Book: The Reincarnationist

Title: The Reincarnationist
Author: MJ Rose
Genre: Historical Suspense
Length: 455 pgs.

Summary: Josh Ryder, an investigative photographer, is the survivor of a terrorist bomb that exploded a year ago in Rome, Italy. Thanks to the bombing, he is now the victim of odd flashes that have the “emotion, the intensity, the intimacy of memories.” But they couldn’t be memories. In these flashes, Josh is a pagan priest in ancient Rome, desperate to save a woman named Sabina and the treasures she is hiding from the marauding Christians. As his flashbacks uncover his previous life, deaths start piling up around Josh: whatever that woman Sabina was protecting in ancient Rome, someone today thinks they’re worth killing for.

Excerpts:

pg 36 – Josh experienced a flash of completely unfounded jealousy and unexpected emotion: a white-hot surge of jealousy unlike anything he’d ever felt for any lover he’d ever had. He wanted to rush over and pull Rudolfo away, to tell him he had no business leaning in so close, no right to get so near to her. Josh hadn’t known that this corpse even existed an hour before, but his recollections had taken over and in his mind he saw muscle appearing, then being covered by flesh, the flesh plumping out her face, neck, hands, breasts, hips, thighs and feet, all coming to life, her lips pinking, her eyes being colored a deep blue. … A million images crashed inside his head. Centuries of words he’d never heard before. One louder than the rest. He snatched it out from the cacophony. Sabina. Her name.

pg 261 – “You might as well be one of those stone sculptures,” Alex mused out loud. “Immune to falling in love. No one has ever made your eyes shine the way a stunning unset gem can.”

“Stop worrying.”

“One day you will stop believing in the possibility of heroes, accept the reality of the people you meet, deal with their limitations and learn to make the best of it.”

“Why should I do that? You didn’t. Aunt Nancy didn’t.”

pg 374 – “When you look into the eyes of someone you’re photographing, and glimpse a terrible suffering, don’t turn away,” his father had once told him. “It’s a gift to see into the depths of grief, because only when you realize that someone can be in that much pain and still function, speak civilly, shake your hand and tell you how nice it is to meet you, do you understand why you can’t ever give in or give up. There’s always another chance, another day. That’s the miracle of the human spirit. Take on the pain, Josh. Give it its due. That’s the only way to beat it.”

Why should you read this book?

You can always tell when I really like a book… I have a lot of excerpts from it that I think are the best-written passages. Let me tell you this: I’m in graduate school, and I’m super busy all the time. But I made time for this book. I read it in two days, despite all my assignments, because I was desperate to know what happened.

Read this book for a great example of suspenseful writing, for fleshed out characters, and even for some well-written intimate scenes. If you’re trying to write emotion but don’t know how to begin, this is an awesome start for you. If you’re tackling the idea of fate, and fate bringing your characters together/splitting them apart, read this book.

Choose the Bolder

“When you cannot make up your mind which of two evenly balanced courses of action you should take–choose the bolder.”
- Ezra Pound

This month, you’re doing what many think is the impossible: you’re writing a novel-length book in thirty days.

Fifty-thousand words in thirty days.

Are you insane?

Yes, yes you are, and I love that about you.

I know many of you might be struggling at this point. This is the rough patch, really. You’re close to the end, but so far from it, you know?

So I’m sure you’re at a crossroads. You don’t know the next step your characters should take. You’re tempted to go back and edit what you have written. Whatever you do, don’t do that.

Here’s a suggestion: choose the bolder path. What would happen if, say, one of your characters died? Or did something almost  as radical?

Maybe it makes sense, what you’re about to do. And then again, maybe it doesn’t. That’s not the point of NaNoWriMo. The point is to put pen to paper, and at the end of the month, have something to workshop. Get that? Have something to workshop by the end of the month.

Good luck. If you need a place to vent about your work, leave a comment and we’ll see what we can do about sparking your imagination.

In the Midst of Living

“My ideas usually come not at my desk writing but in the midst of living.”
- Anaïs Nin, French Writer

First, I need to say that last week the lovely Evangeline at Edwardian Promenade awarded the I Love This Blog to me, and I have to spread the love around. See the end of this post for the award, and my nominations. <3

This week’s exercise is to take a look around you. So often do we writers get lost in the act of writing, that we forget we are supposed to be writing about life. Who are these characters that we spend our every waking moments with? How can we possibly know who they are, and how to make them distinct, if all we do is sit around our houses dreaming about them?

NaNoWriMo is a difficult time for any writer, whether you have a plan/outline or not. I found that during the second week, I began to lag a little. Things weren’t coming as quickly, and I was losing some of my pep.

I knew I had to leave the computer. There was something about sitting in the same spot day in, day out, writing to fulfill the daily goal, that exhausted me. I took a digital camera and small writing journal, and went for a walk.

I took pictures of whatever I saw that inspired me, with the plan to print them out and tape them to the walls around my desktop. I sat by the little lake at the center of my campus, and absorbed. I never wrote anything.

Three years later (i.e. a couple of weeks ago), that moment crystallized into the following:

At Ohio State, my favorite place on campus was Mirror Lake. There are beautiful flowering trees there in the spring, and ducklings that swim in time with The Truman Show soundtrack on my mp3 player. In the winter, the lake freezes over and everyone tests their courage by walking across it. In the fall, the most zealous Buckeyes jump into the lake to show their loyalty against M*ch*gan. There are benches, and sometimes people play their guitars. I would walk around the lake, usually listening to classical music, and breathe it in. I’d stare at the fountain in the center, and how it sometimes made a rainbow on very bright days.

Simple, reminiscent, evocative. Do you have such a moment, and can you use it for your writing?

Awards to Blogs I Love

Dreaming on the Job

Graham Carter

Tales of a Fantasy Scribbler

Word Nerd

(Listed alphabetically)

A Six Word Story

This month, I’m doing a series of short exercises, one a week, to help those of you who are stuck with your WIP. Maybe you’re doing NaNoWriMo, maybe not. In any case, it helps to have an exercise to spark your imagination.

This week’s exercise is a challenge in brevity. The goal of NaNoWriMo, for instance, is to write 50k words in a month. A 50k word work is about the length of a short novel, similar to an Avon or Harlequin romance. This can be a challenge in and of itself… how do you write a novel with developed characters and an interesting plot in 50k words? Some writers, who are cheating themselves, will litter their WIP with adverbs, adjectives, and unnecessary description just to make that word count goal.

Here is a popular and well-known writing exercise… Hemingway was once given a challenge to write an entire story in only six words. His answer:

For sale: baby shoes, never worn.

Apparently, he thought it was his greatest literary work ever. It speaks to the audience, and pulls them in. We know the ending to the story, and can surmise how it began. Most importantly, we care.

Here are some of my six word stories:

He smiled, and her world ended.

She always hated writing the beginning.

Her lips were chapped. Damn frogs.

Required: knight in armor (shining optional).

There are many writers who practice this sort of flash fiction through their Twitter accounts, where each update can only be 140 characters long. Can you tell a story in a sentence? What is your six word story? Do you even count these micro-narratives as stories?

Set Yourself on Fire

Success isn’t a result of spontaneous combustion. You must set yourself on fire.
- Arnold H. Glasow

A somewhat creepy quote just in time for Halloween, I think. Can you imagine what it must feel like, to set yourself on fire? Let’s think of it in the literal sense, first.

There are the branches and twigs, all dried to a satisfying crisp so they will catch flame. There are the ropes, to keep you in place as the flames grow higher and start to lick at your feet. There is the stake to which you bind yourself, and the gasoline in which you douse yourself. There is the doubtful assistant, who ties you up, and lights the flame for you. There are your shrieks, though of triumph or horror for completing the task, we’ll never know.

Gruesome. Happy Halloween.

Now let’s look at this as a giant metaphor, because who doesn’t like a good metaphor?

As a writer, you must set yourself on fire.

There are your ideas (branches and twigs), happily fermenting in the back of your mind and ready to explode on the page. There are your goals and aspirations (ropes), to keep you going as the going gets tough and the rejections evermore painful. There is the blog to which you commit yourself (the stake), and the people who comment (gasoline), holding you accountable. There is your critique partner (doubtful assistant), who asks you questions, and encourages you when you’re ready to give up. There are your shrieks, though of triumph or horror for completing the first draft and having to start the second, we’ll never know.

I encourage all of you to set yourself on fire. Be the passion that brings your work to life, and others will feel it in your writing. As sung in The Sound of Music, “Nothing comes from nothing; nothing ever should.” What does that mean? It means that, like in the quote at the beginning of this entry, success won’t spontaneously combust for you. Success will be a result of an arduous process into which you pour your heart, soul, patience, and resources.

Set yourself on fire. Join NaNoWriMo, and feel the flames burn ever higher as you blaze toward the finish line. Good luck, and may the muse be with you.

Leave a comment about something you do to get fired up about writing. Do you listen to music? Do you watch a favorite movie or read a favorite book? Do you talk to people about your writing?

To Self-Publish or Not

The other day, I indulged during my break time and did some reading on self-publishing. This is self-publishing in the literal sense, meaning that I would handle the interior and exterior layout design, select the printer for the book, obtain my own ISBN, set up a business account, find the printer, and handle distribution.

In other words, to self-publish, I would be a micro press, a.k.a. small business owner. I’m not sure people realize that, in order to be a true self-publisher, you are effectively going into business. This is very different from publishing through Aventine Press, for instance (their services are excellent, but have high retail prices).

Why Would You Self-Publish?

There are multiple reasons for self-publishing, the first usually being that the author doesn’t want to jump through hoops to find an agent, an editor, and then shop around the big name publishers. In the 1990s, this was seen as the extreme vanity of selfish authors, hence the name “Vanity Press.”

A vanity press, also known as a subsidy press, is where the author pays a fee for the publication of the book. The press owns the ISBN, provides a template cover and interior (some packages provide more customization), and prices for small print runs are large due to the print-on-demand technology.

So there is a stigma against self-publishing authors who do it simply because they want to see their name on a book. These authors are seen as “cheating the system,” as it were. And then there are the authors who believe in the very spirit of self-publishing, like Zoe Winters.

Authors like Zoe and myself take great pride in our work, and turn to self-publishing because of this very fact. We also have an entrepreneurial spirit, which we apply to our passion for writing.

These are the two extremes of self-publishing authors: those who self-publish because they’re tired of the rat race, and those who self-publish for the sincere pleasure and pride of having self-published. There are other reasons for the authors who fall between these extremes; all are stigmatized against by the big name publishers and chain bookstores.

Is Self-Publishing for Me?

It depends. Do you have money? Because you’ll need it, to set up your accounts with Lightening Source, a wholesaler, for instance. Do you have storage space to hold your copies? Because if you go through Lightening Source, you are your own distributor and marketer.

But here is the most important question: what is more important to you, seeing your name in print, or putting your name on a book that you guided from draft to publication, hiring professionals as needed? A self-publisher invests in their book the same way a company invests in a product. If the product (your book) fails, you’ve lost the money you invested. If it succeeds, you receive all profits.

Zoe knows a lot more than I do about self-publishing, so I suggest checking out her blog. My experience is with vanity publishers, but for my next book, I do plan on releasing self-published print and e-book versions.

Which, by the way, I’m up to chapter 22 in the second draft! Things are coming along pretty well, I think, considering I’m a full-time graduate student.

Explode Your Ideas

“When I have an idea, I turn down the flame, as if it were a little alcohol stove, as low as it will go. Then it explodes and that is my idea.”
- Ernest Hemingway

This quote describes my idea process fairly well. Many of my ideas come from that liminal state of mind between sleep and wakefulness. This can get frustrating, because who remembers to grab a pencil and paper when half-asleep? I’ve trained myself, thankfully, to keep a pad of paper within flailing distance of my bed.

But that’s the end result of an involved idea process. How do ideas begin? I’m a people-watcher, for one. I often will sit in a crowded place with my headphones on, and my music turned down really low so I can hear the conversations around me. This isn’t to spy on people, but rather to grab impressions.

Maybe Lord Hartwell walks like that man, and scratches the back of his head like that little boy. Maybe Mary twitches her nose to the side like that woman when she smells something she doesn’t like. Mr Spencer sneezes like that old man over there, despite his only being 26 years old.

I take these impressions, along with snippets of stories I hear and read throughout the day, and do…nothing. I think about them for a while, try to decide why I find them interesting, and then I continue with my day. As a graduate student, I have a lot to do, so it’s almost never a problem to let my ideas stew.

A couple of days later, my idea will explode like Hemingway’s stove, and I’ll scramble for pen and paper. I’ll write furiously, scratching out words that don’t work because it takes too much time to erase. I’ll feel triumphant if I catch everything in the first attempt, and then I’ll fall asleep with a smile on my face.

The next morning, I’ll wake and examine what I wrote. Sometimes, I’m pleased with it, and decide it will definitely go in the new draft. Sometimes, it’s complete trash, but I tuck it into my journal anyway, because it’s a piece of writing and all writing counts, whether it’s trash or not. Practice makes perfect, right?

How do your ideas come to you? Do they explode into being, or do they sneak in unawares?

Everything is Ready

“If we wait for the moment when everything, absolutely everything is ready, we shall never begin.”
- Ivan Turgenev

When someone finds out I’m a writer, I inevitably hear about how they have a couple stories of their own lurking in their head, or three novels half-started, etc. Which I applaud, because I’m always happy to hear about fellow writers doing their best to write.

Rarely have I ever heard a story where they finished the work.

Sometimes this is because they’ve lost interest. Sometimes they cite the dreaded Writer’s Block. Sometimes they just don’t know how to begin.

J.A. Konrath declares that there’s no such thing as Writer’s Block. He also says you shouldn’t listen to people who say you must write every day to be a writer. Which I agree and disagree with.

Writer’s Block happens to me, but only because of the quote at the beginning of this post: I suffer from perfectionism, which means there are times when I want everything to be ready for me to write. I want to write, but some part of my brain tells me that the conditions aren’t right, aren’t “ready,” for writing. So I stew, fuss, and complain until my brain figures out that I don’t need perfect conditions to write, I only need to make time to write.

So I do agree with Konrath’s point that you don’t need to write every day. I’d like to alter his assertion, however, by claiming that even if you don’t physically write every day, you do at least think about writing. While you’re waiting in line at the grocery store, ask your characters questions to know them better. Study the people around you and note interesting personality ticks that could help flesh out your characters.

There’s no such thing as perfect writing, remember. There is always room to improve. So don’t let your need to get it right the first time stop you from writing. Let me tell you that you won’t get it right the first time you put it on paper.

Don’t let that blank sheet of paper intimidate you.

If you feel like writing, but don’t know how to begin, write about that! Write about how you’re feeling about your work, or lack thereof. Write about what you did today. The point is to get used to writing, in any form.

Like musicians, writers can only improve by practicing. This includes reading and writing a lot. When you feel the urge to write, just do it. Don’t let your fears crowd your ideas. The moment you put pen to paper, you are ready. There is no better moment to begin than now.

Break the Seas

A book must be an ice-axe to break the seas frozen inside our soul.
- Franz Kafka

We all know that a story in which nothing bad happens to the character isn’t much of a story. The character needs something to fight against, so the reader has a reason to root for the character. This can be for heroes and villains, believe it or not.

That being said, when you write, who do you keep in mind as you write? The characters? Your overarching plot? Your theme? Your reader? Or all of the above?

When I began Trentwood’s Orphan, I had no idea who or what I was writing for. I simply had a character (Mary Winslow) who, like many of you mentioned in the comments two weeks ago, wouldn’t leave me alone. And that was good enough for me, then.

Now, I find that I’m writing not only to learn more about Mary, but also about how the world affects her and how she affects the world…that world including the reader. Can I make my reader cry? Can I make them frustrated? Will they be drawn into the story and wonder how Mary will get past her grief? Will they be desperate to know whether she will allow love, in any form, to break the seas frozen in her soul?

Some might discount this as a romance thing, only. As in, only in romance would an author try to tease such an emotional response from their reader. I beg to differ. Many a literary fiction has done much worse to me than the majority of the romances I’ve read. And perhaps that’s why I want to bring emotional turmoil, real emotional turmoil, to my romance.

Romance is a part of life, as is tragedy. Oftentimes, they come hand-in-hand. Is this so in fiction? Not always. Does this mean romance and tragedy should never happen together in fiction? Not necessarily.

In fact, if an author can touch me in such a way that I feel as though my very soul was burned, I’m much more likely to recommend the book to a friend. That is what I strive for, something so…fierce, I suppose, that my reader is scorched, forever changed by my writing.

Tell me, is this something you’ve considered? Do you feel breaking the ice of your reader’s soul is applicable to your genre? Explain why or why not, I’m very curious to know how you feel about this.

The Motivating Purpose

I wrote my first novel because I wanted to read it.
 - Toni Morrison (American author)

This is very true for my current novel, and perhaps even for my first novel. But is it true for you? Last week we talked about the motivating purpose behind our main characters, and then some. But what is the purpose behind writing about those characters?

This is what I like to call the theme of the work. Why are you writing your book? What spurred that first idea? Who are you writing for?

These are questions that are as important as knowing that first problem that your main character must face. Why? Because it focuses your work. It gives you a breadcrumb trail to the second problem your main character faces, and then the third, and so on…

So what is your motivation behind writing your book? Are you writing it because you, like Toni Morrison, have looked for a book like the one you’re writing, and have found nothing similar? Or have you found one, and was so disappointed by it, that you simply had to give it a try? Or is it something completely different?

I’m writing my book because my parents have entered a stage in life where they are losing those they hold dear. And it occurred to me that I will enter that stage as well. What if it were to happen to me tomorrow? What if I were to lose both my parents? How would I handle it? How would I take care of my younger siblings? What would happen to us?

More importantly, what if I lived during an age where, as the eldest child, and a female, my options were severely limited? What if I lived during an age where death was an everyday thing, and to succumb to grief for longer than the prescribed amount of time was considered selfish?

What is my motivating theme? Understanding the grief that comes from adult orphanism. What is my genre? Historical romance. Will it work? Who knows. But this is the motivating purpose behind my writing.

Tell me in the comments about your motivating purpose, or the story behind your story. Why are you writing what you are writing?

As you can see, I’m relying on writing quotes to provide a thesis of sorts for each of my posts now that I’m in graduate school. It seems to be working out, would you agree?