New Beginnings
In the interest of research and pure hopes of finding some sort of pattern throughout some of my favorite novels, I chose a few off my bookshelf and read the first few sentences of each and jotted them down. I wanted to see how some of the great authors (at least in my eyes) drew their readers in from the very first words. This is difficult to do and I know it is not something that happens with each novel. I have read many books that didn’t really capture my attention until many pages in. 
I don’t want my novel to be one of those – I want to entrap readers’ imaginations from the first page. Now, this is a task that is definitely easier said than done.
What I noticed after browsing the first sentences of some favorite novels was that, much to my disappointment, there was no real pattern. Many of them were heavy with adjectives, describing the scenery. It was almost like a movie film that starts wide and slowly focuses in on the main characters. Others jumped right into the dialogue, introducing a character straight away. Immediate dialogue has an interesting effect, it almost surprises you and makes you want to keep reading.
So, I suppose the lesson in my research is there is no right way, wrong way or most popular way to start things off. You just have to do it however feels right to you. In trying to come to terms with this, I’ve decided to put a snippet of what I have written for the beginning of my so-called, to-be novel. My theory behind this is that if I see it typed out (yes, I physically WRITE in a notebook. Crazy, I know) then I can see how utterly terrible this first attempt was but find the silver lining and figure out where to really begin.
Please don’t take any sort of literary offense to what you may read below and please don’t let this discourage you from reading my novel when it actually is finished one day!
I sat on the soft white sand and watched as the warm breeze made the waves dance onto the shore. Thoughts of days gone by, not my own of course, but those of other, more significant people flashed through my mind. Sitting here in the sun, staring out into a clear blue sea made me feel small and meaningless. But then again, I was. I was a nobody, a lonely soul, a dreamer soaking up the sun and the legacies of those who left footprints on this very beach many years before I ever set foot here.
Yes, it was beautiful here. The sun glittered and sparkled on the water. Water so clear and pure it made you think it could shatter like glass should you touch it. A gentle breeze kept the beach alive and invigorated any soul lucky enough to happen upon this place.
Homes- beautiful, ancient homes lined the sea daring the water to dance closer to its brick. The intricate architecture, the clay shingles, the soft, warm colors of the stone stood as reminders of the days when quality and hard work was the only way of life.
All of the scenery was almost enough to make you forget even yourself. I could lose my thoughts so easily in the sounds, sights and scents of this place they call Verazza. But I don’t belong here and always too soon, I would remember myself and remember how insignificant the beauty of a town on the sea could make you feel.
Fact and Fiction
For those of you out there who know me, you know how much I resisted against the twitter movement. I thought it was a silly fad with no purpose. I’m not exactly sure what prompted me to finally sign up for a twitter account, but I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised. There was a whole world of information on there. It wasn’t just people talking about what they are having for dinner.
It is through twitter that I came across some really fabulous tools for writers. One of these is Writer’s Digest. I came across this article after seeing the tweet. It was perfect! See…the novel that I am working on is a tough subject. It is the biography of a pretty fabulous female chemist but told in fiction.
I had a couple reasons for doing a ficitional biography of a real person. First, I wanted it to be a story and to read like a novel. Second, my absolute closest resource and the woman who the story belongs to managed to provide me with many interesting details and facts about her life but developed alzheimers. This put quite a damper on getting much more truth but made me want to tell her story even more.
Since beginning the writing process I realized that I was struggling with exactly what the Writer’s Digest article spoke of. I had no idea how to balance my fact with fiction. It is an interesting chorus to write, one that I had absolutely no experience with. 
That’s why I found the Writer’s Digest article so fascinating. It never occurred to me to go directly to people who have lived similar experiences. I have an entire world of information and contacts at my fingertips and I was letting it sit idle. So, with the help of a good friend (who is much more attuned in the ways of the internet!) I reached out to people I never would have previously. It is in taking these risks that I hope my novel will be all the richer and why I am more excited than ever to get back to writing my fictional fact.
Or my factual fiction.
Find it in the Soul
I had been meaning to blog about this for a while but for some reason I have managed to put it off. My aunt posted this quote on her Goodreads account that struck me :
“You never have to change anything you got up in the middle of the night to write” -Saul Bellow
There are more times than I can count that I have woken up during the night with an idea that was just itching to get out of my head. The first few times it happened I would stumble out of bed, find my slippers (most times put them on the wrong feet) and fumble around until I found a piece of paper and a pen.
What I found however that even in the (seemingly) short period of time, the idea was neither as fresh nor as good as it was when it first caused me to shoot up off my pillow. And, for those of you who know me, getting my head off of my pillow is no easy task.
I finally learned to keep a notebook and pen on my nightstand for just such circumstances. Now, it could just be my head playing games with me but, I feel as though ever since I took this preventative measure I am not woken up during the night with these mind-blowing ideas.
All of this has caused me to think that great ideas and great writing really come from the soul. Somewhere deep inside that, when tapped into, can be a magical moment. I don’t think the only time this happens is some freak moment during the wee hours of the night. I believe this happens on the contrary – I believe that it takes someone special with a special gift to tap into that reservoir of great ideas and get them to spill out onto paper.
I believe this gift can be trained and honed and perfected but that it has to start from a special place. I think a huge part of this gift is figuring out how to tap in to your soul. How do you reach it? How do you take advantage of all the wonderful, terrifyingly satisfying ideas your soul can offer?
I think it takes practice – a lot of trial and error in order to learn how to communicate with your soul. It takes something very difficult to achieve – complete relinqushment of control. I believe it is only when you can truly give up control to your soul that you will be able to reap its endless fountain of words.
Literally – In a Literal Sense
In an effort to urge my creative side to show itself once again, I have been reading. Now, this is nothing new for me but I have been reading a lot – as in a 400 page book in three nights. I have also been trying to choose books that will challenge me a bit more mentally. Don’t get me wrong, I love the so-called “chick lit” just as much as the next girl but, let’s face it. If you read this genre incessantly, it could cause your brain to rot – literally.
So, the book that I have most recently gotten in to is called “The Imperfectionists” by Tom Rachman. In a brief summary, it is about a bunch of misfit journalists who attempt to run an international English newspaper out of Rome and the troubles they have as the digital age quickly closes in on them. There is one character in particular whom I have come to thoroughly enjoy. His name is Herman Cohen and he is the Corrections Editor. He is a quirky sort of man who keeps a document on his computer called “The Bible” in which he writes dictionary-like entries for every improper word or misspelling he finds in the paper. This in itself amuses me considering how annoyed people get (I know this for a fact…) at how often I correct them when they use a word incorrectly or misspell something.
That is beyond the point however. There is one entry he created that I found particularly amusing and it piqued my interest so much so that I had to do some further research. Here is his entry into “The Bible”
- literally: This word should be deleted. All too often, actions described as “literally” did not happen at all. As in, “He literally jumped out of his skin.” No, he did not. Though, if he literally had, I’d suggest raising the element and proposing the piece for page one. Inserting “literally” willy-nilly reinforces the notion that breathless nitwits lurk within this newsroom. Eliminate on sight – the usage, not the nitwits. The nitwits are to be captured and placed in the cages I have set up in the subbasement. See also: Excessive Dashes; Exclamation Points; and Nitwits.
After I got over the initial chuckle this little entry brought me, I started to think. And I realized mister Herman Cohen was absolutely correct. Even I am guilty of this improper usage of the word “literally”. Who isn’t? This got me curious about how the whole backwards use of literally got started.
The word “literally” means (literally) – word for word; actual; without interpretation; avoiding embellishment or exaggeration
Many times when this word is used, it is used in the complete opposite manner. It is used in a figurative way, usually to intensify a point. After doing a little bit of online research, I came to find that even great authors of our times are perpetrators of this word abuse. Here are some examples:
- Mark Twain described Tom Sawyer as “literally rolling in wealth” – he was not however, actually rolling around in piles of money.
- Fitzgerald wrote about Jay Gatsby that he “literally glowed” – let’s hope not.
- In Little Women, Louisa May-Alcott wrote, “the land literally flowed with milk and honey” – if it did, there would be a whole other book in the works here
It turns out that the apparent misuse of the word “literally” began way back in the 17th century. It is then that this word began to be used only for the sake of emphasis for any given statement. It only snowballed from there. By the time the 18th century came around, the word was being used to emphasize figurative statements as well as true ones. Horrifying, I know! 
It does not appear however, that people truly started having a serious issue with improper usage of “literally” until the 20th century. For some reason, the 1900′s were full of people completely shocked and abashed that someone could use this word incorrectly. There is no real rhyme or reason to why this word suddenly became the focus of usage critics and it surely will not be the last word to be used in a contradictory manner. So, is it right or wrong to use this word as an intensifier? I suppose that can become one of the great questions of life that will never be answered.
For me however, I must go eat dinner before my stomach begins to eat its way out of me – literally.
The Smell of Paper
So, I wasn’t even going to do a blog post this evening but something I ran across on Twitter caught my attention and it brought up some things I have been thinking about recently in regards to books and information mediums. Unless you have been living under a rock for the past year or so, you are acutely aware that the newest thing in the book world are e-readers. I am a very avid reader – it is quite rare that you catch me at any given moment that I am not reading something new. I have always loved reading, from the strange age of four when my first book I could read on my own was Hop on Pop by Dr. Seuss.
If you ask anyone who knows me, they will vouch for the fact that I have TONS of books. There is something about them, the actual physical being that is a book, that I love, crave – even obsess about possibly. The feel of a book in your hands, the smell of freshly printed paper, the crisp edges and tightly bound spine. I love the feeling of walking in to a bookstore and feeling surrounded by this seemingly endless world of literary thoughts. It is thoroughly exhilarating. Now, it is not just new books that I have this passion for, old books as well. You can’t beat the feeling of an old, well-loved book. Tattered pages, faded covers just oozing with the history of everyone who has touched it and soaked up every word it has to offer. I feel as though books have a life behind them, a story beyond the story.
Waverley Novels - Sir Walter Scott
After moving in to my husband’s grandparents old home, there was quite a bit of stuff to sort through that they had left behind in this world. Not much caught my interest until I found a dusty, cobweb-ridden box underneath a bookcase. When I opened the box, I discovered the entire 48 volume set of The Waverley Novels by Sir Walter Scott published in 1900. They were in pristine condition for books that were over 100 years old and smelled of history and musk. I was ecstatic. I immediately cleared a shelf for them to sit proudly on display. My husband thinks I am crazy.
I have gone off on a bit of a tangent but back to the e-readers. I have played around with some different versions of these gadgets but none of them have impressed me thus far. When news of them first hit, I thought “wow, for someone who reads as much as I do, this will be perfect!” My husband was even willing to get one for me for Christmas. After looking at them in the stores, I was deeply disappointed. Holding this miniaturized computer in my hands and seeing the boring type font scrolled across the screen was depressing. I could feel myself getting sadder as I flicked my finger to “turn the page”. I couldn’t do it. I hated it.
Sony E-Reader
I just couldn’t get over the feel of a book in my hands, losing myself in the pages curled up on the sofa. This was too much a part of the experience for me. I came across this blog post: For Everyone Who Believes the Print Book Experience is Just Too Good to Replace on my Twitter account and I thought hmm…maybe this can help me change my mind. It didn’t – but it was intriguing nonetheless.
Go read this blog then report back here to me and tell me what you think about this world of e-readers and whether or not you are on the e-reader bandwagon!
Who Need Grammar?
I have been pondering the thought of what truly lies within me as far as my creative being goes and have a few observations:
My first dilemma with creativity is where to begin. When I was in college and took various sorts of writing courses, we always had this one activity at the beginning of each class – we had to pull out our notebook and for 10 minutes, just write. That’s it. A simple stream of conscience where we were to never let our pen leave the paper. We were not to worry about topic, flow, grammar or any sort of punctuation. In the beginning I had a very hard time with this activity as I have discovered over the years that I am a slave to grammar.
I love punctuation and, as you will most likely see in this blog, I use more of it than is probably necessary. I correct any and everyone around me when they say something incorrectly or spell a word wrong. My problem only multiplies when I actually sit down to write anything for myself. I have trouble letting go and find myself constantly backtracking to correct errors even on a very rough first draft. This becomes quite a problem when you are attempting to let characters come to life.
I think I always try to be too perfect this first time around. For some reason I believe this will save me time in the editing department when that finally rolls around. But, in reality, I am just cheating myself out of writing that could probably be a thousand times better if I could just forget about the commas, periods and whether or not my tenses are consistent.
This is quite a dilemma to overcome but if I can find a way to do it I think I will be able to create like I did back in college once I was finally able to let go. And, come to think of it…I’m pretty sure that my little monster wears a t-shirt that says “Who Need Grammar?”
It Feels Good to Blog
I have been wanting to start a blog for quite some time now but kept coming up with various excuses to put it off. And I’m not really sure why either. Writing is in my blood and when I can’t do it or don’t do it…I miss it terribly and feel this sort of void within me. Now, don’t get me wrong, I have my outlets here and there but most of the writing that I do now and have done for the past few years has been for someone else. Again, I am not complaining about this and even writing for someone else should still hold some sort of worth for myself right?
Right. And it does – to some extent. But no matter how many sporting events you cover or how many articles you write for clients, there is still this creative being stomping around in the pit of your soul just begging to be let out. You would think that letting this nagging little monster out would be a relatively easy task. Just sit down, pull out a pen and a piece of paper and let him run wild. This monster is a funny little thing though. The longer he has been suppressed, the harder it is to let him free.
In a way, you become scared to let him out – afraid of what might escape with him. By no means is this a good excuse to not write or to write about what simply skims the surface of your brain. This is what I aim to conquer and some way, some how – hopefully through this blog – I can become at peace with my inner monster and feel the rush that comes when creativity flows with the force of changing winds.
Just FYI for everyone out there…here is what I imagine this little monster looks like:
He looks cute....but watch out for those teeth!
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