Keeping my hand in ...

Whoo-wee I did not see that coming. You might think I should have 'cos I applied for it. Here is the announcement here. Thanks to the Michael King Writer's Centre, the NZ China Friendship Society, Shanghai Writers' Association and Shanghai People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, I am off to Shanghai in September for eight weeks to work on a new middle grade fiction project. The story is partly set in Shanghai, the setting a catalyst for some big turning points in the plot. I cannot wait to soak up the location, and walk the streets I will be writing about. It's an incredible opportunity and it is still a little surprising that it was given to me. I actually went on a bit of a hot applying jag a few months back. I was feeling pretty bleak about the state of things. I was wondering about slowly taking my hand out of the bucket of water, and just when you are contemplating taking a step back the logical response (of course!) is to apply for things (residencies, funding, etc...). I think the underlying mood was just reaching for some chances to fulfil a couple of long held ambitions. It all felt a bit wild and yet in the fevered moment of applying I realised Shanghai was a perfect part of my project. I guess maybe it felt like that to the selection panel too. I am feeling excited about the story and the groundwork I am laying right now. By the time I am in the plane my main character will be too, travelling to the place that will set her off in a startling new direction.

I applied thinking I would most likely not get it (the classic creative's self preservation approach). But it felt good to apply. It felt important. I was doing something ambitious and gutsy and at the same time practical and purposeful. Applications take effort, corralling information, defining and refining a project, making decisions about what to include and what to leave out. You polish the project and commit yourself to the idea. You imagine yourself taking up the opportunity and then you steel yourself to the likelihood that one of the other applicants will get the nod. But it is no good having goals and then never pursuing them. As much as this business is out of our control and a significant part of our journey subject to the decisions of others, if there are things out there you want to try for, you have to go for it. Because sometimes it might be you. This time it was me, and it is all very thrilling and I cannot wait. And now I'll be keeping my hand in the bucket of water a bit longer.

The universe's gimlet eyes...

Oh fresh watermelon and fragrant blushing peaches, how I love you (although the keyboard is not so much the fan). Summer fruits are, for me, a highlight of the season - Eton Mess anyone?

I am contemplating being not so lazy. Last night the History Channel on telly showed a documentary on Vikings. I took notes and  had to prop my eyelids open several times. On a Saturday night. Really, the lengths I go to for my readers. Especially when you think there are, like, just two of you. I love you both.

And sometimes, I am sure, the universe is trying to speak to me - if it is, it's saying "get off yo' lazy ass and finish writing that sequel to Jack the Viking". Okay, okay, I heard you. It's just I want to make it totes amazing and that takes, like, really really hard work.

Sometimes when the universe speaks to me it freaks me out a little. Someone recently posted a link on facebook the title of which included the word gimlet, and my immediate reaction was to think what an excellent little word that was and I must include it in a story soon. Lo' and behold the next page I turned to in the book I was reading (about ten minutes after my facebooking adventure) included the word gimlet. Having not seen that word in a book, or anywhere else for that matter for more than a few years I really am wondering why it's here now, being so provocative. Don't be surprised if you see the word gimlet turn up in some of my writing soon. Who knows what might happen if I don't use it...

And because I love giving y'all advice here's some good oil from JetReidLiterary on 'plot' - brief, yet oh so smart. And then a reminder from self-pubbed author Lexi Revellian on the value of persistence. I'm not sure I ever want persistence to matter more than talent.  And not all her commentors agree that persistence will pay off, but I think it is a necessary approach to writing in so many ways. And as Revellian points out, "The nice thing about ebooks is that, unlike print books, they do not have a shelf life. No one will rip off their covers and send them back to be pulped. They can sit around twiddling their fingers until their moment in the sun arrives."   

Getting discouraged, sadly, is a common experience for many authors. It is a discouraging business in so many ways. I can't promise you publication, sales, awards or any other kind of writing success. Nobody knows what tomorrow holds - I don't believe in clairvoyancy (even if the universe does chat with me on a regular basis) - but I do believe in hyphens the long game. And for that you need persistence.

Would I do it all again, knowing what I know now?

Sometimes I think having a writing career is like having a baby: you don't really know what it means until the baby has arrived. Before the birth you can't understand what people are trying to tell you, no matter how many times you've heard it, in however many different ways. You have to experience it yourself for the penny to drop. Once your offspring has turned up, just as you figure out how to get them to eat and sleep in a routine, they grow and develop into the next stage and you have to start the learning process all over again. This is a never-ending cycle. You can never get complacent or smug. Your children will always be one step ahead of you. And so it is with being an author. You wrote your masterpiece and some publisher finally said yes. And you thought, 'at last!' - Hell no - this is just the beginning. Now your novel/picture book/whatever, needs you more then ever. You have to learn new skills in marketing and promotion. You have to learn how to talk about writing to a variety of audiences. You have to talk about yourself to strangers. You have to learn how to look busy and not worried as you sit alone at your signing table at an event that didn't quite work. You have to figure out how to get over rejections for manuscripts that are just as good as the ones you've had accepted and you have to suck it up when your books don't sell. And then you have to go back and write another story. And then another one. Even though you're going to have to go through the baby raising thing all over again, every time. And there will be things in the future I don't even know I have to learn yet. Would I do it all again if I could start over, knowing what I know now. Are you kidding me? Hell yes!

By the way as my mother's day treat (no no it wasn't cleaning up the dishes after my children made themselves a cooked breakfast leaving an impressive trail of dirt and destruction) I went to see the new Star Trek movie on Imax. Yowza. Is it too soon to go see it again? It isn't perfect (revenge is so yesterday) but I loved what they've done with all the characters and as soon as the credits rolled I wanted it to be a weekly hourlong series on tv again because even an annual movie length fix isn't enough to satisfy my addiction.

And hey, check this out on youtube. Filmed in the neighbours back yard, the first bag jumper is my son, and the last is my SO. I think the plot is well developed, don't you.

Is today's publishing market a bit like the tv reality show Wipeout?

Happy - people are saying nice things about my book The Were-Nana. Sad - publishing markets seem to be downsizing. I guess its just an economic reality. Sometimes i think wistfully of what it might have been like to be writing twenty or thirty years ago when publishers became more involved with their writer's careers, patiently nurturing them and helping them along. They were probably more willing to take a risk back then too. But then if I was writing back then I have to remember I'd probably be doing it long hand and I wouldn't have some of the excellent technology and groovy accessories that are available to us today. No time is the best time or the worst time. Its just 'how it is' right now and whatever the circumstances, the plain truth is I'm a writer. If I don't find a way to move forward in this environment I may as well give up. But I don't want to give up so I'll be thinking my way through the current setbacks and difficulties and hopefully coming up with some strategies for keeping my sanity and my sense of humour (an essential tool in the writers tool kit) intact. And maybe i'll also find a way to make the most of the way things are now.

And thank you Fifi for your very kind words of encouragement. They made a big difference.