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Not sure why scientists are so ga-ga over figuring out what black holes really are. I’ve already done that. And I know how they are formed. Revisions = black holes Revisions are formed when first drafts become second drafts, third drafts, fourth drafts, etc. An endless loop of deletions and additions that suck the writer…

From your sidebar to your comments section, these tips will help you clean up your blog in just a few minutes.

I think all writers have this knowing inside of us — maybe even a little voice that tells us, “No, not yet” when we want to rush our novels or let them out into the world too early.

I like to call it “writer intuition.” That inner knowing that guides you along your journey on a novel project.

Sometimes we ignore this inner knowing but deep down, we know that it is the truth.

A lot of my non-writer friends always ask me, “How do you come up with story ideas? How do you know what to write? How do you decide who to write about?”

It’s hard to explain to a non-writer how the process works. And for each writer, the process is different. But I do believe all of us have writer intuition.

It’s the knowing that get us to keep working at a scene to get just the right moment.

It’s the gut feeling that tells us that we may have the wrong character as the POV.

It’s that whisper that says, “Yes, it’s ready” when you ask yourself, “Is this project done?”

I’ve had all of these experiences but I’ve also ignored signals from my intuition as well. Every time I ignore that inner truth, it never turns out well.

What about you? How has writer intuition helped you make your novel project better?

I entered a writing contest at the beginning of the summer. The entry requirements were to submit the first 10 pages. I had just started on my Summer Challenge, but I did have an early draft of my first chapter, so I decided to submit an entry. This contest had the perks of getting editorial feedback so it would be worth entering no matter what the results.

So, the result was the I didn’t win the contest. No biggie there. But I did get some editorial feedback, which honestly to me, was a win.

The editor made some valid points for some weak spots, which included pacing, sense of place, and hook. One of the things the struck me was that the editor felt she knew more about the secondary character than the main character and that I needed to shift the focus. As for the hook, she suggested that I get to the paranormal element quickly to intrigue the reader.

The good things that she pointed out were that the novel synopsis was very marketable and the sample pages had engaging characters, appealing voice, and solid writing.

The feedback gives me something to ponder. First of all, it makes me wonder if this novel is starting in the right place. Although the first scenes in Chapter 1 have changed slightly—it could always use more work.

This is thing with drafts—more than likely your first chapter may end up disappearing or be drastically different from the original version.

But to me, this is what revision is all about. Tackling the structural problems in a novel—fixing inconsistencies and trying to get the story in its best form. Those are things that that can be fixed.

But it also helps that at least I’m getting the voice and the characters right. That is a lot harder to fix—although it can be done.

So I’m continuing on with the Act 1 scenes. It’s taking much longer than I thought. But with the help of this editorial critique, it may help me better structure my opening chapters.

The mention of utilizing a pencil in this digital age (Jan Greenberg’s 12.12 post) inspired me to think about when and why I still use one. Although it has been liberating to adopt word processing as well as its visual analog of digital illustration to create my books, sometimes it’s best to keep it simple. Especially in the formative stages of a project, a pencil is indispensable.

But not just any pencil. Relatively recently I discovered the joys of writing and sketching with a mechanical pencil... no sharpening is required and a worn-out eraser can be replaced. It seems odd that I had a full blown computer system a decade prior to adopting a mechanical pencil. Guess they need a better marketing program. I like a .5 mm HB lead. Anyway, why use one at all?

• Taking notes and sketching by hand is the best way to imprint something on my memory. When gathering and processing information, what I write or draw is retained much more vividly.

• When brainstorming, using a pencil allows a much more rapid, fluid, non-linear process. It’s easy to switch between writing and sketching, and erasing irrelevant stuff allows additional ideas to be inserted near related topics.

• When a project hits a roadblock, it’s best to stop wrestling with the computer, sit down with my magical pencil and rethink things. Strangely, doing this while watching TV can be very productive... perhaps it shuts down the usual brain pathways and engenders out-of-the-ordinary thoughts.

• For some reason it’s easier to see the glitches when editing a hard copy. When working with a collaborator, it's convenient to pass a printout back and forth.

• Pencils are very portable and hardly ever break down.

• Last but certainly not least, there is great power in putting things down on paper. Not only books, but great nations have been started that way. A personal or professional goal, no matter how large or small, gets closer to being achieved the moment it’s put into writing (or doodled).

Of course, you need something to write in. I used to scribble on loose sheets of bond paper, then toss the sheets into folders. The problem with that system is the papers get scrambled and tend to throw themselves into inaccessible cracks behind bookcases.

A notebook or journal helps to capture the swirl of ideas and creates at least a semblance of order. I try to date each entry, but since I feel free to go back to add or delete things, it’s certainly not a precise timeline. A spiral binding that lets the book open flat and gives a convenient place to stash the pencil is my preference. These “sketch books” can be found in art supply stores in various sizes. The photo shows a small 6" X 8" one that is great for taking on the road. For stay-at-home journals, I like the large 9" X 12" ones. Be sure to get one with reasonably heavy paper that won't ripple and show through too much from the other side.

This is a section of a journal page when I was working on Missing Math, attempting to work out part of the verse. By the way, that little dog turned into a calf for some reason. (If I had written it down, I would remember why!)

So, during this season the best gift for some people just might be a book they create themselves.

Happy Holidays to all!

Writing a draft is like making a map. What you are mapping is up to you.

If you imagine yourself outside, you will test roads, find crossways and connections, name streets, and never be satisfied with what you've been told about a place. You will go down ill-used paths until you can look beyond the flat edge of the end of the world---here be dragons!

If you see yourself as map-making inside, you will knock on closet backs to check for hidden passages, tear down walls if you suspect doors behind them, and crawl into tight spaces. You will measure a room in the steps of your character. And lie down on your back to examine the ceiling.

Why?

Because then you will lay out your findings in an organized way so that others may explore the same paths, see things they didn't know were there, visit little known attractions, discover short (or long) cuts, realize one land lies beside another, and perhaps find a trapdoor to a populated underground or a ladder to a long undisturbed attic.

You're asking your readers to risk a mountain because you named it and marked one route. I've dared valleys because someone has gone in before me and assures me they will lead me out. Even a house that I've been inside a thousand times is worthy of rediscovery when someone hands me a floorplan and tells me the history of how the backstairs were added.

Fellow blogger Jennifer Thermes is reading Mapmaking with Children: Sense of Place Education for the Elementary Years and has Maps of the Imagination: The Writer as Cartographer on her TBR pile. Jennifer creates maps for a living.

What's the last map you drew? Why?

P.S. I love a good map in a book. Do you? Here's a blog post from The Map Room devoted to Imaginary Places.

Got a question for y'all. When do you recycle (meaning throw out) old drafts? If you keep them, how do you store them and/or organize them?

I looked into my closet and I've got 3 plastic tubs of printed drafts for my 3 (Eeep! I've written three!) books and a couple of postal boxes with newer drafts. I'm definitely keeping all of my edit letters and drafts my editor or agent have sent me, but what about the drafts in between? Do you hold onto those until the book is an ARC and then toss them? Or not.

I'm not sure.

I do know I want to keep the first draft of each book. But the other stuff I probably don't need. Hmm.

If I can remember, I'll try to post what book I'm reading at the end of every entry.

Today, I'm reading Wish You Were Here (HarperTeen) by Catherine Clark. Great so far! I love the postcard entries in the book.

T. C. Boyle has another of his vintage short stories in a recent New Yorker, entitled "Sin Dolor." It's a story of a young boy who was born with some sort of genetic mutation that causes him to feel no pain. The doctor who examines him for numerous burns and lacerations when he is a child at first suspects child abuse by the parents, though he's at a loss as to why the boy feels no pain. The doctor becomes interested in doing long-term medical observations and since the boy is from a poor family he is able to have the boy spend a great deal of time at his own house, eating, teaching the boy, and generally taking a paternal interest in him. However, after a long period of this, the father appears at the house one day, removes the boy, and leaves the village with him. After a long period the boy and his father return to the village and the doctor comes upon the spectacle of the boy performing on stage, putting red hot blades to his flesh, and piercing his cheeks, while the father is taking up donations. The father has made a sideshow of him to earn money. The doctor manages to speak with him, but the boy is resigned to his fate of earning money to support his family. He dies shortly after.

This is the sort of wrenching story I'd come across in the past from Boyle. Language, style, drama is always superb, but there seems always a hard psychological and visceral toll on me. I remember another of Boyle's stories that stayed with me a long time. A young couple in a new home in southern California, where the high crime rate is of concern, engages a home security firm. They provide the couple with a sign for their lawn warning that intruders will face armed response. This enrages one of the crazies who lives in the area (Boyle has already convincingly portrayed this crazy being interviewed by a woman real estate agent), and he invades the home of the young couple firing a gun and demanding an armed response. He locates the cowering couple and kills them.

I marvel at the power and craft of such writing but I get a sense of hopelessness from the theme and denouement. So, Boyle intrigues me and I couldn't help but go straight to an interview by Diana Bishop with Boyle in my latest Writer's Chronicle. In some selective excerpts, Boyle says he's "fascinated with these other guys to see how they've ruined their lives. Maybe writing about them provides a cautionary tale for me." He says "the theme of man as animal often plays a part" in his stories. "I don't want my readers to do anything. I'm not imposing anything on them. They come to me because they like to communicate…I am simply an artist. I'm disturbed by things, amused by things, love things, am horrified by things. I want to constantly address this mystery of the world and so that's why I'm creating art. If it communicates to people then I'm very gratified." All this fits my take on his stories.

Boyle is currently interested in identity theft—his recent novel, "Talk Talk," takes up this theme. "What is identity, who are you, how do you find out?" I'm not sure I'm ready to tackle a Boyle novel—the short stories affect my mood for long enough periods—but perhaps.

What about his drive, and process? "(F)or me the thrill of producing fiction, of pursuing and discovering something ineffable, is enough…because it's such a rush for me to explore something and see where it will go." As you might also infer from this, Boyle is someone who doesn't write to an outline. Bishop asks, "When you start to write a short story or novel do you know the ending or do you like the exploration?" Boyle says, "I know nothing at all. Nothing. The first line comes and I start…I begin by seeing something and then its translated into a voice talking to me and then I follow it and see where it will go." Bishop asks him how he revises? "Constantly, as I go along." Revisions after the first draft is completed? "It is, with minor exceptions, exactly as it evolved on the keyboard," and apparently doesn't need much more before going to the agent.

I like this one too. Bishop asks, "While you may begin writing short stories or novels with a question, you many not end up with the answer? "No." Also, when Bishop asks can art save the world, so to speak? "Well, the world is unsavable to begin with. Art illuminates you. It makes you feel that somebody else is feeling the same thing that you are so you're not alone. But it doesn't have a political agenda; it can't. Because an agenda destroys the aesthetic impulse of the discovery and the exploration of what you're doing. You're doing it because you have no answer. That's why you do it."

I admire a lot about Boyle.

This episode of Just One More Book! is part of our showcase coverage of the International Reading Association’s 52nd annual conference.

Mark speaks with Alicia Logey, the French Immersion Coordinator with the Surrey School District in British Columbia, about the challenges of literacy in a multilingual environment – be it school or home.

Participate in the conversation by leaving a comment on this interview, or send an email to [email protected].