So You Want to Write a Memoir?

My student Sarah shared this article with me. A good list!

Alice Munro's Free Radicals

When I'm skimming through the New Yorker or Tin House or any number of other journals with formidable-to-crazy good short fiction, I maybe read the first line and if it doesn't grab me, I go on to the next. Life's too short for a short story--or essay or novel--that doesn't sing.

This morning I roamed the New Yorker web site looking for a short story for my Gotham class and I found this one by Alice Munro. I could not stop reading.

She knocked my socks off with "A Bear Comes Over the Moutain," that was made into the movie, Away From Her. Incredible artistry. But I don't want to influence you. Read it. Tell me what you think.

Point of view

A couple of Pen on Fire blog readers have questions about point of view.

Bibliophile says:

Hi B, I've been writing different parts of the same story in many different points of view. I've got at least 5 main characters, all speaking in first person. I then spent a week revising everything to omniscient... spent another week reading every chapter on POV in my collection of writing aid books. I had an idea to make one character in to the 'listener,' the one collecting all these stories from the other characters, but thought that might seem amateur-ish. Any advice?

And Christina says:

I finished reading a novel by one of my favorite authors. This particular novel has three main characters. For two, she uses first person; but for the other character, she uses third. It didn't confuse me as a reader, but as an aspiring writer; I feel like I need to know why this was done. I couldn't find the significance of using a different POV for this character - besides the point that the character was dealing with a lot of pain and in the end, she ended up killing her mother.

What do you think about using different POV's in your novel? Is there some type of rule out there that this author broke? As I said, this character was fighting through a LOT. Do you think the author switched the POV on her readers because it was easier to tell the story from a third person POV; rather than take us through the characters inner toil from her POV? Or perhaps when dealing with customer going through a lot mentally, it is better to use a third person POV?

I'm not trying to attack the writer; there's so much I need to learn about writing fiction - so when I see something I've never seen before, I just have to ask!

Well ... that's a lot to chew on.

I'll just give my thoughts and if others reading this blog have thoughts/opinions, please feel free to let them fly. I'm not the last word on this subject.

I don't think there are any fast rules on point of view. As soon as an author or writing teacher says, "This is the way!" someone comes along to break it. In my humble opinion, you do what works for the story you're writing.

I do think when you're writing a short story, using more than one point of view can get to be too much. It's so such a short form!

But with novels, like so very much in life and writing, it just depends. If you use more then one point of view, you've got to have a reason. Often the reason writers do this is that they wanted to get at various aspects of story and they just couldn't do that using one point of view character.

Usually you wait to change point of view characters with a new chapter. Although Ann Patchett did not do this in Bel Canto and it worked quite wonderfully. In Atonement, the novel is written in the third person until you get to the end, and then it goes into first person. Worked for me!

If you're writing a first novel, it probably makes sense to stick with one point of view, because you're getting to know the form, and why complicate things for yourself?

These are just my initial thoughts. I'll keep pondering. Meanwhile, if anyone has anything to add, please do!

Events

Finally, I'm posting a slew of events coming up. I hope you can make it to one!

June 10 7:00 p.m., Newport Beach Public Library
In conversation with Lauren Weisberger about her about her new book, Chasing Harry Winston. (Lauren's first book was The Devil Wears Prada.)

July 12 A fun all-day workshop at UC-Irvine Extention: Jumpstart Your Writing. Call UC-Irvine at 949/824-5414 or visit the UCI Web site.

July 13 1:00 p.m., Barnes & Noble, Newport Center, Newport Beach
Talk about essay writing and her essay, "Knitting: My Urban Escape," included in the anthology, Knitting Through It: Inspiring Stories for Troubled Times (Voyageur Press).

September 28 West Hollywood Book Fair
If you haven't attended the fair, don't miss out. It's a great people-watching day with great panels. I will moderate a panel of literary agents in the afternoon. Click here for more information.

October 11 Celebration of California Writers Week
Join me and other authors for a literary day at the Orange Public Library and History Center in Orange, CA. More information can be found here.

Judging a book by its cover

Do you?

I often do judge a book by its cover. So many books are flung onto the porch every week for the show. On the way to the kitchen, I open the (usually) padded envelope and look at the cover of the book. I don't much care whether it's hard cover or paperback, but I like a nice texture and color. If it's teal, turquoise, aqua, or sky blue, so much the better. I've been known to keep these, and make beautiful colored stacks, or organize by color. The author's photo either compels me or doesn't. If the author looks bratty, or arrogant, the book goes in the reject pile. Not that the author has to look friendly, either. He or she just has to look ... interesting and approachable. I can't think of any author worth spending time on the phone with if they're not nice or fun or glad to be there.

Apparently, a lot of people judge books by their covers. Others judge books by their covers, too.

Do you?

Things to do instead of write

Watch this stop-motion video ... quite mind-boggling.

And look at these little constructions....

And this will get you back to writing....

Actually, that wild stop-motion video made me want to work on my novel. Inspiring! All that art at work.

A bit of log rolling

I love it when nice letters like this one come in:

Hi Barbara!

Just wanted to drop you a short note of thanks!

Earlier today I e-mailed/queried literary agent Bill Contardi. I reached out to him because of your podcast/interview with him in September, 2006. He got back to me immediately! I've included my e-mail to him and his response.

I don't know if he'll eventually take me on, but because of your show a reputable literary agent is willing to give my work a look.

I cannot thank you enough for your show!

Take care,

Ron Alvarez


...

If you haven't already, go my show blog and give a listen.

Critiques: What to keep, what to leave

A former student from one of my online classes asks:

"How do you know what critiques you should use and which ones you should not? I brought in and read some of my work to my writers' group this past weekend and received some feedback. I liked some of their comments but disagreed with others. So I wanted to get your thoughts as to how you should handle feedback."

I generally look for consensus. If a few people are saying the same thing, I pay more attention than if comments are various and random. That's not to say that I don't pay attention to the various random comments, because I do. I seem to pay attention to everything everyone says. Which is not necessarily a good thing.

But consensus speaks loudest of all because if a few people are saying the same thing, then it must be true (I reason).

I also pay more attention to comments coming from someone who writes and reads in my genre.

What I don't pay attention to are comments that sound personal and have more to do with the person offering their opinion than they have to do with the work.

And if there is even one lousy person in a group, it can ruin the entire group for me.

Once, in a group long ago, a member said (of my interracial novel at the time): Well, I don't like black people so I don't have anything to say.

I left that group fast. Ugh!

I also pay attention to comments that resonate. Sometimes someone will say something and immediately I'll say or think, Yes! You're right!

Maybe it's something I sneaked in, wondering if anyone would notice, vowing if they did, I would remove it. Or maybe I was lazy, or maybe it was a darling. Wasn't it Mark Twain who said, "Murder all your darlings"? You know, sometimes we're so in love with something we've written that really doesn't fit in the work, but we leave it in because we're in love with it. Praise those workshop members who find those sentences.

If anyone has more to say about critiques and what to pay attention to, please, have at it. I'd love to hear and I'm sure my former student does, too.

James Frey in Vanity Fair

Don't start reading this instead of writing. Save it as a reward for writing. A good story in June's Vanity Fair.

Back at it

Okay, so we've been spending time getting the studio behind the house together and it's finally become a place where it's quiet and I can work (although new neighbors just moved in upstairs, single guys who work as bartenders, so who knows!).

Yesterday, I pulled out Starletta, with ideas about how to revamp, including changing the title--any ideas? I want to remove "Kitchen" from the title, in part, because it's not a restaurant book. She's a food writer and also because I don't want guys to shy away from the book as some do from Pen on Fire because of the subtitle, which wasn't my idea in the first place, but there you go.

So in the studio, yesterday, I found I wanted to sit here and spread out my stuff. And I did. I worked. And it was good. (I just need to finish getting the courtyard together ... deliver things to Goodwill....)

The long and the short of it is, place is very important. And you gotta like the place in which you're working to do good work. Or else you'll think of any reason to do something else--anything else.

A Carolyn See op-ed piece

I just love this woman. Read this.

Know your audience

The other thing is audience.

It can help to know who writing your writing for. Pen on Fire began with an audience of one. My student Robin. A lot of you know this story. She would become inspired in class but at home her motivation to write fizzled. She jokingly said, If you came home with me, I know I could write.

I said, I'll write a book for you.

Pen on Fire started with my audience of Robin. Soon it spread to include all of my students and others.

Who are you writing for? It could be yourself. But it has to be someone.

Writing is the cure

A friend posed a dilemma about writing and here is what I said to her (which she said was fine to post here, for others to hopefully benefit from):

There does come a point when you (a writer, any writer) finds themselves at the point you find yourself at. Is it worth it? Is the self-disclosure worth raking through the muck of the past and putting it on paper, making art out of it? Is art worth it? Is it productive? Isn't cleaning a closet more productive?

What I didn't say last night, which I ought to have said, and if it's okay with you, I'll post this on my blog so I can say it! is, if there's something else you enjoy more than writing, then maybe you *should* give it up.

In my view, you're a writer. Sure you like other things, too, but you like writing and gain something from doing it. But that may just be my view.

I have considered over the years, at different points, giving it up. But when I ask myself, does anything do more for you, the answer has always been no. I love to knit, I love handicrafts. I studied music for a few years and played the flute. I was involved in the performing arts, and photography. But I always felt--and still do--that something was missing without working on a piece of writing.

Writing is the hardest thing I've ever done. Sure, brain surgery would be harder, but then again, I don't want to be a brain surgeon. And my guess is that for some brain surgeons, writing would be damn hard.

No one can tell you that you should be writing. No amount of strokes or encouragement can make you write every day if you simply don't want to.

But my guess is that if you write a bit every day, you'll want to. You'll work a groove in the brain and in your creative self that will draw you back to your pen and paper, or computer, most days. So much of writing is very much a habit. Like any habit, if you fall away from it, you might think, whatever made me think I liked that habit?

Anyway, only you know what writing does for you, and doesn't do for you. I do know that I've seen your excitement when you were working on a piece that excited you.

I know your friend discouraged you by telling you one of your pieces wasn't in your voice. Voice can take a long time to get to. It takes throwing a lot of words at the page. It truly does. You try out different styles, different tones, different ways of using words, and in this way, voice comes.

Writers need to stop thinking so much--about how we're no good, how we're frauds, how we'll never write anything of substance--and just write. Writing is the cure.

Publishing: Where do we go from here

That's the title of my panel on Sunday and I am greatly looking forward to it. My panelists will be Johnny Temple, publisher of Akashic Books; Susan Weinberg, publisher of Public Affairs Books; James Atlas, publisher of Atlas & Co.; and George Gibson, publisher of Walker & Co.

I am so looking forward to this panel. Saturday, 2:30, Young Hall on the UCLA campus.

.....

And to those who have been asking, illness has passed and I'm back at it, so thanks for asking! And I hope to see you Saturday.

Los Angeles Times Festival of Books

Okay, is everyone going to be there? If you've never been, it's a fabulous book festival with a ton of great panels for writers (and readers). Here's the web site. If you're around Young Hall at 2:30 p.m., say hi. My panel on publishing takes place then.

D.T. Max on Don DeLillo

I'm going through a pile of New Yorkers that my librarian, Haidee, gave me, and right now I'm in the June 18, 2007, issue. I'm reading a long feature about literary archives by D.T. Max. I just wrote to him for permission to reprint the following long paragraph, which I love, about the literary life:

DeLillo’s letters are often about business—negotiations over contracts, responses to translators—but a few of them provide insight into his austere approach to the literary life. One, in particular, is the kind of note that biographers long to stumble across. In October, 1995, David Foster Wallace wrote to him, “Because I tend both to think I’m uniquely afflicted and to idealize people I admire, I tend to imagine you never having had to struggle with any of this narcissism or indulgence stuff. . . . Maybe I want a pep-talk, because I have to tell you I don’t enjoy this war one bit.” DeLillo responded in November. “I was a semiconscious writer in the beginning,” he writes. “Just sat and wrote something, or read the newspaper, or went to the movies. Over time I began to understand, one, that I was lucky to be doing this work, and, two, that the only way I’d get better at it was to be more serious, to understand the rigors of novel-writing and to make it central to my life, not a variation on some related career choice, like sportswriting or playwriting. The novel is different. . . . We die indoors, and alone, and I don’t mean to sound overdramatic but you know what I’m talking about. Anyway, all of this happened over time, until eventually discipline no longer seemed something outside me that urged the reluctant body into the room. At this point discipline is inseparable from what I do. It’s not even definable as discipline. It has no name. I never think about it. But there’s no trick of meditation or self-mastery that brought it about. I got older, that’s all. I was not a born novelist (if anyone is). I had to grow into novelhood.”

Keeping the dark room dark

I've been in bed for days, sick with something or other, but I'm starting to see the light. Which is when I came across this dark page, a little treat, perhaps, for you...

And if you haven't used up enough time playing, here's another fun way to spend a few minutes, created by a fellow ASJA member who is indeed selling big jugs.

Ayelet Waldman & Michael Chabon

A fun interview at coolsville Readerville.

Scan down for the piece about Maira Kalman's latest book, which I also love.

What an agent said to Charles Baxter

Did you read the piece on Baxter in Ploughshares that I posted yesterday? Oh, read it! This is from the piece. So outrageous.

Don Lee writes:

He [Charles] turned to fiction and churned out three novels, but they were disasters. “They were very abstract, these novels, very schematic, in some sense like bad postmodernism,” he says. “Nothing in them felt particularly real, although I didn’t realize that at the time. You rarely do when you’re working. I thought they were great. I was utterly baffled by the indifference or loathing with which people read them.”

One agent was particularly cruel. “I called her and said, ‘Julie, what do you think of my novel?’ And she said, ‘I hate it.’ And then she said, ‘Tell me why I hate it.’ And I said, ‘Julie, I don’t know why you hate my novel.’ She said, ‘Oh, you must, you wrote it. Tell me why I hate it. Is it the characters? Is it the setting? I just don’t understand any of it. Help me out here. Why do I hate your novel?’ It was an amazing phone call. And I kept having experiences like that. This person I knew on the West Coast read one of my novels and said, ‘Well, maybe your imagination’s poisoned right at the source.’ ”

Charles Baxter

He's been called a "writer's writer," and he's on the show today. (Podcast should be up soon if you miss the show.)

Here's a profile of him that was published in Ploughshares. So much good stuff; I had to share it with you.