Book People

I love the smell of books in the morning.

One of the best things about my day job is the variety of people I come across every day.  I wait on cops (the Dekalb County SWAT team are some of my favorite customers), rednecks, soccer moms and dads, hippies, hipsters, artists, politicians, bus drivers, mechanics, and --my favorites after the SWAT team -- book people.

Most of my book people are regulars, and part of the reason I love them is because they are so easy to wait on.  The food is almost secondary to the book, and as soon as they order, they crack it open (or turn it on, if they are e-reader people) and they are gone.  They don't need a whole lot, just their time alone with something good to read and a glass of wine to wash it down.  I like to watch their faces as they read, as their emotions change with the events in their books, the shock or the sadness or the laughter.

Most of the time, I leave the book people alone, because I know how annoying it is when you're in the middle of a good book and someone keeps interrupting you, even if they are interrupting you to talk about the book you are reading.  "Is it good?" they ask.  "Yes," I always want to say, "I'd like to keep on reading this good book."  Hint, hint.

But sometimes I just can't resist.  A few weeks ago, for instance, one of my customers came into the restaurant with Don DeLillo's Point Omega under his arm, and I just couldn't help myself.  Don DeLillo is one of my absolute favorite writers under the sun, and I hardly ever see people reading him.  Which, if you ask me, is one of the great travesties of our time, but I digress.  The point is, I just had to talk to him about the book, which is one that I hadn't read yet, and what followed was the kind of conversation that only happens between book people, gushing about dialogue and theme and words and stories.  This ten minute conversation put a smile on my face for the rest of the day.

A few days later, I was even more excited to find, upon starting my shift, that this lovely gentleman had dropped his copy of Point Omega off at the restaurant for me to read.  And this got me thinking about book people, and the beauty of books, and why book people are so devoted to them.  Books are someone else's thoughts, their questions, their answers, their passions, poured out onto a page and bundled up to share with other people.  We read them, and they become ours, and when we really love a book, we want to share it with our friends, our families, even strangers, because we feel part of ourselves in them.  They can make all of our troubles and neuroses feel valid.  They can make our lives seem better than we thought they were, or inspire us to try harder, to do better.  And when that happens, we want to share it.

Book people are sharers, I think.  We read a book we like and we pass it on to someone else, and we talk about how the book made us feel, how it changed our way of thinking about things, how it made us look at our lives from a new angle.  I love lending books I'm crazy about to my friends, so that we can enjoy the books together, because books are all about sharing ideas with other people.  And that's why I love them.

Back It Up!!

Don't let this happen to you.

Well, readers, I have returned, if ever so temporarily, from my unintentional hiatus to tell why I have disappeared: a few weeks ago, in the middle of a heated spell of writing, my dear computer decided that its services were no longer needed in this world, and that it had better retire to computer heaven (or hell, which is where I would send it).  That is, it died.  It's too bad, too, because I was finally starting to get some good writing done.  But, alas.  It was not to be.  And as I am as yet too broke to buy myself a new computer (in cash or credit), it appears that my updates on this here blog with be sporadic at best.  I am, at this very moment, coming to you from my father's computer, and let me tell you, typing on his ancient keyboard is no Sunday picnic.  We all must suffer and endure for our art!

I also mean to reassure you lovely people that even though I am living without modern technology, I have not given up the craft!  I am forging ahead, like a pioneer, writing (dare I say it?) by HAND!  And I have to say, with the minor exception of aches and pains (okay, full out major, finger-crippling hand cramps), writing by hand is working out alright for me.  And why not?  I have a whole slew of empty notebooks in which to scribble, and a million and a half pens to do it with.  I have to keep reminding myself that until college, this was how I always did it, scratching away furiously, hoping the words in my head would slow down just enough for my hand to keep up.  Hell, for a time after an injury, I even hand-wrote stories with my left hand.  I can do this!  And as I always have a notebook on hand, I have no excuse to wait until I get home to write down what's plaguing my cerebrum.

That said, it is a major pain in the ass trying to query with my various backed-up forms and letters.  Try attaching a Word document to a request from an agent when you don't have Word!  And since they all want something just a little bit different, it's not like I can use the same document for everyone, with a little apology/disclaimer in the body of the email.  Some want the first five pages, some want the first ten.  Some want a one-page synopsis, some want five pages.  But it could be worse.  I could be one of those ridiculous writers who didn't back up their work or send it to anyone, and then I'd be screwed.

Seriously, I have heard too many stories like this, where something happened to the hard copy or the computer that held the only draft.  People, do not be stupid.  Back up your work and back it up often.  We're talking, multiple formats and for every session.  Email it to yourself, use a memory stick, print it out on paper.  Ever watch Californication?  All of David Duchovny's troubles (okay, many of them) could have been stopped in their tracks if he'd just backed up his work.

Ernest Hemingway's first wife lost the suitcase containing the only copy of his first novel in it.  Years of work, gone.  Ernest Hemingway lived in a time without computers or internet or photocopies.  He had an excuse.  You do not.  If you save your manuscript only once, on your hard disk, and then take your computer on a plane and check it with your luggage and your manuscript then disappears with your luggage (a true story I read in the paper a few years ago), then you have no one to blame for the loss but yourself.  Do not be like this person.  Do not be a fool.

Say it with me: ALWAYS back it up!

On Writing: Truman Capote V. Jack Kerouac

Ah, November:  when fall changes to winter and families gather to glut themselves on buttery deliciousness.  November also happens to be National Novel Writing Month.  As I have in years past, I started a NaNoWriMo project and then couldn't figure out what the hizzle to write.  Okay, so I wanted to do a collection of short stories rather than a novel, because I figured I would have to have a less grand plan for them, but of course, a plan is still necessary for a short story.  And for twelve short stories, well, one must have twelve plans.

Which begs the question, how good are these NaNoWriMo novels, anyway?  This is not sour grapes, I still have hopes that I will finish my project on time.  The question comes from my knowledge that the work I am turning out right now is far from my best.  Then again, it is work.  I know that the point of NaNoWriMo is to get people to (say it with me folks!) apply the ass to the chair, to actually write that novel they keep telling everyone they're going to write that day.  And for my own part, yes, I am actually churning out some work, and getting some great ideas while I'm at it.  But in terms of quality?  It's not quite there.  Basically, what we see on my NaNoWriMo screen is stream-of-consciousness that may or may not make sense to a reader.

Type faster, pokey!

Which brings to mind Jack Kerouac.  Before you Kerouac fans get all defensive, I am not dissing the fella, nor am I saying that his writing was bad.  What I am saying is, he famously wrote On the Road in, like, ten minutes (actually, it was three weeks -- a shorter period of time than the month of November).  As the story goes, Old Jackie sat at his typewriter, fingers bouncing all over the keys, pounding words onto a 120-ft scroll of paper as his wife wiped the profuse sweat from his face.  On publication, he added paragraph breaks and margins, took out some sections and added others, but the point is after three weeks, homeboy had himself a novel.   And it turned out to be a major novel.

Looking smug, I daresay.

While On the Road was a bestseller that some said revitalized the world of literature in the 1950's, others were considerably less pleased with the work, and wholly unimpressed with the method of writing.  I am thinking of Truman Capote here, that catty scribe, who, upon hearing about Kerouac's three-week writing binge, famously said "That isn't writing.  That's typing."  (A little disclaimer here, folks: everywhere I looked to get the exact quote, it was different.  While nobody disputes that Capote did say this -- it just sounds like the sort of thing he'd say, doesn't it? -- everybody who quotes him seems to be paraphrasing.)

Oh, you spiteful kitty, you.

What Capote seemed to be getting at with that little jibe was this: Anyone with a little time and a decent idea (and a wife who will change your shirt for you as you type) can write a book in three weeks.  That doesn't make it good.  A writer takes time and consideration when putting word to paper, puts thought and care into the words they choose.

It's hard to imagine that the NaNo people are super concerned with the quality of their participants' writing so much as they are concerned with the fact of the writing.  That is, they are trying to encourage people, all people, to think about words, to think about expressing themselves in words, to imagine a world of their own and assign it a reality on paper.  And in that sense, they are saying to the whole world the same thing that Truman Capote said to Jack Kerouac: Anyone can do it if they sit down and try.

How good it is, then, is not the point.  And that's what I tell myself this month.

Beer Money

Yup. That's pretty much the sentiment.

I spent the early afternoon listening to Terri Gross interview Colson Whitehead on "Fresh Air."  Whitehead, in speaking of his early years trying to make a living as a writer, said something to the effect of, "I wasn't able to make a very lofty living, but I had money for beer, and that helped."  At the risk of sounding like a raging alcoholic, the statement struck a chord with me.

My time in graduate school was the pivotal point when I decided to just go for it.  Those were exciting years, and I got to live my dream life during that period.  All I did was write, read, travel, and talk books over coffee or beer.  Who wouldn't want to live that life all the time?  I got published twice and had opportunities to rub elbows with Ireland's literary elite almost every weekend.  Who wouldn't want that life to continue?

But alas, once the money ran out, so did the allure of the starving artist life.  I do not love being poor but happy.  I would much rather be middle class and happy.  I don't think that's too much to ask -- not having a panic attack every time a bill comes in the mail.  Panic attacks are really bad for the creative spirit.

There are a lot of downsides to trying for a life as a writer, or any type of artistic endeavor.  You are choosing to do what makes you happy at the risk of never being financially stable.  And to be honest, I'm not sure that I would have chosen this life for myself if I had known how hard it would be.  But I probably also wouldn't have tried to be a writer if I thought I had any chance of being happy or successful doing anything else.

That said, I think that everybody's life is harder than they imagined, and at least I get to spend as much time as I want to doing what I love.  It also helps that I have a patient, supportive boyfriend.  And the world's most affectionate cat.

I may not have enough money to go on a week's vacation every year.  I may not be able to buy myself new shoes or go out to dinner whenever I feel like it.  But I have money enough to buy a six pack and curl up with my boys and watch a scary movie.  And as Colson Whitehead said, that helps.  It's good enough for now.

The Whole Vampire Thing

Oh, no! Don't bite me! (Please bite me.)

Okay, guys.  It's confession time: I read Twilight.  Not only did I read Twilight, but I also read New Moon and Eclipse and Breaking Dawn.  I'm not proud.  My little sister was about eleven at the time, and she's about the farthest thing in my family from a reader.  So when she was giddy with the excitement of finding out what happened to Bella and Edward, I was just happy to see her reading.  I wanted to support her.  I wanted to give her someone to talk about the books with (which is something I often wish I had), so I borrowed her copies of the books as she finished with them.  And since this is confession time, I have to admit that I really enjoyed the first book.  The second one was less fun for me -- I thought Bella was waaaaaay to distraught -- and by the third book, I was rolling my eyes almost constantly.  Seriously, I was getting headaches.  My sister still bemoans the way I laughed every time the word "Renesme" appeared in the (thankfully) final book of the saga.

The thing is, I could totally understand my sister's fascination with the Twilight books.  After all, I was watching horror movies with her since before she could string together a sentence.  She loves creepy, kooky, dangerous fiction almost as much as I do.  And I had my own version of vampire love when I was a teenager: Anne Rice's Interview With the Vampire.  I read it the summer I turned sixteen, while I was spending the summer at my aunt's house in Florida.  She lent her copy to me and I remember being rapt.  I was up late flipping pages, re-reading passages.  The eerie gorgeousness of the characters, the danger, the immortality -- they call to a young girl.  And while Interview With the Vampire is infinitely  less ridiculous and better-written than the Twilight saga, it spoke to me the same way Twilight spoke to my little sister.

The reason I bring it up is because last night (after watching an episode of South Park making fun of Twi-hards) I had the most fascinating dream about vampires.  I won't go into all the details, because I don't want to confuse myself, but it started out at Fright Fest at Six Flags and ended in a dusty old Victorian mansion, and somewhere in between, I found myself taking notes for a novel WHILE STILL DREAMING.  This is an important point: Most of what I have actually written and finished in my life came from a dream.  My last novel and tons of short stories were all inspired by vivid dreams from which I could not escape upon waking.  So the fact that my dream self was scribbling down notes about the dream for a novel is majorly symbolic to me.  It's like my Muse is shaking my shoulders and screaming, "This is it, you idiot!  Write this down!"

We all know I am shopping for a new novel idea.  I thought I had one worked out, but I just couldn't get into writing it.  I've been really getting into sci-fi lately.  I've found that I enjoy reading it more than almost anything else, that it yanks me into its pages and won't let me go until the story is over.  Plus, it's Halloween, my absolute favorite time of the year in almost every way.  And I'm writing a ghost story.  So it's not really surprising that this is the sort of idea I would come up with right now.  So what's the big hang up?

It's this: Vampires are just so damned trendy.

I have never, never, never been into trends.  Jumping on the bandwagon is just not my thing.  And I can make myself feel better by saying that I've always loved vampires and creepy crawlies and zombies and werewolves and whatnot, but that doesn't change the fact that the vampire thing is sooooo popular right now that it's almost hard to take anything with vampires in it seriously (True Blood aside, folks -- I will take no dissing of True Blood).

That said, I have also never been one to ignore my instincts.  I have tried at times, lord, have I tried, but every time I ignore the whisper in the back of my head the whisper becomes a giant, steel-toed boot and kicks my ass until I do what it said in the first place.  So there's a very good chance that in the next year you fine people will start seeing new excerpts based on this here dream I had last night.
If I can figure out how to make it NOT about vampires.

Have You Tried This Reading Thing?

Reading together is twice the fun.

No, really.  Have you tried this reading thing?  It's great.  Really great.  I spent most of the last week reading the Hunger Games (this includes a lot of the time I was at work...and I assure you, it is very difficult to read a book and wait tables at the same time).  It was something of a revelation for me.  Or maybe more of a reminder.  "Hey, Rachel," it was saying, "You used to be like this all the time.  You used to be like Belle in 'Beauty and the Beast,' tripping over stuff because your nose was stuck in a book."

And it's true.  I used to read at least one book a week, sometimes two (though I seldom reached the threshold of three like I did this week).  I could barely put down one book before I reached for another, ad when I was younger, I didn't even wait that long.  I got halfway through one book and started another, reading up to three simultaneously, which, I admit, is a bit much.  The point is, I used to read a LOT.  And now I don't.  Which begs the question: What happened?

Growing up didn't help.  Having bills to pay, a relationship to nurture, friends not to neglect, and a job (although I guess we know by now that this doesn't necessarily stop me from reading) are all big hindrances.  But I think that the biggest roadblock has actually been my writing.  After grad school ended and I decided to concentrate on writing my novel and I no longer had assigned (albeit excellent) reading to attend to, I guess I just stopped reading.  Not altogether, but certainly with any zest.  If I was at home (or anywhere, really) with any time on my hands, I felt like I ought to be working on the book.  Where I used to keep a novel or two in my purse, I kept a blank book and a heap of pens instead.  I just felt guilty if I was reading.  I kept telling myself that I should be writing, instead.

Which is ridiculous, if you think about it.  We writers write because we love to (or need to), but we only came up with the idea because we love to read (or ought to, anyway -- anyone who doesn't like reading has absolutely NO business being a writer).  To ignore books as a writer is like being an actor who doesn't go to the theater (which is why I gave up acting, btw; I much prefer movies).  It's just counterproductive.

I had a professor while I was in grad school and during my short-lived stint reading for a PhD, James Ryan, who is a brilliant teacher and gave me one of the most useful pieces of advice on writing that I have gotten to date.  Being a writer, he said, is one part reading, one part writing, and one part living.  None of the parts are more important than the others.  Like I said, the man's brilliant.

So I guess the point of all this is to say that this past week has reminded me why I wanted to write in the first place.  I freakin' love books.  LOVE them.  And I swear, here and now, on this blog post, to the vastness that is the internet, and the significantly smaller (but more important) population that makes up actual readers of this blog, that I will never again neglect my books.  I feel like a better person when I read, a better writer, and a hell of a lot happier.

Even kittens understand.

Also, I'm going to use this as an opportunity to plug the books that brought on this epiphany.  If you haven't read The Hunger Games trilogy, you are wasting your time not reading them.  Drop everything and find a copy.  Do it now.  I'm not kidding.  Go.  Now.  Shoo.

The Journey Continues

After a momentary lull, I have jumped back on the horse that is my (supposed) writing career.  I spent yesterday querying and sending short stories to various lit mags, and I am happy to report that it is already paying off.  Hurray for small steps forward!