IWSG: Reading and Writing Genres

The first Wednesday of every month is officially Insecure Writer's Support Group day. Members post on our blogs, discussing our doubts and fears, struggles and triumphs. We visit each other and offer a word of encouragement for those who are struggling, or cheer for those with a success to celebrate. 

Today's the day--Let's rock the neurotic writing world!

The awesome co-hosts for the March 3 posting of the IWSG are Sarah - The Faux Fountain Pen Jacqui Murray, Chemist Ken, Victoria Marie Lees, Natalie Aguirre, and JQ Rose!

Each month we have an optional question to start the discussion. The March 3 question is: Everyone has a favorite genre or genres to write. But what about reading preferences? Do you read widely or only within the genre(s) you create stories for? What motivates your reading choice(s)?

Before I get on with answering the question, time to report on progress!

 

Thanks to support from my friends, I expect to finish edits on Death By Donut this week and send the MS to my proof-readers. I'm a little stressed about hitting my deadlines, and I know I've gotten into some bad timing for my release. I won't be able to do all the advance work I should, because I'll be on a raft on the Colorado River (or coming/going from Flagstaff) from late March to late April. Since I'd hoped to have this book out before Xmas, and then in January, or certainly by this month, I'm feeling the pressure not to put it off again. I scheduled the release for about two days after I get home. Now I'm wondering if I should put it off until May. I'm not good at doing what I should before a release, but this might be extreme. Thoughts?

 

Meanwhile, as soon as I get the novel out the door, I hope to get atop my fourth collection of short stories, finish the edits, and create a cover so I can send Clues, Cops, and Corpses out into the world. So I have a lot on my plate for the next month, and I've reduced my writing time to try to help save the world. In other words, I'm volunteering about 3 half-days a week at the local vaccine clinic! It's good for me in many ways, but does make it harder to work on the novel and still go for two-hour hikes and bike rides most days. Maybe it makes it less necessary to work out that much, too.

 

With all this on top of everything else in my life, I have to admit that for now I'm pretty much sticking with re-reads (comfort food), supplemented by a few new audiobooks, mostly non-fiction. Thinking more historically, my reading has long skewed heavily toward cozy mysteries and children's books, which are most of what I've written. Science fiction is creeping back in, and I really enjoy natural history as well. So I do read more widely than I write, though my flash fiction has wandered through most of the genres.

 

How about you? What are you reading?

IWSG: On Reading and Writing

 

The first Wednesday of every month is the Insecure Writer's Support Group posting day, where writers can express their doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It's a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds! Check it out here and join if you want support with your writing. 

Let’s rock the neurotic writing world!

Our Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and hashtag is #IWSG.

Every month, we announce a question that members can answer in their IWSG post. These questions may prompt you to share advice, insight, a personal experience or story. Include your answer to the question in your IWSG post or let it inspire your post if you are struggling with something to say. 
Remember, the question is optional!
October 2 question - It's been said that the benefits of becoming a writer who does not read is that all your ideas are new and original. Everything you do is an extension of yourself, instead of a mixture of you and another author. On the other hand, how can you expect other people to want your writing, if you don't enjoy reading? What are your thoughts?

The awesome co-hosts for the October 2 posting of the IWSG are Ronel Janse van Vuuren, Mary Aalgaard, Madeline Mora-Summonte, and Ellen @ The Cynical Sailor!

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I have to admit that I'm a bit shocked by writers who don't read. For one thing, why do you even want to write if you don't like to read? But it goes deeper than that. I learned what a good story looks like by reading stories, good and bad. I learned what good writing was by reading writing good, bad, and indifferent. As a child, I didn't distinguish and didn't even find many books I didn't like, but as I matured, I began to look at what I read and to understand why this book was a truly moving book, that one thought-provoking, this one an engaging bit of brain candy and that one really not worth reading even on the beach.

I also learned good grammar and sentence structure by exposure, which is not 100% reliable but is perhaps more reliable than trying to memorize a bunch of rules.

As for the worry about influences and mixing ourselves with the writers we read, any student of literature knows that influences can be traced to and from the greatest writers: Geoffrey Chaucer and William Shakespeare both cribbed tales from Virgil and Ovid, and endless writers have borrowed from those two. I have learned not to worry about undue influences on my writing: as I have learned to be a writer, my own voice has become strong enough to grow and improve as I read and think about other books, without being overwritten.

To me, that is the essence of reading as a writer.

Now, then, there's also just reading for fun. Turn off the author brain and enjoy a book for it's own sake, too!

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This post has gone up automatically. I am currently away from cell coverage, but will return all visits as soon as I can, and hope to visit a few more besides, before next month's post comes around!

IWSG: Re-reads, brain candy, and other forms of restful reading

Purpose: To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds! Posting: The first Wednesday of every month is officially Insecure Writer’s Support Group day. Post your thoughts on your own blog. Talk about your doubts and the fears you have conquered. Discuss your struggles and triumphs. Offer a word of encouragement for others who are struggling. Visit others in the group and connect with your fellow writer - aim for a dozen new people each time - and return comments. This group is all about connecting! Be sure to link to the IWSG page and display the badge in your post. And please be sure your avatar links back to your blog! If it links to Google+, be sure your blog is listed there. Otherwise, when you leave a comment, people can't find you to comment back.

 
 This month's fantastic co-hosts:

Raimey Gallant, Natalie Aguirre, CV Grehan, and Michelle Wallace!

And the optional question, which I'm not answering but you are welcome to: 

Besides writing what other creative outlets do you have?

I'm not really here to talk about writing this month. We just spent the month of January hiking our backsides off (kind of literally—my pants do fit better now than they did right after Christmas), so it should come as no surprise that I haven’t been writing. Nor have I been reading much, at least not much with substance. A kind of goofy children’s book. A couple of re-reads of light mysteries, and, heaven help me, a Louis L’Amour western (these have special nostalgic significance for me, as when I was in Jr. High and high school I read them like candy, buying far more of them than I should have from the paperback rack at the local grocery store because the library’s didn’t keep up). I am currently working on a rather massive Kim Stanley Robinson alternative future.

One nice thing about all that: with the exception of one or two of the children's books, I'm not reviewing these books. That means I can really relax and just read for fun, which is part of why I love re-reading.

Here’s my excuse: sometimes your brain needs a vacation. Sometimes you are just too tired to do anything that requires real thought, including reading. Sometimes, when you feel that way, you watch TV. I don’t, for two reasons. For one, I don’t really like TV that much (this is related to my issues with prosopagnosia, in part, since I can’t keep track of characters well). For another, most of my reading was in back-country huts and motor camps around New Zealand, so TV wasn’t really an option. But give me a half hour with WiFi every week or two or three, and I can keep my e-reader loaded with the most amazing stuff (and nonsense).

So here’s a shout-out for reading junk, and here’s a promise that I’ll be writing this month (I’ve already gotten back to work, though we’re headed into the wilds again for a few days tomorrow). I have three things I want to do this month: finish and post my WEP story, which I did manage to draft while swatting sandflies in a hut on the Routeburn Track; finish a short story using my Pismawallops PTA characters and see if it's usable anywhere; and start revisions on the novel I drafted in November and December. I may even drop the short story to start this, since I'm not sure that story is going anywhere--maybe the right way out will come to me if I leave it alone for a while.

So--tell me about your creative outlets, or confess your literary guilty secrets!

IWSG: Pet Peeves

Purpose: To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds!

Posting: The first Wednesday of every month is officially Insecure Writer’s Support Group day. Post your thoughts on your own blog. Talk about your doubts and the fears you have conquered. Discuss your struggles and triumphs. Offer a word of encouragement for others who are struggling. Visit others in the group (click on the badge above for the list) and connect with your fellow writers - aim for a dozen new people each time - and return comments. This group is all about connecting!

Be sure to stop by and visit other IWSG members and our wonderful hosts for the month,

Christine Rains, Dolarah @ Book Lover, Ellen @ The Cynical Sailor, Yvonne Ventresca, and LG Keltner!

The question this month is about your pet peeves when reading, writing or editing. Since I don't want to talk about my writing (what writing?) right now, I'm diving into this one!

As a reader, my pet peeves are poor editing and poor writing! Okay, that's a cop-out. But I will dump a book if the opening chapters have too many typos/errors, and I will dump a book faster than you can blink if it has anachronisms and problems with a consistent and believable tone. I am actually more likely to finish a book with a weak plot than one with errors of that sort--they just irritate and distract me too much, while I'm probably too good at the willing suspension of disbelief.

As a writer,  my biggest pet peeve is me. I mean, I'm bugged by the things that keep me from writing, and as Pogo Possum once said, I have met the enemy and she is me (okay, I paraphrased that). On a maybe more useful note, I have a problem with diving in without an adequate plan, and I hate it when I do that!

If we want to talk about my pet peeve as being what I struggle most with, that has to be editing, which is made all the worse when I dive in without an adequate plan (see above). Editing is hard under the best of circumstances, though the more I do it the more I have come to enjoy at least some elements at some times. This, of course, brings me to my favorite pet peeve about editing my own work (as for editing other people's work, I don't really have a peeve, because fixing those things are what I'm there for).

With my own books, I struggle with the step from seeing the big view of what needs fixing ("make this character more distinct" "provide more justification for this plot point") to actually implementing it. It's not that it annoys me, but that it's danged hard. I do dislike it when I'm supposed to be doing big-picture editing and I get all caught up in polishing sentences.

Over to you. What will make you put down a book and run, not walk, to the nearest exit? Or what will make you want to throw your MS out the window and take up a new career as a greeter at Walmart?

New Year's Round-up

It's the end of another year (and what's with that, anyway? Used to be a year lasted for, well, months and months. Now it's about 15 minutes). and time for some reflection on what I've done, what I'm doing, and what I think I ought to be doing.

Don't worry. I'm not going to talk about losing weight (though I'm sorry to say I gained back all I lost trekking in Peru, and then some) or getting daily exercise (I do). I'm talking about writing.

The Year in Review:

This was a big year for me, writing-wise. I brought out the first mystery in the Pismawallops PTA series, Death By Ice Cream, in April. In November I not only published my first middle grade fantasy, Halitor the Hero, but joined forces with six other great writers and participated in the first Bookelves Anthology, a collection of holiday stories for children. I also managed to survive the April A to Z daily blogging challenge, and averaged about 2.5 posts per week the rest of the year, despite being out of the country for five weeks in June and July (and on the trail for three weeks of that time).

It was also a good reading year, as I kept up my better-than-two-books per week reading pace, posting reviews for many, both works for children and adults. I felt at times as though I wasn't reading enough (dang that Internet and its distractions!) and sometimes felt like I was being pushed too hard to read for a deadline. My reading and reviewing (and Internet usage) need to be examined.

I also began tentatively reaching a bit farther out to make more connections in the blogging world, although my reading and commenting dropped off sadly this fall. Rather, I never regained traction in reading or writing after our summer travels, though I did finish the not insignificant editing process for Halitor.

I also did several classroom visits at two different schools, and was well-received by the kids and teachers alike. These visits are highlights of my writing life!

What I didn't do was much new writing, aside from weekly (or nearly) flash fiction. Thank goodness for that, which keeps me sane when I'm revising! By a quick count, I did 37 Flash Fiction stories, if That is 37,500 words right there!

Reflections on 2014:

I feel like the year was a mixed bag. As my comments above suggest, I'm happy to have managed to publish two books in a single year, but those were both largely written before the year began, so I had a year very heavy on revisions. That was not ideal, and I need to work on making my revision process more efficient, so that I can spend more time writing!

My level of engagement with the profession went up, but not enough. Sales also went up, but again, not as much as I had hoped. I still need to work on the advance publicity for a book. I have my days of thinking that I need to hire both a maid and a marketing director, because I don't seem to be doing an adequate job in either area!

So...what about 2015?

So here's the deal about 2015: I want to write more than ever, and I want to shake up the blog a bit, connect more with more people, writers and readers, and use my time more effectively (online and off). Piece of cake, right?

My thoughts run something like this:
For the writing, I plan to finish editing Death By Trombone (the Pismawallops PTA #2), which I drafted during NaNoWriMo 2013! (I also don't want to get this far ahead of myself again; it was for that reason that I didn't do NaNo 2014). I hope to have my first cut done in a couple of weeks so that I can send it out to my first editor/beta reader. Then I can turn my attention to the next project: the Ninja Librarian's third book (still untitled). And I want to create my own short story anthology, using flash fiction I've published here, spruced up and expanded in some cases. And, of course, I'm starting to think about the next full-length novel after revisiting Skunk Corners. That's probably enough and then some!

As for shaking up the blog, I definitely intend to continue with the weekly Flash Fiction. I like it, and my readers seem to like it. I will also continue posting book reviews, but I may back off to one per week, so that I do children's books the 1st and 3rd weeks (to participate in the Kid Lit Blog Hop) and adult books the other weeks. I need to connect up with more people, so will look at participating in additional hops and tours.  Because I do want to continue to post three times/week, I will be filling in the other days with more varied posts, on writing and possibly on life (though my life isn't very interesting), and more photo essays of current and past journeys. I will also work on the flip side of blogging, visiting other blogs.

If I want a new time sink, I will endeavor to learn to make use of the Twitter account I set up last month!

What do you think? What should I do more or less of in my blog?

Oh--and Happy New Year!

Did you get a new eReader for Christmas? Load it with my new book, Halitor the Hero, a fantasy for 10-year-olds of all ages. Use the Smashwords code AV66V to get it at 40% off! Just click on the cover image:

W: Wreading like a Writer

Couldn't resist playing with the spelling there.  Call it the Two Ws.

I've not written much this month on being a writer, but "W Day" seems like the obvious time to get back at it.  Thanks to the Progressive Book Club, I've been thinking more lately about reading as a writer (which is yet another task from reading in order to review, though the two are related).

What do I mean by reading like a writer?  Are there really different ways of reading?  You bet--I can think of at least 4 big ones without even trying.  Let's start with the way I read when I just want to shut my brain down so I can go to sleep.  This is what I think of as reading in lieu of watching TV.  I'm letting a story unfold, not putting a whole lot of myself into it.  Just absorbing and enjoying.  Beach reading.

Other times I may read for information or education. That's not just how I read things for work, it's also how I read a lot of non-fiction.  I want to know things, to increase my understanding of the topic at hand.  This requires a conscious engagement, and I usually try to avoid falling asleep.  Still, I'm reading for content, still not reading as writer, though I may look up at times to acknowledge the writer's use of language, if it's that kind of book (I'm fond of natural-history with a literary twist).

Occasionally these days I'll read a book primarily to review it (though mostly I review books I've read for fun).  In that case, I'll read with special attention to the effect on the reader.  If it's a kid's book, I get to try to imagine how a kid would react.  I pay more attention than if I'm on a mental beach.

So what more do I do when I'm reading as a writer?  I pay attention to everything.  How did that plot twist work?  Why that word?  What did the author do to make my pulse increase there?  It's a bit like what we did in school, and there's no question that it's not the same experience as just reading for the fun of it.  But a writer needs to sometimes (not always--by all means sometimes you should just read for the sheer joy of absorbing a story!) look at how other writers' technique works.  Ask yourself what that scene did for the story.  Why this character here?

I like to read mysteries, and I'm writing mysteries too (the first one that might make it to publication is in the final-edit stages).  It's more fun to read them without thinking too hard.  But if I want to learn how to make those false clues and red herrings work, I have to pull back sometimes and study them.  It's easier to do this on a re-reading, but I think at times it's helpful to ask those things of a fresh text.

Reading as a writer isn't easy.  It requires thought and effort, just like everything to do with becoming a good writer.  When it's too much--I just relax and enjoy a book.  But I also remind myself that learning a craft takes time and effort.  If I pay my dues, study with the masters, and really work, I might become the sort of writer someone else might point to and say "see?  That's how it's done."  I can think of no higher praise.

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 Also: Only a few more days to enter the Princelings drawing and win a copy of the Ninja Librarian!

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U: Captain Underpants

 

 

Yep, that's right.  I shall go boldly into the fray, and talk about Dav Pilkey and Captain Underpants.  A recent article forwarded me by my boss noted that libraries received more complaints last year about Captain Underpants being inappropriate than they did about Fifty Shades of Grey.  Naturally, this is in part because parents worry about what their little ones read, and not what they themselves are reading (though of course there is nothing to stop us checking  Fifty Shades out to young teens, and in fact though I feel it is completely inappropriate for teens, we do not and cannot censor.  But that's a different post).

So why do people, er, get their undies in a bunch about Captain Underpants?  I have a list of possible issues:
--Potty humor
--disrespect for authority
--pranks and bad behavior
--deliberate use of misspelling
--complete and utter absurdity of the plots

To help me think about this, I read the latest, Captain Underpants and the Revolting Revenge of the Radioactive Robo-Boxers.  I hadn't looked at any since about 4 books into the series (this is #10), and was struck by a couple of things.  For one, the text seemed more substantial.  Also, the segments which George and Harold "write" themselves (with the bad spelling and all) were very limited.  And the story?  Well, "absurd" does pretty well describe it.  I can't say it was laugh-out-loud funny for me, but I can definitely see the appeal to the kids.

So the issues:
Potty humor.  Show me a little kid who doesn't love potty humor, and I'll show you a robot from the planet Dullness.  Seriously, if parents think their kids are learning potty humor from these books, they are deluded.

Disrespect for Authority: See above.  In fact, despite the boys being constantly in trouble, I don't find their behavior extreme (it was worst in the earliest books).  And they DO make the principal into a super-hero.  In many of the books, the boys do engage in pranks that we as parents our kids will not emulate.  I think that most kids, though they will laugh at the pranks, also understand the consequences (and Harold and George do suffer consequences for most of their pranks).  Oddly, there are no pranks in this book, only a desperate battle to save the universe with the boys working alongside Captain Underpants.

Deliberate use of misspelling.  This is actually limited to the "comic book" sections that the boys write themselves, which seems to me to provide readers with a) easy recognition that this is not the writing to emulate, and b) a chance to feel superior because frankly, nearly all the kids reading this can do better than that.  It's part of what's funny.  The bulk of the narration is fine.

Complete and utter absurdity.  I don't think this even deserves a response.  I like absurd.  Certainly it is so far over the top that there is no worry that any kids are going to mistake it for reality.  And the claim that we now know what killed the dinosaurs is pretty funny.

Oh, and I gather some parents claimed "nudity" was an issue.  I guess that's because Captain Underpants runs around in a pair of tighty-whiteys and a cape.  If a cartoon drawing of a rather stylized human in underwear is their idea of nudity, I hope these people never go to the beach.

My bottom line: when kids are making the at times difficult transition from reading to learn to read to reading for pleasure, if some potty humor and laughter at the expense of an authority figure gets them to read, go for it.  And for some suggestions on how to deal with various issues you may have with the books, check out this piece from NPR.  My biggest issue with the current addition to the series is that it ends in a blatant advertisement for the next book, which I thought was a bit tacky.  As opposed to tasteless, which defines the whole series, but in a good way.

L: Literacy

Today our school district is celebrating Literacy Day (with a side-order of heath and multi-cultural celebrations--budget cuts make for strange bedfellows!), and I'm out soaking up the events.  But it made me think, because literacy is at the heart of everything we word-wizards do.  I mean, no literacy, no one to read our stuff, and we might as well go take a nap (well, that's not all bad).

So here's the thing: yesterday was Drop Everything and Read day, so I just want to urge every one of you to do something that makes someone more able to do just that.  Help a child read a book.  Read to your baby.  Donate to a literacy campaign.  Or go big.  Volunteer at the school.  Volunteer as an adult literacy tutor.  Donate outgrown books to a preschool near you.

And don't forget to model what you want to see.  Take an hour, drop everything, and read.

Hi, Just needed to drop back in and urge you all to pop over to Jemima Pett's blog and see her review of The Ninja Librarian--and enter the drawing to win a copy of it (or any of a bunch of other great reads).