Tag: Writing

The Writing Life: You Never Know What You Might Have

On By Robert EvenhouseIn The Writing LifeLeave a comment

Since I challenged myself to write 500 words three weeks ago, I did not miss writing an entry on a single weekday. Until, alas, last Thursday morning.

I was in my daughter June’s room and we had just finished playing with some of her toy animals. I usually slap  together a blog in the wee hours each morning before departing for work. For what was the first time in a long time I wrote the entry the previous evening and brought the laptop into June’s room to do a bit of light editing before I rushed out the door. What I discovered after the night of usual broken sleep was horrifying.

It was terrible. I have no idea what creature got a hold of my laptop that night while I was sleeping (perhaps it was my cat Bandit) but they destroyed the perfect gem of a blog I composed the previous evening. I remembered nostalgically, as I sipped on my peppermint tea, that it was a brilliant work, a post worth showing the world. Then, as I looked at the sad sad piece, I saw nothing of worth and nearly deleted the entry altogether.

A Happy, But Tired, Morning

My wife Cindy helps with my editing and, because I desperately need it, I shoved the computer in her direction to get her thoughts. She scanned the page with her blue eyes then looked at me with an apologetic smile.

“What do you think?” I asked knowing the answer.

“Well”, she said twisting her mouth in dissatisfaction, “It’s bland.”

I nodded, closed the computer, and went to work.

Now, someone once told me that the first three days of the work week tend to be high traffic times for blogs. If there is anything trendy or worthwhile to post, post it then so as to get the highest hits possible. This was my reason for not posting that day. I thought, hey, what’s the point? Thursday doesn’t matter. I’ll post tomorrow.

Then, in a flash, it was Friday morning and I had written nothing. I had the draft of that blog from the previous day, and no time to write something new. So, I spiced it up a bit, put in a few anecdotes, and clicked the publish button. I think it was still loading when I raced out the door.

By the end of the day, it was my second highest traffic day for my blog, ever. So the reason I put this post on a Monday morning is to encourage you, writer, to put yourself out there this week.

If you have a novel on the shelf, dust that baby off and start sending it to agents! If you have an idea for a blog, or an article, get started on it. If you have an opportunity to do something great don’t sleep in and don’t let it go to waste. For, you may never know what you might have. It might be nothing. Or, perhaps, it might be something unexpected. Something that in return receives, not that canned rejection letter, but one that says, “We are thrilled to inform you that…”

Come on. Let this be a good week for you, writer. Get devoted to your craft.

Cheers,

Bob

Why Do You Keep Writing?

On By Robert EvenhouseIn Uncategorized11 Comments

It’s late at night and I can barely keep my eyes open. I sit at the keyboard pondering what the next paragraph holds, trying to figure out where a comma should go, and realized I used “the” about a billion times.

Sound familiar? It should if you are a part time writer.

A writer might admit that the craft can be a bit tedious. If they are really honest they would say that it is war. Writing requires the author to be attentive to every single word that is placed on the page. It can be hard to keep your concentration as there are only a few opportunities in a day when you can momentarily swing your attention to your work.

Someone might ask you why you would even write at all? That someone might be you. And, after all, they might have a point. It’s not a viable source of income. Of course there are the Rowlings, Tolkiens, and Grishams’ who’ve make millions. But, there aren’t that many authors that can support themselves solely through writing. Just have a gander around your local bookstore to see the tens of thousands of books. Most of those authors are still working their day jobs.

Why then? If there is little or no money in it, why even write at all?

For some it might be the fact that to write, and to write well it requires honesty. Therefore it is a place to be yourself. For others the allure of a big contract is there, and let’s be truthful that is in the back of all of our minds. The reason I write is because through a collection of experiences I began to understand there was a story for me to tell and I liked it and wanted to write it. For me its that simple. It is true that writers are supposed to write for their audiences but its equally true that they write for themselves (with the audience at the forefront of their mind of course!).

So, readers, why do you put words on the page?

Writing to Music – Impossible or Essential?

On By Robert EvenhouseIn Writing Tips3 Comments

At first I thought the idea preposterous. Trying to articulate a sentence using carefully chosen words, while guitars, drums, and a forlorn singer are echoing rhythmic poetry into your ears at unnecessary loud volumes. It’s like two people trying to go through a turnstile to board a subway from opposite sides. It simply does not work…or does it?

Coincidentally, I have, at least to my feeble understanding of what writing is, composed my best chapters when listening to Frightened Rabbit or one of my favorite classical movie soundtracks. I even finished a draft of a novel while doing it. I am not sure if it is the simple fact that I listened to the same music again and again while writing a particular chapter or novel, but after a while, I simply could not write without music.

There are many places to get music: iTunes, Pandora, but I choose Grooveshark. My friend Josh introduced me to it and its my favorite website for music I’ve discovered thus far. If you have other places (legal domains only please) do share.

I often write to Frightened Rabbit‘s live album Liver!Lung!FR! Why? I’m not sure exactly. While their music may be sometimes over the line, they remind me of Mumford & Sons only a bit more, well, English.

The soundtrack to Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen has been a favorite. The single movie of the trilogy that I did watch, I did not like. But the soundtrack to Transformer 2: Revenge of the Fallen help me finish my latest draft on The Tale of Calelleth. Why? The noble trumpets made me think of a cavalry charge and self-sacrifice, two events incorporated at the end of my book.

The soundtrack to War Horse is my new favorite. I have started my next novel which takes places at Keuka Lake in upstate New York. Its a tremendously verdant area, filled with green mountains, groves and groves of trees, and deep mysterious lakes. It is also about friendship between two kids who meet there one summer and an event that changes them forever. I hear this in the music. I can imagine the films’ landscape while listening to the soundtrack and it combines a feast of imagery that fuels my writing.

Regardless of what I listen too it must either fit the story or scene. It can also be the a random album just like Frightened Rabbit. However, I could never write about something sad while listening to a song blazing at a furious pace. For that I must have something melancholy, striking a chord, releasing a flood of mental images that pours from my finger tips and onto the page.

How about you? What music do you listen to when you write, if any? Do you find it too distracting?

Cheers,

Bob

The Hardest Part Of Writing A Novel

On By Robert EvenhouseIn Writing Tips4 Comments

More and more authors are expected to do more for their books. Promote themselves, creating networks and audiences before they publish, and of course, do some significant editing.

Editing, more commonly know as revising, is my arch nemesis. It’s the nasty reality of writing, the rude awakening that says, “you know how you slaved over your novel for the last few years to produce this draft? Yeah, you aren’t even close to being done”. Then it howls in laughter.

Okay, maybe it’s not that dramatic, but you get the idea. You finish your novel thinking you’ve done your best to have commas in the right place, eliminate the passive voice, and destroy the repetitive use of words. But, as you open the word document and begin reading you will probably do what I did when I started to read my finished draft. Groan. Sigh. Then let you head slowly fall until its rested on the desk in the realization that more work is ahead.

Now maybe you thought of it, but I didn’t. Revising, I believe, is the hardest work, work that causes you to dig even deeper into your self than a novel does.

Since I know only bits about the editing process, I do know it can be more of a refining period and much more than simply tweaking grammar. Therefore I wanted to pass on this video about refining your work and tips from a very good blog WritingIsHardWork.

Where Do Ideas For Novels Come From?

On By Robert EvenhouseIn The Writing Life11 Comments
A Sudden Storm

Ideas from novels can arrive from anywhere. They can come from reading, lectures, true life experiences, or anywhere. I’d like to share the two sparks that started my novel below.

If I’m honest, my first novel began a long time before I had a desire to write. The first moment of inspiration came when I was throwing a softball around in preparation for a softball game at my parent’s church.

It was a magnificent day like most Michigan summer days. A slight breeze was in the air. It was not too hot or too cold, just perfect. No one mentioned the weather. I had no clue that it might change and I get the feeling none of my team members who tossed the ball around with me had an inclination of what was to come.

In what seemed like less than an instant the sky was dark, then from beyond the horizon of tall maple trees came a deafening roar. It was the sound of gallons of rain drops falling from the blackened clouds above.  Lightning forked across the sky and I ran and dove into my car just as the immense rain drops clattered on pavement and pummeled my car with such force I thought it was hail. I imagined what it would have been like were there no cover at all and how the cold heavy drops would have felt had they pummeled me instead of my trusty Chevy Cavalier.

This sudden unannounced storm would be the first ingredient that would ignite my novel.

The second happened a few years later.

My friend Matt suggested that I read a book he had just finished. It was a book of popularized history call How the Irish Saved Civilization by Thomas Cahill.

How the Irish Saved Civilization

I picked it up and immediately I was hooked. As I read, I came to a part where Mr. Cahill talked about the viking raids on monasteries in Ireland and the surrounding countries. It sounded terrible. I imagined the monks in the sack cloth robes gardening in the beautiful summer morning. Then just as the change of the weather I experienced a few years before, the countryside would be filled with enemies that rushed forward from the undergrowth and cut down everyone in the monastery.

When thinking back on my first novel, The Tale of Calelleth, I realize that there are many things that formulated the novel in my mind. These are the first two experiences that I can remember that cemented the idea of an enemy showing up unannounced. It has since changed from a faceless pure evil to something more complicated, but the storm and Mr. Cahill’s book forever impressed upon my mind the idea of this horror that some in the tangled history of the planet had to live through. They had no refuge as I did in my Chevy Cavalier.

So how about you, reader? Are there any particular experiences or things that you have read that were the seeds to a novel you are now working on?

Cheers,

Bob