The Writerly Pause: Home of The Grit & Crit

Book Review: Operation Homecoming

2009-08-02T17:15:00.000-07:00

A soldier writes home to his mother:

"Dear Ma,
They call them HERO missions. They are the worst kind.
It's the body bag in the back, that makes the trip rough."

Think of this as a book that belongs to all of us. It was born out of our collective psyche, as Americans who are witness to an event that is shaping our generation and those after.

Read the rest at The Kitchen Dispatch

And Then There Were Three

2008-10-02T20:49:00.000-07:00

As with a lot of groups, activity on The Writerly Pause has ceased.
Three members remain --Sovann Somreth, Kanani Fong & John Louis Peters. We keep in touch, continue to edit, rewrite and submit our manuscripts.
It's been fun.
We hope to see you when the three of us get our books accepted and published.

John Robison: A Fun Filled Feast

2008-09-27T05:57:00.000-07:00

John Robison has groupies now. No, not sleep in your bed groupies (his wife fills this role), but book reading ones. I call them this because John used to work as a sound engineer/explosives expert/ flaming guitar builder for KISS, as well as for other bands. Back then, he couldn't have given a flip about all the groupies who were really into guys with mullets and over processed long hair. Nah. But I figure he has them now because he's written a book called "Look Me In The Eye," which serves as a "greatest hit" to millions with Asperger's.

Anyhoo.... after his reading at Book Soup, myself, John, Sovann, David, and the driver sent for John went out for dinner. You know that when in a given night, you're treated to stories about him and Korean War Veterans working behind the scenes at KISS concerts shooting off Howitzers, mirror neurons, research at Harvard, and later --when everyone at the table (well almost everyone) confesses to various recreational drug drug pasts you've stumbled onto something cool. You also know that nothing can push the night off into the realm of "too weird to be believed," when the night is capped off by a long conversation with a book clerk, who happened to work as Oliver North's secretary back in the Reagan Administration.

That's right. Combine the stories of John, Howitzers, Korean War Vets, Explosives, Drugs, Mirror Neurons, Harvard and Fawn Hall, you've pretty much got an evening where even Hunter S. Thompson was called from the spirits and was lurking about.

And that's what happened. All of it. There can be no

replay of everything that was said, but I will only depart with this:

It was great. It was real. He's a charming speaker, you wish he would go on and on. And yes, yes, yes... you must read his book if you haven't yet. If you haven't, then start with my review.

General You-Know-Whats

Yes, he was the first guinea pig for an experimental treatment called TMS. It has "awakened a part of my brain," meaning that he can now read people's faces, and see music that he hadn't heard in 30 years.
He has no opinion about those who believe their children "got" Asperger's through vaccinations.
Despite the success of his book, John has and will continue to keep his car repair shop open. He knows that making a living as a writer can be fairly treacherous, and the car repair gives him both a different social outlet and also a regular stream of income.
He shops for cars with people like Peter Frampton.
His brother Augusten Burroughs lives nearby.
He's an advocate for the development of TMS (which you can read about on his blog).
He ate Spaghetti Bolognese (quick someone call TMZ with this tidbit).
He does pretty well with jet lag.
He made some changes in his paperback book, expunging the swear words because he became aware that a lot of 12 year olds and teens were reading his book.
None of my pictures turned out. I am getting a new digital camera that stays still when you click the damned thing. But it's okay. I have a feeling ....call it ESPN* that I'll be seeing more of John in the future.

And by the way, I'm auctioning off one of John's dirty t-shirts on eBay. Buy it. I'm a writer and I need money, and yes, if I have to support myself by filching dirty undergarments and eyeglasses from writers to support myself, I will.

*Extra-special notion

No, we weren't on drugs, but I think fittingly, the waiter shook the camera to make it look like we were!

Seven-Year-Old Authors

2008-08-04T23:08:00.000-07:00

Last Friday, I had the honor of speaking to a class of students about life as an author. You may be wondering how that was possible since I’m still looking for an agent for my first book?

Fortunately, I had an in. My seven-year-old son is enrolled in a summer school course called Create a Book where children spend six weeks writing and illustrating their own books. The first day of class, my son came home with a message that the teacher would like me to speak to the class because he had told her I was a writer.

I was really nervous, as I had no idea what to say. Fortunately, the children were interested in writing and had lots of great questions on their mind. Here's a sampling:

"Why did you decide to write?"
"When did you decide to write?"
"What is your book about?"
"Why did you write about that?"
"How many pages is it?" (When I said three hundred, I heard quite a few oohs and ahhs.)
"At what grade level can a child read your book?" (That little girl seemed put out when I mentioned it was geared towards adults.)
"What are you working on now?"
"What’s a catapult?"
"Do you have any pets?"

To think only two years ago these children were learning their ABCs. Now, they’re writing books and asking the same questions I hear adults ask at book signings.

At the end of class, the students passed around their completed books. Each story was required to have a main character, a problem to be solved, and how it was solved. So basic, that with all of our adult complicated ideas about writing, this basic premise is sometimes forgotten.

Some children wrote mysteries, others science fiction, and others about how to make friends with someone if they don’t like you. It's interesting what's on a seven-year-old's mind.

The last page of their books included an author's bio page. My son's final line brought a smile to my face. "When I grow up, I'm going to write books."

Kent Haruf: Tight Prose On The High Plains

2008-07-21T18:51:00.000-07:00

Amazon.com Widgets

click to order

This is the stuff you dream of writing. It's the stuff that makes you forget about cooking or going to bed. Kent Haruf 's prose is spare and unsentimental, yet lithe as winter wheat blowing in the wind. He depicts everyday people who live in areas that are usually overlooked. The pregnant, homeless girl; the two ranching brothers who've never married; the woman who's lived with the tyranny of her violent father and later, the feebleness of a younger brother, and the social worker who has seen too many tragedies unfolding before her. All of his books take place on the high plains of Colorado, a rugged unforgiving landscape only for the most hearty who can endure isolation, wind and sand.

A finalist for the National Book Award for fiction, Plainsong artfully weaves together the lives of six people in the small farming town of Holt, Colorado. What's astonishing in how smoothly Haruf does it with a minimum of fuss and exactness --one can only compare the structure to great architecture.

In each of his books, the characters come alive because of the emotional truths. Here's a bit from his first novel, The Tie That Binds, where the narrative voice just rolls along, spelling out the truth in a way that's matter-of-fact, but also descriptive. The overall effect is poignancy without sentimentality:

"But she was crying then. There wasn't any sound to it. It was past the point where the puny sound of a human voice can make any difference. She walked out of the house away from her father towards the hayfield to tell Lyman, with the unregarded tears falling onto the breast of her blouse. After that, I know of only two other times in her life that Edith Goodnough allowed herself to cry. Neither was at the death of her father."

The skill with which he writes, the choosing of the right words, when to put in short, sharp passages of description is so well wrought, that one is never distracted from the pull of the story. His latest book, which came out in January 2008 is West of Last Chance, a pictorial of the lands and people of the high plains he writes about. Those who like Willa Cather's My Antonia, will no doubt find the same strength in character and storytelling as well.

National Book Award Winner Sherman Alexie

2008-07-19T06:00:00.000-07:00

In June, I reviewed Sherman Alexie's book. You can read it here. What I liked about it was the voice, that ranged from scared to smart alecky, completely stunned, but then also pragmatic. This was a narrator who was uncertain about the world, and whose circumstances have forced him to go beyond his tribe at the reservation, the the larger one outside.

Sherman Alexie, who won the 2007 National Book Award for Young Adult Fiction, reads from his book The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian.

Gustavo Arrellano: Smart & Pugnacious in "Ask A Mexican!"

2008-07-12T09:32:00.000-07:00

What started out as a column for the Orange County Weekly is now the Everyman handbook on the cultural clashes and misperceptions between Mexicans and well, everyone else.

In addition to his usual journalism assignments with the paper, Gustavo Arellano has penned a weekly column that typically starts out with, Dear Mexican. Ask A Mexican! is syndicated in newspapers across the country and has a following of those who understand irony, and others to whom it simply falls flat. Some questions are curious about Mexican culture or history.

Gustavo Arellano, Photo from OC Register

Others are meant to be rude and degrading. Some are just bizarre:

"Dear Mexican, Why don't Mexicans like Science-fiction movies?"

Here's his answer in his typically sharpshooting manner:
"Dear Gabacho, One of my favorite ethnic jokes goes like this. Why aren't there any Puerto Ricans on Star Trek? Because they don't work in the future either." But Mexicans don't like alien films because they're always thinly veiled allegories about Mexicans if you believe University of Texas professor Charles Ramírez Berg."

No matter how someone tries to plot to throw Arellano off, he goes off into the archives of history or through volumes of books to find a quasi-historical/academic answer for the person he'll address as Dear Gabacho or a variant of. Arellano uses his brains and words as a billy club. He handles the questions deftly and with humor, and the voice that comes through is often irreverent --to both sides.

His book, which was published this year by Scribner, will go down as a classic. Not only is it funny, pugnacious and mocking, but it demands we look at perceptions of race and culture, questioning what it is to be an American.

Here he is in an interview at the Los Angeles Press Club:

Elmore Leonard

2008-07-01T07:12:00.000-07:00

Elmore Leonard

Short story writer, novelist and screenwriter Elmore Leonard was a copywriter working for Chevrolet supporting his wife and five kids. He submitted western stories to dime-store magazines. The rest, as they say, is writing and rewriting, eventually finding the right voice and a combination of hard work, persistence and luck. His style can only be described as short, sharp making its mark with a minimum of fuss. His stories move at pace that unfolds quickly, the patter between characters is filled with irony, humor, and accuracy. This is standard now for a man who has written 40 books, and whose "ten rules of writing" are well known if not followed by legions.

I was going through an old Moleskine book and found notes I'd taken during an interview with Elmore Leonard at UCLA. Among the gems I wrote down in regards to developing character were:

"The characters are made up, they're fun. I audition characters. If the character isn't interesting, if he doesn't talk, then he's demoted. But, those who don't talk are more likely to get killed!"

A Winner: The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian by Sherman Alexie

2008-06-18T07:09:00.000-07:00

Illustration by Ellen Forney, from the book

The setting is the Pacific Northwest amid tall pine trees and blue skies. The tribe is the Spokane. The focus is Arnold Spirit, the gawky, fourteen year old nerdy teenager whose parents are alcoholics. His sister spends twenty three hours a day alone in a basement and his only friend is the school bully. Arnold stutters and lisps, he's prone to seizures. He's the human punching bag on the Spokane Reservation, a geek who makes sense of life by drawing comics because

"I want to talk to the world. And I want the world to pay attention to me."

His predictable life is interrupted one day at Wellpinit High School after being given a geometry text book and seeing his mother's name on it. Arnold already knows how downtrodden his people are, but when he realizes the textbooks haven't been replaced in twenty years, he throws it at his teacher. During Arnold's suspension, the teacher comes to him and explains the injustices his student feels are correct, that in fact here on the reservation there is no hope, and to find it he will have to get off the reservation. The story gains its momentum when Arnold choses to attend a "white" school twenty-two miles away.

Poet, Playwright, Novelist, Screenwriter Sherman Alexie

This book is about the opening of Arnold's world, and using both the limitations and gifts of his tribe to find hope. Alexie deftly creates characters with both sophisticated realizations with sophomoric behavior and perceptions. His new friend Gordy at Reardan High School tells him:

"And, yeah, you need to take that seriously, but you should also read and draw because really good books and cartoons give you a boner."

This is Arnold Spirit's coming of age amid the incessant hopelessness of the Indian reservation and the gleam of his "white" high school. Alexie is wise not to let Arnold veer off the path and let this become a reality-TV teenage hi-jinks chapter book. He lets Arnold find his own identity by facing the loss of a friendship, alienation from his own tribe, death and grief, love, and the need to make new friends in a foreign environment. With a self deprecating but smart narrative voice, Arnold finds both hope and acceptance. He discovers that even though he is a Spokane Indian, he's a member of other tribes as well:

"And the tribe of cartoonists.
And the tribe of chronic masturbators.
And the tribe of teen age boys.
And the tribe of small-town kids.
And the tribe of Pacific Northwesterners.
And the tribe of tortilla chips-and-salsa lovers...."

Finding one's way in life and a sense of belonging is the recurring theme in novels. If you've seen his 1998 hit Indie movie "Smoke Signals," you'll see True Diaries as an expansion on this theme. Alexie writes this coming-of-age novel with humor, skill and consideration. This book garnered him the 2007 National Book Award for Young Adult Fiction. Frankly, I can't wait for this movie to come out.

Sherman Alexie accepts the National Book Award for YA Fiction 2007

Found On The Road: The Essentials of Writing

2008-06-09T14:02:00.000-07:00

I took my first novel class at UCLA Extension Writers' Program in the spring of 2002 because the advanced short story class was full. I had no intention of writing a novel, rather, Novel I was simply going to be a ten week look-see into an area I'd never considered. Through a series of exercises designed not so much to give us direction on 'how to get published" but to slow us down and teach us about the craft of writing, we had plenty of time to explore. Needless to say, I was hooked.

Looking back at the papers I saved, there were exercises on stream on consciousness writing, dialog, taking postcards and writing a scene based on the picture. There were more, and after many years of "ten week look-sees," I've learned the three most essential things for a writer are:

Quit thinking so much. Inspiration is at your fingertips everyday.
Patience is a necessity of writing.
It helps to have friends.

But I haven't worked on the manuscript for the past six years in a row. The writer in the studio only writing is only a fantasy. I had to work. I have kids. There's a house that falls apart. Some years, I took classes in poetry and literarure. For a year and a half --or maybe it was two, life took over and the novel just sat there untouched. I also read a lot. My advantage has always been (and maybe it's because I was raised in a small town) --I understand there's a time for everything.
But, a wonderful thing happened almost two years ago. My friends and I formed The Writerly Pause. A core of five, we --John Yelverton, Sovann Somreth, John Louis Peters, David Cossaboom, and myself have all taken turns being Indiana Jones.

For the past year, amid some daunting familial and financial upheavals, I've been working sporadically on the final rewrite of my novel. I don't think my own story is unique. There were times when I forgot the story line, when I couldn't remember the names of characters. Now, I understand that this was caused by the stress of the tumultuous times. It was never a matter of me being stuck in a rut --I would have loved a rut, but the day's schedule could literally turn in a moment. Often I had to write in short bits --stolen minutes of time between disasters. Through it all, I was encouraged by people like Frank Schaeffer and Patricia Wood as well as all my friends in The Writerly Pause.

The fecker is done, printed, ready to edit

I also have to say blogging was at times a lifeline on the days when I couldn't write because the stress of being a caretaker was utterly disorienting. Blogging is a form of conversation. And boy, did I need to talk! So thank you all!
Scene 74 was finished today. It is the final chapter. As it turns out, I like my book.
Tomorrow I'll follow the example of Frank and Patricia. I'll print it up, put it in a binder, toss it aside, and after a few weeks read through, make notations and then, in a final flurry... make the changes and then send it out to a few well-chosen readers. No it's not over. A new part is just beginning. But yes, this is a really great step.

Windfall: An Interview With Patricia Wood

2008-06-04T18:30:00.000-07:00

Patricia Wood on her boat, Orion
By Kanani Fong

“I don’t want to be paraded as an expert,” says Patricia Wood, author of the novel Lottery. “An expert is a mother or father who work day-to-day to understand their kid and to get the world ready to welcome him.” Wood knows a thing or two about the challenges of special needs children and adults. As a special education teacher, her hands-on experience was invaluable in creating her protagonist, Perry L. Crandall, a mentally challenged man who transcends all expectations in this debut novel. And indeed, it was the authenticity of Perry that both won the notice of fans, and even the 2008 Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction, where it was short listed this year.

As with most writers, Wood’s primary goal was to tell a good story. “But if I could tap into some consciousness, to get people to think about their assumptions, all the better,” she says. As a doctoral candidate at the University of Hawaii in the area of education and disability, she's written extensively about special education, home-schooling for the disabled, and as an advocate for special needs students. However, it became apparent in all the academic journals and even magazines like Ability that they were all preaching to the same choir. “We know how far people can go,” she says, “yet not enough gets out to the real world. Normal people do not pick up a book to read about special needs adults.”

Rather than type out another article, or non-fiction tome, she chose fiction, which can be a more accessible way to reach a large audience and raise awareness. She wanted to throw a tire iron at the way most people think of the mentally challenged. “Oh, here’s the beggar who’s retarded,” she says, as a means of illustrating the perceptions that many people hold. The challenge was to create a character the reader could root for, but to flesh him out by giving him desires, goals, tragedies and more importantly, ideas.

“I wanted Perry to be loved for his perceptions, and for the readers to see his ability and gifts,” she says of the protagonist. Other people, like his mother have given up on him, and the schools have a low set of expectations. Pat believes this isn’t atypical, that benchmarks applied evenly across the board to a diverse group of people are unrealistic, and not a true measurement of ability.

“Learning isn’t linear. People learn in all sorts of ways,” she says, of her decision to let Perry’s grandmother yank him out of school, to work at their boatyard. Pat cites a nine-year longitudinal study by Jacque Ensign Defying The Stereotypes of Special Education in the Peabody Journal of Education in 2000. They compared special needs kids who were home-schooled vs. those who went through the traditional educational process. The kids who came out ahead were those who’d been under the guidance of the parent at home, or even on the road. “It was mainly due to the parent’s attitude. They excelled on a higher level because the parent could see the kid’s gifts.” Indeed, the key person in Perry’s life is his grandmother, Gram, who takes him out of school and teaches him herself.

Pat thinks of the possibilities in teaching and guiding special needs students. “I often think, what would happen if we taught public education in a variety of ways, using different skills? What if we could work 1:1 with these kids, go at their pace, follow their interests? What if we don’t make a such a deal that a kid can’t hit all the academic benchmarks, but we focus on finding their innate gifts?”

She’s seen the results of non-traditional learning. She and her husband live on a sailboat year round in Hawaii. “We meet cruisers who come into our harbor. Many of them have children, and they’ve been at sea for years. I met a family whose daughter had qualified for special education, but was still having difficulties in school. They decided to go away for three years. When they came back to live on land, they were petrified that they’d ruined their kids’ chances. But as it turns out, they were learning by doing. The daughter is now in regular education classes. She’s doing well.”

A relative of Patricia’s --who was at the profound end of the Down’s syndrome spectrum inspired the seeds of Lottery, though she is careful to point out that Perry isn’t based on him. However, she thought of him, and the responses others had to him. There were a lot of day-to-day things he couldn’t do by himself. As he got older, the stakes went up to find something so he could earn a small living. But they failed to find the right thing. Finally, someone thought to have Bic send them a bunch of pen parts. “This was the era when they’d send you all the parts and you’d get paid for how many boxes you would fill. He could put together Bic Pens faster than anyone else,” she says. “Lottery isn’t a book only about a financial one, it’s also about the lottery in life, the genetic lottery, the windfall one receives when they find something where they can achieve some success.”

Pat also made sure that she wrote about Perry’s sexuality. “Sex is a desire of those with mental challenges. It was important for me to include it. People like Perry want love, they want a girlfriend, they are curious about sex and they want it.” She points out that the perceptions and also many of the depictions on television and movies typically choose to render the disabled sexless.

Though Pat says that the story’s the thing, she hopes that it’s a vehicle for deeper thought and discussion. Perhaps the readers who will gain the most from Lottery are those with little or no experience with those with different abilities. “Love transcends mental acuity, age, weight, education, even morality.” The real lottery is when people go beyond fences that hold them back.

Patricia Wood’s book Lottery is available in paperback now.

Great Writing Course Opportunity

2008-05-28T11:39:00.000-07:00

Writing At Godmersham Park
August 15, 16, 17, 2008
An intensive non-residential three-day course for creative writers.
For more information please go to their site. As far as courses go, it's not overpriced. I've seen courses go for way more than this in less than inspiring settings, with tutors that are... hmmmmm...
Besides, who could resist taking a course, working with a tutor on ground Jane Austen once visited? This is the house owned by Edward Austen Knight, brother of Jane. Of course you want to go.... so do it. Go have a blast!

The Ernie Saga --(really good writing)

2008-05-27T06:00:00.000-07:00

or why Al Martinez won't let his cat out...

"The dog was OK but that wasn’t the end of the story. A car swerved to miss the Pekingese and scraped another car. There was a fistfight. Sheriff’s deputies were called. Meanwhile, a man who claimed he was once abducted by occupants of a UFO saw the dog drop from the sky and thought it was an extraterrestrial."

Read the rest on Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Al Martinez's blog and be sure to say hello!

Update: BookExpo, Patricia Wood -- The Orange Prize, WP Openings & William Lobdell

2008-05-24T14:00:00.000-07:00

by Kanani Fong

You know the quality of something is to be questioned when they let The Writerly Pause have press credentials, or if their website is so crammed full of "gee whiz" technology that it sends all browsers into a tailspin. Thus is the tale of Book Expo America 2008 as it rolls into Los Angeles with the newest in publishing news and books. I'll be there on Wednesday, to report on the good, the bad, and wallow in the mediocre. This writer is hoping for some pretty good swag, or she's so outta there.

Image stolen from the Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction

While The Writerly Pause appreciates the austere image of our friend Patricia Wood's book Lottery on the official Orange Broadband Prize For Literature (UK), we much prefer the one by us posted here on this blog, prior to her getting all fancy on us and being shortlisted for this prestigious literature prize. We're very happy for Patricia, and to all her naysayers all we have to say is, "We told you so." While you can read the "celebrity" review on the Orange Prize website by Matthew Rhys you can also take the quick and dirty route and just watch the remix we did last year.

A natural pairing for us: literature & books

This afternoon, after our usual "Grit and Crit" at the Pasadena Public Library, we went to Islands for something to eat. On a whim, we called Patricia, who was either on her boat in Hawaii, in England, Scotland, France or Germany. What can I say? Five writers, five scenarios.

Upcoming will be an interview I did with John Robison that I was holding for the "June" paperback release of his book "Look Me In The Eye." This has been pushed back until September, so we'll release it sooner.

Heads up (or about friggen time): Long time LA Times journalist and closet novelist William Lobdell has a book coming via Harper Collins. It's a memoir, "Losing My Religion: How I Lost My Faith While Reporting on Religion in America." William covered religion for six years for the LA Times. His research and writing during this time profoundly changed his life. I took a novel class with William at UCLA, and his writing always stood out. I'm pleased he's having this success.

Are you in the final stages of a novel or memoir? Have you taken writing classes? We have openings for our Grit and Crit sessions at the Pasadena Library.
Please submit a sample of your work to ninewriters@gmail.com, along with information about who you are and why we should't be afraid of you.

Words

2008-05-17T14:25:00.001-07:00

Chinaberry Tree
Originally uploaded by Like Paper Cuts

By John Yelverton

When I sat down today I intended to write about Southern Literature. But I spent the last hour or so reading the Book of Revelation hoping to find a title for my novel. It’s a Southern Gothic thing, and I think I hit on something. By the time I finished, though, the air around my head was so heavy and oppressive that I didn’t feel like talking about, say, Carson McCullers, or god forbid, Walker Percy. Even Darcey Steinke, if you count her as Southern, can be depressing as hell.

Speaking of Walker Percy, let me recommend a book that isn’t fiction, but is highly interesting, and sheds some light on his personality. That’s The Correspondence of Shelby Foote and Walker Percy.Published a while back, but still in print. Funny thing, the relaxed, congenial Shelby Foote comes across as the stronger voice, with an openness and an intellectual curiosity--much more so than the rigid and puritan Percy. I suspect Walker swallowed too much Kierkegaard. Foote never had the success as a novelist that Percy did, but he produced a fine history of the Civil War.

Turns out that what I really want to talk about is words—and not just any words, but real down-home stuff. What started me on this road was coming across a children’s book called Zora Hurston and the Chinaberry Tree (by William Miller). Zora’s mother dies, and she climbs the chinaberry tree and looks out over the world her mother said she would conquer.

A chinaberry tree. All of a sudden I’m back Home—wind-grieved as the place was. (Thank you, Thomas Wolfe, and Shelby Foote.)

Chinaberries In Winter
Originally uploaded by Big Grey Mare

Don’t know if you’ve ever seen a chinaberry tree. We had one in our back yard until we cut it down to make room for a screened-in porch. The last one I saw--that I’m aware of--was on a lonely road in Georgia, next to a dilapidated farmhouse. (How’s that for Southern color?) They were once common in the South, and in other warm parts of the country. I imagine that most have been cut down now: they’re considered an invasive species, brought from India in the nineteenth century as shade trees. Round green crowns, limbs solid as a rock—a great tree for climbing. They produced small flowers that gave way to marble-sized green “berries.” By Fall the berries yellowed and softened into a casing that was filled with slimy, thick liquid around a seed. We kids used to squeeze them and squirt the seed at each other. I’ve heard those little seed pods were poison, but nobody ever died.
We didn’t call them chinaberry trees. In fact, I didn’t hear that name till years later. We called them chaneyball trees. (Pronounced ‘Cheney,’ as in ‘Dick.’)

And now I want to recommend another book, or set of books, called The Dictionary of American Regional English. There I found my word for the tree, a word that was in use (with some variations) as far away as Louisiana. (I grew up in North Carolina.) But if I ever wrote a story that had a chinaberry tree in it (and I may plant some in my novel), I don’t think I would call it a chaneyball tree. But maybe I would.

The Dictionary of American Regional English is a browser’s dictionary, and a wonderful one at that. In a sense, it’s not a reference book at all. If I were reading Faulkner’s The Hamlet, I don’t think it would be necessary to know that ‘rabbit grass’ is a very local, Mississippi name for sedge (the plant we called ‘broomstraw’ in North Carolina)—it’s not important to the understanding of the story. On the other hand, it might be good to know that ‘belly-buster’ (and ‘belly-flop’) was, in some parts of the country, an expression for coasting face-down on a sled on a snowy hill. Could Edith Wharton have used it in Ethan Frome?

But most of all, The Dictionary of American Regional English is just plain fun. It’s like looking through the family album and finding all those faded brownie photographs — a moment from long ago, caught. And like those brownie shots, these words are fading away, replaced by other forms, homogenized.

‘Kitty-corner,’ for example, was used (primarily) in the North; ‘catty-corner’ in the South. Who knew?

Where I grew up, ‘locust’ and ‘katydid’ were both used to mean ‘cicada,’ a word we never used, and probably didn’t know. And there they are, the locusts and the katydids, documented.

‘Midges’ are Northern gnats. An even more Northern gnat is a ‘no-see-um.’ (My wife’s mother in Maine says this.)

In the South we had ‘redbugs.’ We had ‘chiggers’ too — though I never called them that.

We wonder: were there rules for when you use the pronoun ‘hit’ instead of ‘it,’ in the same dialect?

And on and on.

The dictionary has been in progress forever (see http://polyglot.lss.wisc.edu/dare/dare.html). Four volumes of the alphabet are out now (though Sk), and the final volume is due in 2009. Supplements will follow. If you’re interested, the work can be found in good-sized public libraries, and in college and university collections.
Enjoy!

--John Yelverton

Where's The Limo?

2008-05-16T17:51:00.000-07:00

At the beginning of each class, there's always one person who is sure that when they get their book published, a limo will be sent, Oprah will be waiting and they'll be rich. But then reality hits, and here they are --struggling with blogs, feeds, subscriptions and remixes like the rest of us. You can read more about journalist, teacher, & book doctor Dennis Cass on his blog.

Maxine Hong Kingston

2008-05-03T22:50:00.001-07:00

"I let them write their way home from war."

Amazon.com Widgets

I had the pleasure of listening Maxine Hong Kingston at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, where David Ulin of the LA Times Book Section did a masterful job of moderating a discussion. Maxine Hong Kingston is the author of fiction, non-fiction and poetry. Kingston is an American writer whose work puts her in the ranks of Eudora Welty and William Faulkner.

Her first book, written in 1976, was Woman Warrior: Memoirs Of A Girlhood Among Ghosts. The writer uses the myths told in southern China, brought to the new world by immigrants, reshaped to compliment their new life in America, to tell the story of growing up in a Cantonese-speaking neighborhood in Stockton, California. They are American myths, and Kingston is gratified when her work is seen as "American literature, and not those Chinese books." Through the process of talking story, the myths brought over on boats and planes and settled into the living rooms and kitchens and talked about to the generations that are born here. The book is written in a poetic voice greatly influenced by the cadences and rhythms of her childhood, and very much influenced by the process of "talking story," and remembering dreams.
Maxine Hong Kingston, photo from Koa Books

Dreams are a recurring theme in her work. She believes dreams are important, and can signify something that needs tending to, or our deepest desires. When she was a child, it wasn't uncommon for the family to come down in the morning and ask one another, "What did you dream about?" Talking about dreams was a practice handed down from one generation to the next. This was driven home when Hong Kingston went to China to find her mother's long lost sister. She found her. The first thing the aunt asked Kingston was, "How is your mother, and what is she dreaming about?" Luckily, Kingston had recently spoken to her mother, and had an answer for the aunt.

Like many writers, Hong becomes deeply involved with the characters she creates. When she got to the end of Woman Warrior, she knew all the adventures and experiences still continued. In a way, the characters she creates live life off the page, until she lassos them back to appear in the next book, older, or a bit changed. The imagination enables her to create a reality that includes the lifespan of a character that exceeds any one book.

Of her switch from novels to non-fiction, Hong Kingston cited the Berkeley Fire (where she lost not only her home, but her entire community) as one thing that helped her make the shift. After the devastating experience, she found she no longer wanted to write by herself, that in fact, she wanted the company of others. So she gathered friends and former neighbors as they wrote down their experiences. From this, she went on to work with veterans, helping them tell their stories of war. "I let them write their way home from war," she said. "They find they can make beauty and art from war." And this is the great thing about Hong. One senses her restlessness, her decision not to take anything for granted, but to keep pressing not only herself, but us, to look for answers.

Back To Writing & The Critique

2008-04-15T22:52:00.000-07:00

by Kanani Fong

"To be able to make progress on your work with people you've built an understanding with is invaluable."

Jo and Yelverton

Over the years, I've read both good and bad things about writing groups. Agents and editors often recommend them, while many writers have bad experiences and loathe them. There are online groups, and ones that have met for decades. Finding one isn't easy. It has to be the right mix of individuals, and while writing is a priority, what really makes the fit just right is if the members aren't hellbent on outdoing, competing or impressing one another, rather, they have to be a group that wants to have fun.

Last year, a few of my writer friends and I gathered each month to talk to published authors about books. It was a lot of work, which included corresponding with publicists, agents and author, making sure everyone had the book, scheduling a time to talk via phone with the guest author. We even started this blog.

Jo and David

The best was just getting together on a regular basis and having lunch after we would talk to an author. The fare ranged from a BBQ with burgers and sausage, to a potluck brought over to Pulitz er Prize winning author Al Martinez's h ouse. Our time together offered a respite from the long sessions at school. Quite frankly, it was the spark between us that kept us going, long after the enthusiasm of the program had faded.

The group has winnowed down after our homecoming with Author Frank Schaeffer in December. Rocky moved to Texas, both Vanessa and Karine joined groups closer to home. Those left had a chance to expand and add some new people. Because we've all been through the same writing program together, there's a familiarity with one another's work, and a funny trust that comes only from paying to suffer for so long. We decided not to add anyone new right now, and just help one another get through the tail end of our finals drafts and start the query process. We decided to meet every few weeks at the Pasadena Public Library. This library is one of the last great ones in the southern California region. Just being there makes us is inspiring. As Sovann said, "It has a Hogwarts feel." We are very happy to be out of the West L.A. area, and bring it into an atmosphere that is decidedly less LaLa Land and more literary.

JP, Kanani, Karine

Rocky, Sovann & Vanessa

We read one another's pages --3000 word limit, each reader allowed to comment up to 4 minutes, the writer responds for up to 10, but after all the comments are given. This group is beyond the stage of cathartic writing. In fact, we're all writing novels, which helps because we have similar challenges. We're on final drafts and have been working at this for more than a few years. Fortunately, we're familiar with one another's work, so we can get into character, storyline, and structure.

This week, JP sent around his latest synopsis. This was the second time we'd seen it, probably the 800th time he'd rewritten it. It was tighter than it had been before, but still, we found areas where he could improve it. It was also pointed out to JP that one of his characters needed to be at least mentioned in Chapter 1. Mind you, last December when he went through this long class on "How to pitch your novel," no one in the entire class (including the self proclaimed famous agent/teacher) had picked up on this. JP, who has already submitted it and has had one response, will now rewrite Chapter 1.

In mine, David discovered several typos and omissions. I told them of rediscovering the last 1/3 of my book that I thought had been lost in a crash, of constantly seeking ways to unfold a story, how to bring back stories to the front while not losing the thread of the story. In a way, a novel is like origami. Lots of ways to fold and unfold. But one way works best to make a swan.

In Yelverton's book, it was decided he used great subtlety in describing what could have been a grisly scene. He also has a new and improved opening scene, which we liked. Yelverton and I decided that we were pretty much rested up, and also sick of our manuscripts. Both of us are finishing out books in the next two weeks, before we meet up again.

The upshot to having a writers' group is that there is value to having your work reviewed by people who are both critical and familiar with your work. To be able to make progress on your work with people you've built an understanding with is invaluable.

The original group

We'll be back

2008-02-13T08:40:00.000-08:00

The Writerly Pause is on an indefinite hiatus. We've enjoyed sharing our experiences with you. For more blogging fun, please go to Get Lost With Easy-Writer for posts on life, travel, and writing.

Currently, Yelverton and Kanani are finishing their books. Kanani was relieved to find her lost last third of the novel, given that last year her cranky Mac took a permanent crash. John Peters is sending his book out for query. Sovann is getting ready to do the same.

We meet every 2 weeks at the Pasadena Library to discuss our work.

A Talk With Frank Schaeffer

2007-12-16T07:57:00.000-08:00

by Kanani Fong

"After 23 drafts, this wasn't shooting from the hip."

As the first author who ever offered to speak to The Writerly Pause, we think of Frank Schaeffer as family. Readings are an author's privilege, set up by the publishing companies or invited to talk to groups from hundreds to single digits. Regardless of the number, what does is that a writer is recognized and that they get out from behind the computer and talk about their work. And so it was that Frank and his wife Jeannie were on their way to a reading in Maine, when he pulled over into a run-down parking lot to speak with us about his memoir, Crazy For God.

His newest joins a number of his fiction and nonfiction books, as well op-eds published at the astonishing rate of about one every year or two. Crazy For God has been reviewed in a spectrum ranging from Jane Smiley in The Nation and Warren Cole Smith in the Christian news journal The World, as well as out on the C-SPAN, the Boston Globe and the blogosphere. The reason for such wide reviews is that he was born into an evangelical family, which helped to shape the religious right. He also walked away from it all. Frank's memoir is not only the examination, but the unleashing of all that has driven him in the past.

For readers familiar with his first three novels, Portofino, Saving Grandma, and Zermatt,"Crazy For God" provides an insight not only into the world of his fictional hero Calvin Becker, but of Frank Schaeffer himself. It's no secret that those novels took inspiration from his own life, and one needs to look no further than the first sentence of this memoir:
"Being raised inside a miracle makes you feel singled out. I wanted to fit into the world. I still do."

Thus starts the story of his life as the son of two charismatic and well known American evangelicals, Francis and Edith Schaeffer, founders of L'Abri. His parents were religious leaders opposed to theological modernism within the protestant church, puritans living near the lap of luxury in Switzerland. To the thousands who came through their mission, life at L'Abri was one of intense discussions and examinations of their values and relationship to God. Everyone from students to Billy Graham came to the Schaeffer dinner table. And indeed, by the time Frank was eleven, he could roll out the arguments that would support his parents' beliefs, as if by rote. But growing up in the Schaeffer household was anything but idyllic.

Schaeffer's biggest childhood point of conflict, much like his fictional protagonist Calvin Becker, was his mother. She was certain with how life should be. Life and fate in the Schaeffer household was strung like a silk thread between a crucifix and a tree outside:
"People's eternal destinies hinged on a word or tiny event, maybe on no more than an unfriendly look. Even an inappropriately served high tea on Sunday afternoon could send someone to hell. What if the sandwiches were prepared wrong and they went away with the impression that we were alike all those so-called ministries where they didn't even know to butter thinly sliced bread out to the edges?"

Yet today, in his journey to find his own spiritual identity, Frank discovered the thing to avoid is the certainty that you are right. This isn't easy in a world that wants instant answers and immediate gratification, where souls are either "lost" or "saved," and belief seems rooted in fear. Today, Frank practices Greek Orthodox faith, where he feels the "slow journey to God" and mystery is fully accepted is more compatible with the reality of how life works.

The writing of this memoir was a journey unto itself. Twenty three drafts, over 580 pages, now trimmed to its present 408. Frank contacted colleagues, asking them about their perceptions of him during the time he was involved in the pro-life movement. He asked his sisters to examine their childhood and write him letters. Many of these recollections are published in the book, though one of his sisters opted out. Frank also writes about his father's mood swings that might be diagnosed today as bipolar disorder, his mother's bitterness over her own unrequited dreams, his own dyslexia and failures at formal education in a British boarding school. This is by all accounts a modern American family, an image many evangelicals are loathe to show given their dependency on being not human, but telegenic in their ploy for dollars.

Many writers of their own memoirs ponder how much they should say about people they remember. But Crazy For God is Frank's chance to set things straight. He condemns present televangelists for their money grubbing and power mongering ways, which collide with anything spiritual. With this book, Frank Schaeffer's break from the religious right is now complete, and his faith has reached a deeper dimension.

His father, the late Francis Schaeffer, represented what he feels is missing from the evangelical movement: a love and understanding of the arts and popular culture, from the Roman empire to Bob Dylan and the present day, the willingness to hash things over and to see things differently. This is the main message Frank wants to make in his book. His father, though long revered by many conservative evangelicals, was much more than those who followed. Francis Schaeffer was a devoted patron of the arts and a well read philosopher. "Christianity has created a wide range of arts," says Frank. And he ventures to say that most evangelicals don't care about the arts, which to him are an expression of a person's spirituality.

This lack of the arts has created a society where freedom of choice has come to mean "having more things to buy." Frank believes that consumerism has become the highest form of expression, not the arts. In other words, you are what you drive, you are what you wear. Give money and you'll be redeemed. Spirituality at the swipe of your ATM. He sees consumerism as the biggest threat to a spiritual life.

We ended our talk by telling him that we were sending a care package in his honor to a military unit in Afghanistan because of his history of support for soldiers in books such as Faith Of Our Sons.

Crazy For God is a book that will make you think. It's the amazing story of a man very much searching, finding, losing, finding himself again, and learning to live with grace.

Other Links:
Frank Schaeffer's Official Site
C-SPAN Book TV
Frank's column in the Huffington Post
Any Soldier.com

Writer Impossible: "The Workshop Writer"

2007-12-10T23:25:00.000-08:00

Get Lost With Easy-Writer: "Make sure that it's not the taking of workshops that makes you identify yourself as a writer, but the reward of steadily working on your own --doing it everyday, learning, improving and finishing a piece."

On The Trail: Research For My Novel

2007-11-23T16:10:00.000-08:00

By John Peters

"Massaging the historical details into the story in such a way that is real to my character and not a history book."

"So, you must've done a lot of research?"
Being that my novel is set in 300 B.C., I’m asked this question a lot. The answer is yes, a ton.
The follow up question is usually, “What’s your process?”
That’s a little more difficult to answer.

Before I thought about writing a novel, I read Peter Green’s, Alexander of Macedon, 356-323 B.C. When I finished, I was amazed at the variety of people Alexander had fought: Persians, Pashtuns, Phoenicians, Messagetae, Scythians, Indians and many more. I wondered who these people were and how they viewed the man we now know as Alexander the Great.

The research began and an idea for a novel was born.

At first, I reread Peter Green’s biography of Alexander and then I read a biography of Alexander by the Roman historian, Arrian. With this information I began my first draft. Initially, I tried to write, rewrite and read more books about the people of this time period, but the first draft was taking forever. I felt overwhelmed. Around page seventy, I decided to focus on getting my character’s story out. I used the events of the battle my story followed as a rough outline for the novel and followed where my character led me. I’d worry about rewriting and specific historical details later. That decision was liberating. My mind, unencumbered by these other concerns, allowed the story to flow onto the page.

Once the character’s story was told, I felt I could take all the time I needed to do the research. I did and I really enjoyed it. I took a class at UCLA on Ancient Perisa. I read the Illiad, Xenophon’s 10,000, and two more Alexander the Great biographies by Roman historians. I found the Osprey military guides that detailed tactics, battles uniforms and equipment. I read other articles in periodicals, on the Internet and more books. I visited the Getty Villa and watched movies such as 300, Troy, and Intolerance. The History Channel, Discovery Channel and as mentioned already, the Internet, were all valuable resources. The Internet had great information, from shipbuilding to ancient names to making reed arrows. Thank heavens for Wikipedia.

The research, laying in the new historical details and the rewriting of scenes with a better understanding of my character’s world translated into a second draft that took a year longer to write than the first.

While there is still some minor research being done during my third and final draft, the main focus is working with the language of the novel. Massaging the historical details into the story in such a way that is real to my character and not a history book. For example, my character wouldn’t know the names of the various types of helmets and units within the Macedonian army. But he would comment on the colors, weapons and armor of various units.

So that’s how I gathered the information about my character’s world and used it in the novel.

2008 Robinson Jeffers Poetry Prize

2007-11-20T08:10:00.000-08:00

Big, big news....

The annual Tor House Prize for Poetry is a living memorial to American poet Robinson Jeffers (1887-1962).
The first prize winner will receive $1,000 for an original, unpublished poem not to exceed three pages in length. Poets whose work is chosen for Honorable Mention will receive $200.

The final Judge this year is Robert Pinsky. Go to the Tor House site for more information and past winners.

Crazy For God by Frank Schaeffer

2007-11-09T22:39:00.001-08:00

On Sunday, December 1, we'll be talking to Frank Schaeffer. Talking to him is like returning home --he was the first published author who agreed to speak with us. We're pleased to be back with him, and we're working furiously to finish our novels before December 1 (or at least I am).

Right now, we're reading his book "Crazy For God, How I Grew Up As One Of The Elect, Helped found the religious right and lived to take all (or almost all ) of it back."

I thought I'd share two passages:
"People's eternal destinies hinged on a word or tiny event, maybe on no more than an unfriendly look Even an inappropriately served high tea on Sunday afternoon could send someone to hell. What if the sandwiches were prepared wrong and they went away with the impression that we were alike all those so-called ministries where they didn't even know to butter thinly sliced bread out to the edges?"

"Fundamentalists never can just disagree. The person they fall out with is not only on the wrong side of an issue, they are on the wrong side of God. ...."A church split builds self righteousness into the fabric of every new splinter group, whose only reason for existence is that they decide they are more moral and pure than their brethren. This explains my childhood and perhaps a lot about America, too."

We'll have loads to talk about. Jane Smiley wrote a great review in The Nation, and it was also reviewed in The World as well.

Report on our meeting today

2007-11-04T19:06:00.001-08:00

What writers do when they have a chance...
Yelverton & Rocky had a head start at the bar of El Portal. I bought drinks for Jo, David and myself, and I just don't remember much about what we said, but rest assured, we had a good time. If you weren't there, we missed you.

Topics we covered (not in order):
1. Rocky is moving to Magnolia, Texas on December 15. Let's hope by next summer, Rocky has ensconced himself as a literary type in Magnolia and has started a Writerly Pause chapter in Texas. If you're in Magnolia and you have a book you're working on, give us a holler. If you can get Larry McMurtry as a guest --then double good.

2. Frank Schaeffer will speak to us on December 1, 2007 at 10:00 a.m. We'll be meeting in Culver City, thanks to the nice folks at Hacker Douglass.

3. If you get the "special" maguerita at El Portal be aware that it will hit you between the eyes really fast.

4. We want to add more people. Jo has someone in mind, as does David. If you're interested, look on our sidebar for more info.

5. How can Yelverton be so thin and drink so much beer?

6. Kanani went back to the bar when everyone else had gone and had a coffee with Rocky.

7. We're thinking of starting a litblog with themes, guest writers, etc. etc. John had some great ideas.

8. We'll have a farewell party for Rocky & Laura before they leave. They will be in a hurry packing but we don't care. We need to send them off properly. We need a place with a piano so that Jo can sing, and so we can sing with her --ha ha ha ha.

9. Santa Anita racetrack at 3 p.m (after going to El Portal) is a lovely place to go.

10. We talked about books, Emily Dickinson, John Robison, Patricia Wood, Dean Koontz, Ann Rice, Haruki Murakami, Frank Schaeffer and I can't remember much more. David, as it turns out, has turned into a huge Murakami fan since we started. He's read 5 of his books. Yelverton has written to him. Let's hope we get a response.

Keep writing and loving the things you do....