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"God, I was so happy, seeing them like that, hearing the laughs and screams, seeing their grins flapping in the wind as they tore around the track. I had to wipe a tear from my eye before they could get off the ride and meet me across the street. Samantha had a huge smile on her face, and her eyes were the size of saucers."

That’s a blog entry that Janice Erlbaum wrote in 2005 about her trip to Coney Island with a young runaway. Over the next few months, her troubled relationship with that teenager would change dramatically--an emotional process recorded in Erlbaum's new book, Have You Found Her.

Today Erlbaum explains how her stories move from diary to blog to final memoir shape, giving us a glimpse--just like that video--behind her pages. 

Welcome to my deceptively simple feature, Five Easy Questions. In the spirit of Jack Nicholson’s mad piano player, I run a weekly set of quality conversations with writing pioneers—delivering some practical, unexpected advice about web writing.

Jason Boog:

On page 225, you have a great scene with Sam and your domestic partner at Coney Island--it's a gorgeous, kinetic scene. Could you just walk us through the process of writing that scene? How did you build it from memory and how did you edit it into this final shape?

Janice Erlbaum:
I originally wrote the Coney Island scene the day after it happened – it’s posted on my blog as an entry called “Coneyworld,” dated August 28, 2005. Continue reading...

“That handwriting—careful, shaky, spiky, every letter distinct, straight up and down, like it took hours to etch, and that was with her good hand. The poem was about watching the stars fall from the back of a pickup truck, hitchhiking by the constellations. You could feel every bit of it: the piney smell of the Oregon trees, the jolt of the rocks in the road."

That’s a gorgeous bit of prose from Janice Erlbaum’s memoir, Have You Found Her. In that passage, Erlbaum reflects on the writings of a teenaged runaway that she befriended in New York City.

The pair bond over writing—two struggling authors trying to make sense of the world—and I think their friendship will be familiar to most of our readers. Today, Erlbaum explains the ups and downs of negotiating her two book deals.

Welcome to my deceptively simple feature, Five Easy Questions. In the spirit of Jack Nicholson’s mad piano player, I run a weekly set of quality conversations with writing pioneers—delivering some practical, unexpected advice about web writing.

Jason Boog:
You've now published two books. Which mistakes did you avoid the second time around? More specifically, could you describe the process of publishing this memoir--how did the looking for an agent/publisher process change the second time around?

Janice Erlbaum:
Again, I’m a lucky bastard, because I sold Girlbomb in June of 2004 as part of a two-book deal. Continue reading...

"I was vindicated. I'd solved even more of the mystery--Nancy Drew and the Case of the Homeless Girl ... 'I'm glad I found out. Knowledge is power, right?' If I only knew what to do with all this power I had."

That’s Janice Erlbaum writing about a homeless girl she befriended at a New York City shelter. Over the course of a difficult year, Erlbaum struggled to help this girl, uncovering some dark secrets along the way. You can read the results in her new memoir, Have You Found Her.

While fabulists like James Frey give the form a black eye, good memoirs are based on plenty of detective work, both emotionally and physically. Today, Erlbaum explains how she reconstructed the life of this troubled girl named Sam in her new book--helping us become better memoir detectives.

Welcome to my deceptively simple feature, Five Easy Questions. In the spirit of Jack Nicholson’s mad piano player, I run a weekly set of quality conversations with writing pioneers—delivering some practical, unexpected advice about web writing.

Jason Boog:
Your book incorporates letters, speeches, phone messages, and other archived material from Sam. How did you collect all this material and how did you turn it into prose? Any advice for using this kind of research in an active way, so our memoirs don't end up sounding like scholarly papers?

Janice Erlbaum:
Well, I’m hugely sentimental, and a little bit of a pack rat, so I tend to keep things like letters and cards, especially when they’re from someone very dear to me. So I had a manila folder in my files called “SAM,” into which I stuffed all her letters, drawings, and etc; I also had the few emails she’d sent me in an archive.

Continue reading...

“I'm in Washington Square Park wishing I could write a poem, the poem that would help. Poetry doesn't help, money helps. I know I don't believe that. What to do. Observe, observe, observe. It is my new mission to lay back and observe. Put less of myself out there and listen more.”

That's memoirist Janice Erlbaum writing a blog entry in 2005, reflecting on life changes that would ultimately bring her in contact with a teenaged runaway named Sam. (She had just finished her first book, Girlbomb.

Erlbaum would keep writing as she came closer and closer to this troubled girl, and that journey is recorded in her new memoir, Have You Found Her.

Today, Erlbaum explains how she ended up becoming a writer and how she supported herself over the course of her career--all the nitty-gritty detail that can help a fledgling writers think about their own lives.

Welcome to my deceptively simple feature, Five Easy Questions. In the spirit of Jack Nicholson’s mad piano player, I run a weekly set of quality conversations with writing pioneers—delivering some practical, unexpected advice about web writing.

Jason Boog:
While writing and living this book, you also maintained a freelance career. This can be a very difficult lifestyle for a writer. How did you hold your life together, both financially and emotionally, during those early years before your first book was published?

Janice Erlbaum:
Most of my freelancing involved my books, and my steady gig as a columnist for BUST magazine, and thank god for that – I’m terrible at pitching articles and drumming up piecework. Continue reading...

I'm setting a bad example. Over the weekend, I went to a quiet, hilarious dinner party with some close friends.

Unfortunately, I’ve been swamped with projects and I didn’t write a single word about this minor, yet entertaining episode from my life. Little details about my friends, our lifestyles and the soggy winter of 2008 will soon fade into oblivion.

That's why writers like Janice Erlbaum put me to shame. She keeps impeccable track of her memories, and has made journal-keeping an integral part of her life—a practice that produced two personal, intricate books.

Her most recent work is Have You Found Her, a look at Erlbaum’s caring, but troubled, relationship with a young runaway. This week, she’ll teach us how to preserve our memories and write better at the same time.

Welcome to my deceptively simple feature, Five Easy Questions. In the spirit of Jack Nicholson’s mad piano player, I run a weekly set of quality conversations with writing pioneers—delivering some practical, unexpected advice about web writing.

Jason Boog:
In the book, you refer to copying down dialogue and scenes in your notebook a few times. I can imagine you were doing this constantly. In your experience, what's the best way to record an experience you want to write about later? What's the best way to record intricate details and conversations without spoiling the actual experience?

Janice Erlbaum:
I am an avid journal-keeper and a fairly consistent blogger, so writing down things as they happen is part of my ongoing creative process, whether I’m working on a book-length project or not. Continue reading...