Do You Believe in Magic?

I wasn’t going to post today, but the thoughts were fresh in my mind, thanks to a conversation with a friend, and couldn’t be ignored. I’m in a rather soapboxy mood, so feel free to tune in or tune out.

Remember in the movie version of The Wizard of Oz when Dorothy, the Scarecrow, the Tin Man, and the Cowardly Lion discovered the “wizard” hiding behind the curtain? This “wizard” tried to play it off by his warning to them to “pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.”

Too late. He’d already been exposed as a complete sham—a humbug, according to the Scarecrow. He didn’t have a drop of magic within him, and couldn’t really give them what they desired—a brain for the Scarecrow, a heart for the Tin Man, courage for the Cowardly Lion, and a trip home for Dorothy—except through nonmagical means. But there was magic in Oz. The witches proved that. Later, even the humbug wizard gained magic. You have to read Baum’s Oz books to learn how. Yet the man-behind-the-curtain notion is still pervasive in our day and age.

We live in a cynical age. We’re used to reality TV and news reports that take us “behind the curtain” by debunking magic acts or exposing as frauds politicians and authors who claim they’re telling a “true” story while making up key facts. We’re tired of the lies, aren’t we? If there’s a man behind the curtain, we want to know!

Sometimes we take this mindset to the books we read. As adults we learn to “put away childish things” like believing there are fairies in our backyard or that dogs can talk in order to embrace reality. That’s why we categorize fairy tales and other such stories as stories of childhood, rather than for adults. If we happen to pick up a fantasy book, the use of magic is severely scrutinized, slapped with a deus ex machina label, or written off as “convenient” if it doesn’t seem “realistic” enough to suit our adult sensibilities.

You know what? I for one have had quite enough of the search for the man behind the curtain. This doesn’t mean I plan to bury my head in the sand and totally ignore reality or reality-based fiction. It means I’m going to continue to unabashedly cherish those stories that take me to magical places or to ordinary places that seem magical, and then try my best to offer that kind of journey through my own writing. The stories I loved as a child I still love as an adult. Grimm’s Fairy Tales has a prominent place on my shelf, not hidden underneath the bookcase out of fear that someone will check my bookshelves and ask about what I’m reading. I’m a firm believer in story magic. I love miraculous escapes and magical derring-do. And many of you do too. I wasn’t the only adult reading Harry Potter’s adventures.

I love the fact that authors like J. K. Rowling, Neil Gaiman, C. S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolkien, Holly Black, Juliet Marillier, Jaclyn Moriarty, Charles Yallowitz, Caroline Carlson, K. L. Schwengel and many others are unapologetic in the use of magic in their stories. If you haven’t already, you might check out Moriarty’s Colors of Madeleine series; Yallowitz’s Legends of Windemere series; Carlson’s The Very Nearly Honorable League of Pirates series; or K. L. Schwengel’s Darkness & Light series.

            

           

Or consider stories like Charlotte’s Web by E. B. White, Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH by Robert C. O’Brien, Three Times Lucky by Sheila Turnage, The Tale of Despereaux by Kate DiCamillo, The September books by Catherynne Valente, The Watsons Go to Birmingham—1963 by Christopher Paul Curtis, The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett, and other books that remind you of the magic (and sometimes sadness) of childhood. Be willing to suspend your disbelief and leave your cynicism at the door as you take a journey through these pages.

           

Do you believe in magic? I do. I still believe in the power of stories to transform us and transport us to unforgettable places. Do you?

Oz photo from takaiguchi.com. Book covers from Goodreads.

A Writer’s Process (12a)

Today, I’m talking with another great classmate of mine, Nora Carpenter. She’s here today and tomorrow to talk about her young adult novel, A Beautiful Kind of Crazy. And no, the novel isn’t about me. But thanks for thinking of me. We’ll also discuss some trends in young adult fiction. I’ve got my coffee in front of me, so let’s get started.

El Space: Welcome, Nora. Please share four quick facts about yourself.
Nora: I graduated from VCFA’s Writing for Children and Young Adults master’s program in July 2012—a proud member of the amazingly talented Secret Gardeners! I am Associate Editor for Wonderful West Virginia magazine; I’m a certified yoga teacher; I live in Asheville, NC; and I have a wonderful husband, son, and two mischievous dogs, Holmes and Watson. Sorry . . . that’s five facts. 🙂

El Space: That’s quite all right. The more the merrier, I always say. 🙂 What inspired you to write A Beautiful Kind of Crazy?
Nora: The initial nugget of inspiration came to me because of some struggles that some of my friends were going through, things for which there were no definitive answers. I started thinking about some hard topics, like family goals versus individual goals, loyalty, and betrayal, and how a teenager might handle being pulled in different directions by different people she loved. From there, the character of Cay Zeller was born. The novel explores deep family bonds, prejudice, and what it takes to heal a cherished bond severed by betrayal. And her story turned into something I didn’t expect, which was nice.

El Space: Cool! I love when a story evolves. What authors inspire you?
Nora: Gosh. So many! Actually, this is an interesting question for me, because I find most often that books inspire me. That is to say, I fall in love with certain stories and characters. There are no authors about whom I can say I love every single thing they’ve ever written, but there are definitely books that make me think, Wow. This is absolutely incredibly done. I hope my stories impact readers the way this story has impacted me.

So, let’s see . . . some inspirational books/authors for me are: The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett, Damage by A.M. Jenkins, The Higher Power of Lucky by Susan Patron, and the Make Lemonade trilogy by Virginia Euwer Wolff. I could go on all day, because I’d say anyone who writes a story that resonates with me provides inspiration. And I think I learn something from every book I read. What really impresses and inspires me is when authors make regular, everyday characters with regular, relatable problems completely fascinating and engaging.

             

Also, I love when authors write notes at the end of novels and talk about how they had to write their book five or six times to get it right. That is inspiring. It reminds me to make sure I give them as many drafts as needed. I think a lot of people think authors just sit down and churn out 300 pages on the first try, and that first draft is published as is. And maybe there are some people who do that. But gosh, writing is an incredibly difficult labor of love, and it can take draft after draft after draft to finally reach the heartbeat of a story and produce something that is vibrant and true.

El Space: What writing advice have you received that changed the way you think about writing?
Nora: In a fabulous lecture, Louise Hawes explained that in order to generate plot, you should constantly ask yourself two questions: “What does my character want?” and “Why does she want it?” I have these questions posted at my desk and they led me to create the plot for A Beautiful Kind of Crazy. It seems obvious now, but it was eye-opening back then to realize that in a great story, plot is inextricably connected to its protagonist. You shouldn’t just be able to change the protagonist and have the exact same story unfold. A different protagonist would have different ways of thinking about the world, and so make different choices, and have different friends, etc., all of which would change the outcome of the novel.

Breakthrough #2: During my second semester at VCFA, I worked with the magnificent Tim Wynne-Jones. He taught me so much about craft, but one of the best lessons I learned was how to make use of dialogue “beats” (pauses in which dialogue is broken by narrative—maybe a few words, maybe a sentence or longer—that make the dialogue feel real). Not only did I learn how to make fictional dialogue more authentic, I also learned how to accentuate important lines of narrative by manipulating the sentence length and structure of what comes immediately before and after.

El Space: What are you working on now?
Nora: I’m so close to finishing the last draft of A Beautiful Kind of Crazy. After that, I’ve got several ideas, but I’ll most likely be starting a novel with a teenage protagonist who suffers from undiagnosed obsessive compulsive disorder. People usually think someone with OCD is just a super-organized neat freak. That person may have OCD tendencies, but the illness is much scarier and life-hindering than that. My character is afraid of touching certain things, can’t stop washing her hands sometimes, etc. I’m also working on some more poems for Wild, Strong, and Free: Interactive Yoga Poems for Kids, my kids’ yoga picture book.

Tomorrow, I’ll continue talking with Nora about her novel and trends in young adult fiction. For now, if you have questions for Nora about her novel, the authors she admires, or about yoga, feel free to comment below. And thanks for stopping by!

Key from eastonclass1.bltnorthants.net. Book covers from Goodreads.

A Writer’s Process (9)

And now from the ridiculous (see last post) to the sublime. Today on the blog is the chic and sensational Sandra Nickel, another good friend from VCFA. Get out your magnifying glass and your deerstalker, ’cause we’re talking about mysteries and ghosts. Mwahahahahahaha!!!!

Sandra at Shakespeare and Company in Paris

El Space: Please share a few facts about yourself.
Sandra: I like to think that my writing is the reason my husband fell in love with me. Friends wanted to set us up, but he was living in Moscow, and I was living in New York, so I sent him an email every other day for three months until he was so intrigued, he hopped on a plane to New York so we could meet and have dinner. We did have that dinner, and I have lived a surprisingly European life ever since—two-and-a-half years in Moscow, four years in Paris, and now Switzerland. All because of those notes I wrote. The power of writing. See what it can do?

El Space: Wow! You must have sent some amazing email! Where is your writing taking you now?
Sandra: I’m working on my first middle grade novel, Saving St. Martha’s, a mystery set in a Swiss boarding school. A sort of Nancy Drew meets the first Harry Potter. I just received my critique group’s last comments, so I’m revising.

El Space: Please tell us about it.
Sandra: The heart of the story revolves around two twelve-year-old girls. Lorna is all logic, and Jeannette all mystical ideas, but when their parents ship them off to St. Martha’s to get rid of them, they become best friends; the school, their sanctuary; and Martha, the ghost of the former headmistress, their protector.

But the school is in trouble. Its old abbey is falling apart and the school is in terrible debt. A prized painting—the last gift from the school’s patroness—was never found. And worse, the girls discover that the hard-hearted Corbett Rast and his bank are going to take the abbey and shut down the school unless St. Martha’s comes up with $1,000,000 in 10 days. The girls and Martha vow to find the long-lost painting. But Corbett Rast wants it too . . . and will stop at nothing to get his hands on it.

Martha, the ghost, is quite snarky, so the story is fun—part mystery/part boarding school story, and a lot about friendship. The great news is that Saving St. Martha‘s has had a nice reception so far. It was named as a finalist for the Katherine Paterson Prize and Hunger Mountain selected the first two chapters to be published in its upcoming “Mentors & Tormentors” issue.

El Space: That’s awesome! What inspired you to write Saving St. Martha’s?
Sandra: A couple of things, really. First came the setting. My daughter used to go to school in this truly amazing place—a Swiss chalet that had been built for the 1900 World’s Fair in Paris and then taken apart and rebuilt piece by piece on a hill above Lake Geneva. The chalet is all dark wood and tall, sloping roofs, and inside there is this gorgeous staircase worn smooth and glossy from all the girls that have run up and down it. The moment I saw that chalet, I wished I had gone to school there and knew it would be the perfect setting for a middle grade story.

Sandra and her daughter at the chalet that inspired Saving St. Martha’s

At this same time, my daughter and her best friend were so taken with mysteries and hidden treasures, they formed their own two-member club, a sort of private detective agency that solved the small and large mysteries around them. I put the school together with their private detective firm, a hidden treasure, a mystery, and came up with Saving St. Martha’s.

El Space: What drew you to write for the middle grade audience?
Sandra: Well . . . I wasn’t drawn to write middle grade. Not really. That whole story of what inspired me to write Saving St. Martha’s was a someday, down-the-road sort of inspiration. A long, long way down the road. I could imagine writing for young adults—and I did—and I could imagine trying my hand at picture books—and I did. But middle grade? There was something eminently frightening about it. My own middle grade years hadn’t been wildly happy, and I had clouded over my memories to the point of remembering very little. How was I to write for an audience living out the years I felt least connected to?

But then, I was accepted into the MFA program at Vermont College of Fine Arts and someone—I don’t remember exactly who—tossed down the gauntlet of: “Why don’t you try writing a middle grade?” So, I did, mostly because I like to pretend I’m not scared of anything, other than heights and mice. I went through hypnosis to reconnect to my middle grade years. I hung out with middle grade kids. I read any and every middle grade book recommended to me. I wrote. And what fun it all has been!

El Space: Sounds like you were well prepared. What was the most challenging aspect of writing a mystery?
Sandra: In a way, mysteries are easier to write than other stories, because the broad arc of the story is already there. You set up the mystery, and then the mystery must be solved. Easy, right? The problem is that the small arcs that make up that broader arc can be tricky. New mystery writers—and this was certainly true for me—often believe they must hide the hints and clues and truth from the reader. But the opposite is true.

Mystery writers must reveal every detail for the reader, but then use sleight of hand, distraction, or an unreliable character to make the truth difficult to discern. This is the tricky part, where mystery writers strive to hit the sweet spot of revealing enough, yet not too much. For this, having a critique group or beta readers is essential, since they are coming to the story for the first time. You want them intrigued, but not confused; you want them to have just enough information to keep reading, but not so much that they put down the book because they’ve already figured it all out.

El Space: What authors inspired you when you were growing up? Which inspire you now?
Sandra: There were so very many who inspired me. I was a big reader! But since we have been talking about middle grade, let me say: E. L. Konigsburg, Frances Hodgson Burnett, Roald Dahl, Louise Fitzhugh, Norton Juster, Madeleine L’Engle, and C.S. Lewis. As for now, this blog isn’t long enough to name them all. But I guess I can say: Ditto for all the above, and add a few of my “new” discoveries: Kate DiCamillo, Katherine Paterson, Louis Sachar, David Almond, and Grace Lin.

Books that inspire Sandra

El Space: Do you stick to one project or work on more than one? What tools are helpful?
Sandra: I’m an immersion writer. I absolutely love submersing myself completely in one story-world at a time. That’s not always practical, however. Right now, in addition to Saving St. Martha’s, I’m working on a young adult Gothic ghost story and a storyteller’s poem about a female Paul Revere. When I need to quickly switch from one story to another, the best tool I have found is to freewrite my way into a character’s world. I start by having the character dress herself, noting every detail from the scratch of her wool skirt, to the cut of her socks’ elastic into her calves, then move onto other details like the woody-lead smell of her pencil and the squeal of a violin in the room next door. Five minutes of these kinds of specifics are enough. The wormhole is created, and just like that, I’m pulled from one story-world into the other and am ready to write.

Sorry, that about wraps it up! Thanks, Sandra, for being such a great guest!

If you have questions for Sandra about her book or her process, please comment below.

Magnifying glass from trenchesofdiscovery.blogspot.com.