writing

this is not my beautiful house

A little over a week ago, when I found out my novel was going to be sent out to publishers, I bought this bottle of sparkling syrah to open if and when the book sold:

Notice how it’s open.

Yeah.

I have spent most of the weekend giggling hysterically and consuming bubbly alcohol, thinking to myself: This is not my beautiful house. This is not my beautiful wife.

How did I get here?

Well, I got here by starting this novel in 2006 and not abandoning it. I got here because I have an amazing, amazing agent who spent the last year helping me make my manuscript better than I ever thought it could be when I started querying. I got here because I have a team of endlessly talented writer friends who live in my computer, who never let me give up even when the Revisionland Hotel started feeling like the Hotel California.

I spent most of last week on the phone with editors who loved my strange nocturnal black & white circus novel.

On Friday afternoon, THE NIGHT CIRCUS sold to Doubleday.

To say I am elated would be the understatement of the century. I am delighted beyond belief, and I am absolutely thrilled to be working with my editor. (My editor! It’s like the my agent game all over again!)

So I lift a glass of sparkling syrah to each and every person who got me here.

Thank you does not even begin to cover it. I would knit you all red scarves were I not such a slow knitter.

Apparently, this is my beautiful house. Same as it ever was.

Kittens, as always, remain unimpressed.

By erin, ago

tousled & autumnal

It’s autumn! For reals! I have socks on! My coffee was pumpkin flavored this morning! It was iced coffee, but still. Autumn! Oh, how I adore you, season of mists & mellow fruitfulness.

The circus is officially out of my hands. It’s strange, but it’s been a long time coming. So while occasionally glancing wistfully in the direction of the Revisionland Hotel, I’m working on a new novel. Right now it’s grown-up Alice in a 40s noir-inspired Wonderland. I have a couple of languishing works in progress that I probably could have gotten back to, but my brain was craving something new. I’ve written 25k in just over a week. I need to read some more detective novels to get the flavor right, but so far it’s interesting.

And I decided I needed some updated photos of myself, so the boy indulged me in a photo session yesterday. Still getting used to the new camera lens, but after some trial & error, I’m pretty pleased with the results. The best ones are now on the about page, and here’s how the rest of that hair tousle went:

By erin, ago

re-visioning

This post is going to be about revising. It will not be anywhere near as good as this post about revising, but I figured I’d give it a whirl anyway. I’ve gotten fairly familiar with how this process works for me, and as you all know by now, ’tis the summer of revision around here.

I started with my agent notes, both e-mailed and scrawled in my almost-illegible handwriting from a phone call. I read them. I re-read them. I highlighted specific things that really jumped out at me.

I talked to two of my dearest betas about it. I wrote down what they had to say. I read & re-read.

I pulled out my old notebooks, ones that dated back to ’08, and looked for things that I hadn’t used that I might be able to work with now. I pulled out a couple of pages worth of notes.

I took all of these notes, from agent and betas and the 2008 version of me, and transcribed the stuff I found most useful into a new notebook.

I started adding snippets of new scenes, bits of dialogue, hypothetical questions.

I made a gigantic timeline. I got a dry erase board to hang by the desk. So far it just looks cool and office-y, but I’m sure it’ll come in handy later.

I had more discussions with betas. I started having revelations. I began pulling possibilities from lists of ideas.

Now, I’m taking all of this stuff and developing it into full scenes. I’ve hit the writing stage, the really writing stage, after several weeks of this pre-writing process.

So far, I have not once looked back at the previous draft.

Why? Well, I already know what’s there. What I need is what’s *not* there yet, so I’m finding those things elsewhere, in notes and conversations and daydreams and at the bottom of cups of tea.

So I can take the new and layer it back over the old.

I’ve come to realize that I need to see it in my head as a different book, first. I have to find the shape of the new draft before I can mold the old draft into it. I can’t just go into the old draft and start pushing it around and filling in holes.

I have to develop the new draft and then work backwards. I need that picture, that vision of the new version, in order to get there.

This is how I revise. I have to get to the point where my brain can see where I’m going, and then it’s just a matter of writing to get there.

That’s not to say I know exactly how to get there, there are still hic sunt dracones parts of the map, but there is something resembling a map now.

I just got this beautiful book of Jerry Uelsmann photography. He does these gorgeous layered photos, made with multiple negatives in a darkroom, nothing digital.

It’s amazing stuff, and being in the head space that I’m in right now, it’s reminding me of how I revise. I’m finding new images to layer over the old ones. Not to obscure what was there before, but to elevate it into something else.

By erin, ago

monday miscellany

Stuff accomplished during the week of no internet:

  • Finished three (3!) paintings. One is off to its recipient already, another is waiting for payment & the third is available on Etsy.
  • Got rid of my stupid summer head cold that I had hoped was allergies but was really just a head cold. I don’t get sick that often and that’s twice this year already, bah.
  • Went through two old notebooks that contained two years worth of novel notes, and pulled out several pages worth of possibly useful stuff.
  • Transcribed the possibly useful stuff into a new notebook.
  • Made strawberry frozen yogurt.
  • Sort of figured out the structure of the new draft. I think. Maybe. I have to see what it looks like when not scrawled on a spare piece of paper in magenta Sharpie.

So, not the huge dent in revisions that I’d wanted, but still productive. Am revising-o-rama this week, and I feel better about it having gotten the paintings out of the way.

Also, this weekend I bought a gigantic (2’x3′) dry erase board. I am a nerd, but I am a happy nerd. Hopefully it will help with structuring and time line and such. The kittens were disappointed that it did not come in a box. But it does have four different pens! And it’s magnetic! Oooh, I should get magnetic poetry for it.

Um, anyway.  It’s hot & humid out and the Kitten Flop Barometer is at Heavy Flop. Tessa is heavily flopped over the printer at the moment.

Back to notes and time lines and coffee for me.

By erin, ago

agented

Gather ’round, kidlets. Story time.

In 2003, I tried doing NaNoWriMo for the first time, because I’d always wanted to write but had never been good about sitting down and actually doing it. I had ideas in notebooks but nothing concrete.

I tried. I failed. Burnt out around 15k.

In 2004, I tried again. I made it to 50k that year. That novel is not a novel, it is a sprawling mess of post-apocalyptic… something.

In 2005, for NaNo #3, I had no plot but lots of atmosphere, and when I reached the 30k mark and had no idea where to go with it, I sent my characters to the circus.

In 2006, I spent NaNo working on that circus. I ended up with something interesting, but not novel-shaped.

In 2007, I did another 50k worth of work on the circus. In NaNo terms this is cheating. I’m sorry.

Throughout 2008 I took the 100k+ of circus… stuff and attempted to shape it into a novel.

I don’t know how many drafts it went through. Four, maybe? It started to have something resembling a proper shape in the beginning of 2009.

From 2008 to, well, now, I started learning about the publishing industry.

On June 2nd, 2009, I sent out my first batch of query letters.

I sent six queries out in that first batch. Within 20 minutes I had a partial request and a full request. I got another full request two hours later, two rejections the next day, and a third full request a few weeks later.

Ten days later those first two full request turned into rejections. The partial joined them in rejectionland soon after.

I sent out more queries. I got more requests. I got more rejections.

In August, I got a full request that turned into a phone call. A very nice phone call that I’m pretty sure I did nothing but stammer during, and was a request to rework the book almost entirely, but it was still an offer of representation.

I got in touch with the other agents who were still considering. Some of them passed. I had more phone calls. I think I stammered less in those.

I ended up not taking any offers at that point. I decided to revise independently, because everyone seemed to be saying different versions of the same thing.

I spent September and October of 2009 revising. I pushed around what I had. I tried to have more *stuff* happen. I polished it. I wrapped it up in pretty bows.

I sent it back to the three agents who wanted to see it.

More phone calls. More e-mails. All three of them said different versions of “well… not there yet.”

So I sighed. I ate a lot of chocolate. I wrote a completely different story for NaNo ’09. I took December off.

In January of 2010, I checked into the Revisionland Hotel.

I tore everything apart. I changed the format. I changed the plot. Well, I changed what little plot there was into an actual plot. I took over 25k out and put other stuff in. I sent it to old beta readers and new beta readers. I changed it some more.

I sent it back to agents two weeks ago.

Last week I had one offer of representation.

On Monday I had three.

I thought about it. A lot. I was extremely lucky to have three wonderful agents spending their time on me and my work, offering wonderful advice throughout this process.

In the end I signed with the same agent I had that very first stammering phone call with back in August.

I am now represented by Richard Pine of InkWell Management.

Almost exactly a year after I started querying.

By erin, ago

fountain pen number two

Remember back in March when I got my very first vintage fountain pen?

I’ve been trolling Etsy vintage for pens since then (well, pens & train cases & bowler hats,) but nothing’s really caught my eye & budget at the same time until this past week.

So now I have a second vintage fountain pen.  Except this one is a part of a set.

It’s a Sheaffer Snorkel Clipper Pen & Pencil set, complete with box & instructions. It has a really nifty filling mechanism that you can sort of see the instructions for in the photo & I kind of flailed around like a dork when I filled it this afternoon and the kittens thought I was weird. But that’s nothing new.

This set is from somewhere around 1955-59 or so, and both pen & pencil appear to have never been used.

I think this officially means I’m starting a collection.

By erin, ago