The last few months I have spent immersed in two enormous westerns, the Pulitzer prize-winning Lonesome Dove (at 850+ pages) and the more recent, weird and wonderful Tom’s Crossing (at 1200+ pages). I kept them in different rooms and read one in the daytime and one at night. While reading I’ve been slowly drafting my own mid-grade western (something I’ve poked at for the last two years). 

Reading these books has been an adventure. I’d describe both of them as epics. (Tom’s Crossing has classical literature references throughout.) Both take their time. Some readers might find the pacing and digressions frustrating, but I like a book with varying rhythms. (I like to write that way too.) Both have great character development and a huge cast of characters. Both have heartbreaking moments and moments of humor. I could imagine the authors enjoying themselves as they wrote, which makes for my favorite kind of book. And both stories have horses named Mouse — a coincidence or not?

So what are they about? Let’s dig in.

Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry

I have wanted to read this book forever and took it along with several other westerns to my writing retreat two years ago. (While there I read first chapters and took notes on style, character, plot, and themes revealed in the books’ beginnings.) This July it was a book club pick — hooray for me!

Lonesome Dove is the story of two former Texas rangers, Call and Gus, who run a livery stable together in a Texas border town called Lonesome Dove. The story takes place in the 1870s. These former lawmen are in the regular habit of stealing and reclaiming horses (and more recently cattle) that have been previously stolen and reclaimed from Mexico. Call is a hard worker of few words. Gus is a loafer and talker. About two hundred pages in, they take a crew of cowboys on a cattle drive to Montana. Before the drive begins, the mayor of Fort Smith, Arkansas (who is also a dentist — I don’t know why, but this little detail humored me) is shot by Jake Spoon, a cowboy who’s taking refuge in Lonesome Dove and is now on the drive. The sheriff, the mayor’s brother, is out to hunt Jake down. There are several secondary stories and characters that thread their way through the cattle drive and many early details that become important later on.

What a book! I’ll never forget it.

Tom’s Crossing by Mark Z. Danielewski

I read about Tom’s Crossing online sometime last year and immediately requested it at my library. By the time I got it this spring, I realized that even with a couple of weeks devoted to serious reading, I wouldn’t be able to finish before the next person on the library list got their turn. So I used my Penguin Random House author discount and ordered myself a copy. (It’s currently on sale at Amazon for $14.99 — far less than the $40 list price.)

Tom’s Crossing is set in October 1982 in Orvop, Utah (a stand in for Provo). It’s about two teens, Tom and Kalin, who commit to rescuing two horses destined for slaughter by the local meat packer, a terrible man / fabulous character named Orwin Porch. But fifty pages in (a very mild spoiler), Tom dies, and Kalin is left to rescue the horses alone…until he runs into Tom’s ghost. There’s murder and characters who are wrongly accused and prominent families and old feuds and an epic journey and (I am not exaggerating) hundreds of characters who over the years comment on the goings on during this week in October. There are several secondary stories and characters that thread their way through Kalin and Tom’s journey and many early details that become important later on.

Coincidently, a book club friend was reading at the same time I was. And when I told my mom about Tom’s Crossing, she downloaded a copy and raced through. 

What a book! I’ll never forget it.

What have you read lately?

The post Quick Lit: Two Books, 2090 Pages appeared first on Caroline Starr Rose.

The writer and reader stand at either end of a pond. The writer drops a pebble in and the ripples reach the reader. The writer stands there, imagining the way the reader is receiving those ripples, by way of deciding which pebble to drop in next. Meanwhile, the reader receives those ripples and, somehow, they speak to her. In other words, they’re in connection.
— George Saunders, A Swim in a Pond in the Rain: In Which Four Russians Give a Master Class on Writing, Reading, and Life

The post Why We Read appeared first on Caroline Starr Rose.

“Writing is hard. Publishing is hard. Finding an agent is hard. Writing a query letter is hard. Marketing your book is hard. Writing your next book is hard. Navigating a writing career is hard. Nothing gets easier. This is normal. I’m sorry. If you feel this way, more or less, most days you’re trying to put words together, then you’re doing it right. Keep up the good work.”
Why Are We So Surprised by Failure? :: Agents + Books

“This formula essentially hijacks our natural ambition, shifting our attention from the hard, ambiguous, but ultimately satisfying efforts required for true accomplishment toward overwrought prescriptions that waste our time.”
Is the Internet Hijacking Our Ambition? :: Cal Newport

It was a joy to talk with my critique group member and friend, Uma Krishnaswami, about writing Books Up the Mountain.
Process Talk: Caroline Starr Rose on Books Up the Mountain :: Uma Krishnaswami

Here’s a fun podcast episode where I’m talking with my publisher, Sarah Mackenzie, of Waxwing Books and Read Aloud Revival.
RAR #285: Becoming a Book Woman with Caroline Starr Rose :: Read Aloud Revival Podcast

This is a good one.
A Guide to Literary Agent Etiquette :: Nathan Bransford

“From my experience, a picture book takes from twenty minutes to twenty years to write.” In June, Jane Yolen passed away. She had published more than 450 books at the time of her death. Jane Yolen has been described as America’s Hans Christian Anderson and children’s literature’s fairy godmother. I loved this fifty-five minute interview with her daughter and sometimes co-author, Heidi Stemple. Listen through to the end. Jane does a reading of her most well-known picture book, Owl Moon.
A Legacy Interview with Jane Yolen, Heidi Stemple, and the SCBWI Impact and Legacy Fund :: Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators

And finally, this beautiful tribute Heidi wrote for her mother: “I read to my mom in her last two weeks. She didn’t want to hear novels. Just poetry and picture books. There was something so comforting about the picture books—a full circle. She read them to me when she cared for me as a child and I read them to her while I was caring for her. That triad, reader to listener to book—the stuff she highlighted in keynote speeches and now I do, too—was keeping us connected.”
Lessons from My Mother, Jane Yolen :: School Library Journal

The post Writing and Reading Links appeared first on Caroline Starr Rose.

Today’s the day my tenth book publishes. Welcome to the world, Books Up the Mountain! If you’re in the Albuquerque area, I’d love to see you tonight at Bookworks at 6pm or Saturday at Books on the Bosque at 3pm. **A note on if you plan to come tonight: Parking at Bookworks is always tricky. I encourage you to arrive early!**

My talented friend Sharlotte (of the incredible birthday cakes) has outdone herself in making these cookies for both events.

The Albuquerque Journal had a nice review. A big thank you to David Steinberg, who has always been so kind and supportive.

A little love note from my publisher:

We are overjoyed to welcome Books Up the Mountain to our Waxwing Books collection! Sharing this story with the world has been a dream come true for me. Caroline’s way with words is utterly breathtaking, and paired with Gabrielle’s whimsical illustrations, this will be one you (and your kids!) won’t want to put down.

I hope you love my Book Woman as much as I do. 🐎 ⛰️ 📚

P. S. If you’d like to learn more about the Pack Horse Librarians, here’s a wonderful program from PBS that runs twenty-seven minutes.

The post Welcome to the World, Books Up the Mountain! appeared first on Caroline Starr Rose.