play my main characters . . . everyone has to dream a little or we wouldn't do anything. But my joy came really from the immediate writing. After the creative writing was done, I was stumped. What now?

So I had my sister, mother, father and friends read my very first draft and provide some input. Since my parents were true Britts, they corrected some American sounding words and phrases -- although to this day, I've realized there are a couple of corrections that I still got wrong. If you're interested -- whenever someone was to have tea, you'd say 'put the kettle on.' I think I just said, 'put the tea on.' And also -- so embarrassing -- I talked about stiletto pumps -- I meant stiletto heels of course but pumps in England are sneakers or trainers. I don't know how I did that! If I ever do another edition, I'll fix it.
If friends wanted more information in a particular part of the story, I added it. With no formal editing and knowing really nothing about writing novels, I had my writing evaluated at a writing competition. And here's where I wish I could write that they were astounded by the raw talent of this unknown author but instead they threw out terms like show and tell, and hook and point of view. I had no concept of those terms -- I know pretty crazy -- so thus began my venture using my analytical part of my brain. I needed some tangible rules about writing and my research in the process of writing began. So I did a lot of reading . . .

In my last post, I'd mentioned the Action, Conflict and Resolution rule. I did that -- went through all my chapters, making sure there was some of this in each. But then I realized as fascinating as my friends and family found my book -- because I wrote it -- what would draw others in? I needed a hook. I'll explain the creation of my hook next time when I'm authentically inspired. Until then . .

What If?

So the writing of the story took me about 6 months. The story came from my sister relationship, my family relationship, family stories I'd heard, first loves and shattered dreams and of course the all-exaggerated what if? I think it was stuff I needed to write about. You know when you come home from a first date and you just have to tell someone all about it. Or you heard a story of something just awful that happened to someone else and you're outraged. You need to express your opinion on it. I tend to be good at what ifs which isn't always a positive trait. It's great when you're writing a story, but bad when you cripple yourself with worry. So what if I'd lived in that era and what if my sister was dating a guy I hated or what if I was dating a guy my sister hated. And what if we had this friend that seemed normal but was actually a little psycho, but still you couldn't put your finger on the psychosis. And what if you had your life mapped out -- you knew just what you wanted -- and it didn't work out that way?

I didn't do an outline, I just wrote spontaneously until I felt the story was complete. I've since learned there are two kinds of writers -- those who write outlines and those who don't. Some do both. I tend to believe that it's more common for the first book to be written without an outline. We've all heard that everyone has a book in them -- if this is true, why the outline? All that inspiration is tucked away somewhere; we just need some quiet time to unleash it. So the writing really was the easy and fun part -- it was all the details and editing afterwards that took the time.

So if you're in the writing phase and say perhaps you're stuck. My advice: Do the what if game and make it as outlandish as you want. Who wants to read a story when nothing ever goes wrong anyhow? That's not real life and it also offers no conflict.

The number one rule I learned is: ACTION, CONFLICT & RESOLUTION. Each chapter needs some kind of action which results in a conflict and finds a resolution. Those three points are crucial. As you reach the climax of the story, the conflict will increase but up to that point, you can have an ongoing conflict where the resolution to the prior conflict causes more conflict etc. Get the point? My initial chapter -- before it went through some edits -- was Emily wanting to have a nice boyfriend. The action was she got set up on a blind date; the conflict was that she was shy and wasn't sure if she should go, and the resolution -- she did go out with him. That's a mild conflict, but eventually her submissiveness and the dominance of her husband brought much greater conflict. The resolution, she stayed with him until . . . well you have to read the story. Don't want to give too much away.

And finally, when you start writing -- it'll be a mess. Don't worry about it. If you care too much, you won't write at all. So don't be a perfectionist in the initial writing phase. The re-writing and edits come later. It's a process and the first step is putting pen to paper and allowing your thoughts to spill into a story that has some thread weaving it together or some theme that you want to share. So use the action, conflict, resolution rule and what if game. Writing is an ongoing process where we get better the more we write. I have a long way to go, but I believe if you have some imagination, persistence and the tools you need -- it's a talent worth developing whether as an outlet or gift to share.

The Beginning of the Tale

That first night I stared at my computer screen -- with the intention of writing in my journal -- I wasn't sure what details to include. But instead, I envisioned a scene; one from my memory of the small village of Allendale in the North of England. This is the village my mum grew up in and also the village where my grandparents had lived. As little girls, my sister and I would share a small bedroom on the second floor in the back of the house when we visited on holiday. We also shared a bed -- a big soft one that would dip in the middle -- so that in the middle of the night we'd be scrunched together and I would often be annoyed that she was in my space, especially when freezing toes would touch my leg and shock me out of a deep sleep. They didn’t have central heating so we'd hate to have to get up in the night to use the toilet -- we'd sit on that ice cold seat and hold our breaths. Unfortunately it was kind of a closet, so the bath and sink were in an adjoining room and I couldn't be entertained by my nanny's fascinating teeth, floating -- like a biology experiment -- in a jar by the sink. The bath was also big and deep and I loved to sit in there and smell the clean soapy smell -- lavender I think -- and imagine the hot cocoa and cheese on toast my nanny was preparing. We'd sit by the coal fire -- even in the summer -- and have our late supper with wet hair, playing card games. I had many memories of that particular location and also heard so many stories from my mother. So on that night, when I sat to write in my journal, I began a story of two sisters -- twins, as people always thought my sister and I were twins when we were young, being 16 months apart (actually, there was a time when an elderly woman had thought my sister and my brother and I were three identical girl triplets. We all had white shoulder length hair -- yes even my brother -- it was during the Shaun Cassidy era and he had the chocker and open collar to match. My mum's hounding him to cut his hair didn't work, but this older lady's comment sure did). Anyhow, it allowed me to incorporate all my senses from way back when of this quaint home and its traditional customs. Years later, when I went back to visit, it was like stepping back in time. As a child it seemed sheltered from the rest of the world. Don't ask why I didn't create a story set in Nova Scotia, where most of my growing years were spent or Altrincham, Cheshire -- the town we lived in when we moved back to England for a short time. Maybe those are other books. For some reason, the innocence of the place was what drew me in. And most likely the tale I wanted to share was a story of family bonds, of love, and of life's unexpected turns, starting from a very innocent place. I think that's how I'd felt when I sat down to write. I'd been raised in a loving way, naïve somewhat to the unexpected and sometimes hurtful experiences lurking around life's corner, until that point in time. There was a pain inside me, so deep at the thought of the possibility of losing my sister, that this was a way of releasing it. I wouldn't let my mind go there and instead healed it in a different kind of way. At least that's my guess on it. I wasn't aware of why I had such a desire to write, the obsession of it suddenly, but in retrospect it all makes sense.

I used my mother's era because it seemed even more sheltered and I had countless stories of the way it was when she grew up. I'd been a sponge, sucking in all the details that were now a part of me. So I just wrote and wrote and wrote, giggling and crying along the way. I wasn't sure what was going to happen next, but I knew anything could -- after all it was fiction. So it wasn't my real-life story, but still, these were my senses; my imagination and my feelings were incorporated and weaved throughout.

Finding My Passion

Summer, 2002, I had an 8 month old daughter and two boys -- a 2 and 6 year old. I was able to stay home with them and found my days filled with going to different parks, listening to the frightening exclamations of Teletubbies -- and I never could figure out exactly what they were -- and play dates. The passion question still entered my mind. I mean, what was mine? What was something I couldn't wait to do and was my own thing? Okay so I love to eat -- couldn't count that really. Running -- love that and yeah, I'm somewhat passionate about it, but it's kind of the counterbalance to my love for delicious food. Yes I loved being a mom, but what was something that was totally my own thing? That didn't relate to me being just a mommy, but more the whole person that incorporated my past and future goals too. Occasionally, I'd tutor a neighbor on algebra or help a friend do some basic statistical analysis for school -- but basically I felt my brain turning to mush, and changing diapers and then the thought of doing math wasn't exactly a thrilling sounding outlet to me. Was math my passion? Especially if Passion was defined as something that is totally your own. No math was my stability to my brain, not my passion. So I let the question quietly slip away, content with my life -- cause I really was content. I didn't need this burning question constantly prodding me. So I let it die.

And then the Autumn came, and with that a wonderful visit from my sister. My sister and I were best friends, only being 16 months apart, and we had anticipated this trip for a while. She had 4 small children of her own and we both lived far apart; she in Canada and me in the States. This was a celebratory trip for us as she'd been ill and now seemed better. We hiked, ate-out, shopped -- all the things that we'd always done together growing up. When she left, I had great memories to treasure. I reflected on how lucky I was to be so close to my sister and that, I believe, was where my passion was ignited. A couple of weeks after she'd left I sat at my computer, thinking I was going to make a journal entry and then instead I just started to write a story about sisters. It wasn't our story, but instead incorporated so many feelings of my own life with fictional drama (after all that was so much more fun). Somehow I wanted to capture a sister relationship, to make it timeless in a concrete way. It incorporated who I was -- my observations, my emotions, and my overactive imagination -- and also provided the creative outlet I apparently needed in my life. But this was only the beginning.