Forget About It For A Day…

You know what? I’m sick of writing about writing. I’m sick of reading about writing. I barely glance through my formerly favorite writing blogs, skimming without even really reading the words. I delete newsletters unread. I refuse to follow links to those fabulous discussions about writing that always seem to be popping up on Facebook. Those awesomely funny writing-joke pictures make me roll my eyes.

Every time I do slow down to read something about writing, I find myself doubtful and anxious: does this mean I’m doing it wrong? Is this mistake they’re talking about endemic to my own writing? Have I totally hosed it all up and I should just go work at McDonald’s?

Sooooo maaaaaaany opinions. Sooooooo maaaaaaany articles. And blogs. And discussions, and web sites, and books, and… and… yeah. So you know what? Just for today–I quit. I’m going off to sit in the sun, or walk in the rain, and have a day filled with a life that has nothing at all to do with writing. I’m going to enjoy a cup of coffee without a notebook near to hand; I’m going to drive down a long winding road without thinking about the current novel in progress. I’m going to call someone I haven’t talked to for a while and not discuss my life or career at all.

Want to play? Pick out a “forget it day” on the calendar, mark it off with a big bright indelible marker, and don’t let anything–not deadlines, not inlaws, not kids, dogs, or the Zombie Apocalypse–get in the way of that day.

I’ll see you out on the beach–and I promise not to talk about writing at all.

 

Gender, Gender, Who’s On First?

I have read a lot of kerfluffles about gender stereotyping, the need for “nerdiquette” panels, and the general unfairness of women being expected to take an essentially defensive stance in the face of offensive behavior–by which I mean that we’re supposed to expect it and learn how to handle it, rather than declaring it unacceptable and working to make society change its tolerance of said offensive behavior.

Full disclosure: I’m a semi-rabid feminist. I totally believe in changing the social mores, the overwhelming acceptance of stereotype, rather than telling women to learn karate, carry pepper spray, and guard their drink at parties, because “that’s just how things are.” When a guy routinely has to go through a party with their hand over their drink every time they look away from it, and keep a “buddy” along to get them pried out of a corner when some drunk has them pinned down, and a dozen other social hazards women face, then I’ll feel like that’s just the way things are. But I digress. This is a post about gender roles in writing, and how you as a writer–and an artist–can fight to change society’s mores.

Awareness always comes first, of course. Blog posts like “Striking A Pose” by Jim C. Hines, takes a pretty straightforward look at the problems with how women are routinely posed in genre book cover art, as opposed to the guys. Others take a more lengthy examination of overall stereotypes, as in the Fantasy Faction 3-part series on “Writing Fantasy Gender Sterotypes“. (In part two of the series, there’s an excellent question raised: How can you avoid writing stereotypical men or women if you’re not sure what the stereotypes actually are?)

And discussion only expands awareness. So I’m going to cheat a little on this post, and throw open the door to comments and discussion…instead of saying anything myself. What are you doing, in your writing, to avoid stereotypes? What research are you doing to be aware of the issue, and how severe do *you* think the problem is, across various genres? Could it be argued that, no matter what book one picks up by which master-of-the-trade, eventually anything can be lumped into a “stereotype” category, although it was perhaps shiny and new at the time of printing? When does a certain depiction become a stereotype as opposed to a bold new way of writing characters, and should we, as writers, actually worry about that–or just concentrate on telling the best story we can and let the sterotyping take care of itself?

*sits back to listen*….

 

So Much To Read, So Little Time…

My stack of To Be Read may not quite rival that of an editor, or a publisher, or even some of my writer friends, but it’s pretty intimidating to me:

This stack contains several pending book reviews for Green Man Review or Sleeping Hedgehog, reference books on writing novels, mythology, and historical fact, and a couple, just a couple, for my own reading delight (those would be the recently acquired Glen Cook books and the ones on spirituality). Even the Dickens doorstopper up at the top is reference material (don’t ask, and I won’t bore you with the details on that one).

And then there are the books that are in my e-files to read: the editing sample chapter due out next week, the books piling up on the Kindle that I desperately want to read, the copy of Treasure Island that came on my shiny new phone, oh, and one that didn’t make it into the picture above: Tolkien and the Study of His Sources: Critical Essays, That one needs turned around for a review in the near future, as I’ve been sitting on it for far too long (and trudging through diligently but slooooowly. It’s not a fast read for me.) I did just turn in a review of the New American Vegan to Sleeping Hedgehog, so that’s one less off the stack.

And then there’s a book in progress and short stories to polish and send out, and editing on book 3 about to begin, and teaching a writing workshop class this Sunday, and a Plan to create for the next six months–stay tuned for that, as I’m daring to dream a little here–and oh, yeah…. tomorrow is my eleven year anniversary of being with my wonderfully patient husband. So I’m taking time off from everything to celebrate that…

Which is what you have to do when you’re madly overloaded with schtufftado: kick it all aside for the day and say screw it, I’m gonna party… ;-p

 

Dazed and Confused, Amazed and Amused…

Readings are, by and large, deadly-dull affairs. Friends and family sit politely, trying their best to prevent their eyes from glazing over; once their relative or friend has stood up for their turn, they gratefully head for the nearest exit.

That’s standard. That’s why readings, whether open-mic at a coffee-shop or single author reading slots at a convention, are so sparsely attended and often require a buffet of expensive treats to induce a healthy audience turnout.

Those of you who know my style of writing are waiting for the “but”. All right, here it is:

But I recently attended my first evening of a reading by students of The Muse Writers Center of Norfolk, VA, held at Lola’s Caribbean Restaurant, and I really enjoyed myself. Yes. And it wasn’t just because the food and service at Lola’s are phenomenally good–as an aside, it’s actually worth making a trip over the water, if you live in Newport News or Williamsburg, to visit this place–yeah, it’s that good.

Anyway.

Starting with Kelly Avery, who did a very nice job of reading an essay about a family gathering fraught with only tangentially explained tensions, on through the bright, evocative poetry of Cathy Malley, to the triumphant and powerful wrap up by teacher and writer Mae Lynn Walker–a short story about a woman with a steadily progressing degenerative disorder (it sounded like Alzheimer’s to me, but the disease was never directly named)–the readers, twelve in all, thoroughly impressed me with not only their material but their confidence in presenting it. For all that a few of them admitted being nervous about reading to an audience, they did a superb job overall.

And what an audience! I counted forty people in that room (Michael Khandelwal said it was closer to 65; I just know what I counted at one point, but now I think of it, I wasn’t looking back toward the bar…). Now, granted, it was a great restaurant, and granted, the Muse Writers Center has been around for seven years now (if I recall the comment correctly), and granted, these folks were reading work produced from a variety of seminars and workshops and classes, and granted, there were a number of Muse teachers (including me) in attendance–still. That is a really freaking big audience for a reading of twelve people. Color me impressed.

So here’s the deal. If you’re a writer or a reader in the Hampton Roads area, especially in Norfolk or Virginia Beach, you really ought to check out the Muse Writers Center. If you’re over on my side of the water, in Williamsburg or Newport News–it’s still worth making plans to attend a reading once in a while. The folks I heard were good, which speaks volumes about the teachers, the classes, and the students they attract. Take a look at the upcoming schedule, and take a night off to encourage and support your local community of creatives. You won’t regret it.

Oh–and if you happen to go to Lola’s, and you want real Cuban coffee, you’ll have to ask for it specifically…and it’s well worth asking for.

 

Amicable Advice

I fear clicking on links to writing-related web sites. Most of the time they’re innocuous; I scan the article, nod or roll my eyes, and occasionally post the link over onto Facebook. But sometimes… ahh, sometimes… one link leads to another, and another, and another… and I lose half my day to looking through the link trees of article after article.

I tell ya, it’s a damn dangerous place, the Internet… especially for the poor, innocent writer.

So here’s my latest source of suffering and time lost. May you enjoy it as much as I did… oh, and clear your schedule for the next couple of hours…

I started off with Anne R. Allen’s blog, which is one of the few I subscribe to (to which I subscribe? meh. Shut up, inner critic!); her post on how to query book reviewers caught my attention, as both an author and a book reviewer myself. That led me to Alan Rinzler’s post, “Good Day Sunshine For Writers“, which makes a strong case for the benefits of self-publishing–and offers an equally strong warning that self-publishing is not in any way easier than traditional:

[I]t’s just as hard as ever to write a good book that generates and sustains the buzz, a book that people want to tell their friends about, a book that produces major sales.

I also wandered off track to take a look at Ash Ambirge’s latest blog post, “It’s Okay If You Suck At This“, which offered me some much-needed perspective and which everyone should go and read right now. Even if you’ve read it already. It doesn’t get old. Really. Most of Ash’s posts don’t, for me at least…

Then it was back to Anne R. Allen’s blog and sideways from there over to Kristen Lamb’s blog, to read a post about “How to Win The Hearts of Bloggers“, which is where I started to lose some serious time. In addition to being an excellent blog post (and an extremely interesting interview of a book blogger) in and of itself, this one also sidetracked me into “The WANA Theory of Book Economics” (which is definitely worth a read by anyone even tentatively maybe possibly thinking about self-publishing or, for that matter, hoping to make a living from their writing at some point), and a discussion about spam toads (which is even more interesting than it sounds, and has some really good tips about blogging and using social media).

At that point I managed to stop the madness, because one of my dogs began insisting, not understanding Daylight Savings Time, that it was, in fact, dinner time thankyouverymuchdamnit right nowww mommmmm… and that made me look at the clock and screech a little. Just a little. Because it was a thoroughly enjoyable diversion…

…and now, set a timer… or install Eyes Relax and use it… and then go forth to learn and enjoy!