Read The Panic Years

I'm a late bloomer and proud and happy about it. I married late in life, and had my beloved son late in life, and because I had so many wild and reckless years before hand, I've never had to look back and wonder if I missed anything. (Believe me, I didn't).

But, there's a trend now for people to marry young (I don't get it. Don't they want to be traveling and having adventures?), and with that trend comes a great deal of new angst. First time out author Doree Lewak, wrote a book about it, The Panic Years, which was so sharply written and so laugh-out-loud funny, that I wanted to do a q and a with her.

What gave you the idea to write The Panic Years, a very funny book by the way?

The expression goes, Write what you know. And that was certainly true for conceptualizing this book. In my early 20’s – at a time when I should have been enjoying a carefree dating life – I felt myself getting gripped by the Panic, yet I found it so hard to disentangle myself from its evil clutches. I would obsess, I’d self-destruct, then I’d obsess some more. Friends suddenly became bitter enemies once they flashed their haughty new engagement bling. I’d submit fake announcements in my college alumni newsletter, thinking I was proving something to everyone else, when I was really trying to prove something to myself. I finally woke up to the fact that this attitude was incredibly counter-productive, self-defeating and quite unattractive to boot. Now, as a reformed panicker, I want to take the de facto wisdom I’ve gained and help a new generation of panickers control the Panic before it controls them.


2. I laughed at your bio, which says you live panic free in Manhattan. That's pretty hard to do--how do you manage?

Well, I can say I’m panic-free regarding a marriage timetable, which isn’t to say there isn’t an ocean of issues to panic about in Manhattan. The city is almost a panic vacuum by design; there are always other people unapologetically showboating what you don’t have – and that’s kind of the point. The key, I think, to protecting your sanity is making yourself impervious to the scorecard of others. They have nothing to do with you or your life, and the only achievements that matter are your own.

3. OK, this is the part that unnerved me, which is really is generational. The title talks about being "on the wrong side of 25" which made me gulp a bit. I thought women were marrying much later now--like in their 40s. (They're certainly having babies later.) Why do you feel there is still all that pressure on women to marry this young? And is a lot of the pressure put on by the women themselves? Also, coming from an older generation, I grew up hearing that marriage was NOT the brass ring, that we should go out and have adventures and careers and friends and that to be single was not a punishment or a sentence. Why do you think your generation returned to this idea of marriage as the be-all and end-all?

I realize that it might sound anachronistic, but I still posit that even with all of the progress we’ve made over the decades, women may be breaking glass ceilings professionally, but they’re still crashing personally – and it’s because they’re missing what they consider the most important sphere in life: marriage. Despite the statistics that would indicate that marriage numbers are on the decline, my own research has pointed ot the notion that marriage is still one of those ideals that will stand the test of time.

I’ve seen 18 year-olds panic and I see 45-year olds panic – the Panic knows no bounds – and it certainly transcends time and age. But this question touched on an important point: where and what is the origin of this panic-fueled phenomenon that continues to plague America’s singles population? Of the scores of women I interviewed for the book, many of the same women who claim they want to get married so badly are the ones who actually have a hard time articulating the reasons they want to marry.

A large swath of these panic-stricken women actually fail to assess just why they’re so consumed with the idea of marriage; the concept has simply been so ingrained and such a part of the social conditioning that there’s a real lack of self-awareness in terms of personal wants and needs. Failing to be in tune with our own goals certainly fuels many cultural myths, including that of a female marrying by 30 or else she’s a veritable failure.


4. So where do you see yourself in five years? And what are you working on now?

I’m a full-time writer who can’t imagine working in any other realm. I hope to continue working in various journalistic outlets – and hopefully spreading my wings as a writer and person. While writing “The Panic Years” was so gratifying and important to me, I wouldn’t have written it if it weren’t so close to the bone. Readers certainly know when an author is passionate about her topic, or simply going through the motions, and I think that in order for any literary product to fly, the voice really must ring true. So any future project I tackle is one that I know will touch me in a real way.

5. What questions didn't I ask that you wish I had?

One topic that I think really lends itself to the whole “Panic Years” discussion is that of “having it all” in life. I’ve been asked about how realistic it is to “have it all”– and I think the language of the question itself is so telling.

While I do think that we – women, men, singles, panickers, non-panickers, etc. – can ‘have it all’, it’s essential to define what “having it all” really means. When we use that kind of loaded language, we’re almost setting ourselves up for inevitable disappointment; it suggests that what we have today will not be good enough tomorrow. With that kind of fate we’re sealing for ourselves, we almost ensure that we’ll never be fully happy because we’ll always want, covet, desire more, instead of appreciating what we have today and saying, That’s good enough. We needn’t surrender the idea of "having it all" in life. If we're determined to actualize it, we can "have it all"; but in order to achieve that, we may have to move the goalposts first. It's only when we redefine "having it all" can you first start to tackle it in a real way.

Second Life Novels

Every novelist knows the drill. You put out a novel and pray for reviews, readers and a long shelf life, but that sometimes doesn't always happen. Or if it happens, it happens in the first six months and then fades away. But sometimes, books get a second wind, and when that happens--well, there's magic.

Elizabeth Rosner is a spectacular writer. Her first novel, THE SPEED OF LIGHT , about three people's (two grown children of holocaust survivors and a housekeeper who is the only living witness to her government's massacre of her Central American village) grappling with their pasts and struggling for a future, has been given a wondrous plug in the July issue of O (Oprah Magazine), thanks to the "bookshelf" of Gillian Anderson. (Elizabeth was just recently in London with Gillian to work on finalizing the film script for the novel's adaptation.)

This fabulous publicity, of course, makes it perfect and amazing timing for sales to skyrocket! However, Amazon says they are currently out of stock. But if everyone orders a copy anyway, this sends a very potent message to Amazon and to the publisher that copies of this 2003 novel are still in demand. Oh, and don't forget to write an Amazon review for this title as well.

Writing novels is a tough, sometimes lonely, and passionately satisfying job. To hear that a first novel from a few years ago now has a new life is extraordinary, don't you think?

Let us Now Praise "Reading with Robin"

Writers need all the pr they can get, and when there is a friendly, smart and uber passionate reader behind the pr, it's even better. Case in point, Robin Kall , the creator and host of Reading with Robin, a WHJJ Providence, RI radio talk show devoted to authors, readers, and their favorite--and not so favorite--books.

Launched in 2002, every week Robin has great guests on and invites listeners to call in with comments and questions--and she gives away books! She's had guests such as Alice Hoffman, Jodi Picoult, David Baldacci, and me, me, me!

Being on Robin's show was wonderful--an event so special to me that we became friends afterwards. Robin also is on the Board of Directors of Reading Across Rhode Island and the Rhode Island Center for the Book, and is the guest at book club meetings throughout the state. And she fights against breast cancer with "walking with Robin," a team that was one of the top fundraisers the past few years.

Check out Robin's wonderful website and blog and listen in for some fabulous book talk.

writing student successes!

For no other reason than I like it, I've attached a photo. On the right is the backdrop of the Empire State Building from Max's soccer field, and that isn't a UFO (wish it were) in the sky, but a very bright light.

One of the things that I do, which I adore, is to work with and help other writers. I teach novel writing at UCLA, I consult for them and for some agents and I mentor privately. This weekend, I found out one of my students got a bite from a fabulous agent who heard her read, and one was accepted to study in a prestigious program with Dorothy Allison. Of course the funny thing is while I can help other writers, I am always swimming without a life raft in my own work, unable to see what works and what doesn't without the help of my possee of readers and friends. Why is this, I wonder, and can I develop the tools I need so I can help myself more? Is it psychological? (I bet it is.) Can it be helped?

On another front, I wish I had a really cool knitting pattern for a sweater, but everything I see looks well...usual. I want hip! I want cool and asymmetrical! I want exotic yarn that doesn't itch and is in a deep, dark edgy color!

Read Months and Seasons

My friend and UCLA colleague Chris Meeks is also a great writer. And I'm not the only one to think so. The LA Times Book Review said of Chris's first book, The Middle Aged Man and the Sea, "The stories are poignant and wise, sympathetic to the everyday struggles these characters face." Entertainment Weekly raved, "A collection that is so stunning...that I could not help but move on to the next story."

In Chris' new collection, Months and Seasons, (you can see the great cover at the right), he deals with people grappling with the jolts of everyday (or not so everyday) life. From a supermodel who wakes up after heart surgery to find her inner and outer landscape changed to a Manhattanite who believes she's a chicken, these stories surprise, shock and deeply resonate.

How cool are ecospheres?

Ecospheres have got to be the most amazing gift around. I first saw one in a magazine and Max and I decided that this was just the thing for Jeff for Father's Day. Developed by scientists, it's a contained biosphere, with water, oxygen, algae, shrimp that eat the algae, bacteria that eat the waste products of the algae, gravel and diatoms that keep things tidy. Astonishingly beautiful, it's also fascinating to watch. (I was a little worried I would feel claustrophobic watching shrimp contained in a glass ball, but that's not the case at all.)

The brine shrimp (yes, folks, big sea monkeys) can live from two to ten years. When the shrimp go to the great shrimp heaven, you can get the ecosphere "recharged" for a minimal sum, and depending on the light, the algae grows and turns green. The ecosphere itself is about 6" high and 4" wide and truly a thing of beauty.

Amazing, right?

Q and A with Meg Waite Clayton

Meg Waite Clayton's the author of a book with an irresistible cover (see right)--the written word, ah yes. But what's inside is just as riveting, and Meg was gracious enough to allow me to pepper her with questions.

(I also want to mention Meg's great blog, first books, which are terrific stories of how writers get started.) Now, back to our interview.

1. The Wednesday Sisters seems to be a very different novel than your first novel, The Language of Light. Deeper and richer and more complex. Can you talk about how you progressed from one book to the other?

Well thank you!
My writing progress definitely did not come in a straight line. Between The Language of Light and The Wednesday Sisters, I worked on a few things that didn’t pan out or haven’t quite come together yet. One very pivotal moment for me, though, was at the Sewanee Writers Conference, which I was very lucky to attend as a Tennessee Williams Scholar the summer after The Language of Light came out. I studied with Tim O’Brien, who gave us all a piece of advice that made me rethink how I was writing: He suggested we ought to be using extraordinary actions by our characters to illuminate ordinary and universal emotions. I really embraced that advice as I set out to write The Wednesday Sisters. It took me way out of my comfort zone, but that turns out to be as good thing for my writing as it is for so many things in life.

2. The thing that I really loved about your novel was the slow patient way you built up your characters while setting them against a major chunk of history. What was the research process like? Was it a combination of having lived it, talking to women who had, books, or something different altogether?

I was pretty young in the late 1960s; at the time the book opens, I was eight years old, so in some ways the character I am closest to is Kath’s daughter, Anna Page.
I do have memories of the period. Watching Neil Armstrong step onto the moon, for example, is one of my most vivid childhood memories. I remember the Olympic Black Power salute from the 1972 Olympics, when I was thirteen, too, and watching the Miss America Pageant. So I have some emotional response to those events to draw on. But even the events I remember, I don’t remember in detail. I definitely had some research to do.

I have a huge three ring binder overfull of things I collected for The Wednesday Sisters. I pored through magazines and newspapers from the late 1960s, picking out clothes and hairstyles they would wear and trying to imagine which articles they might read and what they would think of them. I did research on the state of medicine at the time, the state of scientific research, the details of peace marches and women’s rights sit-ins and women’s running. I even researched what kind of typewriters and copy machines and credit cards were and were not available at the time. I went through bestseller and top-forty lists, listened to music from the era, and watched old Tonight Show clips and old movies. (All great fun!) One of the most compelling things I did was watch the lunar landing and lunar walk footage; even still, I well up with emotion when I watch that!

The staff at the Palo Alto library was a great resource, especially Steve Staiger of the Palo Alto Historical Association, who gave me access to about a million photos. And for the things I hadn’t personally experienced, I relished opportunities to touch base with someone who had, including my mom.

I love research because it not only illuminates the things I don’t know, but also leads me to new launching pads.

One of the things I learned along the way, that I personally experienced but didn’t really remember: I started high school the year Title IX passed, but before it went into effect. My yearbook from my freshman year has pages and pages of boys’ sports, but very few of girls’ sports. There were only six teams girls could play on, two of which were bowling and archery. (I show up on the badminton team.) Not even a girls’ track team. Can you imagine that?

3. Writing plays a major part in these characters lives. I loved the message that writing doesn't have to culminate in a book deal, that it can feed the soul of anyone who works hard at it, that with hard work, it is possible to get better, and that writing can make sense of one's life. Can you talk a little bit more about this?

Like the Wednesday Sisters, I’ve come to know myself much better through my writing. I like to think maybe this is reward enough for writing, and there have certainly been times when the publishing side of things was not going well and I clung to that. Sometimes I think writing without the goal of being published might even result in better writing. I did start The Wednesday Sisters at a low moment in my writing career, and except for showing the first couple chapters to my husband and my best writing pal, I wrote it in isolation. That was liberating, actually, to just write what I thought I would like, without worrying what others would think.

(Although it was very scary then to turn the draft over to others!)
I know that even before I’d ever published a word I was already getting a lot out of writing personally. I have kept journals ever since I started writing in earnest, which turn out to be wonderful records of my sons’ lives and my own. (Which of course I feel free to borrow from when I’m writing!) The community of people I’ve met over the years as a writer is also something that is really special; I sometimes think I might keep writing just so I can enjoy their company. I observe the world much more closely as a writer than I ever did before, too—and so enjoy it more, I think.

4. I'm always interested in process. What's your writing day like? For you, what is the most difficult part of the writing?

If I had to pick a single word to describe what makes me a writer, it would be “discipline.” It sounds boring compared to the bursts of great inspiration I, at least, used to imagine constituted the makings of a real writer, but I sit down every day at the computer or with my journal or manuscript, and I do my best.

I know very few writers who couldn’t wallpaper the entire mansion in the Wednesday Sisters’ park with rejection slips, including myself. But the only thing you have to lose by trying is a little pride, and that’s a small price to pay for a shot at your dream. So I sit down and write.
My rule for myself when I’m writing first draft—and my chocolate expenditures definitely skyrocket when I’m writing first draft—is 2,000 words or 2:00. If I’ve got 2,000 words by 10:30 in the morning, I can eat bon bons all day. But the truth is if I’ve got 2,000 words by 10:30, I’m not getting up even for lunch because that is a great writing day.
I don’t even need rules for myself when I’m revising. For me, first draft is like going to a cocktail party where I know no one, and revision is like sitting down over coffee with old and dear friends.

5. What are you working on now?

I’m finishing up the first draft of a new novel with the splendid title of “Untitled Catholic Story.” At the moment, it is definitely drivel, but I’m hopeful there is a story that can be pulled out of the muck.

6. What question didn't I ask that you wish that I had?
How about: How do you hope readers will experience The Wednesday Sisters?
And the answer:

Joyously! I think of it as a little bit of a fairy tale, and I hope that, like the best fairy tales, it will make readers imagine—and reach for—great futures for themselves.
And I hope that they will respond like one blogger who posted that “…when I finished, I emailed all of my best girlfriends just to tell them I love them.” I’d just spoken to my friend Brenda, my “Tuesday Sister” (because that’s when our Nashville writing group met), when I read that post, but after reading it I picked up the telephone again and called Jenn, my #1 Wednesday Sister, to tell her I loved her.

Announcement

I am thrilled to announce that my novel Breathe (originally called Traveling Angels) was bought by Algonquin Books. Pub date and details to follow.

Oh! I am quite breathless with joy!

time on my hand question

In the middle of novel writing and script writing, I keep thinking that I need to change the look of this blog. Should I got all white? Or should I keep it as it is? I have to also overhaul my website very soon, which is going to be a royal pain, so I'm open to suggestions and my only criteria is I don't want it to look like everyone else's, too uber-polished without the quirky messiness which is me. So, if anyone is really, really helpful, I'll give them the other thing I like to paint, a ladder in the sky.

it's STILL hot

1.Peppermint ice tea
2. Grapefruit ice pops from Garden of Eden
3. Cold foods to eat
4. Air conditioning
5. lots of books
6. lots of movies
7. knitting, though I wrecked the sleeves so that's an irritant right now
8. Jeff and Max

OK, summer isn't too bad if you stay indoors a lot.

A respite from heat whining: Read this book!

What's better than reading in air conditioning on a sweltering day? (See, I'm not whining).

Sandra Gulland's Mistress of the Sun was on the best-seller list in Canada for over two months. It's also a BookSense pick for June. Her interview is particularly fascinating for me because of the smart, savvy way she talks about the process of writing and of research.

Mistress of the Sun has a fascinating topic--the power these women really had, set against the backdrop of glimmering Versailles. What drew you to writing historical fiction in the first place?
I came to historical fiction by the back door. My first novel was a futuristic story about the end of the world. I grew up during the Cold War, and the end of the world was with me always, and perhaps I thought I could shed it by writing about it (thereby passing it onto some undeserving reader). Fortunately, the novel was unpublishable. My next novel was lighter: a contemporary comedy of manners about an elderly eccentric inconveniently possessed by the spirit of Josephine Bonaparte. Part of the convoluted plot entailed the spirit leading the woman to a diary written by "Josephine" and a fuddy-duddy historian coming in to document this discovery. Only a few pages of this manuscript was the so-called "diary" written by Josephine. I sent the rough draft to Jane Urquhart, then Writer in Residence at University of Ottawa. She told me that the diary pages had life, and suggested I forget the rest. I had long wanted to tell Josephine's story, but lacked the courage. And so, given this nudge, I began writing Josephine's diaries and let go of the contemporary scaffolding. So clearly, I came to historical fiction in a very round-about way.

It's been said that your books don't read like historical fiction at all, that in fact, they seem a unique kind of writing, which is quite a compliment. Why do you think your historical fiction is in a class of its own? Is this deliberate on your part?
I do take this as a complement — thank you — but it's certainly not deliberate on my part. Perhaps my ignorance of the historical fiction genre has something to do with it. But most of all, I feel that people of the past are simply people, not that different from you and me. I'm pleased that historical fiction fans like my novels, but I'm especially pleased when they engage readers who do not, as a rule, read historical fiction. How do you feel about researching (love it/hate it) and what's your research process? Do you try to stay as close to the facts as possible or do you feel yourself drawn to the embellishing of the truth? I love research: love it, love it, love it! (Have I made myself clear?)My research method sounds more systematic than it is. I basically wade into the subject, resolved to study the most current and respected biographies first, but invariably get side-tracked by the more esoteric works. I post dates and events to an elaborate timeline.

In the timeline, I look for the factual arc of a story, and then write a draft. I don't write in many details at this stage. I'm looking for the emotional line of the story within the scaffolding of facts. This is where embellishment can be so important. Action A is followed by Action B — but how, and why? A historian can simply state the facts, but a novelist must show how they connect. It has to make sense — and this is where it's so important to feel your way into a character's story, imaginatively try to discover the emotional truth in the facts. In order to bring that truth to life, one must embellish. Once I more-or-less have what I think will be the story in place, I know what further research I need to do. That's when I travel to the significant sites in the novel, and research the themes that have emerged in the early drafts.Then, of course, I have to revise — re-vision — and the process begins again: revise and research, research and revise as the shape of a novel, the character's story, begins to come more clearly into focus. I like to stay as close to the facts as possible. That's what fuels my imagination. It gives me something concrete, something to begin with.

Often it's the tiny factual nuggets — the small discoveries — that allow my imagination to flower. In learning that Louise de la Vallière's father had a gentle expression, for example, and that he worked to heal the sick, I began to have something I could work with.That said, the story is all-important. I simplify and shift the factual record if need be. What I love about your novels are the rich, amazing little details, like putting Belladonna in the eyes to make pupils dilate. What are some of your other favorite details?I love researching details of daily life: I collect them avidly. }

One I love but did not have occasion to use in Mistress of the Sun was a military school practice of keeping a room warm with a hot cannon ball in a bucket of sand. I hope to be able to use that in my next novel. With Mistress of the Sun, I had a lot of fun with language. I enjoyed searching Books Google [http://books.google.com/] for archaic expressions. For example, "red as a ...." What might someone in the 17th century have said? A quick check on-line and I'd discover a wealth of archaic expressions: red as a turkey-cock, red as a drunkard. One I used was red as a pulpit cushion.For Mistress of the Sun, I did a great deal of research into 17th century horsemanship, learning about bread baked specially for horses, the words used to describe a horse (a flea-bitten or mouse color, knees great, plain, & firmly knit) and the methods used to train a horse (the word cherish so often used). It was horrifying to read the midwifery guides of the time, full of graphic details. These helped me to understand the realities of the lives of women.

You live in rural Canada for part of the time, I believe. Do you find being outside of a city has its benefits in writing? Or could you live anywhere?
My husband and I now have two homes: one in remote, rural Canada, and the other in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, where we live in the center of town. I very much enjoy the contrast. I have an office in both places and am always working, but I aim to do the high-concentration early draft in my Canadian home, where it is quiet and there aren't many distractions. In San Miguel, there are many temptations, but they can be quite inspiring creatively. I think I could live and write anywhere, likely. I've learned to use headphones to shut out the world. The problem, as a historical novelist, is that at a certain stage of the writing I need to be close to my reference books — and books are not so easily transported. I have some books I take back and forth, and some that are duplicated, but my main reference library is in our home in Canada, and so that's where I "thicken" scenes and fact check.

I know, I know, everyone asks this question most likely, but I'm fascinated by how other writers write. Do you outline? Do you know the heart of your novels or does it all emerge through the writing? You're writing about historical figures, so a lot is already known about them, but what surprises you about these people as you write?
I love this question, actually, and I'm always interested in how other writers answer, in part because I'm always looking for that elusive "better way."It took me eight years to write Mistress of the Sun: too long. My cut file is at least three times the length of the novel. After the novel had been accepted for publication in both Canada and the U.S. — after everyone was more or less happy with it and thought it just needed tweaking — I lopped off the last third and completely revised it. It wasn't until the final days that I even knew what the ending would be. All this to say: I don't want to take eight years to write my next novel, so I'm giving a lot of thought to my method. I want find a way to get closer to the essential story sooner.In the past, I would outline, but once into the draft I would forget about it completely. Then, between drafts (and there were many), I might outline and analyze, trying to figure out what was wrong, trying to figure out how to make it right. The "heart of the novel," as you so nicely put it, emerges very, very slowly. While it's true that the broad outline of my character's life is set in history, what she felt about what happened — and, most importantly, why she did what she did — remains unknown. That's the part that's challenging: figuring that out — and in doing so, the heart of the novel begins to be revealed. It takes many drafts. Right now, for my next novel, I'm hoping to have imaginatively worked through the story more before I begin. I'm trying Robert Olen Butler's dream-storming technique (as explained in his excellent book, From Where You Dream. it's a fluid out-lining method that I hope will help me get closer to the heart of the story without going down so many dead-ends. I’m not sure that can be avoided, however.

Can you tell us about your next project?
I'm thinking a lot about La Grande Mademoiselle, the Sun King's big, oaffish and eccentric cousin. She was a fireball, a warrior, an early feminist, a writer, and the wealthiest person in Europe — wealthier than the King himself. She rejected marriage to practically every king in Europe ("Not good enough!"), only to fall for the charms of a short, ugly womanizer, a lowly courtier. They secretly married, but he became abusive and she kicked him out. As with all life stories, it's long. There are a number of fantastic "chapters," but I'm not sure which I would focus on. I've lots of mulling to do yet.

You believe in your fans so much that you included them in the critique process of Mistress of The Sun. What was that process like? Did you make all the suggested changes or just some of them? Would you do it again?
I used to be an editor, and I'm a strong believer in the value of the editorial process. For me, reader feedback, and lots of it, is essential. In addition to my editors — who are wonderful and very rigorous — I lean on friends to give me critical feedback along the way. Then, when the manuscript is finally "there" and just about to be published, I arrange to have one or two book clubs read and discuss it. They're sent manuscripts, and they tape-record their discussion. I provide a brief guideline and a few questions, but other than that, it's open-ended. They send me the tape: I play it, cry — and then I get to work. I don't make all the suggested changes by any means, but I do try to resolve areas of difficulty. Based on reader responses to Mistress of the Sun, for example, I reworked the opening, cut an early chapter, and developed the ending quite a bit more. I think it's a stronger novel as a result and I'm grateful for that. A novel is only born once.

What do you wish I had asked you that I didn't?
This: Every novel presents a challenge. What did you find challenging about writing Mistress of the Sun? Louise de la Vallière's story was challenging because she leaves her children and the King to join a convent: how does one make that a "victory" ending for a modern reader? And yet it was a victory for her. So that was my greatest challenge: to tell her story in a way that the reader would applaud her. I'm pleased to say that, from reader reports and reviews, I think I may have succeeded.

104 in the shade

Holy Moly. Does anyone out there like summer, and if so, can you tell me five reasons why?
Crankily, Caroline

heat exhausted

Ugh. It's 95 and the three h's-hot, hazy and humid. Tomorrow in the NYC area it's supposed to feel like 104. Every time I hear a newscaster bubble, "What a gorgeous day!" I want to scream because gorgeous, to me, is 65 degrees (70 is negotiable), blue skies and no sticky sunblock (being a reasonable facsimile of Caspar the friendly ghost by nature, I need a gallon of SPF 90000 not to burn--plus I like being pale!)

If anyone has the following or knows how to make any of this happen, please, I beg you, take action! The list is in no particular order. I'll also gladly accept anything not on the list, so please do send your creative suggestions, or your own list, to me:
1. a backyard swimming pool
2. a beach house right on the water (without sharks or jellyfish in the ocean, thank you.
3. personalized air conditioning that follows me where I go
4. sunblock that works and that isn't sticky and disgusting
5. mango ice pops
6. critically and commercial acclaimed new novel and a great time writing my new one
7. a movie deal for a film that really and truly gets made--and made brilliantly
8. Obama as president
9. the discovery of the theory of everything
10. proof of reincarnation
11. perfect health, money and joy for everyone I love
12. Love. of course. The be all and end all. Love.

Two project tango

Do people out there work on two projects at once? I don't mean a novel and a script, I mean two novels at once. I am bouncing back and forth, and the only reason I'm not stopping is that it's a lovely feeling (albeit a very confusing one.)

Friday's Forgotten Books

I've been tagged by novelist Clea Simon to participate in the wonderful Forgotten Books Project, spearheaded by the fantastic writer Patti Abbott. Writers choose a book that they have loved and that they feel has been wrongly forgotten or neglected. Every Friday, a writer writes up a brief review of the book (or it appears on Patti's wonderful blog) and then the writer tags someone else to do the next book. Brilliant, right?

And very, very hard to select just one book.

But, that said, one book i adore is After Life by Rhian Ellis. It's on my special shelf in my office, so I can dip into it at will. It begins with a thirtyish woman dragging her boyfriend's dead body out of her apartment and burying it, and guess what, the story gets even more tense and wonderful from then on. The heroine Naomi Ash comes from a long line of mediums, and she practices her craft in a spiritualist town, but After Life is about so much more than the business of being (or not being) psychic. yes, the details about mysticism and the rise of spiritualism are fascinating, but this book's poetic, evocative and wrenching heart is really after truths about the nature of reality, love and being human.

"A lonely life is a crime without witnesses," Naomi says, "Can you ever be sure what happens in it?" Naomi certainly can't, and although she buries her boyfriend Peter, ten years later, his bones wiggle to the surface, and an investigation begins. Between a terrifying reality, insistent spiritual visions (including ghostly walk-ons from Peter himself) and yearning hopes for a better future, Naomi navigates a jagged line to a conclusion that's shattering, suspenseful, and deeply satisfying.

This was truly one of those novels that made me yearn, "Why didn't I write this?" This writing is fluid and haunting. Ellis skips back and forth through time effortlessly and with great grace, the characters are so alive you can hear them breathing on the page. After Life is a psychological thriller that still surprises reading after reading--and what's higher praise than that?

I'm tagging Miriam the Medium novelist Rochelle Jewell Shapiro next!

Read This Book!

Imagine this. You take your sunny six-year-old daughter to the hospital for something routine and hours later she dies of a massive infection.

Imagine trying to come out from under all the grief, to make sense of it, or to find the slightest reason for any sort of joy at all. Novelist Ann Hood did exactly that in her astonishing brave and heartwrenching new memoir, Comfort: A Journey Through Grief (I raved about it in Dame Magazine this month.)

Ann was gracious enough to answer some of my questions, posted below

1. Although grief is not circular, but more of a rollercoaster, the element of the circle of time figures predominantly in the book for me. There's the photo on the cover of the lovely circular bracelet, and there is also the circle of your adopting a little girl at the end of the book. Do you feel that there is any sort of sense to life now? Or is it simply the day to day moments that give life meaning and purpose?

I am more appreciative of moments, of finding the extraordinary in the ordinary: Annabelle's hugs, my son Sam singing on stage in Fiddler on the Roof, the smell of lilacs in my yard. Perhaps we are not meant to make sense of life? For me, losing Grace will never make sense. All I can do is remember, again, the brief moments I had with her and relish them.

2. What I loved about this extraordinary book was your bravery. What's truly comforting is that you don't offer any false comfort. There is simply the honest sense that this is the way it was for you and you show yourself emerging as best you can. You don't try to impose any sort of tied-up-with-a-bow meaning. Did you read any of the plethora of books on grieving that are in the stores (or did you hurl them across the room?) Did anything, other than knitting and your family, help you?

I hurled them! I did! Some tried to give outlines and steps to get over loss, and I found that not only insulting but also futile. Dr. Therese Rando's books on grief are useful and honest. Bt I found those later. Knitting, friends, family, my return to cooking and reading. Those got me through. they still do.


3. What I also loved about your book was how the voice differed in the essays, from the ragged anger of the prelude to the almost haunting calm of the final essay. Was there ever a moment when you felt, no, I don't want to be writing about this anymore, or do you feel that this time and this grief will somehow always be infused in your writing?

I think this grief will always be lodged in me, and as time passes and I see new pieces of it I will write about that. But I also am pleased that I have moved into other writing that celebrates life: a travel piece on Tuscany for Bon Appetit, going "green" for Good Housekeeping, cooking with my family for More Magazine. And a new novel.



4. Your new book, I believe, is about adoption. Can you speak a little bit about it?

I am very superstitious about talking too much about something so new. But I can say that it explores several families on the path to adopting babies from China, like we did with Annabelle. At its heart, it is about baby yearning, love, and hope.



5. What question should I have asked you that I didn't?

Well, I just want to say that Monday night I was sitting at a cafe with a friend in NYC, on 6th Avenue, and I watched all the people passing by, and I thought: I am no different than anyone of them. Loss is part of all of our lives. But I was very lucky to be given this gift of writing, the ability to articulate what we all feel, to put words to this enormous thing. That is what I tried to do.

Darling starling

How beautiful is this starling on the right? We found a baby in our flower pot in the front of our house, anxiously waiting for his mother who was nowhere to be found. (Actually, the contractor found it in the middle of the street, scooped it up and gently put it in our flower pot.) Because we live in an urban area, there are all sorts of cats, dogs, traffic, and etc. that are dangerous, so we banged on the door of a neighbor, our resident nature expert who told us we had to go get an eye dropper and baby food and feed the bird. It's also a myth that touching birds antagonizes the mothers. Birds have lousy senses of smell and won't notice any human scent.

Feeding a baby starling was the most incredible experience! You have to sort of gently hold the bird and then very, very gently prod the mouth open and then squeeze in the food (organic chicken and veggie baby food at the pricey Garden of Eden! Nothing's too good for the starling!) We called the uber cool bird rehabilitation center who told us to get the bird to them, to keep it warm and not to give it water because birds aspirate water and drown. Oh. Nothing like making us nervous.

Jeff woke up at six in the morning worrying about the bird (the starling was singing! He was fine!) and we all piled in the car and drove 45 minutes to the bird place. They introduced him to a bunch of other starlings and we roamed around looking at all the gorgeous birds they rehabilitate and then set free into the wild! All the cages had great signs, too, (In memory of Roger Lafone, tough as an eagle, gentle as a dove...This is dedicated to Mary Chelsea. She loved birds and they loved her back) and of course as soon as we left, I started to ache for the starling and miss him.

Oh, I have a marshmallow heart!

Help! I hate my keyboard, plus welcome to Bookballoon

First, I am still battling the keyboard wars. I tend to mangle my keyboards because I type so hard and fast, the letters wear out within a month. I've tried press on letters (they wore out), a keyboard condom (ghastly and it somehow trapped dirt inside the plastic shield, which made it doubly disgusting) and I have worked my way through two Logitechs. One was insane and somehow screwed up things in my computer. The second Logitech, with programmable keys, just for fun would put plus and minus signs in the middle of the copy. I now (you would think I would learn, but I haven't) have a logitech wave. Love the design--ergonomic, comfortable, nice key feel, but the space bar is so LOUD it makes me crazy. So does anyone know a good, quiet, ergonomic-but-not-split-keyboard keyboard that I can fall in love with enough to want to marry it?

Next, I want to tell every one about BookBalloon, a new online community, “where readers and writers discuss books and the arts.” The heart of the site is the discussion forum. And the heart of the forum is the reading club, which tackles a different book, new or classic, each month, selected by the members. June’s book is American Woman by Susan Choi; July’s will be The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri; and August’s will be Virginia Woolf’s To the Lighthouse.
Other discussion threads focus on specific genres, publishing news, and literary events. Aside from books there are discussions of movies, music, current events, and more.

The forum also offers several threads on craft and publishing specifically aimed at writers.
BookBalloon also features special events, such as Q&As with special guests. June’s guest will be Logan Ward, author of See You in a Hundred Years: Four Seasons in Forgotten America. Ward will be visiting and chatting with members beginning June 24th.

Friendly and free. Go check it out. And if anyone knows how to quiet a noisy space bar or has suggestions for a great keyboard that isn't the price of a small country, please let me know!

Q and A with Welcome to Shirley author Kelly McMasters

Welcome to Shirley is a terrific , smart and heartbreaking memoir about growing up in an atomic town that I raved about in Dame. I loved it so much I pestered for a Q and A and the author Kelly McMasters was gracious enough to answer my questions. I especially loved what she had to say about the de-romanticizing of the writing process.

1. I love the fact that you were on the road to becoming a lawyer and you gave it up to write. But how did the idea of writing about your home town come about?

I went to grad school focused on a completely different project—my great grandparents performed on the vaudeville circuit and I’ve always wanted to dig into their story. But while I was in school I started working on a collection of essays, and each essay kept returning to Shirley, my hometown. I produced a number of them before one of my professors took me aside and suggested I look for a link—what question was I trying to answer by continually delving back into that place and time? The book started to come together once I hit on that question—why, when I have these beautiful memories of my childhood and my friends and I talk about our hometown as magical do we also have a sense of shame about the place where we grew up?


2. I read and loved and essay of yours on Powells.com where you talk about the writing process, how you spent so much time workshopping your intro that you were finally told the workshop wouldn't be looking at any more intros of yours anymore, to get on with it and write! How is your writing process going now? (And what are you working on?)

Thank you! I was so excited to write an essay for Powells.com, and was surprised when that story popped out. My workshop is such an important part of my writing process—we’ve been together in one form or another since grad school and do our best to support one another and keep each other on track. My agent is also incredible—I really don’t know what I would do without her. She read every chapter of the book and gave me detailed notes on structure as well as style. She also reads my essays when I think they’re ready to send out and edits those as well. This is incredibly rare in the business and I’m so thankful for my workshop and my agent.

In terms of process, I wish I could say I wrote every day, but I don’t; I do write most days, though. When I’m stuck, I take a page from one of my favorite writers Abigail Thomas and assign myself 2 pages on something—she suggests subjects like write 2 pages that take place in water, write 2 pages of lies, write 2 pages that involve 3 hard boiled eggs—and if it is a good day I lift my head and realize I’m on page 10. My husband has been an incredible influence on me; he is a painter, and I notice that often people romanticize what he does and imagine him in a bar every night or out gallivanting at galleries and sleeping till noon, but nothing could be more distant from the truth. Whether it is painting or writing, it is our job. If we are hung over, we produce crap. If we don’t focus and carve out time for producing the work, it isn’t going to get done. Some days you feel like writing, some days you don’t, but when you look at it as your job the excuses fall away and it is easier to just get down to work!

3. What's fascinating about Welcome to Shirley is the tone. Horrible things happened in Shirley, and yet, your childhood sounded idyllic in a whole lot of ways, because of the people. Are you still in touch with anyone from Shirley?

Idyllic is the perfect word. I’m still in touch with my four best friends from childhood, as well as their families and a group of friends from school who still live in there. The most amazing part of the book process so far has been the nearly one hundred emails I’ve received from people who either once lived or still live in Shirley. I’ve had letters from people who lived there in the 50s and from girls who are in their first year of college away from home, and all but two have been incredibly warm and excited about the book. Most, of course, talk about the people they’ve lost, and almost all of them love the good memories and nostalgia that the book shakes up in them.

4. I know, I know, it's the question every writer gets, but I'm curious. What are you working on now and how is it going?

I’m working on a collection of what I’m calling “country essays” right now, most of which focus around an old 1860s farmhouse and dairy farm that my husband and I are renovating in rural Pennsylvania. The first, called Hearts and Bones, was published in the Washington Post Magazine and I’m slowly building other pieces around that one. I’m reading lots of EB White and Verlyn Klinkenborg and George Elliot, trying to slow my rhythms down. Some writer friends told me to make sure I had another project going during the time that Shirley was hitting the shelves so I could sink into that one instead of obsessing about Shirley, and that has been a luxury. I haven’t figured out the motivating question yet so I can’t call it a book, but I am loving the work and it has a similar feel to the way the first book began, so we shall see!

5. What question didn't I ask and I should have?

One question that I think is important is: Why should someone who doesn’t know Shirley or live near Long Island care about this book?

I just returned from a trip to DC for a talk at the Cleveland Park Library, a reading at Politics & Prose bookstore, and an interview at the Wilson Center for George Seay’s Dialogue program. Folks in DC relate everything to policy, which was exhilarating and really opened up the conversation about the book. The national laboratories across the country have a history of pollution—in fact, most of the labs that focused on nuclear weapons are in worse shape than the Brookhaven National Laboratory; Brookhaven was moved to the top of the list because of its position on top of a drinking water aquifer—so this is clearly a national issue. More importantly, we are also standing at an historic moment in history: the Senate is about to look at a plan that provides $544 billion towards new nuclear power plant development in the United States. As Mr. Seay pointed out during our interview, policymakers often forget the human side of issues and don’t look beyond their reports and budgets. This book shows that human side and the subsequent collateral damage. This needs to be considered in the discussion about the ill-fated move towards nuclear power.

Let's hear it for Archie McPhee

Never having been fully mature, I admit I adore all things kitschy or silly or distinctly odd. When I worked at the odious video club hell, I was known for having a two foot long rubber lizard sprawled on my desk, which was almost as good as the big rubber fly I had tacked to my bulletin board. All courtesy of Archie McPhee.

Now that I am a mature person (heh), I have all sorts of little things like this in my office. Check out the top right: Mr. Bacon vs. Monsieur Tofu! Mr. Bacon and Monsieur Tofu are fired up and ready to rumble, but only one can remain at the top of the food chain! Mr. Bacon stands 5-5/8" tall and fights for everything salty, greasy and meaty. Monsieur Tofu is 3-3/8" tall and represents all things made of coagulated soy milk. The winner gets eaten for dinner! Each vinyl figure has bendable arms and legs.
Mr. Bacon vs.Monsieur Tofuitem 11814$9.95 ea.


But wait, there's more! Look to the right again. All copy, by the way is from Archie McPhee.

Horrified B-Movie Victims. We provide the victims, you provide the terror! Each dramatic play set includes nine 2-1/2" to 3" tall, hard vinyl victims captured in utterly terrified poses! Are they reacting to the advances of a giant, man-eating alpaca or the sight of your grandma in her nightgown and curlers? The possibilities are endless!
Horrified B-Movie Victimsitem 11642$15.95 ea.

Come on, you know you want them. And if you get them, and decide they aren't for you---please, please send them to me!

Morning Chocolate and a question

Askinosie Chocolate (Billed as "life behind bars...without parole) is truly the most delectable chocolate I have ever tasted. A friend sent me some as a congratulatory gift in this very cool box, and I have been eating the bars every morning. (I know, I know, but I also take vitamins.) This is the richest, deepest, darkest chocolate on the planet--and it's chocolate with a heart of gold because it's also made with an eye to the environment and to help the farmers. You just want to marry it!

This extraordinary chocolate is made from Cocoa beans from Ecuador, in a tiny town in the foothills of the Andres Mountain, the supposed resting place of the Quechua Indians before they went further into the Andes. The centuries famous Ecuador Ariba flavor is found in these beans. The chocolate is also made by Shawn Askinosie, the brother-in-law of the very cool co-owner of Energymuse.com, Heather Askinosie (Timmi Jandromy is the other founder.) This is my favorite place for very cool necklaces. (You want to marry the necklaces, too, and I swear by my prosperity one.)

Now that I am fortified with the chocolate post, I have a question. What makes a book YA? I never understood why Madapple (see a few posts down) was considered a crossover, and now I have a friend who has written a brilliant heartbreaker of a book (which is also very funny in parts) about a young girl, which publishers seem to think should be YA, which means rewriting the character, who is 8 up to 13--which makes it a whole different book with a whole different flavor. As written, this book reminds me of Ellen Foster, and that isn't YA--so can anyone explain the difference to me?

What you read/what you write

Lately, I've been thinking a lot about the subjects that draw me, and other writers to their work. Part of this is because I recently had an acquaintance hand me back my novel before she finished it. "You're such a happy person," she said (and it's true, I am. I'm completely immature and silly and so enthusiastic that a college roommate once asked me to tone it down.), "So why do you write such sad books?"

Why indeed.

I could talk about Plato, and the purging of pity and terror that any good catharsis should give you. I could talk about "Let's Hear it for the Unhappy Ending," a piece I wrote for the Boston Globe where I showcased sad novels I adored. I could mention how I call comic romps "flu books"--lots of fun when you are sick or want something for the beach, but something that doesn't quite satisfy a soul like mine, which yearns for Wuthering Heights over Friends.

Like most of the writers I know, I write the kinds of books I want to read, books that I hope are deeply emotional (getting that blood on the page), thoughtful, full of questions about love and relationships, and also I want them to be like a punch to the heart. But being a worrier by nature, I write about people caught in terrible circumstances fighting for a way out, and sometimes some of the people aren't so nice. Mothers leave their kids and don't look back. Lovers cheat in ways so cruel they could shatter your heart. People who are perfectly healthy reach for the jar of peanut butter and die in your arms. I think of what plotlines draw me. NOT this one: a woman quits her job and moves to Kansas where she becomes a champion breadbaker and meets the man of her dreams. BUT I do like this one: when a woman's sister dies suddenly, she suspects her sister's husband of beating her to death and kidnaps their baby and goes on the road. OK, maybe that's a TAD melodramatic, but you see where I'm going.

I can be happy because I work it out in the books. It's my catharis. So, what I want to know, is what subjects draw you as a reader, and as a writer? What is the question you're always struggling to answer? And sigh-of-hope, is there anyone out there who also loves the thorny novels, the heartbreakers with only a faint glimmer of hopeful light in them?

Happy holidaze

On the left is the ad that got me in trouble when I was 11. I saw it in a comic and because I wanted that miniature monkey (who wouldn't?) I sent away. Two weeks later, twenty five boxes of greeting cards showed up at the post office. My father refused them and sent them back and another week later, I received a registered letter from a lawyer threatening legal action for my "breach of contract." I cried and wouldn't tell my parents, but I finally did and my father got on the phone and said the magic words, "She's eleven."

Damn. I so wanted that monkey.

I also fell prey to the Sea Monkey scam, expecting them to do tricks like the ad showed, but alas, brine shrimp are brine shrimp.

Off to a craft festival (earrings! earrings!) and the home to read Margot Livesey's newest.

See you later, alligators.

Read This Book!

First of all, Madapple has one of the most arresting covers, doesn't it? I gave it a rave in my column at Dame Magazine, and I was so taken with it, I asked the author, Chistina Meldrum, if she'd let me pepper her with questions, and she very graciously agreed.

Madapple is dark, hallucinatory and haunting—and one of the most original novels I've read. Can you talk about how the idea came about? Where did Aslaug, the protagonist, spring from?

When I was an undergraduate, I studied comparative religion, and I was fascinated by the traditions and mythologies that seem to cross cultures. I thought it would be interesting to build a sort of mystery around some of these overlapping traditions.

Then I went to law school and began working as a litigator. During this time, I spent my days formulating arguments for my clients, selecting and emphasizing those facts that best supported by positions. In each case, my opposing counsel would do the same, emphasizing those facts that best supported her argument. In theory, truth somehow filtered through: the judge or jury would sort through the extreme arguments and parse out what was fair and true. In actuality, each argument oversimplified reality, and the ending result, while perhaps as fair as was feasible, often had little to do with truth.

It was this experience as a litigator, combined with my background in comparative religion, that spurred my writing of Madapple. In Madapple, I wanted to explore how we humans, in our attempt to understand the world, at times simplify and thereby distort it. I wanted to think about how we create categories, based on what we want or have felt or believe is socially acceptable, and then divide the world into these categories.

Specifically, I wanted to explore the dichotomy between science and religion. Having studied religion, I’d come to believe this dichotomy was a human construct. As Aslaug, the protagonist of Madapple, says, “Science describes the world, it doesn't explain it: it can describe the universe's formation, but it can't explain…how something can come from nothing. That’s the miracle.” Yet religion absent science also seems insufficient. If God exists, would not nature be a means by which to understand God? The more I researched the natural world in my writing of Madapple, the more convinced of this I became.

Ultimately, I hoped Madapple would be a contemplation on faith: faith in God; faith in science; and the way in which faith can both open the mind and confine it. And I hoped Aslaug, the protagonist of Madapple, would be an embodiment of this contemplation on faith. An isolated girl whose daily existence is utterly dependent on the natural world—on foraging—and who interprets the world through this lens; but whose emotional life, due to extraordinary circumstances, becomes fueled by religion and mythology. When these two ways of seeing the world collide in Aslaug’s trial for murder, the reader must ask: Is the devil in the details, or is it God? In the end, the categories fail: the answer is both. \

You talk about how rationality is "limited in its ability to capture the world"--a phrase I love. Can you talk about how this applies to the novel, and how it might apply to your own life and your own beliefs?

The phrase sprouts from the idea that the division between science and religion is a human construct that oversimplifies the real world. Limiting the world to what humans can understand rationally is to neglect the mysteries that lie everywhere. Science abounds with unanswered questions. Some of the most fundamental concepts in science, like gravity, cannot be explained: they can only be described. Humans might be able to use their rational faculties to describe in great detail the laws of nature, but no rational explanation can explain why the laws of nature function as they do. For me, life is richer when I am aware of and open to and curious about such mysteries.

Are you still working as a litigator or are you writing full time?

I am not working as a litigator. I am writing and parenting full time. But practicing law still informs my writing in ways that continue to surprise me. I hadn’t expected my legal background to be useful to me in my writing, but it has been. In Madapple, my legal background was useful in writing the trial scenes, of course. But the intellectual discipline of being a litigator—the training I’ve had in formulating arguments—has proven extremely useful to me in terms of plot development and storyline. In some ways, Madapple was like a novel-length argument, where each element was there for a reason and, in the end, it was essential that all the pieces fit.

What's your writing process like?
I write mostly during the day when my children are at school, but I also write in the evenings and on weekends when I feel compelled to do so. I don't use an outline to plot. I use more of a general framework. For Madapple, I actually made a graph—shaped like a bell curve. But I don't plot out every point. I plot out the main ones, then I write. And the writing often takes me in different directions than I'd intended. The process for me is dynamic. Sometimes the writing drives the plot, pushing it outside the confines of my plans, and sometimes the framework reins in the writing. I don’t share much related to my writing in the early stages of a project. I find I need to have the freedom to write without being concerned about what others would think, at least until I have solid draft. Once I have such a draft, it helps me to have guidance from others—to get fresh perspectives. But if I let go of a project too soon, I’ve found I can lose my way a bit.

Can you talk about what you are working on now?

My second novel also is a literary mystery of sorts. I’ve finished a draft, but I’m not yet ready to share much about it. It has been purchased by Alfred A. Knopf and will be edited by Madapple’s fantastic editor from Knopf, Michelle Frey.

What question didn't I ask that you wish I had?

The one question I have been asked more than any other about Madapple is why it is categorized as a young adult book rather than an adult book. The fact is, Madapple is what people in the industry refer to as a “crossover” book—that is, it is appropriate for mature teens and adults, but not for children. The protagonist in Madapple is sixteen. Although she is an unusual girl, having grown up under extraordinary circumstances, she grapples with many questions to which I believe older teens and adults might relate. That said, the book is in some respects controversial. I didn’t write it with the intention of being controversial, but I did write it hoping it would spur thought. For this reason, Madapple probably is not appropriate for teens under age fourteen, and it may be most appropriate for people sixteen and up.

Let us now praise Siggi's yogurt

I really don't love yogurt. I used to have six different kinds sitting in my fridge in my tiny 4th floor walkup in Chelsea, and they all almost went bad. I stopped eating it altogether years ago, though every once in a while I would gamely taste a new brand, only to feel jilted and cranky because the advertising promises were never fulfilled.


A few years ago, when we were in San Francisco, I discovered Continental Yogurt and went nuts for it, but of course, it isn't sold in the NYC area (I even wrote and begged the company to sell it here, too.)

Then I saw this Icelandic style skyr yogurt (Come on, who can resist the word Icelandic? I certainly can't) from Siggi Hilmarsson, which has got to be one of the all time most wonderful names on the planet. With flavors like Pear mint, pomegranate and pasion fruit, and orange ginger, (I am a gingerholic), this yogurt seemed irresistible. I bought a few to try. Plus, this yogurt is uber-healthy, with no gelatin, or high fructose corn syrup or aspartame or rBGH or preservatives; it's low in fat and sweetened with Agave nectar and it has three times the protein count of regular yogurt.

Oh. My. God.

This yogurt is so thick and creamy, it puts Continental to shame. The orange ginger has tiny pieces of ginger in it. The Pear mint is so divine I want to marry it (after I marry my computer.)

In which the author's keyboard is possessed

In between dealing with the face swelling, I got a new computer! (I always begin a new novel with a new computer, and it since it seems to take me a few years, it works out fine.) Because we all have Dells (I had a Mac years ago when I had a job job and loved it) and are all networked, I got a bright shiny silver one, that is so rich and pretty, I keep stopping work just to admire it.

However, my new keyboard was possessed.

It made the programs stop working, and made odd messages flash on the screen. When I typed, the time would show up at every other letter. We got on the phone with tech support for four hours, who gee, what a surprise, had no idea what was going on and nearly started with the dreaded "You have to reinstall windows." Finally tech got the problem fixed, and I got off the phone, and two seconds later, all the programs stopped working and the computer began flashdancing. The keyboard then began typing every other letter and forgetting the middle ones. When we changed back to my battered-within-an-inch of-its-life keyboard, everything worked!

There's only one problem remaining. I wish the type were a tad sharper. I tried Cleartype, but while it sharpened the type, it made the font size a tad too big, and no matter how I get back into display, it's either this slightly large size or miniscule. Does anyone out there have a Dell and know the solution?

Meanwhile, it's such a hopeful feeling to have a new computer. I wonder if it's legal in any state to marry your computer?

SexTV/Canada and me

Got your attention, right? Despite the name, SexTV in Canada is a prestigious, informative and very big television show in Canada, and their shows are concerned with sex and relationships. Recent shows include a report on polygamy and there's an upcoming show on the book, Going Gray, about the ramifications for women when they stop dying their hair (I reviewed this book for The Boston Globe.) So a crew came to my house yesterday to talk with me about my infamous Cassandra/High Infidelity essay that was in the anthology The Other Woman, in New York magazine, and has all this film interest, which is why I'm killing myself to finish the script.

Of course, two days before they were due to come, my face exploded. I had some sort of weird bump on my eyebrow which really hurt and the left side of my face was swollen to the size of a small planet. I rushed to the doctor who told me it was probably preseptic cellulitis and the infection was spreading and I needed to get to an opthamologist fast because this kind of thing can cause oh...blindness and brain disease. Totally panicked, I ran to the opthamologist who put me in a waiting room with a TV (I had to watch General Hospital) and then told me, nope it wasn't that. It was just a badly infected cyst and yes, the infection was spreading, and was I picking at it? Insulted, I said of course I wasn't picking at it. After the doctor asked me several more times if I was picking at it, he gave me antibiotic, told me to put hot compresses on it and told me to come back.

By yesterday, the swelling was gone except for a weird bit under my eye, and I did my best to spackle makeup on the little sucker.

But Michelle, the producer, and Jeff the camera guy were great. We sat around and made fun of Bush for a while, (and I told them in the dems don't take the white house, we are moving to Canada), then we made fun of the Queen, and then we got to work. Michelle asked a million smart, thoughtful questions and I wasn't nervous at all, which was a surprise. Afterwards they filmed me talking with Jeff, then filmed me walking, then we went to the river so they could film me with the Empire State building behind me.

Michelle thought Jeff was Italian and that I was Irish (This totally dumbfounded me and then I figured it was because of my pale skin, freckles, green eyes and black hair, I guess, which is known s black Irish.) This happens all the time, though when we were in France, the French thought we were both Italian, and when we were in Italy, the Italians thought we were French and Greek. Nope. We are Russian,Polish-American Jews. Spaciba, horosho. (Sorry, no Russian letters on my keyboard.)

Lots of fun and now I get to say I was on SexTV!
Infected swollen face and all!

Flower empowered

Max took this overhead photo of our wagon at the flower market today, a perfect way to spend Mother's Day. We live in a city, so our backyard is the size of a postage stamp, but big enough for flowers. Plus, the boy made me a movie for a gift!!!! I got orange glittery earrings from Jeff, and we bought dark chocolate for homemade ice cream tonight.

Happy mother's day to everyone out there who mothers others-!

Who Gets Reviewed and why?

As a novelist, I yearn for reviews. Of course I do. I worry and panic and if I still bit my nails (thanks to hypnosis, I gave that up last year!) I'd do that, too. I study every word of every good review wondering if they gave me the review because they felt sorry for me and I memorize every word of the bad reviews (I can still recite a Kirkus I got for my third novel by heart.) panicking that it might be true.

But, I know the other side, too. As a book columnist for The Boston Globe and Dame Magazine (I'm also a critic for People, but all those reviews are assigned), I have the privilege and responsibility of choosing about 8 books every month to review. I want to do right by authors. I want to give ink to the books that might be under the radar.

It's incredibly hard.

There are so many wonderful books that I often make huge piles and try to winnow it down before my deadline. Though I try to keep up with religious readings of Publisher's Weekly and Kirkus, I still somehow miss a lot of books--either because I didn't get the catalogue or I didn't hear about the book until too late--or I simply missed them. Sometimes I ask for a book and it gets lost in the mail and I'm so busy, I forget to rerequest. I work with a lot of fabulous publicists at the houses whom I trust completely. They know what I like and what I can't get through and they alert me to books I should know about. In fact, once a publicist called me and said, "I am trying so hard to get reviews for this book, but it's so sad, it's difficult." I immediately requested it (I adore sad books) and wrote a whole column around it (Let's Hear it for Unhappy Endings) for the Globe.

It breaks my heart sometimes, not to be able to give space to every book that comes in that I love. Right now I have eight books lined up that I desperately want to do for Dame, but I only have space for five. Some, I probably can do for the month after, but some, the pub date will make them too late. Some I can probably talk up on my blog, but some I can't.

I guess all this is in way of telling writers out there--that reviews sometimes don't happen because of space or timing, not because your book was not wonderful. And that reviews are really one person's opinion. There have been books that every other reviewer on the planet has loved and I've loathed. I've championed books that other reviewers have dismissed. So who is right? (I'm dying to say me, but that's just not so.) Of course, this is the kind of thing I tell myself when I get a review that isn't cause for celebration.

Before I was at People, my last novel, Girls in Trouble, was slated for a People review. I was thrilled! Everyone was thrilled! They called for me to take a photo and FedEx it to them the next day! I had Jeff take pictures of me standing on our front stoop, an urban landscape, and I was freezing in a little red velvet blouse because it was winter! (The People photo is on my website on the bio page, I think-)And then I waited. And Waited. I bought the magazine every week and the review never ran. I was sure it was because the review had been so awful they hadn't wanted to run it. But now that I'm at People, I know that many books are reviewed, but space, timing, and a whole lot of other factors all go into what the editors decide to run, and that many four star reviews I wrote for the magazine never saw themselves in print.

So I try. I try to give press to the books that might not get it otherwise, and I'm trying now to give press to books on my blog with author q and as, and my personal Ya Hoo Go and Read This Book Immediately! On my blog, I break the reviewer rule and I'll give press to people I know (with full disclosure, of course.)

It's a tough world out there and books need every bit of help they can get.

Buzz your book!

I'm a huge fan of M J Rose. She's a talented writer and a wonderful friend, but she also has this great biz, called AuthorBuzz.com which really helps writers get their book out there. It's four years old, and in the last two weeks alone, Author Buzz had four books on the bestseller list

Authorbuzz gets the news out to 350,000 plus readers, 10,000 librarians and 3,000 booksellers. What does 350,000 plus readers mean? Well librarians love AuthorBuzz so much they are putting the books on their own library websites increasing the weekly potential audience to millions, not just hundred of thousands. They also have blog ad campaignes which can reach millions. Plus, they are starting Blogathons to encourage bloggers to talk up a book. And of course they do creative brainstorming and campagins for radio, move theater and more.


It works brilliantly. Here's the email: Authorbuzzco@aol.com to talk about upcoming titles.

Let us now praise Minnie

It's coming up to an anniversary and I'm missing Minnie.

That's him, on the left, my Vietnamese tortoise who died last year. He was with my for over twenty years, and though I know it seems strange, I adored him. He was about 8" long and 4" wide and like all males, he had this gorgeous ring of orange around his eyes. He made clicking sounds when he was pissed off, which was about 70 percent of the time. He liked to walk around and his favorite toy was a rubber squid he liked to snap at.

By the way, it's a very bad idea to buy or sell turtles and tortoises, because they really belong in the wild, but I found Minnie in a pet store, jammed in a too small tank, and my then boyfriend and I decided we had to rescue him. (We promptly went on to rescue five more turtles. We used to let them roam around our Upper West Side apartment. One of the turtle's passions was to eat the lint off the small rug. )

Owning a reptile is very, very strange and wonderful. We took him to the Turtle Show in the Village where people showed off their reptiles, and in some really weird cases dressed them up (You can't imagine what it is like to see a turtle dressed as Zorro, complete with a little hat and cape. One person put a pink ballerina outfit on their Leopard tortoise--a reptile that is about two feet long and hardly dainty enough to go en pointe.) We visited one guy who kept 75 turtles in his basement, much to his wife's distress, and he crooned, "Michelle, Ma Belle" to his favorite, a little box turtle he lovingly held in his hand.

The boyfriend and I broke up, and I got custody of Minnie, to my great relief. I took Minnie to the curator of reptiles at the Natural History Museum and he admired him and then admonished me for kissing Minnie's shell. (Salmonella! I didn't know!) There were months when Minnie was the only human life inside my tiny apartment beside me, of course, and it was actually a wonderful comfort to see him every time I came into the apartment. When I began to date again, Minnie was my litmus test--love me, love my turtle. I'd walk Minnie in Central Park and on the street in front of my house, where nine times out of ten, some wiseacre would ask, "Oh, is that dinner?"

I miss him. I know this is an odd post, but the heart is a funny muscle.

Writing process

I still don't want to announce my big news until a contract is signed, but I am waking up amazed and happy.

And I'm working on a new novel. Starting a new novel is really hard for a whole variety of reasons. I have the initial idea, which I love, but executing it is going to be really tricky because it jumps about in time. It's like dipping your feet into a huge ocean and you aren't quite sure if that slice of black over there is a shark fin or just the way the light is hitting the water, but if you don't go in the water, you'll never swim.

I'm doing revisions on my last novel, so I can't quite hurl myself full-hearted into this new one, but I want to keep it alive so I try to think about it every day and at least write down a sentence or two, but there is always that terrible fear. Can I do this? Have I taken on something that's beyond me? And of course there are other questions--what is it really about? The what's it about question usually isn't answered untilt he 5th draft for me.

I just told another writer this morning that I only know one writer who "follows her pen", who has no outline or preconceived idea but goes right on ahead and writes her novels and does very well. I look at that in absolutely amazement. How is that possible?

So, what I'm really curious about is how other people start their projects. Are you filled with hope and excitement until you get to the middle of the novel when you lose your way? My last novel took me 4 years to write, and if I could prune that down to two for the next one, I would be so happy! I know part of it was a wrong turn in the storyline (I have a tendency to overstuff the plot) and once I got rid of it, the writing was really easy. Maybe this means showing a synopsis early on for me.

Anyway, I'd love to hear anyone's thoughts, especially fellow strugglers. Screenwriting counts, too.

Allergies and writing world

First, does anyone have any advice about childhood allergies? Max, the light of the universe, has all of a sudden developed allergies. He's been sent home from school twice because the white of his eyes turned red and he had deep purple gashes under his eyes, coughing fits that last into one in the morning. We've been to the doctor three times and have tried a bunch of meds. I'd love to have something natural. My mother is urging us to have him get allergy shots, but both Jeff and I had them as kids, loathed them, and found they didn't help. Anyone want to weigh in on this? Any and all advice will be so appreciated!

This is really hard because I just finished a novel about a young boy who has asthma. In my exhausted state, there is a bit of magical thinking going on--Max doesn't have asthma, thank God, but he does suddenly have these terrible allergies. Did art create life? I know it didn't, and I know it's dangerous to think this way. I'm just very, very tired.

Contest winners!

I want to thank everyone for participating and I've decided that anyone who wants a 2 x 2 watercolor of a coffee cup can have one. Just email me your address at carleavitt@hotmail.com and I will get out my paintbrush. (Frame not included. heh.)


Now here is a poem I love, sent to me by one of the people in my UCLA novel writing class:


Here I Am Exposed Like Everybody

Here I am exposed like everybody,
with one hand already in the other world,
with a subtle cord at my throat
that makes music and draws my blood.
This writing thing is awful—
someday I’ll die of loving someone—
they call it being a poet but it’s being a saint.
We’re not canonized, but we go around
with strange halos over our heads,
at night we sometimes glow brilliantly,
we have conversations with unseen creatures,
we see apparitions all the time,
and we sleep sitting up in the living room.
Our bosses despise us, our fellow workers
laugh at us behind our backs,
and only dogs follow us on the streets.
What I have in common with a saint
or beggar is loving one person above all things,
never having any shoes, and knowing
someday God will come down to do my hair.

…Gloria Fuertes