Grief

I'm not usually a re-reader of books. Oh, if I truly love a book, I'll keep it, place it on the shelf and say: one day I'll re-read this one. But rarely do I ever get around to it. There have been a few exceptions: Of Human Bondage, Emma Who Saved My Life, and As Meat Loves Salt. All books that I love and could read many times without hesitation, but for some reason have only giving one more read over the years.

And then there is Grief by Andrew Holleran, a book I have read once every year for the past three years. It's a slim book at 150 pages but packed with so much emotion that it haunts me for weeks and months afterward.

A gay man in his mid-fifties moves to Washington DC to take a teaching position in order to assuage the grief that has descended upon him after the passing of his mother, whom he has cared for after an accident has left her unable to care for herself. While renting a room in the house of another gay man in his mid-fifties, he begins reading the letters of Mary Todd Lincoln written after the assassination of her husband and her aimless drifting within her own grief for the loss of him and her life.

What Holleran does is intertwined these two lives, the narrator and Mrs. Lincoln, and bounds them by their grief of the loss of their mother and husband, respectively, but he also bounds them by their eras: post-Civil War and post-AIDS. Landscapes have been changed for these characters and neither one is sure how to navigate the new terrain.

Indeed, all the characters in the book are trying to navigate unknown terrain, together and separately. Frank, the narrators friend who also teaches at the university and had secured him the position which has brought him to DC, is navigating a relationship with the Lug, a handsome and thoughtful partner who Frank believes is too good for him. The narrator's landlord, a man trapped by his own ageism: he's too old for the young men he desires and too young to be as housebound and resigned to a state of loneliness as he is. They are all grieving for youth, security, loss, and love. Universal themes that resound in the quiet of this novella (Holleran sets his narrator adrift on numerous night-time walks through the most-times deserted historic streets and buildings of DC lending such a sense of silence that you can almost hear his footsteps on the cobbled stones outside the Ford Theatre or the Capitol or the National Gallery).

I am drawn to this book time and again because it teaches me how to deal with grief, an ever present ennui for my life, the choices I have made, the repercussions of all those choices. I grieve my childhood. I grieve my descent into a world of sex and drugs. I grieve the HIV that was the result of that descent. I grieve that it's taken me so long to pursue my true desire of being a writer.

But this book, as filled with grief as it is, pulls me out of my own grieving by telling me that grief is natural but it can't be all their is: one can't survive on grief alone. Mary Todd Lincoln learns that the hard way. She couldn't release her grief and eventually it killed her, brought her back to her husband and her children who passed before her. She ate her grief until it filled her, until it was all she was. And we learn this from the narrator who ultimately returns to his grief after the brief reprieve of DC. He needs the grief awhile longer: "...grief is what you have after someone you love dies. It's the only thing left of that person. Your love for, your missing, them. And as long as you have that, you're not alone--you have them."

It's a beautifully wrought book of emotion and understanding and searching and survival. And even though I'm in the middle of my third reading, I can't wait to read it again next year.

A Lament from the Cubicle

Of course I don't want to whine about my life. I try desperately not to be that guy anymore. So this is not a posting in which I whine, it is a posting in which I lament the fact that I don't have the time to write as often as I used to.

I am a lucky man. This I know. I have a great life, one I never thought I could deserve or acquire: great partner, wonderful dogs, a condo that we are buying (not renting), many little red boxes (from Cartier if you're unaware of what a little red box is), and many other wonderful possessions, I was laid-off but found another job within 7 months (only truly looked for a job for the last 3), good health (for the most part), a completed novel and an agent who believes in it and my talent. All the things one could hope for. But, of course, we always want more. And the "more" that I want is time. Time to write.

My new job is a good one. Great boss who I get along with and like a lot. Fun and helpful co-workers. Decent money. All good, except the fact that it is one freaking busy office. So busy that for the first month I would, more often than not, forget to eat lunch (and breakfast sometimes). Non-stop from the moment I walk in the door. It's a bit crazed, I must say. Granted I started right as they entered into their busiest time of the year. Holiday Image is the name of the company. We create, design and install holiday decorations for many high-end businesses (www.holidayimageinc.com). It's amazing what goes into the final products of these decorations. It's fun and interesting, but a heck of a lot of work.

Consequently, I have no time to write. By the end of the day, I am exhausted, mentally. Seriously brain-dead. I get home, cook for Carlos and I, watch some mindless television or play mindless games on the computer, then fall into bed less that 2 hours after I've gotten home. It's not a pretty sight. I try to write on the bus on the way into the city and that's worked a bit, but it's a pale comparison to the writing I was producing when I was laid-off. Remember when it was good to be the king? Yeah, well, it sucks to be a peon back in the cubicle.

And then there's school. One of the reasons I took last spring off from classes at NYU, where I've been pursuing my BA in Liberal Arts with a concentration in Creative Writing, was the fact that writing for classes was getting in the way of finishing my novel. While I have been wanting this BA for years (and have worked hard to get it since 2004), I have to admit that it's become more of a burden now than an achievement sought. Because of the new job, I'm only taking 1 class this semester. 1 class! And I am so far behind in it that its not even remotely funny. The thought of having to read these assigned works, rather than the books I have on my shelf that I need and want to read as research for my new novel, really sets my anger on edge. And then spending what little extra time I do have to write assignments rather than work on my personal writing makes me wonder why I'm still in school. I only have 24 more credits (6 classes) to go to graduate, to get that piece of paper, but I truly wonder if it's worth it if it keeps me from my true goal of writing.

But enough of the whining I wasn't supposed to be doing and back to the lamenting. I lament the loss of time, personal time. It will come again, I know. I have faith in myself, in my talent, in my work, so I know I will succeed and with that success with come the time I walk out of that cubicle (not just the one I currently sit in but the "cubicle" as metaphor for a day job rather than a true career as a writer) and not look back. I will not die in a cubicle, this I avowed myself years ago. Everything I do, all the writing, is in pursuit of that goal. I am not in search of fame and fortune (sorry Carlos), I am in search of freedom and time. And I've always known that it was my writing that would lead me to that goal.

So, enough lamenting as well. Time to continue the pursuit. Research when I can. Write when I can. And it will come. The King will return to his kingdom. It's just gonna take time.

I Have an Agent!

Well, the headline says it all. It's been a long road, though not nearly as long as it's been for others, but it's all been worth it.

As previously posted, in May I attended the wonderful Backspace Writer's Conference (they are having another one this November, which I highly recommend attending). While there I had the opportunity to have my query and 1st two pages read by attending agents in a workshop-style seminar called the Agent/Author day. Of the 18 agents that heard my work, 6 requested more materials, a high percentage if you ask me. Of course, the moment I got home I jetted the requested materials out to them.

Within a couple of weeks, the wonderful April Eberhardt of the Reece Halsey Literary Agency got back to me with feedback. While she loved the story, she felt the 'writing wasn't quite there yet.' She felt the book moved too slowly, which I had to agree. Hard to hear but completely accepted. I went back to the drawing board and decided to take some chances with the book. I decided to approach with a new boldness, stop being coy and "subtle" and just tell the story. The rewrite turned out to the be strongest version I had ever written and finally felt the book was finished.

I sent the reworked version out again. In addition, I requested of a couple of choice agents that already had the older version, to substitute the new version, and thankfully each agreed. That was back in July.

More waiting. A couple of nudging emails and then I started following each of the agents on Twitter. I began interacting with one of them, sending subtle and not so subtle reminders that she had the manuscript, which she assured me she was getting to, but was swamped (all agents are swamped right now). Weeks and months passed and slowing my manuscript rose to the top of her stack.

The week of September 20th, she read the manuscript. We set up a time to talk Wednesday, September 23rd to discuss and, while I figured she'd say the usuals (love the story, love the characters, but...the writing's not quite there yet), she surprised me. "Love the story, love the characters, but above all I love the writing." I was flabbergasted. I was shocked. She offered representation then and there.

So, the contracts have been reviewed and signed. And now I have an agent! Jennifer DeChiara has her own agency http://www.jdlit.com/ and has been in the biz for quite awhile amassing a well-respected reputation for being very nice but very tenacious when it comes to her clients (ME). I am beyond excited to have her in my corner fighting for my book. She is passionate about books and publishing and about my work. While I know selling any fiction is tough these days, let alone Literary Fiction, I have complete faith in her and my book.

Between the two of us, On the Edge of Someplace Else will find its proper place on the bookshelves.

Who's Running the Publishing Industry?

As children in our Social Sciences class, we learned about Supply and Demand. It's the cornerstone of all of industry: people want (demand) and businesses create for consumption (supply). Which comes first, though, isn't one for ages, unlike the chicken/egg conundrum. Sometimes a product will be created that fills an heretofore unknown void in the consumer landscape (supply preceding demand), whereas sometimes the consumer landscape demands a certain product and an industry will comply (demand preceding supply).



But what of supply and demand in regards to the publishing industry? As a writer of literary fiction trying to secure an agent to represent my first novel, I have been told frequently in rejection after rejection: "Your story is very interesting. The writing is very good. I love your narrative voice...BUT...I don't think I can sell literary fiction in this market right now." Now, I understand that this could just be a gentle way of saying: "Your writing really isn't that good." And, as a first time novelist diving into the deep end of the pool, I assumed that was the case with the first few rejections that stated the above, but after about the fourth or fifth, I started thinking: "hey, maybe they do like my writing but actually can't sell literary fiction in today's market!" And that got me to wondering: who exactly is running this business?

The usual trail to publication and literary success:

1. Aspiring author writes novel.

2. Writer queries novel to agents

3. At least one agent recognizes the excellence of said novel and offers representation (it only takes one they tell me)

4. Agent and Author work together to create best manuscript possible

5. Agent queries her contacts at the publishing houses

6. At least one editor at a publishing house recognizes the excellence of the novel and offers to publish (again, it only takes one).

7. Editor and Author work together to create the best manuscript possible

8. Novel gets published, sells millions, author never has to work a day job again

Even despite the abysmal state of the publishing industry in this day and age, this happens frequently. According to a publishingcentral.com's article from this past May, Bowker reports that there were 275,323 new titles published in 2008. That's a goodly amount of new books to be sure, though apparently down 3% from 2007. So, while the odds are stacked against us first-time novelists, they aren't completely insurmountable. That is unless you write literary fiction.

Supposedly the demands these days are coming from the consumers standing in the Young Adult Paranormal section of the bookstore (think Twilight, and Harry Potter, of course). Every agent, every publisher, every bookstore is apparently looking for the next big YA hit. It makes sense in an if-the-iron-is-hot-beat-the-shit-out-of-hit kind of a way. But is searching for the next formerly big thing selling the consumer short? I mean, we've already got Twilight, so why do we need another?

Reading, for many, is an escapism, especially these days. I get that. My mother was a Harlequin Romance kind of woman. She would, literally, get a box of them sent to her and would devour them in a day while lying on the couch, most likely, pretending she wasn't 50 years old, living in Oklahoma, the mother of eight children and working at the local Army hospital in the janitorial department. Books are great for that. I see people reading all the time on the bus into New York and on the subways. They're trying to step out of our lives for a bit, be somewhere else besides the Lincoln Tunnel. And YA Paranormal is about as far from the Lincoln Tunnel as one can get, I would suspect. But, besides the escapism, books can also teach us about others as well as teach us about ourselves. Books can, and should, provoke us to think beyond, not just step out of, ourselves. They should encourage us to turn and look at back at ourselves once we've taken that step beyond. Great books can do that. but not so great books can do that, too.

The thing is: I don't think the publishers these days think about any of that. I think they are merely looking at sales reports and demographics and the bottom line. Granted, the book industry is a business: that's the bottom line in regards to keeping the industry afloat. But surely, they can step outside themselves as well, right?

So, the question is: who's running the publishing industry? Does the consumer want the next Twilight or is it the publisher, merely because Twilight has become such a phenomenon? If the publisher gave the consumer something other than the next Twilight, would the consumer revolt or would they take what's given them? Does the consumer even know what they want before they enter the local bookstore or stop in at Amazon.com to browse the offerings? I doubt they do. Most times, in regards to books, you don't know what you want until you see it. And if they don't know what they want then what makes the publishing industry think they know what the consumer wants? In truth, no one knows what will be the next Twilight or the next Da Vinci Code or the next Freakinomics. It's all a crap shoot, though I would suspect the publishers are trying to make it less of a crap shoot by forcing particular books onto the unsuspecting public. The supplier has to anticipate the consumer's need/demand, but in the realm of books I don't see how that is possible. And the supplier can't either, so they choose which books to push. They create the demand by creating buzz via marketing. But they don't do that for every book they publish. In a way, they don't give the consumer the option as to what they demand.

I guess all this means that the publishers are running the publishing industry but they're doing a shitty job of it (and not just because they don't push literary fiction). They push books that will sell, which aren't always the best written books or even the most interesting books (The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova from a few years back is a prime example: huge success from a debut novelist, but the book itself was boring beyond belief. But the marketing campaign was so thorough an assault the book sold millions, undeservedly, in my opinion. Same with The Lovely Bones. While the story was interesting due to its perspective, the writing was atrociously heavy-handed and in the end the story was banal and uninspiring).

All this makes me wonder what amazing books are we missing out on because they don't fall into the biggest section on the publisher's pie chart. You think about the great works of literature and wonder: would they have a fighting chance in today's bottom-line oriented publishing industry? The Catcher in the Rye? To Kill a Mockingbird? The Grapes of Wrath? Moby Dick? I fear not. I fear they wouldn't make it past the query letter phase from all these agents trying to predict what the publisher is wanting who are trying to predict what the consumer is wanting. "Interesting story. I connected with the character of Holden Caulfield. The writings good. But I don't think I can sell this in today's literary climate. But remember, it's all subjective..."

Not that I'm saying I've written the next Catcher in the Rye but if the agents and publishers don't start taking more chances and don't start having more faith in the consumer to know what they want rather than being told what they want, we may never know.

Hearing Voices

Quick breakdown of my writing process:
A character will come first. A "person" with a story. Not fully, usually just a ghost of a person in search of their corporeal existence, which is what I'm supposed to give them: flesh and story. I have to immediately get words on the screen in order to make the characters real for me, even if it's only preliminary sketchings. And once I have that down, I can start learning about and building their world: backstory, family, friends, work, play, dilemmas, etc. I tend to write and do research at the same time. A lot of times, these bits and pieces of flesh will come to me just before I fall asleep. It's some of the best writing time for me. And surprisingly, I tend to remember it all the next day. It invigorates me to get to the computer first thing in the morning, to get it all down, to continue their journey from imagination to print. May not be the ideal process but it's the one that works for me.

So, as many of you know, I've been working on my first novel, On the Edge of Someplace Else, for quite awhile now (diligently for 2 years, but I've been living with the story and the characters for over 10 years now!). Spending so much time with these characters, thinking about them and how to tell their stories, has been an all-consuming process. Not a day or night has passed that they didn't have something to say: you need to change this, Jeff; um, since you have so-and-so doing this, then I can't do that; remember you changed my age in the beginning so you have to change it in the middle too; etc, etc. It's been endless. Until the other night.

August 4, 2009, I finished the fifth version (in 2 years) of my novel. Working off of agent and friends' feedback, I reworked the book then edited it again. Once that was done, I said: this is it! I can't look at this anymore. I need to move on. But I've said that before, after each version. Yet the characters would still come to me at night, requesting and demanding changes, revealing new twists or turns or secrets I didn't know they had, introducing me to knew characters I didn't know were vital to their stories. And then I'd have to go back.

But this time I forced myself to move on. I started work on the second novel, working title: The Reclamation of Karel Benakov. As usual, the getting-going was slow work, with much research to be done (especially this one, which is a good deal out of my inherent knowledge zone) and much backstory to create. It can be fun, but hard work and lonely. You don't want to discuss it too much with anyone else having such paltry information with which to answer the inevitable questions, so you keep to yourself. So, I slogged away, writing here and there, adding this and that to the characters lives and troubles. Slow going. And then the other night, as I was laying in bed, these new characters started pushing themselves into my consciousness, mainly Charles and Wallace, though Father Tony has had a few things to add. They all started revealing themselves and their stories and their lives. I was confused for a moment because I've been so used to Jenny and Brian and Mr. Barnes and the other residents of Ashmoore, Oklahoma coming to visit and talk, but they stayed silent. But the confusion dissipated pretty quickly, and I started to listen.

And since then, Charles has come to my thoughts every night now. I realized yesterday, when I "tried" to think about the first novel, about the characters, nothing new came. According to them, they're done, they've said all they needed to say. The relief that washed over me was nothing short of cleansing. I could officially move on, officially welcome Charles and Wallace and Berthold and all of their family and friends into my bed, my mind, and my life with no qualms or worries. It's been an amazing transitioning. I highly recommend it.

Jeff

Back Again

So, it's been a month since my last blog entry. Why the silence, you ask? Nothing personal. Nothing you did. It's me, not you!

Actually, it was me and the rewriting of the novel. As I stated in the Revision Update entry, I have been in the throes of editing my book, On the Edge of Someplace Else. While the feedback I had received from a couple of agents, as well as a couple of non-agent readers, simply suggested that the novel needed some tightening up, some reworking of the characterizations, to move the action along a tad quicker, and such, I started seeing it as much weaker than they did. I started seeing my fear in the writing: fear of being too obvious, too aggressive, too offensive with the subject matters (rape and child molestation). Once I realized this, I decided I had to dive deeper into these characters' lives and actions and motives for the novel to succeed, at least for me. So I jumped back in, but this time kept swimming until I reached the bottom, and with that the edit soon became an all out rewrite. From a tense change (from present to past, allowing reflection), to a narrative shift (from omniscient narrator to one of the main characters), the entire feel of the novel changed to one that, I feel, is more intense, weightier, more meaningful. So, the work has been more than worth it.

But why the fear in the first place, though? Of course, all writer's have fears: fear of missing the mark of their true intention, fear of not being understood, and, of course, fear of rejection. But this fear had to do more with being too raw for the reader. Instinctually, I am a raw writer. I love the blatant truth in writing. I love writing about difficult subjects plainly, without smoke, without mirrors. Just saying it, whatever "it" maybe be, gets it out of the way for the real excavation to begin. I've always written this way, astonishing many with the rawness and honesty. But for some reason in this novel, I found myself holding back. Maybe because these stories aren't, technically, mine, I didn't feel I could truthfully speak in my usual manner. But most likely, I just didn't trust that the readers of my novel could handle truth, honesty, and the raw reality of life. I snuck around the subject matters like a scared child, using tricks and subtlety that reeked of dishonesty and, most of all, fear. With this latest version, I decided to turn on the lights, show the reality of these characters' lives in all their blatant ugliness. And lo and behold, the book is the closest it's ever been to my original vision of the story.

So, the moral of this blog entry: Fuck the Fear! Simple as that. Works for writing, as well as life in general. Fuck the fear of even trying to be a published writer. Fear has kept me from this dream for far too long as it is, so fuck it, I say. Maybe I'll work up a t-shirt to sell. Maybe a bumper sticker, refrigerator magnets. I can see this happening, sweeping the nation. I can hear Obama starting the State of the Union address off with the new American motto: Fuck the Fear!

Who's with me? Who's gonna fuck the fear? We've got nothing to loose...but the fear.

Been Away

Just a quick note to tell why I've been MIA on the blog. I've been focused on the rewrite/re-visioning of my book. I think it's going very well. I've chopped 35 pages/over 10,000 words from the first part of the book (Book is in 2 parts). The book reads so much better now, tighter dialogue, tighter action/tension. It's been amazing, though difficult and hopefully worth all the work. Not sure I'd be able to make anymore radical revisions after this, so it better work.

In addition to the radical revision (switch to one narrative voice from multiple, switch from present tense to past tense), I've been working off this amazing list of "Ten Mistakes Writers Don’t See (But Can Easily Fix When They Do)" that I got off Twitter. Talk about really tightening the manuscript! It's a must for any writer who hasn't become aware of those writing habits/quirks that can make a manuscript annoying to read (I have an affinity for the word "just" for some reason. In my search of the first half of the book--98 pages--I used the word 153 times!). It's been a very enlightening process.

So, that's why I haven't had time to blog, but I'll get something else here this weekend. Until then, back to the editing board!

Jeff