Three Thoughts to Wrap the Week

1...The next class in the free WRITERS WORKSHOP series at KCLS Woodinville Library (17105 Avondale Rd, Woodinville) is tomorrow a.k.a. SATURDAY, MARCH 22 from 11-1 PM. This month I will be joined by guest teacher Jolie Stekly, an instructor from the UW Certificate in Writing program. Jolie will focus on methods for developing 3-dimensional characters and sound plots—and will share her thoughts the “what comes first?” (plot or character) conundrum. Grab a pencil and paper and join us!

2...I am thinking of starting a monthly newsletter for writers, readers & educators. Each issue will spotlight a couple of cool books and events, offer a writing challenge, and provide a mini-educator's guide to a popular novel.  I've been looking at Constant Contact as a way to develop this newsletter but it costs money and I'm wondering if there are better options. Your thoughts?

3...If you're looking for a fun weekend read, here are three books with hot RED SHOE COVERS and spines worth cracking (one sci-fi fairy tale, one YA verse, one contemporary chick lit):

http://www.indiebound.org/book/9781442433168

http://www.amazon.com/Elevated----Young-Adult-Romance-ebook/dp/B00IGINRFI/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1395111104&sr=1-1&keywords=elevated+elana+johnson

 http://www.indiebound.org/book/9780312642976

Trying to Photograph Seagulls

Last month, while visiting my son at college in Massachusetts, we went to a footballgame. We sat on the bleachers, watching his school team get crushed by the visitors, eating kettle corn and smelling the crisp fall air. I looked up and a saw a flock of seagulls swooping hungrily above the field.  I pointed my camera upward.

All I could capture were the clouds. But, I promise you, the seagulls were there. They were beautiful. And now, what's left for me, is to try to use words to paint the picture my camera could not grasp. Like emotions, like the passage of time, like the sensation of a kiss. Writing is like trying to photograph seagulls. Even if all you wind up with is a bright, blue sky, the effort is entirely worth it.

What's your "seagull photograph" experience?

 

If you want to play along and give my upcoming novel a lift, click HERE.

Have I mentioned that I don’t write YA?

I write novels. Why do the protagonists tend to be teenagers? I really don’t know. I sometimes wish I could write humorous or action-packed middle-grade stuff like the amazing Barbara Park’s JUNIE B. JONES series or Mary Pope Osborne’s MAGIC TREEHOUSE. I can’t get enough of the gorgeous art of folks like Wendy Wahman and Paul Schmid. Heck, I kind of wish I’d been born Agatha Christie or Arthur Conan Doyle if you really want the truth. But I can’t. I don’t. I wasn’t.

I’m me.

Maybe someday I’ll write about protagonists who are older or younger. Maybe someday I’ll write in third person (or maybe even second). Maybe someday, I’ll be done exploring that fascinating, immediate, joyful, tragic, terrifying, limitless epoch that is being a teenager…

• WITHIN a family and a community including CHARACTERS who happen to be parents, teachers, siblings
• WHILE TESTING identities that may or may not fit

• AND EXPLORING friendships and romances for right and wrong reasons
• AND TRYING TO FIGURE out WHAT YOU MIGHT BE GOOD AT and WHO YOU ARE and WHO YOU WANT TO BECOME…and WHY

Actually, I’m still doing all of that. And I’m learning through the medium that, right now, frees my voice and lets me dive deep (albeit sometimes fearfully) into memory, curiosity and hope.

So, no, I don’t write "YA." I write the books I can write in the strongest, most expressive way I can. And I honestly hope that curious people of all ages will read them.

The difference between a great idea and a NOVEL

I’ve discovered that I have this time-consuming habit of being trapped between two stories and struggling (sometimes for months) to figure out which one is the beginning of the actual book I should be writing. It’s not pretty. I wish my brain worked IN SOME OTHER WAY. But it doesn’t. Maybe it can’t. All I can say at this point is that I’ve begun to learn how to listen to the warring factions of my creative brain and I have realized something.

THERE IS A DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A GREAT CHARACTER OR CONCEPT and the START OF A NOVEL. At the beginning, they may feel the same but they are NOT.

When it’s just a flashy idea, it can start with some cool lines, maybe the vision of a character or a great WHAT IF notion. However, as time progresses, you feel resistance. Maybe you’re wrestling with form or point-of-view. Maybe the plot feels overworked or you dread the thought of the research you’ll have to do to make it feel real. Time passes and the word count goes up and then DOWN and then up and then DOWN AGAIN. You WANT to see the book through but somewhere in your gut is this sense of dread each time you face the computer.

When it’s a BOOK, maybe it starts with a great scene or the voice of an interesting character, but then, as you mull and write and eat a bunch of junk food, the story begins to wash over you. Driving carpool, you suddenly realize that the supporting character has a complex relationship with his dad and older brother. Putting on your mascara, you see how to resolve a challenging plot issue by changing the WHO of an action. The story structure feels like it’s settling into place. The “AND THEN WHAT HAPPENS” strategy IS WORKING! It is still as grueling, sometimes requiring discipline you’re not sure you’ve got but you know that THE STORY IS THERE.

Sometimes, you actually like the IDEA better than the BOOK for a while. Or it’s just hard to abandon the curious character you’ve been writing about, even if s/he is going nowhere emotionally, or plot-wise.

HAVE COURAGE. Close the file. Write THE BOOK!

Update: Things Burned While Writing

Lest you think having a second book in the pipeline has improved any of my neurotic writing behaviors, herewith evidence that I am unchanged. I call this photograph: YES, YOU CAN BURN CHOCOLATE IN THE MICROWAVE.

All you have to do is accidentally enter 3 minutes instead of 30 seconds and put a few chocolate chips into a small bowl. Voila! Inedible author surprise! 

If the above illustration makes you feel a bit less lonely in your writing universe, here are links to a few previous culinary failures in the service of literary art. I bring you FAILURE A and FAILURE B. Enjoy!

 

 

 

Back-to-Business: TSoLG Winners & Teaching About Writing

First...
Congratulations to the winners of THE SOUND OF LETTING GO cover reveal giveaway! All of the following winners were contacted via email yesterday.

The signed hardcover of AUDITION was won by Vivien

The signed arc of TSoLG was won by Kaitlin

The swag from Elana Johnson, Carrie Harris, Jessi Kirby & Gretchen McNeil was won by Mimi

And, since we had over 2,000 entries, I added 2 extra prize packs (hot-off-the-presses Sound of Letting Go swag ) which were won by Kristia & Debby

Second...
Over the weekend, I had the pleasure of teaching a workshop to some wonderfully talented teen and adult YA writers. The workshop was called NOVEL SUMMER and we discussed strategies for producing a first-draft manuscript by August 30. Here are some of the "rules" we came up with to avoid self-defeating thoughts and behaviors en route to the finish line!

1. Don't read yesterday's work.
2. If you get stuck, allow yourself to "switch brains" by doing research or something else manuscript-related for 10-15 minutes.
3. Don't fear making choices. If you are uncertain about a setting, a character name, or a plot twist, allow yourself to make a decision (choose a city in which to set the story, for example) and remind yourself you can always change these choices in your next draft.
4. Learn your writing idiosyncrasies. Do a ten-minute timed write. Note where you pause, put down your pencil. Is it at the six-minute mark? At the nine? Push yourself a couple minutes past the stall. Force yourself to write two more sentences. See if you can stretch that writing muscle. When you master ten, try twelve minutes. And so on.
5. Incentivize your writing. Look deep in your heart for a reward you can give yourself for a good day, a good week, or a good summer of writing. It doesn't have to be expensive or even tangible. Perhaps you will just allow yourself to have a messy house and not apologize for it. Perhaps you will reconnect with an old friend. If you can afford it, a massage or nice meal isn't bad either!
6. Don't wait for "inspiration to strike." Acknowledge that bad writing days are still better than non-writing days and just because you don't feel creative all the time doesn't mean you have no future as a writer.

Back to Business: Becoming a Plotter?

Like the chicken or the egg, I feel confident that the eternal writers' debate over whether plotting (outlining and other detailed planning before starting ms) or pantsing (a more go-with-the-flow, follow-your-characters) is the optimal way to craft a novel will never really end.

My tendency is to work somewhere in the middle. I start with character and a pretty clear sense of the trajectory my mc will take. Then I do a fairly quick first draft, generally with quite a few research breaks depending on the topic. After that, I make a detailed chapter-by-chapter outline, including date-stamping each verse (or chapter). All the while, though, I try to remain very open to letting my characters act and speak as authentically as possible and try not to push the story in service of a pre-determined plot notion.

Of course, thus far I have published contemporary YA. However, my next manuscript has a strong thriller element. And a technology component. And some government stuff.  In a near-future setting. Can I pants a first draft of a novel that requires futuristic world-building? Or is it time to outline and date-stamp BEFORE I do the first draft? And will that make the first draft weaker character-wise?

Think I've asked enough questions. Do you shift between plot and pants mode depending on genre? Have any other thoughts or suggestions?  Help, please!

Filling the character well...

When I am writing/revising a novel, I carry my characters around with me all the time. Thoughts they might have, words they might say, pop into my mind at the strangest times. I do a great deal of research, including reading, interviews, and character worksheets. However, there's an evanescent part of character-building that I, for one, cannot quite reach through these methods. For this, I need movement or music. Although I rarely play tunes while actually writing, I find that music brings me to an emotional space that connects facts with feeling. For my current novel, I've been listening to a lot of
Miles Davis
Neon Trees
Ingrid Michaelson
Makem & Clancy
The Civil Wars
The Lumineers
Pink

An eclectic mix, I know, but it does what it needs to do: Open my heart and set my characters free.

And, while I'm revising and insufficiently participating in other blogospheric fun, here are a couple of virtual places you might want to visit today:

Bookanistas:  Jessica Love has high praise for ELEANOR & PARK, and Katy Upperman  shines a light on THROUGH THE EVER NIGHT.

VerseDay 2013 continues over at the blog of the amazing Marcie Atkins.

 And away we go into March...!

 

Back-to-Business: ABOUT THAT POSTING SCHEDULE

Awhile back, I shared some thoughts about my ever-evolving relationship to blogging and "plan to make a new plan" for posting.

Buried under reading, writing and freelance deadlines throughout this lovely holiday season, I've decided to post on Mondays only through January with the occasional ad hoc additional post if I'm really inspired.

On February 1, I'll return to Monday-Business and Thursday-Bookish posts.  I've loaded up my Kindle and stacked my bookshelf with arcs and look forward to some cozy fireside reading this month that will find their way into book reviews soon. And, as I now scurry back to my manuscript, I'll leave you with this crafty word of encouragement (at least, it feels encouraging to me)!

"Nothing you write, if you hope to be good, will ever come out as you first hoped."

-- Lillian Hellman

Wicked for President

This week I had the pleasure of seeing the musical WICKED at the Paramount Theater in Seattle. I'll admit I was a cynic. I generally try to avoid those Justin Bieber, Twilight, Les Miserables frenzies. Not that I don't appreciate these phenomena, I just worry about the homogenization (sp?) of our culture when everyone chases on star, one story, one idea. I worry about the many other worthy artists and thinkers don't happen to capture the cultural zeitgeist and I try to seek out their work--their divergent points of view. I tend to loathe big Broadway spectacles (especially those movie-turned-musical disasters or shows with mediocre storylines that are really just excuses for linking together a bunch of songs from an era, by a rock band, etc.). And I don't really like big crowds.

However, for a variety of reasons, I went to Wicked. It was wonderful. Nuanced, musically excited, over-too-soon. In the program notes, Stephen Schwartz said it took about four years to create the story but, as a writer, I know that means four years plus a lifetime of writing, composing, succeeding, failing, exploring, learning...The result, Wicked, is a story with neither wholly good nor intrinsically evil characters but people in challenging situations who find their courage, give their greatest gifts, when they realize not their potential but their limitations. I could go on. I won't.

Just, honestly, I wish Elphaba and Glinda--or people like them--were on the presidential ballot this year. People who were not afraid of their own vulnerabilities, of their unlikeable qualities, of the danger in the power they wielded.  Don't get me wrong, I am certain that both Obama and Romney are more dimensional, less polemical, and generally smarter than the campaign process forces allows them to be.

Still, instead of hearing speech after speech about how the candidates will save our economy, bring peace to our world, "defy gravity," I'd love to see one of those guys bow his head and admit that he is "limited" in the way all true leaders should see themselves--should be.

On creativity and marketing "mash-ups"

It's almost summer and trailers for blockbusters are flooding the shores of promotional beaches.  Two that recently caught my attention: THE RAVEN and ABRAHAM LINCOLN, VAMPIRE HUNTER. Two icons of literature and history reimagined as forms of sleuths. Still, both movies testify to our culture's (at least the producers of our culture's) reliance on historically recognizable "brands" (yes, I'm calling our former president a brand) to fill movie seats--to yield success.

I know there's nothing truly new under the sun.  At its core, even a new novel tells an "old" story about love or sacrifice or greed--something from those seven deadly topics.  In the writing biz, we pitch in shorthand.  (e.g., you tell your agent your book is HUNGER GAMES meets PRIDE AND PREJUDICE).  Recent Suzanne Collins juggernaut aside, sometimes it saddens me how MUCH film entertainment simply revisits the past and how little really reaches forward to create new worlds, new heroes.  Collins herself cites mythology as one of her inspirations for the trilogy yet her society and characters feel fresh and her social commentary is challenging. The most amazing thing, I think, about Collins and other new-branders, Rowling & Meyers, is that their books were not made into films called SHAKESPEARE'S TWILIGHT or HARRY POTTER VS BATMAN.

GLEE may have popularized the "mash-up" song presentation style, but I'm not sure I dig it for movies. Especially when it feels like all that was done was to take one of those editorial meeting pairings like STAR WARS meets NANCY DREW and put it on the screen, keeping recognizable elements of the titles, while spending insufficient time exploring the validity of the combination to create a work of any cinematic merit beyond special effects.

I'm not saying there isn't room for those quippy AVENGERS (yeah, I liked it!) on movie screens this summer. This isn't a call to action, just a rant.  And a hope. For more films that are a little daring.  A little  less familiar. Even just a little new.

Memories for Mother's Day

I was thinking about images that take me back to the safety and warmth of my childhood home.  So many of these memories are tied to my mom and grandmother.  Here are a few:

• The smell of garlic sauteeing in olive oil.
• Curling up under a hand-knitted afghan--in colors a bright mishmash of skeins from the sale bin.
• Any song from Joan Baez's "Diamonds & Rust" album.

You reading this mom?  Happy Mother's Day!

What takes you back?  Leave a comment below.  Or just share it with your own mother-person.

Back to Business: THE MAGIC HOUR (for writing)

It is 10:35 am.  The kids are at school, I've done my sit-ups, and my stomach isn't even growling for lunch yet.  I'm here, alone, at my computer until 3 pm when "mommy time" begins again. But I'm not working on my manuscript yet.  Instead, I've zipped through my social media routine (email; updates for Twitter/Facebook/websites; and a bit of inexcusable surfing), returned two phone calls, and drafted the itinerary for the next leg of the Stages on Pages tour.

Sometimes I have guilt about this routine.  However, I've discovered over the years that I do my best creative writing after lunch.  Maybe it's the carbs.  Maybe I just need to know I've handled the business side of life before I can settle down.  And it could be that my "magic time" for writing will change.  But, for now, I've given myself permission to do NON-MANUSCRIPT-RELATED STUFF until 11 am.  Along with that, I MUST GIVE AT LEAST 2 HOURS to creative writing between 11 and 3.  Sometimes I go the whole four hours.  Sometimes, it's jittery segments of time interrupted by the phone, email, the dog, whatever.  But I get at least two hours in!

What's the insight here?

1. I have created space in my writer-life for the marketing stuff and have made my peace with it.
2. I have created a MANDATE TO WRITE that is flexible enough that I manage it almost every day.

What is your MAGIC HOUR for writing? Have you made peace with some kind of schedule?

Why I love #Smash

I was having a slow writing morning. Honestly, I should have gone to the grocery store (we're totally out of milk) since that would have been significantly more productive.  Instead, I scraped the remains of last night's pasta out of a tupperware and sat down to watch Smash.

For you Downton Abby, anti-gleeks who may not know it, Smash is the story of a producer, composer, librettist and a crew of performers workshopping a musical en route to Broadway along a road paved with creative frustrations, desperate dreams, achingingly beautiful songs and singers, and some pretty fantastic romance.  And I don't just mean Debra Messing kissing the guy who plays Joe DiMaggio.  I mean ROMANCE AS...

• the thrill you get when you build a work of art
• the way, despite the television medium, the performers' and creators' real passion for Broadway somehow shimmers through the small screen
• that connection, that drive to understand one's creative self and the character you are writing, dancing, singing, portraying
• the pure, painful, elegant beauty of a star-high dream

SMASH takes the classic show-within-a-show structure to great heights. The fame of iconic Marilyn Monroe is the topic of the musical at the story's core, which reflects back not only on the lives of the two actresses wanting to portray her but also the very act of creation itself.  And, for somebody in the rough-and-tumble writing biz, I see another FANTASTIC meta-layer: Smash is the heart-and-brain-child of Steven Spielberg and a gifted theatrical team including playwright Theresa Rebeck. NBC has made a real investment in making SMASH a smash--a gamble the media is watching. The show itself exists as a testament to the struggle it represents. So, that's uncanny.  Just like the way no one can really control what will be a hit (or a bestseller) and what will sink into oblivion. We just keep reaching up, hoping for that smash.

Last fall, I my debut novel danced into the world. Right now, my next book awaits my editor's eyes. And, as I await her comments, I'm struggling between writing the next book my heart wants to write, and writing something I think will sell better than verse novels about performers.

Maybe that's why I was having such a tough workday. Maybe that's why I turned on my "On Demand" and watched this week's spectacularly produced episode of SMASH.  Maybe that's why my glued-to-the-set eyes were brimming as the episode drew to a close.

And then, because my heart was full, I wrote.

Because,

I am Marilyn.  I am SMASH.  Aren't we all?

ON WRITER’S BLOCK, BOOZE, AND THE QUESTION OF AUTHENTICITY

This past weekend, I found myself discussing “writer’s block” with a group of book people. Personally, I do not struggle with “the block" because writing is my job. So...

I accept that there are fallow periods where I don’t write anything epic, or even respectably mediocre.  Bad writing is part of the process, part of my job, so long as I don't send it to my agent or editor.

My husband is not allowed to wake up and say, “Gee, I don’t feel that lawyer vibe right now. I’ve got Lawyer’s Block. I’m just gonna put my head back on the pillow, not go to the office, eat chocolate for lunch and maybe cry a little.” (BTW, thanks, hubs, for working so hard every day and still stopping at Safeway for milk on your way home and then singing our littlest one to sleep). Job = no block allowed.

Let's be clear. While I'm good with sitting down every day and working on stories, I still have my share of anxiety. My self-editing inner critic is called MARKETING ME. That’s where the drinking comes in. NO, it’s not what you think. Thanks, though, for letting yourself go straight to THAT place :)

In my first novel, AUDITION, the main character has sex with a not-so-good guy, and a friend with an eating disorder. It’s not exactly a BOOK THAT EVERY PARENT GROUP WILL LOVE. While working on my next manuscript, I can’t deny that I wished my character hadn’t led me to, well, wine bottles. MARKETING ME begged, “Couldn’t we just skip the controversial stuff and write a nice little story that didn’t require a massive debate as to whether it should be 12-, 13- or 14- and up?”

Despite the pit in my stomach, I managed to give MARKETING ME a good, bitchy glare. When I wrote AUDITION, I know that I followed my character with my heart—I didn’t shy away from where I felt Sara needed to go. I’ve tried to be equally honest in the new book. Do I wish that my work was a little more Y and a little less A? Do I wish I wrote happy mainstream stuff with thoughtful, rule-abiding teens who engage only in occasional quick kisses that don’t get anybody pissed? Yeah, I wish those were the stories I wanted to tell. BUT…

Last week I read a book that chickened out. The author checked the boxes in terms of educational content and social issues but never let the characters escape their lasso of “THIS IS A MIDDLE GRADE NOVEL” to see where they’d truly to go. I found the book implausible and, well, dull because the kid characters acted like FORMULAS not ACTUAL people. (NO, I won’t tell you the title. I don’t name books that really miss the mark and I’m not starting now. I will say that I’m betting the book does okay—not great, mind you, but probably better than mine.) 

I just can't do that.
I don't want to do that.
Even if I have to do ongoing battle with MARKETING ME.
Even if it changes the shape of my writing career.

Do you struggle with an inner critic like MARKETING ME? Tell me your story.

PS I am also not averse to recommendations for good cabernets ;)
PPS I wish I could draw a little cartoon of Marketing Me. Actually, I just wish I could draw.

A theatrical writing tip from Lena Roy

"I am a writer with the sensibility of an actress. I love translating acting exercises into writing prompts. One of my favorite ones is for character development. I used to sit on the subway and look at everyone’s shoes across from me, and I would pick a pair to focus on. What kind of person are they? Where are they going? How do they hold their body? Where do they hold their tension? How are they different from me? Then I would get off the subway, and get into character, walking around in a different body. You can do the same with writing!"

--Lena Roy, author of EDGES (FSG, 2010)

Why does Lena write like an actress?  Read her audition story HERE!

Back-to-Business Monday: IT'S ABOUT THE BOOKS, RIGHT?

It's a fine line we 21st century writers walk between writing great work to go between the covers of our books AND writing, almost constantly, as part of our efforts to reach out to our readership through websites, blogs, Twitter, Facebook and so on. So many words, so little time.


Every week (and sometimes almost daily), I have conversations with authors struggling to find balance between producing their best work and promoting what's already published (not just on line but through bookstore appearances, author visits, conferences and other types of in-person promotion) so that they'll continue to have opportunities to write. I always have the greatest sympathy for this conundrum--I struggle with it myself. And I so wish I had a magic formula to help authors choose which types of promotion are worth the time and angst and which are not.

Right now, for me, I feel strongly pulled toward writing (over promotion). This always happens when I'm revising something that really excites me. You know, when you find yourself driving along the road or standing in the shower and all of a sudden you think, "Of course, and then the mc HAS GOT TO do/say/think..." and you've got to pull over quick or wrap yourself in a towel to write your idea out, dripping wet or running late to whatever's next in your real world.

To this end, I'll close today by pointing you to my lovely friend Molly's blog to read about her November event, the Golden Coffee Cup. Molly has a knack for spreading good writing karma and for those of you who are "all about the book" like me right now, you might want to head on over and join in the golden fun!

Wordy Wednesday: WATER

Sitting on the beach with my notebook, writing the old-fashioned way is a lovely summer treat.  The most amazing thing about this small, pristine body of water to which I have come every summer since I was four years old, is the way it awakens memories in all of my senses. The sun-colored water lillies so pretty but, close up, full of tiny black bugs.  The splash-lap of the water against the boat dock.  The squish of the sand beneath my feet--that icky part just before the sand bar.  The ever-changing colors of the lake itself from hazel like my son's eyes to black before a storm to a rich blue on a sunny morning.  Most of all this place has a particular smell--of heat and decay, of growing things and hope--a smell that, in all my years of writing, I've never been able to perfectly describe.  It makes me aspire to write better and better in hopes of someday capturing that smell, in words, so that others can be here with me forever.

On Making Dances and Pacing Novels

Perhaps from the outside making dances, like writing, seems like a giant, freewheeling adventure. Yet those working in such creative fields know that good work merges inspiration with a great deal of hard work and discipline. Still, choreography seems to differ from writing in that it is made upon other people. Inside the choreographer’s mind is a vocabulary of movements and ideas he or she has developed more or less through personal dance experience. These notions must be modified and even discarded for a new vocabulary when a dance is made to embody the ideas presented in a musical and is performed by other people.

Such adaptation is essential when choreographing for young musical theatre performers many of whom have more acting or singing experience than dance training. To make successful dances for such performers, one must develop meaningful, exciting movements that can be both understood and proficiently reproduced. Some of the best dances I have created for kids—the ones that have yielded the biggest smiles on their faces, the most enthusiastic applause from the audiences—have been streamlined, group- and gesture-based routines.

Granted it is delightful when a cast contains trained ballerinas or gymnasts capable of stunning pirouettes and cartwheels but I have learned to truly appreciate the glory of thirty-odd children marching in the same direction, their arms linked together or held in a clear, artful pose. I have come to believe that the young artists’ ability to connect with the movement, its meaning and its execution, is directly correlated to the success of any given dance in performance.

These choreographic principles have begun to echo in my mind as I revise my current YA novel. As I watch closely for character consistency and struggle with the pacing of dramatic plot elements, I have come to think of this book as a sort of dance between myself and the imaginary reader. Will he or she believe this notion? Is this secret revealed to my reader too quickly? Will he or she find this answer too complex or too simple? As a choreographer and a writer, I have my own vernacular, my own voice. Yet, as a person who firmly believes in the essential craftsmanship of creative works, I strive to find a way to connect my style to the nature and experience of my reader. In the end, whether written or danced, the success of my work depends on the dialogue between me and those for whom I create.

Awaiting the New Year with "Alfred Kropp"

I’ve never been a fan of the New Year’s holiday. It seems so random to use the changing of the calendar as a reason to set goals, a starting-point for change. For many years, friends and I have made a practice of skipping the iconic descending ball, opting instead for the early bird special at a local bistro and bedtime before eleven. Yet as I write this on December 28th, I find myself waiting to begin again.

Perhaps human beings simply need this sense of renewed opportunity to re-prime the canvas and try another landscape, another color. Thus the appeal of New Year’s Eve lies in its very arbitrary (yet grand-scale) embrace of something we want every morning when we rise, every Monday when we return to the desk, and every season when we switch out the wardrobe and adjust the thermostat. As the champagne sloshes and the incomprehensible “Auld Lang Syne” crackles through the speakers, we become the Baby New Year, fresh and darling and full of possibility.

As a non-material gift to each of my sons, I read one book of their recommendation over the holidays. My eleven-year-old chose Rick Yancy’s “The Extraordinary Adventures of Alfred Kropp.” This splendid reimagining of the Arthurian legend bears mention here for its unique take on notions of death and “rebirth.” The titular character encounters death both literally during the wild adventure and psychologically as his sense of self is transformed through his experience. ‘Who is Alfred Kropp?’—the thematic question of the novel—evolves richly into ‘What does it mean to ask ‘who am I’ and what does the answer require of me?’

This is what New Year’s is all about. While not new information, it bears consideration if you feel at all moved (or distressed) by this quirky holiday. For myself, I plan to think hard about themes of identity and renewal in what I read and what I write…and I’m going to really try to get an agent.

So much for scoffing at that blasted Times Square ball!