Day 6: 100 Days of Discipline

My new blog, TOIL, SOLITUDE, PRAYER aims to build the small habits that create, support, and sustain a writing practice.

Today's post: Preparing to Write

However, if you're just joining me, begin at Day 1 and use what works for you.

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ADVICE NO WRITER CAN AFFORD TO IGNORE

Okay, the ex-army officer who said this probably wasn't talking to writers. He probably wasn't thinking about how to create unforgettable charcters either. Nor was he talking about how to make your screenplay leap to life, or how to take your non-fiction out of the dry world of the academy and directly into the hearts and minds of readers. But without absorbing this message, can you really do any of those things?

I know I can't.

"The secret to success is to always be in love. Staying in
love gives you the fire to ignite other people, to see inside other people, to have a greater desire to get things done than other people."

John Stanford, Ex-Army Officer and Educator

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THE WRITING QUOTE OF THE DAY

In my years as a novelist-in-training, I started three personal collections:

1. Rejection slips. Why writers save these, I don't know, but many -- perhaps even most of us -- have impressive collections. Maybe we hoard them so we can re-read the little promising scrawls at the bottom. The "Thanks!" that is often enough to keep us going for another day, or the heart-lifting "Please try us again." (Is this the time to say thank you to all the editors who took the time to write a note?)

Or maybe we just stuff all those little rejection slips and letters in folders or boxes or trunks because we want to prove them wrong. Every bloody one of them.

2. Heart shaped stones. On disappointing days on the marketing front -- and let's be honest here, most days are disappointing for the new writer struggling both to be heard and more importantly, to be worth hearing -- I'd take the dogs to the beach and walk till I discovered a heart-shaped stone or my own undaunted hope, which ever came first. I can't remember a day when I didn't come home with both tucked securely in my pocket.

3. Writing quotes. They're copied into my journals, hastily written on old receipts in my purse, and the very best ones are tacked up around my writing room. They are, and always have been, the best talismans against discouragement I know. In 2007, I thought I'd share a few on a daily -- or more realistically -- near daily basis.

Since a disproportionate number of my favorites come from Ray Bradbury, I'll start with one one from him:

"I have learned that if I let a da go by without writing, I grow uneasy. Two days and I am in tremor. Three and I suspect lunacy. Four and I might as well be a hog, suffering the flux in a wallow. An hour's writing is tonic. I'm on my feet, running in circles and yelling for a clean pair of spats."

Happy reading and writing to all in 2007!

*Oh yes, and one more thing. If anyone has a favorite writing quote, I'd love to hear from you! There's a lot of days on the calendar left to fill.

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10 THINGS THAT HAVE CHANGED SINCE I SOLD MY BOOK

A year ago today, something incredible happened to me. Let me set the scene: It was around eleven in the morning, and I was in my study writing when the phone rang. I shambled toward the kitchen, coffee cup in hand, a defiant bunch of characters still carrying on a spirited dialogue in my head. I was still wearing my pajamas.

My first thought? Maybe it was my agent calling to say she'd sold my book! An amazing coincidence maybe? A sign that that I possessed the gift of prophecy? Nope.

Actually, that thought has passed through my mind every time the phone rang for years -- even before I had an agent. In fact, I've probably been dreaming about that phone call since I was nine years old and I first started writing stories instead of multiplication problems on my papers during math class.

The only difference was that this time I was right. This time it was my agent. And this time she wasn't calling to say hello, or to suggest a revision or to tell me that we'd gotten a pass. This time she began the conversation with the words, "I have some very exciting news..."

What happened next, I recorded in detail last year. This year I want to talk about the expectations those words carried for me. (The illustration above may give you some idea of my modest hopes.)

While I waited tables and dreamed and scribbled by moonlight, I'd come to believe that if I ever sold a novel, I'd never have another moment of self-doubt, the grouchy old man in the deli would smile when he saw me and toss in an extra quarter pound of smoked turkey, and it would never rain on my birthday. Slowly, in the course of the past year, I've been disabused of nearly all my out-sized expectations.

In actuality life has both changed immensely -- and not at all.

Ten Things That have Changed:

1. I eased my way out of my waitress job -- with baffling reluctance, I might add.

2. When I told people I was a writer, they didn't do that funny thing with their eyebrows, or sneak each other sidelong glances, like they had in the past.

3. On my tax form, I wrote WRITER all in caps, instead of waitress. I wonder what the IRS thought about the row of exclamation points at the end.

4. I worked more hours than I ever have in my life and I loved every minute of it.

5. I learned that in today's market, the success of any given book depends as much on the writer's efforts as it does on the publisher's.

6. I became an enthusiastic promoter.

7. I threw around strange terms like "my publicist," "my editor," "my galleys," like I'd been doing it all my life.

8. I made some amazing new friends.

9. I went to New York for only the fourth time in my life -- and this time I went "on business."

10. I realized that self-doubts, rainy birthdays, and grouchy guys at the deli never go away. And what's more, I wouldn't have it any other way. If life was perfect, what would we write about?

And the one thing that hasn't changed? This morning, around eleven O'clock I was in my study, talking back to a troublesome character, and sucking on a cold cup of coffee. And yes, I was still in my pajamas. In the end, that's still what it's all about.

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SADIE J. ON AMAZON!

A while back I told you about Sadie J, the character I came to love so much that I grieved, seriously grieved, after I wrote the last story about her.

Now that story, "My Women", is available on Amazon for a price not seen since the days when Woolworth's flourished -- 49 Cents!

Out of that 49 cents, I think I get about a dime. So please, read it -- because it takes a lot of dimes to buy a cup of coffee these days...and I have a kid in college...and because someone just told me that oversized acorns like the ones I pictured yesterday mean it's going to be a cold winter. But mostly I hope you read it because Sadie J is a woman you're going to want to know.

When I first sent the story to my agent, this was her e-mailed response:

" Rip my heart out and tear it to shreds... this is so powerful!"

Yes, I know -- she's my agent; it's her job to love me. But it's also her job to tell me when I'm off the mark. And believe me, she's not afraid to do so.

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TESS GERRITSEN READS THE LIAR'S DIARY AND...
originally posted: September 12, 2006

LOVES IT! Yes, that's right. With her own much anticipated novel, THE MEPHISTO CLUB, hitting the shelves today, this amazingly generous writer took still found time to read my galley and offer her support.

When her email came in late last night, I was so thrilled I woke my whole family up with my hooting and hollaring. And once they heard what she had to say about my novel, they jumped out of bed and joined me in my happy dance.

Her quote:

"Patry Francis is a sly and seductive writer, and in THE LIAR'S DIARY she inexorably sucks you in for a twisting ride full of dangerous curves and jaw-dropping surprises. This is one of my favorite reads of the year!"

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HOLY COW! WAITRESS GETS A BOOK DEAL!
originally posted: November 14, 2005

I bought these shoes a couple years ago on sale for $14.99. A deal! I called a few of my waitress friends who came out and bought two or three pairs. But not me. See, I didn't plan to wear those ugly black clunkers much longer. Back at home, I was writing my little heart out (mostly in secret, lest people think I'm crazier than they already do). But also in secret, I believed something great was going to happen to me. Something miraculous. I was going to find an agent who had faith in me; and somewhere, somehow I was going to get a book deal.

This summer, when the soles sprung their first official hole and rain or every gooey gross substance on the kitchen floor leaked through saturated my socks, I refused to buy another pair. Nor did I replace my yellowing tuxedo shirts. This, you see, was going to be my last season as a waitress. Those who had heard I found an agent, asked almost daily if I'd sold the book.

"We're revising," I said. "Maybe we'll go out with it in the fall."

People gave me the kind of looks reserved for escapees from the asylum. "Better get a new pair of shoes, hon," they said as they walked away.

Meanwhile, the holes in my shoes got bigger and the soles got thinner. But I was not buying another pair. Well, at least not till next spring. But worse than the problem with the shoes, my backaches required more ibupfrofen to quiet them, and my feet ached so much that sometimes I still felt them in the morning. Everything was telling me that the work I did was too physical for my ectomorph body, and that I'd been doing it for far too long. And yet the only Plan B I had was a miracle.

Then last Thursday around 11:30 a.m. the phone rang as I was wandering around the house with a coffee cup in my hand thinking about my work in progress. On the other end of the line, the most amazing literary agent in the known universe, Alice Tasman of JVNLA (Jean V. Naggar Literary Agency) greeted me cheerily.

"I have some very exciting news for you," she said. "Dutton has made an offer on your novel."

While she gave me the details of the offer, my eyes drifted toward my waitressing shoes which were sitting in a square of light in the middle of the floor.

"You mean I can hang up my waitress shoes?" I said.

"You can burn those babies," she replied.

What happened next and for the rest of the day can only be described as the five stages of happiness. In the countless times I imagined getting this call, this was not how I thought I would feel.

Stage 1. Weeping and shaking. Tears of joy? I'm not sure. They felt more like tears of shock or of something shattering inside me. When I called my husband to tell him the news, I was crying so hard that he was certain someone had died. "What!" he finally screamed on the other end of the line, giving me the kind of response I thought I would have.

Stage 2. Numbness. I proceeded to call everyone I know, everyone who believed in me, or didn't believe in me, and tell them, it happened. The words, the call I was waiting for since I was eight years old and first dreamed fo being a writer had been spoken. And yet, as I heard the happy responses of friends and family, I felt surreal. Who got a book deal? Me? It couldn't be true.

Stage 3. Drunkenness. Remember that good champagne I said I was drinking the other night? Well, it wasn't for nothing. It was then followed by a celebratory dinner and a bottle of pinot noir.

Stage 4. Crashing. When I came home from dinner, I went up to my room and fell into an exhausted, intoxicated sleep with my boots on, the pointed toes directed toward the ceiling like the wicked witch of the west. For a full hour, I slept the sleep of the dead.

Stage 5: Bliss. When I woke up, I found myself in the middle of the most beautiful room in the world. Who cares if the walls were still a pukey green and I had been planning to get new curtains for about three years now? It was my room. My life. And it was an amazing place. As I wandered around the house at midnight, I opened random windows and shouted out them. I did a victory lap around the lonely streets of my neighborhood. At 1:30 my cousin Ali called and the two of us laughed giddily the way we did as adolescents when a cute boy from school smiled in our direction. I noticed that all my animals, who are usually asleep at that hour, were up and trailing me around the house, wondering what was going on. The two dogs had dragged their toys out, obviously sensing the aura of celebration that I exuded. Whatever game I was playing, they wanted to play too.

I know that this kind of happiness cannot last,and probably shouldn't, because it's pretty much a full time job. "You gonna do the laundry, Mom. I need some jeans," my son asked a day or two into my bliss. To which, I answered, "Sorry, I'm too busy being happy. Maybe next week."

I also know there's lots of hard work ahead. But this has been my week for singing. For doing little dances in the middle of the grocery store. For my first sip of good champagne.

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In today's promotion-crazed world, I am a reluctant but avid participant. And yes, I know that sounds like a contradiction. Why? Because it is. But if this shy writer wants anyone to read her book, she knows she's got to GET OUT THERE and let people know about it. To my amazement, I'm actually reveling in it.

Still. I particularly love this quote because it is a reminder of the naure of a writer's work. In the end, it is the words, the story that is clamoring to become visible, not the writer. We must not forget where the true magic lies.

"The pages are still blank, but there is a miraculous feeling of the words being there, written in invisible ink and clamoring to become visible."

-- Vladimir Nabokov

I started writing poetry, then tried some short stories. When I started to tripping over the furniture and generally feeling crowded, I set up housekeeping inside a novel. THE LIAR'S DIARY is forthcoming from Dutton and Brilliance Audio in February, 2007. It will also be published in Germany, France, the Netherlands, Spain, Poland and The Czech Republic.