The dreams my subconscious burps up

Last week I was in Saskatoon for business, and fit in a visit with a friend who happens to be a visual artist. We started talking about dreams, and using dreams as inspiration for art. Both of us liked the idea of keeping a bedside journal to write down our dreams, but neither of us has actually gotten around to it. But a recent vivid, disturbing dream has me considering starting one.

I’ve just gotten off a train, and am walking through a busy train yard. Everything is dull and grey and brown. There are so many people walking by, I feel a little claustrophobic. Most of the people are women and young children, which adds to my anxiety, as there are trains moving so close to us that we can easily reach out and touch them. The women are all fat like dumplings, and all clucking and yelling at their children to stay close, to stay away from the moving trains.

As I walk, a train moves towards me, then is moving by me. Also moving towards me is a young boy, maybe six years old. He is alone, and for a moment I’m afraid that something bad will happen to him, as he has no one to watch him. But as we walk towards each other, he seems very smart and careful. He’s about fifteen feet from me when he reaches his right hand to touch the moving train. His hand catches on the train, and he whips by me so fast I don’t have time to react. I whirl around, and he is staring back at me as he zooms away. I feel sick and helpless.

At this point I woke up, full of adrenalin and still feeling horrified. But right away I thought, “That dream is the start of a great short story or something. Maybe I should start keeping a dream journal.”

I’m not sure exactly where that dream came from, but it’s similar to a dream that haunts the narrator, Darby, in my novel. Darby has recurring dreams about a black horse running along train tracks towards an oncoming train. Both dreams share the same sense of doom and powerlessness.

My friend, the visual artist, also had a powerful, disturbing dream. I would share it, but it’s her dream and I have a feeling she might use it in. At least I hope she does. Her dream was a true gift, and full of insight.

Keep dreaming, friends. You never know what your subconscious has in store for you.

Canada Reads 2010 kicks off just in time for Christmas

Putting together your Christmas wish-list, or shopping for book-a-holics? The books on this year’s Canada Reads list will fit snugly into any stocking. My friend Alexis Kienlen explains below.

Hello, my name is Alexis. I’m an author, poet and journalist and one of the bloggers of the Canadian literary site, Roughing it in the books. This is the second year that Roughingitinthebooks has hosted the Canada Reads challenge. Starting December 1, we call on anyone who wants to participate to join us at our site and sign up for the challenge.

Here’s how it goes:

You pledge to read all five contenders by March 6, 2010, in time for the debates, which will run from March 8 to 12, 2010 on Jian Ghomeshi’s CBC radio show one “Q”. You can predict the winners by March 7, and then the results will be entered in three draws which will be drawn by Melanie, my co-blogger at Roughing it in the books.

The five books and five panelists are:

• Olympian Perdita Felicien who is defending Anne Marie Macdonald’s “Fall on your Knees”
• Rapper Cadence Weapon aka Roland Pemberton who is defending Douglas Coupland’s “Generation X”
• Dr. Samantha Nutt who is defending Wayson Choy’s “The Jade Peony”
• Broadcaster Simi Sara who is defending Marina Endicott’s “Good to a Fault”
• Author Michel Vezina who is defending Nicolas Dickner’s “Nikolski”

We hosted our first challenge last year and had a blast and lots of fun with participants across the country. We hope you will join us this year!

Head to our Canada Reads challenge for more details and email melanie@roughingitinthebooks.com if you want to participate.

Getting to Know Our Characters

Since I began this project, I’ve had a bit of a problem with Bea, one of my main characters. Bea is murdered at the beginning of the story, and her death and life situation are both very hard to write about. I started to create distance from Bea for a few reasons:

1. I didn’t want to write about anyone I knew who had been in situations that were at all similar to Bea’s.
2. I don’t want anyone to think I am writing about them, specifically. Especially since I’m living in and writing about a small community. (I realize I don’t have a lot of control over this).
3. I find it difficult to take a close look at a character who dies violently.

As I started working with Susan, my mentor, it became obvious I had to get closer to Bea’s story. She needed a voice. But how to develop that voice?

Susan saw I was having a problem with Bea’s voice, and suggested I look at characters in novels I like, and write Bea’s story from that character’s point of view. That way, I’ll have something to draw on, and Bea’s voice will start to come through. I went through my stack of novels and found a female character who I think has several traits in common with Bea. Already I feel like I have a better handle on Bea.

Then, this morning, I was talking to my neighbour, Edna (also a writer and editor), about voice. Edna suggested I also do a character interview to fill out the details of my character. I dug up this post by Kait Nolan on structured character interviews, and plan to start my “interview” this afternoon.

As I was finishing this post, I visited J.L. Martin’s blog. A few weeks ago, she had a great post on using smell when writing descriptions. As luck would have it, her latest post is on using old photographs to develop characters. Wow. What a great way to find inspiration for characters.

What about you? What techniques do you use to develop your characters’ voices?

Themes That Creep Into Our Writing

Recently, a local middle school teacher asked me if I’d be interested in facilitating poetry workshops for students at her school. Of course, I said yes. As she was putting together the grant application, we decided to focus on a nature theme, specifically human impact on the natural world. After all, we live on the edge of the boreal forest.

“Besides, you have several nature references in your poetry,” she added.

For some reason, that remark caught me off guard. I’ve never thought of myself as a nature writer, especially since I’ve lived in the city for several years. I never sit down to write a “nature poem.” But when I thought about it, a lot of my poetry contains references to the natural world, even if it centres around another subject, or is set in the city. Even my novel includes a lot of imagery around weather and drought and forest fires and lakes, so these themes continue.

My obsession makes sense, considering I grew up on a ranch and spent many hours outside studying frogs, snakes, and various other critters. I always like to say that my writing isn’t really autobiographical, that my poems aren’t necessarily about me. That I’m not a character in my own story. But it’s not that simple. I am not separate from my writing. Parts of me seem to leak into it, without me even realizing it.

Below is an example of that sneaky nature theme creeping into my poetry.

I Will Die On A Tuesday Morning

I will die
early on a Tuesday morning
with the sun warming my room, spring peeking
around the corner.  I will not wait for crocuses or new leaves.
Not this time.

I will stay a while,
to see my family together one last time, to hear the bagpipes singing,
to touch my granddaughter’s Sawash.  Then I will fly south,
to the endless Hills I’ve always known.

I will be wind skipping over coulees, tearing at the horse’s mane.  I will be lightning crashing to earth, singing along miles of fence.  I will be creeks in spring, summer rains.  I will be thin soil, absorbing decay, pushing up new grass.

When you need me, come to my dark Hills, my brooding skies, fierce winds.  Be still. You will know that I am here.

(Copyright Lisa Guenther. Previously published in Notebook Magazine , Stroll of Poets Anthology, and Stop Motion.)

Photo of the Cypress Hills courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/photos/ajuorio/. Creative Commons.

The Three Rs: Revise, Revise, Revise

Photo courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/photos/tnarik/366393127/. Creative Commons

 

A couple weeks ago, Susan Swan, my mentor at Humber, suggested a few changes to the first few chapters of my novel. Yesterday, I popped my finished revisions in the mail, satisfied that the story was stronger. Here’s an overview of the changes I made:

A Truckload of Characters

Have you ever moved to a small community, where everyone seemed to know who you were right away, but you were struggling to keep names straight? That’s what my novel was like. A truckload of characters. I thought I’d be able to orient the reader to the characters. Susan had a better suggestion – only keep the characters I need to tell the story.

Demoting Lena

Earlier this month, I wrote a post about trying to get Lena’s voice right. My main character, Darby, discovers several letters that Lena wrote to Darby’s mom some twenty-five years earlier. These letters shed light on the murder of Bea, Lena’s sister-in-law and Darby’s mentor.

Susan suggested that I tighten the relationship between Darby and Bea by making Bea Darby’s aunt. She also suggested that the letters should be written by Bea, so we get Bea’s point of view.

So last week I demoted Lena to a minor character, and gave Bea a voice.

Writing as a Journey

This isn’t my first revision, and I’m sure it won’t be the last. I have pages and pages of hand-written material that will never make it into the novel. But writing is about exploring, and sometimes you have to go in the wrong direction to figure out which way you really want to travel.

Right now, I’m satisfied that I’m heading in the right direction.

A Guide During the Journey?

If I wasn’t working with Susan, I probably would have floundered for quite a while before I figured out this latest set of changes. Susan is an experienced writer, editor, and teacher and I trust her opinion.

I don’t know if I would have let too many other people read the complete early drafts, though. Only two other people come to mind.

I’d like to hear from other writers about who their early readers are. Do you have one or two trusted readers, a great writing group, or do you fly solo on the early drafts?

Musings from Fred Warren

This week’s post features an interview with Fred Warren. Fred Warren writes science fiction and fantasy. His short fiction has appeared in a variety of print and online publications, and his first novel, The Muse, is scheduled to debut in November 2009. Fred works as a government contractor in eastern Kansas, where he lives with his wife and three children.

Check out Fred’s blog at frederation.wordpress.com.

How do you start your day when writing?

I commute to work, about 45 minutes on a rural highway, which gives me a chance to collect my thoughts and prepare mentally for the day, including my writing. I’ve had some of my best story ideas  on the road.

Is there a specific space where you like to write?

I’ve always wanted to have a writer’s lair, but it’s mostly catch-as-catch-can among home office, bedroom, living room, and workplace (when there’s no work going on). I travel a lot with my job, so there are many hotel rooms, bookstores, and coffee shops, too. As long as a place is reasonably quiet and I can avoid interruptions, I can write there.

Your bio says that you wrote privately for years before you started publishing. What made you seek publication?

It was a mix of things. I wrote bits and pieces of stories for a long time as a sort of adjunct to my journaling, when I got tired of writing about the weather and what I had for lunch each day. It was kind of like talking to myself, though, and if you do that long enough, you go crazy. Later, I did some collaborative fan-fiction, just as a lark. I had a lot of fun creating longer stories and playing around with dialogue, and I got some positive feedback from people who were enjoying what I wrote. I was pleasantly surprised that I could write something that other people might actually want to read, and that opened the door to thinking about the possibility of writing something that people might actually want to buy. I got involved with a writer’s forum online, Liberty Hall, that forced me to step up the quality and quantity of my writing, provided rigorous critiques, and encouraged me to submit stories for publication. Once I got my first sale, there was no turning back. I was hooked.

What draws you to speculative fiction?

I like stories that take me someplace I’ve never been, that expand the boundaries of my imagination. I’m also fascinated by what happens when you put ordinary people into extraordinary situations. I spent some time in the Air Force doing flight test, and I can tell you that the most interesting things happen when you take an airplane near the limits of its capabilities. I think people are much the same.

In a nutshell, what is your novel, The Muse, about?

The Muse is a modern fantasy about a struggling writer who is looking for a shot of inspiration to take him to the next level. We talk about writers looking for their muse—this guy literally finds his muse, but it’s nothing like what he expected, and he discovers his world’s a lot stranger and more dangerous than he ever imagined. He’s in a battle for his soul, with the fate of the people he loves most in the balance.

What was your biggest challenge when writing The Muse and how did you overcome it?

I had a real mental block about writing a long story. Before The Muse, I had written nothing but short stories, up to about 8000 words. Cracking the 10000-word barrier was a huge milestone for me, and once I’d done that, getting out to 50000 words and beyond wasn’t nearly as daunting. I discovered the disciplines I’d learned writing short stories served me well in the long form, and it was actually liberating to be able to lavish more detail on characters, setting, and dialogue. It was like moving to a four-bedroom house after spending my whole life in a studio apartment.

Was their someone who read early drafts of your manuscript?

Oh, yes. Lots of people. I started with folks from Liberty Hall whose critique skills I knew and trusted, and expanded that circle to people who wrote in different genres or were simply avid readers who didn’t write at all. Old, young, male, female—I wanted as broad a sample of reactions and advice as I could get.

How did you find a publisher for your book?

It was the last thing I expected. I figured after I’d revised and polished the draft, I was in for a long haul of shopping the story around in search of a publisher. Grace Bridges was starting up a small, independent publishing company in New Zealand, Splashdown Books, and she got hold of one of my drafts. She liked it well enough to offer me a contract.  It was a case of the right story meeting the right person at the right time. We were both taking a risk—new author and new publisher, but Grace and I have worked well together, and I think the story is stronger for her involvement in its production.

What advice would you offer writers who want to use social media to promote their writing?

Keep your expectations realistic. There are lots of powerful tools available to promote your work, but there’s a lot of noise out there on the Net as well, and your promotion efforts can turn into just so much spam. Don’t expect people to respond to a flood of ads and tweets. I think it’s important to establish a presence on the Internet, a place where people can find you and your work, and to use your existing contacts and networking, the people who know you, to spread the word and build some meaningful buzz. It’s the personal testimonies that will carry the most impact—Person A telling Person B that this book is great and they need to read it.

Is there anything that you wish someone would have told you when you first started working on your novel?

Be ready to be surprised. I discovered that the story and I both grew as I wrote it, and things began to happen that I never expected. Characters seemed to take on a life of their own, objects I thought were mere window-dressing took on huge symbolic importance, and the surprises were almost always more helpful to the story than anything I’d planned.

Here’s a freestyle writing challenge. Describe a character that wants to forget his/her last birthday.

I creep toward consciousness as the stasis chamber completes my annual resurrection, and I remember the last time, stumbling onto the deck of my crippled starship, realizing the meteorite impact had destroyed any chance of reaching my destination. My mission has failed. I wonder if there’s any point in waking up again.

The chamber door chimes and opens with an inrush of conditioned air, tangy and metallic, and I discover with a thrill of fear that I’m not alone. We stare at each other. The alien is more human in appearance than I would ever have expected—slender, bipedal, with liquid green eyes and a bluish cast to its skin and flowing hair. It produces an object from behind its back. A weapon? No, it’s small, round, and sprinkled with tiny, colorful dots.

It’s a cake.

The alien smiles. “Your language is difficult. I hope I have interpreted the custom properly. Happy Birthday?”

I accept the cake and smile in return. “Close enough.”

The Books I Love

Lija Kresowaty over at The Writer’s Pet recently invited me to guest post on her blog. One of the things she asked for was a shot of my bookshelf. Then I caught up on Cynthia’s Catching Days blog. She’s been writing about what’s on her bookshelf, so I decided to follow suit.

One of my all-time favourite books is Lake of the Prairies, a memoir by Warren Cariou. Cariou details growing up in Meadow Lake, which is just an hour or so north of where I’m living now. Some of his stories were hilarious – his description of halter-breaking a 4-H calf comes to mind. Other parts were poignant, and had me crying (although that’s not hard to do). Everyone I’ve lent this book to has loved it, so I highly recommend it.

Another favourite is The Temptations of Big Bear, by Rudy Wiebe. Wiebe’s novel sat on my to-read list until last winter, but when I finally got around to reading it, I could hardly put it down. It’s a novel based on the Northwest Rebellion, with large parts of it also set in my neck of the woods. It’s told from multiple points of view, but Big Bear is the chief character. I loved how Wiebe created an image of pre-railway Saskatchewan. It also touched me in a way I can’t quite describe, other than to say I felt like I was mourning for a land I could never visit. Or that I was looking over Big Bear’s shoulder and seeing destructive change crashing towards him. It also reinforced my belief that the land is more than a container for resources that we can extract.

Those are only two of many books that I love. What about you?

Creating Characters that Smell

Lately I’ve been struggling with my second narrator, Lena Day. You see, while Darby, my main character, is the main narrator, Lena’s voice also is introduced through letters she wrote to Darby’s deceased mother, May. Lena is the sister-in-law of Bea, who is found dead at the beginning of the first chapter. She is also the mother of Darby’’s best friend, Jen, and of Darby’s current boyfriend, Luke.

Confused yet? Bottom line – Lena is tightly connected to all the characters and the plot.

The problem is, I don’t know what Lena sounds like when she writes letters. She’s a bit of a mystery to Darby (which is fine) and to me (which is not fine). I’m not sure if this is because of some sort of generation gap (Lena’s about 25 years older than me, while Darby is my age), or the fact that Lena wrote the letters when she was younger. Or that I’m a fairly inexperienced writer, and two narrators is a lot to handle.

So, today, I decided to take action. I re-read this Margot Livesey interview on writing from multiple viewpoints. Great, especially the advice about letting characters have their say. But I was still stuck. Then I thought, what would Lena smell like?

You see, recently J.L. Martin wrote a post about using the sense of smell in our writing. I realized that I needed to know more about both “mature” Lena and “young” Lena. So I did some mind-mapping in my journal, and then was able to start writing a little more from her point of view.

Here are a few things I “discovered”  today about mature Lena:

• She smells like coffee (trying to stay awake during shift work, as she’s a nurse) and floral shampoo.
• She is a “Protector” – calm, nerves of steel, loyal, but can be fierce if she feels people she loves are threatened.
• Can be very suspicious of people.
• She puts a lot of pressure on her kids to succeed.
• She’s 5′6″, in good shape. Blonde, with hazel eyes.
• Usually wearing sneakers (work) or cowboy boots (farm), along with jeans and button-up blouses. Always looks pulled together.

And young Lena:

• Smells like floral perfume while in nursing school in the city. During the summer, while at home, smells like horses and hay.
• Came from a close-knit, “good” family.
• Grew up on a ranch south of Maple Creek, SK. This is where she became friends with Bea.
• Athlete in high school. Particularly good at barrel racing.
• Very popular in high school. Beautiful – farm-girl version of Marilyn Monroe.
• Curious, social, likes to gossip. Assertive about questioning people, finding out the background of new people.
• Very smart, good at science and math.
• Sees the world in black and white. Slots people into categories (good vs. bad, friend vs. enemy).
• Nurturing.
• Loyal to family and friends.
• Trusting towards most people. Optimistic about her future, and the future of her family and friends.

I’m  feeling more confident that I’ll be able to capture Lena’s voice. I guess that we really do write what we know – and if we don’t know right away, we need to figure it out!

Where We Write

I don’t know about you, but where I write has a big impact on how productive I am. I sometimes like to get away from my regular workspace to write new fiction. I can revise from my regular workspace, but if I’m working on prose, I get “distracted” by my regular work. Or Twitter. Or my cat. You get the idea.

When I lived in Edmonton, I usually headed to a coffee shop to do some writing. Any coffee shop worked fine. But my favourite writing spot was Steeps on 124th street. That little tea shop had the perfect atmosphere: good tea, comfortable chairs, other people working on various projects or chatting quietly, music, and a busy street to stare at.

In the last week I’ve been writing at the north end of Brightsand Lake. Although the weather’s been gorgeous, all the campers have left for the season, the concession is closed, and I’m alone most of the time. Just me, the pelicans, and the occasional human. I’ve been plunking my laptop on one of the tables on the concession’s deck, and writing for hours at a time. Not sure what I’ll do in the winter, but for now I’m loving it.

For some reason, I can hammer out a new poem almost anywhere. I’ve been struck over the head with a poem at concerts (Po’ Girl!), in the car (usually while someone else is driving), on the bus, almost anywhere. But not fiction. With fiction, I need to give myself the space to focus for a while.

What about you? Where do you write?

My “regular” workspace – fine for revising, but sometimes I need to get away to write new material.

My “alternate” workspace at Brightsand Lake – just me and my laptop!

View from the deck of the concession at Brightsand Lake. Facing south-west.

Another view (south-east) from my writing spot.

Building a Fictional World Detail by Detail

Recently I volunteered to run a writing workshop, as part of an annual arts festival in my area (www.borealjam.com). We went to a historical school, sat down at the old wooden desks, and got down to business.

The focus of the workshop was including concrete details in our writing. Details are so important. As Janet Burroway notes, details are what convince and engage readers. Think of CSI – the reason we (or at least I) find the plots at all plausible is the specific details. Natalie Goldberg advises writers to think of details as the ingredients. Add your own heat and energy, and you get a black forest cake, or apple pie, or whatever. This piece of writing is a beautiful example.

I took part in the writing exercises as well, focusing on our setting (Moosehead School). While writing about the school, I decided to make it the setting for an important turning point for my protagonist, Darby Swank. Originally, I was going to have this take place during a visit to Fort Pitt,but the school is closer to her home base and makes more sense. Maybe I’ll still use Frenchman’s Butte/Fort Pitt as a setting later on. Or if not in this story, in another.

I really tried to nail down the feeling of being in a one-room school in the summer. The buzz of flies, the black spider with the fat white abdomen on the green steps. The white exterior with green trim. Inside photos of school alumni lined the walls. Past visitors had signed the chalk board, including the latest class of graduates. It was so neat to see years of signatures layered one on top of the other.

Here is a slideshow of photos from Frenchman Butte, Fort Pitt and Moosehead School. For more photos from the arts festival, visit www.borealjam.com.

I was really impressed with the people who took the workshop. As people shared their work, I was amazed at how many great writers we had in the room, even though they didn’t necessarily consider themselves writers. Whether they were hammering out a poem or prose, people painted vivid pictures. One interesting aspect was that many of the people in my workshop were visual artists, and I think this helped, as they understood the need for concrete detail and the creative process. I hope they keep up their writing.

Resources mentioned:

Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within. Natalie Goldberg.  Publisher: Shambhala Publications Inc.

Writing Fiction: A Guide to Narrative Craft. Janet Burroway. Publisher: HarperCollins.