When Callie and her grandfather discover what he thinks is a new plant species, they travel to town to have it photographed and send their findings to the Smithsonian for verification. Throughout the year as they await news, Callie daydreams about what she will become…a teacher, a scientist, one of the first telephone operators. At no time does she think about housewifery, but her mother plans otherwise. She schedules practice sessions to improve Callie’s poor domestic skills, leaving Callie no time to spend with her grandfather.

Callie’s favorite brother and father encourage her mother’s course. Even her grandfather falters when Callie tells him she wants to go to university and be a scientist. Just before the old year passes, word comes from the Smithsonian. The plant is indeed a new species and will be named after the Tates. Callie and her grandfather are toasted for their discovery. Callie enters her tweflth year and the twentieth century with hope for her future.

Favorite passages:

Callie’s description of her grandfather before she approached him in the shed:

The old man had tufty eyebrows of his own, rather like a dragon’s, and he was altogether too imposing a figure to have clambered on as an infant.

Her grandfather’s tale of forming the National Geographic Society in 1888:

They had banded together to fill in the bare spots on the globe and to pull the country out of the morass of superstition and backward thinking in which it floundered after the War Between the States.

Dani, the new protaganist, is settling into her role. I feel I know her pretty well and she’s certainly added spice to the story. She’s also energized the secondary characters.  I can’t say I’m as fond of her as I was of Gilly, the original character.  And I’m having a hard time justifying Gilly’s exile to people who read my original manuscript. Dani was created under duress, sort of like a forced friendship, but I’ve grown to admire her.

Some of the newly integrated scenes feel raw and clumsy. I’ve been offering small chunks of my story as homework in the class I’m taking.  That’s a good thing except it’s slowed down the revision. Feedback is invaluable, but in the end, it all comes down to the writer and the pen. And my pen needs to fly.

Around noon something soft bumped against my front door. A package! Inside was a note from my dearest aunt, a pair of deep blue pajamas covered in stars and moons, and a Flicka DVD. All my hard edges softened. In the card, my aunt related a story about my grandmother polishing her waitress shoes so they’d look good on the outside. Then Grandma stuck cardboard in the bottoms to cover the holes and headed off to work.

My grandmother’s flame burned bright. My aunt pointed out that I am that woman’s granddaughter. And my amazing aunt is her youngest daughter.  Grandma had ten children, nine that survived. She raised them during the depression on a diner waitress salary. Her husband, when he came home, was a violent alcoholic. My grandmother escaped him and remained single for many years until she met R.C., the man my cousins and I knew as our grandfather.

R.C. and Grandma settled in a house he built on his farm in Bushnell, Florida.  Tucked into an oak hammock behind their new home, was R.C.’s cracker homestead. My family lived in that old house for a year when I was twelve and that seeded the story that won me the Highlights’ contest.  Yes, I am my grandmother’s granddaughter. She inspires me still and so does her daughter.

Last week ended with a lesson on description and those sneaky adjectives and adverbs. Adverbs, I can live without, but my descriptive passages  start out loaded with adjectives.  Second drafts eliminate some. Then, I bite on something hard to extract the excess. Kate offered this quote from poet Mary Oliver’s Blue Pastures: “Look for verbs of muscle; adjectives of exactitude.”

Some of the early critique groups I participated in reject adverbs and adjectives altogether and although I don’t feel that strongly, learning by abstinance has its merits. I feel queasy when nouns are unnecessarily embellished. Drat! Did you see those adverbs creep in here?

I know the answer. Writing kidnapped my brain. All those years, the scribe in me waited patiently for art and horses to move aside. Then it opened like a magnolia and  pollenated my mind with enough story ideas to keep me scribbling for the rest of my days. It’s so so hard to force that blossom into a corner.

I’ve tried. Last weekend, I sanded and drilled sixteen wood plaques to make decorative leash holders for local shops. I collected photos for sample portraits. Monday morning, I read my email, checked in with my class, and typed my blog post. That afternoon I made an incredible mess painting a base coat on the plaques. Tuesday started badly and I sought solace in my class lesson. The art, piled on the dining room table, sits there still.

Last night, I created a rigid schedule for the days to come in hopes I’ll stick to it. But next weekend, I’m attending a positive training class for kittens as fodder for non fiction.  From opposite corners of my brain, a flower and a paintbrush glare at each other, their boxing gloves primed.

As a prepublished author and a fairly new writer, I’ve tried to find reputable sources to learn from and I feel I’ve gathered sage advice – write what you know; write your book without outside interference; believe in your story. Then you find good critique partners and fine tune your manuscript until at last it’s deemed ready for the publishing world.

And there lies the problem. Because what you learn from the publishing world is: your book idea needs to make bored agents and editors spit out their morning coffee, it’s that dazzling.  Create a literary masterpiece if you must, but make it commercial. Which leaves you sputtering over the four volumes of fantasy that ruled seven years of your life and practically ruined your marriage and most of your friendships. Now agents inform you high fantasy is taboo.

What do you do? You write a good story. I’m in the middle of revamping my first book, AGAIN, still hoping it has merit. This rewrite is done with agents and editors  in mind. How will they see it? Is it fresh? Will they turn every page with eyes wide? Will they miss my characters when the last word is read? And guess what… it’s a much better book! So, my advice to new writers is this: write your story and consider it a work-in-progress until your book has a cover.

On the down side of this week, three months ago my husband lost his job of twenty years. There’s been no job offers yet. Like so many others, we’re facing hard decisions.  I’m returning to portraiture (animals only this time) and selling my art. My stomach churns at the thought. I’ve loved every minute of the last two years, writing and studying the craft.  I worry I won’t have the time or energy to finish my books. I’m afraid I’ll lose touch with the writers I’ve met and my dream to be a successful novelist will dribble down a hole.

On the up side, late last week, I found a box on my doorstep. I opened it up to find another box, this one crisp white with the words Rothrock’s, Honesdale, Pa. written on it. Inside, a card sat atop mounds of tissue paper. It read: Susan, From all of us at Highlights, congratulations. We look forward to publishing your winning story soon! Sincerely, Christine Clark, Editor in Chief. I peeled back the tissue paper and a small pewter bowl gleamed up at me. Engraved on the outside was Highlights for Children, Fiction Contest 2012.  Isn’t it wonderful that just when you need it most, confirmation comes?

As my head hit the pillow, my annoyance ebbed and I thought about the privileges I shared with fellow Americans, including the freedom to read and write whatever moved me. It’s hard not to take that for granted and even harder to imagine the restrictions others suffer that we don’t.  I fell asleep feeling blessed.

One sleepless night, I called my protaganist to my head and asked what she was up to. She didn’t have anything to say. She didn’t even offer a  bedtime story or lullaby. Last week, author and social networking whiz, Lia Keyes, started a micro blog for Rowena, a character in her YA fantasy A Warning To The Curious.  I was enchanted by Rowena from the start. Lia enhances the journal with delicious images of gadgets and dresses and European hotspots from Rowena’s time-traveling adventures.

Commenters on Lia’s personal blog  praised her new venture. I love the idea of giving my characters a forum. But I approach it with caution. Some weeks I barely eke out two posts for this blog. Cobwebs cover my Facebook and Twitter.  Can I handle another writing commitment, even one so alluring?

This month at the SCBWI conference in Orlando, the buzz at the lunch table surrounded a Florida high school’s intent to replace textbooks with E-Readers.  Most middle-aged writers I know accept the inevitability of cyber publication and marketing with knuckle-biting resignation. I don’t own an electronic reader and shudder to think printed versions of books may become relics. Will there be a funeral to honor their passing? Will libraries become dusty museums with snoring docents at the door?

Garrison Keillor’s recent article in the New York Times mourns the end of a publishing era. He fears the market will be flooded with self-published electronic books, making it hard for readers to find the needles in the haystack … books by reputable authors. Many in the publishing industry dispute that, claiming readers will sift through the chaff. Editors and agents have every right to defend the electronic trend. They’re fighting to remain relevant.

This may seem like a new discussion but an introduction to Italo Calvino’s 1979 book, If On A Winter’s Night A Traveler, claims the book is ” its author’s triumphant response to the question of whether the art of fiction could survive the vast changes taking place in the communications technology of our world.”  Was Calvino seeing the end of print books forty years ago?

Did you hear that? Was it the sound of the last pages turning?