Many thanks to everyone who participated in this month's blog series! I had a lot of fun gathering candid and heartfelt responses from authors. Lorie Ann asked me to post my own list, so here goes nothing:
7 Things You Don't Know About Me
1) I've been writing stories and songs since birth, practically.2) I am capable of charming squirrels out of trees.
3) There is no television show I have loved more completely from start to finish than Leverage.
4) I love word play.
5) Synchronicity and causality are recurring themes in my life.
6) Chances are, I'm shorter than you.
7) I project. In more ways than one. So there you have it! I hope March has been lovely for all of you. Don't forget to mark your calendars for Operation Teen Book Drop 2014, which will be happening in just a few weeks on April 17th. Stay tuned to the readergirlz blog, Facebook, and Twitter to learn how you can participate and #rockthedrop!
The term synchronicity, as I understand it, was coined by Carl Jung to express the concept of significant coincidences, or the imbuing of propitious moments with some form of transcendental meaning. As an author, such moments stand out in my writing life. They don’t happen often - but they are quite extraordinary when they do, and I never forget them.
Let me share with you a few examples. When I was writing ‘The Red Judge’, one of my ‘Children of Plynlimon’ books, I had two such experiences. The first involved the Red Judge himself. The climax of the novel needed to be in the heart of the Forest of Dean, and I’d made the decision that it shouldn’t happen outdoors, so booked myself into the Speech House Hotel - which was at the dead centre of the forest - to see whether it might be the right sort of location. It most definitely had the atmosphere I was looking for and, in case there should be any doubt that I had found what had to be my location, as I was settling up to leave I noticed a painting tucked away behind the Reception Desk. ‘Who’s that?’ I asked, looking at the somber face of some seventeenth century gentleman clad in red robes. ‘Oh, we don’t know,’ came the reply. ‘Just some old judge.’
Even stranger though, in the early stages of writing that book, I had reason to look into the history of conjuring. I’d wanted the evil villain of my piece to be a conjuror, and to give him authenticity had decided to base him on some real character out of legerdemain’s long and colourful history. The character I’d chosen, whose name I used in the book, was one Dr Katterfelto, self-styled King of Conjurors. I’d enjoyed writing him in, and was doing further research out of interest because his colourful character had rather captivated me. I found out that he’d fallen on hard times, been forced to give up his theatre in Piccadilly and bowled up in my home town, which was something of a coincidence. Reading on, however, I discovered that he’d not only come to my small country town, but ended up in its debtor’s gaol - and that’s where the syncronicity kicks in because back in Katterfelto’s day, my house was the debtors’ gaol. It still has the old gaol door, studded with iron nails. The basement, above which I’m writing this now, still containing the remains of the cells.
In other words, I’d chosen to write into my book an obscure character out of eighteenth century history, who had once lived in my house. Carl Jung, what do you say about that?
I could go on like this, but I won’t. The only other story I’ll mentioned here happened when I was writing my second novel, ‘Telling the Sea’. I had won the Smarties Book Prize with ‘Midnight Blue’ and was determined to prove I wasn’t a one-trick pony and could write other sorts of books. Where ‘Midnight Blue’ had been shot through with fantasy, ‘Telling the Sea’ would be as gritty and down to earth a story as I could make it.
I laboured on it for a whole year, knowing my publisher would have liked a sequel to ‘Midnight Blue’, or something in similar vein. By Christmas the book was nearly finished – and so was I. Taking a break for the festive season only increased my sense of anxiety about whether my tale of an abused mother, oldest daughter Nona and her four traumatized brothers and sisters running away to the wild Welsh coast was what anybody wanted to read. I worried all through Christmas, and after New Year, chopping up the Christmas tree to feed onto the fire [prior to picking up my manuscript and carrying on], I was still worrying. It wasn’t that I had doubts about the actual quality of the book. I was proud of ‘Telling the Sea’. It had proved to me at least, that I wasn’t a one-trick pony. In addition, I’d grown deeply fond of my characters [I still think that among them are some of the best characters I’ve written]. However, there was personal tragedy behind the central story of a fatal attraction to the sea, and I couldn’t imagine ever posting off my manuscript and allowing it out into the world.
And then in the Christmas tree, tucked down out of sight, I found a tiny wren’s nest. Just at the moment when I most needed somebody to say it’s going to be all right, panic not, there it was. And what was the name of the cottage to which Nona and her family escaped? You may have guessed it. In the Welsh, Nyth-y-Dryw. Or, in the English, Wren’s Nest.
‘Telling the Sea’ is being launched again TODAY, this time for the e-book market. With a film crew, I’ve been down to the real live cottage behind the fictional Wren’s Nest to make a little film about the writing of the book. If you want to view it, here’s the link. If you want to buy the book to read on the fabulous new full-colour, yummy Kindle Fire that you’re going to be given this Christmas, here’s the link for that too. I’ve been busy editing 'Telling the Sea' for a new generation of readers, and here it is, Christmas again. What will I find hidden in my tree? I’ll have to wait and see.
So here goes for the 2nd Campaign Challenge Rachael Harrie gave us at Rach Writes. The challenge was to write a blog post in 200 words or less, excluding the title, that includes the word "imago" in the title and in the body of the post includes the following 4 random words: "miasma," "lacuna," "oscitate," "synchronicity". For an added challenge make reference to a mirror in the post. For an even greater challenge, make the post 200 words exactly. All criteria are met (after much gnashing of teeth and pulling of hair.)
The Imago
Arms folded, Nyla stares through the beveled glass door into the galería. Somehow, the glass is both mirror and window. Superimposed on the polished floors of the sunlit galeria beyond, her reflection stares back, as if bemused.
When Nyla was younger, in the miasma of grief that pervaded her home, she sometimes caught mental glimpses of who she might become away from her family’s confused dynamics. These glimpses led her on, in hopes of escaping the pain that oscitated inside her, as one family member after another went down dubious roads to disaster. Now, through some synchronicity, her decision to teach English in Spain has allowed her to catch up the person she hoped to be.
I sent the first three chapters of my inspirational romance to an editor who requested them and now am digging into that pile of romances I received at last summer’s Romance Writers of America conference.
I’m surprised at how many of “my ideas” I see cropping up in these books. Of course, these romances are already published; mine are still in the works. When I thought of the idea for my inspirational romance, I hadn’t seen any romances in which a dog played a key role. Then Marley and Me hit the shelves (and soon after the movie theaters), and now it seems every publisher has romances with comical animals in them. That’s synchronicity. Many writers writing about the same thing at the same time without realizing they’re far from alone.
Years ago, I wrote a picture book series about a clumsy uncle whose speech made him sound as if he came from the Victorian Era and yet he was always trying to impress his niece and nephew about how hip he was. He ended up in a series of accidents in each book, and each book started with a warning. The first one stated, “Warning: This book is not meant for scaredy-cats.” I sent a proposal for this series all over with no response. A few years later, the Lemony Snicket series came out. This series bore enough resemblance to mine that my series basically became unsaleable.
A new writer hearing this might respond, “They stole your idea!” I doubt it. If I had a contract for every time I submitted a story to a publisher and, a year or two later, they came out with a highly similar story by a different writer, I’d be very well published by now. But I’ve seen synchronicity in action.
In a journalism class I took in college, the teacher assigned students to write a story about a psychological experiment. In the experiment, scientists had people in various vehicles try to get toll collectors to waive the fee for crossing the bridge. The scientists discovered that people in luxury vehicles like limousines had far more success at gaining free passage than less prestigious vehicles. For my hook (or first line of my story), I wrote:
“Money talks.
And when it does, people listen.”
The college instructor collected the stories we had written and redistributed them in the classroom. I received the story of a woman who sat across the classroom from me. The opening lines for our stories matched, yet neither of us had copied off the other. That’s synchronicity.
Beginning writers sometimes worry about joining critique groups because they fear another writer will “steal” their ideas. This could conceivably happen, but it’s more likely that another writer (or two or three or fifty) is already out there working on the same idea.
Recently, I heard that publishers think they’ve identified what the “next big thing” in publishing will be after the current trend of vampire stories dies down: angel stories. I was happy to hear this since I had an angel book, The Time-for-Bed Angel, published in 2008. This time, I may be riding the crest of the synchronicity wave.
and I just ate waaaaay too many treats!
I did a Costco run (as well as Walmart and Petco). I'm a glutton for punishment.
I hit Costco at just the right time ~ LUNCH. They had every single food demo person they employ handing out goodies. And I think I tried them all.
(And at Costco there is no rhyme or reason to the order in which the samples are presented: there can be meat, then ice cream, then chips, then something hot and spicy, then cake, then yogurt, etc.)
Today I had bits of the following, in approximately this order:
a meat in a pocket sort of thing, an Italian style meatball, a chip with spinach dip, a brownie with whipped cream, a turkey sausage, some tomato pesto and cream cheese wrapped in a tortilla, a chocolate cupcake, something with curry, some savory meaty gooey hors d'oeuvres thing on bread, another mysterious meaty something in a pocket, a creamy fancy French cheese on bread, and red velvet cake. I passed on the bacon guy because he was shouting "BACON! COSTCO BACON! READY TO EAT JUST HEAT IT UP! BACON!" and he kind of put me off. I mean c'mon, there's no need for yelling. And I know what bacon tastes like, thank you.
So between all my stops today I was inspired to come up with new lyrics to the old 12 Days of Christmas song. Feel free to sing along~
(I will skip all the endless verses and just cut to the chase)
On the 12th day of Christmas, my VISA gave to me~
12 turkey burgers
Too much toilet paper
Lots of coffee filters
9 pounds of coffee
8 printer ink things
7 pounds of crunchies
Chicken pasta salad
Fiiiive ping pong baaalllllssss
4 kitty treats
3 bags of litter
2 loaves of bread
And a cat climbing furniture thingggggg!
The last of which is still in the back seat of the car. I have to figure out how to sneak it into the house without them seeing it. I think I have a plan. If I get out the vacuum cleaner they'll all go outside, so if I act fast I can drag the thing in and hide it in the hall closet. Wish me luck...
Read the rest of this post
Angelo has another thought-provoking post at his blog, this time on the Filippino Consul General's argument against the boycott of Herman's Bakery. Shut-UpPinoys
Here's my own take on the matter.
The background
Herman's Bakery is the business run by a family corporation, headed by Juan Tenorio Guerrero, a/k/a Juan Pan. Other Juan Pan businesses include Western Union and MITA travel.
Juan T. Guerrero (Juan Pan) has been president of the Chamber of Commerce, head honcho of the Red Cross, a former Congressman in the CNMI Legislature, Executive of the year, and an otherwise well-recognized and respected community leader in CNMI and Guam. Herman'sHistory
But he's taken a stance against federalization , and opposed the wage hike as well. In fact he said these would be a disaster for the CNMI. PanPredictsDisaster
The call to action
For his opposition to the rights of workers, especially the alien workers, and his opposition to possible improvement in the CNMI through federalization, now there is a call for action against his businesses. A boycott. A boycott of Herman's Bakery products (which are available retail, but also used at KFC and other places), his Western Union business, MITA and any other Juan Pan business.
The call is being sent around by text messaging. (Love technology!) And it's making some waves, getting a little press coverage and prompting a call to Juan Pan himself, while he was in D.C. talking about how the CNMI doesn't need U.S. takeover of immigration and labor.
Juan Pan's response
Juan Pan, when learning of the call for the boycott, tried to paint himself as only a messenger. He said that he is just delivering the message of the Chamber of Commerce because he is its president. And that he has a right to express his own opinions, too. Don'tShootTheMessenger
What? This is a ridiculous response.
Juan Pan fully supports the Chamber's position against federalization. He's been a mover and shaker in the CNMI's effort to stop federalization, speaking out on it, predicting disaster, joining in the meetings. If he had serious qualms about the Chamber's latest position, he could have argued against it at some point. He could have begged off being the "messenger" and let someone else deliver the Chamber's position. His decision to be the one to testify is evidence of his commitment to the opposition to federalization.
And then there's the Chamber's position against grand-fathering in long-term residents. They want to say that all the years people have lived in the CNMI as alien workers doesn't count. That everybody starts over, starts on the date of the new law, assuming one is passed.
And this position, against grandfathering in our long-time resident aliens, is just nasty. Immoral. Cowardice.
the RP Consul General's mistake
The RP Consul General urged everyone to ignore the boycott because it would hurt the workers employed by Juan Pan. It's a "pressure tactic" and that makes it blackmail. And so it would be wrong.
But if you employ that logic, it would mean we could never protest anything. The Boston Tea Party (which is one of the most outrageous acts of vandalism and theft to ever be perpetrated in the name of a cause) would be reduced to nothing more than a crime, not an eloquent demand for freedom. The Emancipation Proclamation and the entire Civil War, fighting against slavery, would be wrong because slave-owners would react, and those poor slaves would have no homes, no place to work, nothing--but freedom. The Resistance against Hitler would be wrong, because trying to undermine his power and pressure him into not torturing and killing Jews would be-well, blackmail. And the German law could be used against your family and other innocents.
Obviously, the RP Consul General's argument is baloney.
Boycott--it's not wrong, it's a right.
There is nothing wrong with concerted effort to boycott. It's a tactic that recognizes how economic endeavors are intertwined with the political. And when you can't make direct progress on the political front, you need to refocus on the economic. There have been some successful boycotts. BoycottPepsiforBurma , TheMontgomeryBusBoycott , and the original boycott, aimed at landreform in Ireland.
So, if you support federalization, the wage hike, and recognition of aliens' long-term residence in the CNMI as a basis for rights, then boycott the Juan Pan businesses.
As for me, I support those things. I'm not a big fan of the U.S. and its handling of immigration at all, but I've come to the conclusion that the CNMI can't make things better on its own because our leaders are all like Juan Pan--getting rich from cheap foreign labor, and thus forgetting the higher moral values in support of equality and liberty, living wages for all and an end to poverty, justice and universal brotherhood that they had instilled by their faith, by their community, and just by living.
By:
Judith Mammay,
on 5/8/2007
Blog:
Judy's Place
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Made it through JOSEPH for the second time today, and have an additional whole page of edits... simple things like a missing word and and extra words, etc. Now I will wait until I get it home, print it out and go through it one more time. Sometimes I think it is easier to read the hard copy than to read things on the computer.
Working on a little marketing, too. I sent a couple of brochures to Matthew's teacher, and she seemed really excited about the books, saying they were really needed to make people more aware of autism. She thinks they need to be in classrooms and libraries...figured she knows the people around here, so sent her a whole bunch of the brochures to share with all those people she thinks need the books. Not all that many, in the overall scheme of things, but if I find enough enthusiastic people to share their thoughts about the books, it can only help get them out to where they will do some good.
Quiet day today, for the most part...took the kids to WalMart after we went out to dinner, to spend some of their own money, and miracle of miracles...WalMart HAD the computer game that Matthew has been obsessing about for the last three days. Jay was happy to find the one he wanted too, so things were REALLY quiet when we returned.
Golf was good today, in that it was good weather (not too hot) and the course was nice. A little different than most courses in Florida...it looked more like a ski field filled with hills and lots of moguls...not very many flat places at all. Scored poorly on the front, but at my handicap on the back
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Fascinating post about coincidences that become much more than coincidences. Loved the film about the house and the beaches too, though glad I was here and home indoors on a day like this. Now for the kindle . . .
Congratulations and happy e-day!
Thank you Penny. Having been up most of night I'm now in bed with newspaper, dogs & bread and cheese. Happy launch day indeed!
Pauline happy happy relaunch day! What a marvellous story of Dr Katterfelto but more so, what a wonderful video and record of how and why you wrote "Telling the Sea" because of course 20 years ago, one wouldn't even have imagined making a video of one's work.
I too have a house next to the sea that I visit annually... on what tourists think of as a sublime coast. But it can also be wild and stprmy and has an unspoilt peninsula that runs straight out into the Atlantica rollers as they beat up from the Antartic. So I loved every moment of your video and the idea as you put it... "there is something extraordinary about places at the end of the world" and that people have 'interesting relationships with wild places." Its odd, if I've somehow not managed to go right out to the point of that peninsula (a 4 hour round trip walk) and return to London without having done it, I feel oddly bereft.
Your film was a wonderful tribute to how you write and also a tribute to the places where inspiration come from. Thank you for lovely experience. I await my Kindle Fire!
Diane, thank you so much for your kind words. I think those of us with an affinity for wild places, especially the sea, should stick together! It's what's always there, isn't it, at the end of everything. My experience of these 'ends of the world' places is that they're often where people ruck up who've been running and can go no further. Consequently they become places for starting new lives - either in splendid isolation, [like Griselda in 'Telling the Sea' who lives in a tent in the common] or as part of some tenuous community, which is what my heroine Nona, and her family are trying so hard [and failing] NOT to do.
And then, of course, there are the people like us. Least said about us the best, i guess.
PS. The Kindle Fire is a thing of beauty. I read out of duty on my grey ordinary, flat, rectangular Kindle before, but now I read with relish. And watch films. And do so much else.