News & Notes

Road Trips and Reading

Took a two-week whirlwind road trip with my wife, seeing Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, a tiny bit of Texas, and a chunk of southern California. The initial excuse was to see the Grand Canyon, which neither of us had seen before, but we also saw a number of other national parks: Crater Lake (we’d been there before, but always love seeing it), Lassen National Park, Bryce Canyon, Zion National Park, and Carlsbad Caverns among them. We made a stop in San Diego, staying at a nice resort on Mission Bay called Paradise Point, and then capped off our trip with a day at Disneyland. Highlights also included: stopping in Rachel, Nevada, ten miles from Area 51, after our car was attacked by a swarm of grasshoppers; horseback riding in Red Canyon; watching 400,000 bats make their nightly exit out of a cave one night short of a full moon; and buying our ticket to the UFO Museum in Roswell, New Mexico from the man who started it: Lt. Walter Haut, the public information officer in the Air Force ordered to release the press release saying the government had, indeed, recovered an alien spacecraft in 1947 (only to have him later ordered to retract it). Recent good reads: The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold and Mr. Paradise by Elmore Leonard. Sebold’s was interesting because of the point of view, the fourteen year old main character essentially a ghost who follows what happens to her family and friends after her murder (I’m not giving anything away here, because the murder happens in the opening pages) — which, from a writer’s point of view, is a nifty way of being able to tell a story from an omniscient point of view. Paradise had all the things that make Leonard fun — great dialog, snappy writing, colorful characters — but I don’t think it’s one of his better books. It’s already starting to fade in my mind.

Not much writing done during the trip, but it’s slowly coming back up to speed. Taking a week off next week from the day job to do some marathon writing, which should be interesting. It’s the third draft of a young adult fantasy I’m trying to get right, making it easier to put in some long days (since I know the story), but I’ve never done more than two marathon days in a row before (which I define as writing for at least eight hours a day). See how it goes.

Relentlessly Readable

I had never read any John Irving so I thought I’d give him a shot. I was aware of his work from the books that were turned into movies (The Cidar House Rules, The World According to Garp), but we all know that watching a movie adapted from a book and reading the book itself are two completely different experiences. My wife had recently read A Widow for One Year and heartily recommended it, so I thought I’d pick up the paperback and give him 50 pages (my standard for trying out a new author). I was pleasantly surprised.

One of the qualities I strive for in my own writing is to make it relentlessly readable. I don’t always succeed, but accessibility–meaning, the ease at which the reader is pulled into and through the story–is very important to me. I’m also acutely aware of it when reading others.

One of the masters is, of course, Stephen King. If you haven’t read him before, you really should, and don’t be put off by his reputation as a horror writer. True, he’s written lots of horror, but his writing is a lot more diverse than that. Try Bag of Bones, one of his recent novels, which mixes suspense, romance, and even a bit of the John Grisham legal thriller, or his most recent story collection, Everything’s Eventual. There’s masterful writing in both that novel and the short stories.

John Irving’s one of those writers, just like Stephen King. He meanders frequently, and there were times that I was tempted to skim, but I never did because I was afraid I’d miss something good. Definitely a master storyteller.

Other great recent reads: L.A. Dead by Stuart Woods (good, pulpy mystery and A Redbird Christmas by Fannie Flagg (unapologetically sentimental, but I’ve always been a sucker for a good sentimental story.

Putting Me In My Place

The scene: my dining room table, where I’m feverishly working on the latest writing project which seems of profound importance to me. Two-year-old daughter enters the room and stares at me, smiling.

Me: What is it, hon?
Daughter: (Continues smiling.)
Me: I know you want to play, honey, but Daddy’s writing.
Daughter: (Goes right on smiling.)
Me: If Daddy works real hard at his writing, and writes lots and lots of books, maybe someday he’ll make enough money to stay home — and then he can play with you all the time! What do you think about that?
Daugher: (After a pause.) I had a poopie.

An Epic Day

Yesterday was a very good day — mowed the lawn, played with my daughter, did a thousand words on the novel in progress, sold a story, and attended a fun party with other writers. The kind of day that covers all the bases, appealing to all parts of my personality.

I’m very pleased with the short story sale. Pleased because it was to the All-Star Stories anthology Twenty Epics, edited by the irrepressible David Moles and the lovely Susan Marie Groppi. Relieved because the story (titled “Epic, The”), one of the most unusual I’ve written, was so tailored for this specific market that I’m not sure it would have been possible to rewrite it for anyone else. Without giving away too much, let’s just say I myself am the main character. Man, it was fun to write, though. I was laughing all the way through.

Minutes after finding out about the sale, I hopped in a car and drove out to Lincoln City to attend the wrap-up party for the short story workshop taught by Kristine Kathryn Rusch and Gardner Dozois. I attended this workshop myself back in 2002, and it really was a watershed moment for me — holding up a mirror to me and my writing, showing me exactly what I needed to work on if I wanted to get where I wanted to go. Anyway, it was great to see Kris and her husband Dean Wesley Smith, as always, people I’ve known since I was a wee young pup in college and who mean a lot to me. Gardner was his usual notorious self, cracking dirty jokes and working the room. Jay Lake, Loren Coleman, Steve and Chris York were all there, as well as the famous dancing cows. I gave all the suffering students commemorative glow in the dark alien key chains as keepsakes. Hope they treasure them always.