How Voice Is Helping Me Save My Story

Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about voice. What is a writer’s voice? To me, it's the honest, pure tone that flows from my innermost imagination, the very center of my being when I am my least inhibited and my most inspired. When I picture it, I see this lovely cloud of swirling mist, speckled with silver and gold, purples and blues and greens and oranges. Writer voice to me is almost like magic—with it, you can create entire worlds. It’s amazing. And it can be really hard to find—at least for me.

I’m editing another draft of The Fortune Teller’s Daughter, which is a book I started writing in August 2015. Interestingly, the scene that prompted the entire book is no longer even in it (which might give you some indication of where I’m at in the editing process). I hope to finish editing this draft by the end of July and up until today—I didn’t think I was going to make that goal. Here’s why…

I’ve learned a lot by writing 500 words every day. I’ve learned to keep stories fresh and vibrant, because they feel fresh and vibrant when I’m returning to them every day. At the same time, I’ve learned a little bit more about how to create deep point of views, how to blast filter words and how to do more showing than telling. My newer work bears the fruit of all this experience and learning—my older work, not so much. This makes it difficult to go back and edit something that was written with less practiced skills. To be honest—it’s caused a real struggle. I find myself questioning whether or not I’m editing out the voice of my book and trying to stop that from happening while still addressing what needs to be addressed.

Another difficulty, is that the last few books I’ve written have been in the first person—which was definitely not what I was doing in this book, so making the shift back into third person has been something of a challenge. (As an aside, my main strategy for addressing this has been to read third person books when I’m editing third person novels and vice versa for first person. It’s worked well, so far.)

And at times, I’ve experienced a sense of despair about the whole thing—wondered if I ought to just go back and rewrite the entire book? But I don’t want to do that. I remember the feeling I had when I first wrote this one. I loved the story. I loved my main character. I loved how right and good the story felt. I don’t want to throw that away—not when I don’t have to.

What I do have to do—is find a way to reconnect to my story. And that brings me to back to voice. Voice is so important. It’s the only thing that is ‘me’. And as I grow as a writer, by reading and writing more, it’s the one thing that will truly define my writing from that of others. I have to trust that voice. I have to let it shine. And while, yes, I am going to learn new things about writing—I can’t abandon older projects that I’ve injected so much of my voice into just because I’ve learned new things. I have to finish them. And the thing that makes me forge through and not abandon them where they stand is the fact that they’re filled with my voice—filled with love and care and passion for the story I was seeing when I wrote it.

Being able to connect to that spirit is exactly what’s going to help me finish my older work. And oh, do I ever want to finish it! I wrote four books in the last year and I genuinely cherish each of them. But it’s time to get focused. To move those stories from my computer to my bookcase so that they don’t get lost in the shuffle of all the new ideas that are coming. So that is my new goal for the end of 2015—to get each of these stories to a publishable state by the end of the year. Focusing. Finishing. Here’s hoping I can make it happen!

Happy writing everyone!
S.

Time Turner Magic - An Anniversary Blog

Wow. Where does the time go? My blog is officially 3 years old today! I started this blog in 2012 on National Indigenous Peoples Day (also called, National Solidarity Day) because I wanted to have a place to talk about all of the positive initiatives I saw happening in my community (Six Nations of the Grand River) and because I knew there were seldom positive stories about my people in the news. This is changing though—there are a lot more positive stories out there and it’s my hope we only see more and more.

The blog became a place where I could share what I was learning, what I was reading and what I was writing about. Over the years those topics have ranged across the things I am most interested in: Indigenous education, languages, Treaties, water and physics. Over the last year, my greatest passion and focus has been on storytelling, writing and learning about publishing—especially since I decided to become an independent publisher. Learning about publishing has been a very different process for me than learning to write or being a writer. It requires a bit more of an organizational/business lens. The whole area is absolutely fascinating to me. And as I’ve been reading book about publishing I’ve been learning to plan and piece things together and get excited about developing editorial plans and profit and loss statements and define marketing goals and budgets. I feel a similar kind of excitement when I’m writing too—a thrill, a sense of adventure, a feeling of being swept along by the story.

Of course, there are downsides to all of this happy, excited energy as well. For instance, every once in awhile, I’m gripped with this fear that I’m not a good enough writer. That I’m too edgy or not edgy enough. That it’s all been done before and better by someone else. That I don’t know what I’m doing. And the beautiful thing is—I don’t. I’m simply putting words down one after another. Telling the stories I see unfolding in my imagination the best way I can. Maybe not everyone will like the stories I have to tell. And that’s okay. That happens sometimes. I suppose this is why we have to write the stories we love. The stories we believe in. The stories our characters trust us to tell. Because it’s not easy work being a writer. But it gets easier when we stop telling ourselves we can’t and showing ourselves we can.

I hope to spend a lot of time this next year showing myself that I can. There is a lot of help and encouragement available to writers and independent publishers these days. By far, one of the biggest pieces of advice/wisdom coming from every book, blog, article and podcast I’ve read/listened to about publishing is for writers to do one thing—write what we are most passionate about in a way that only we can. I look forward to another year of doing just that!

Anyways—today is also Father’s Day and so I will be spending a quiet day with my darling love and father of my daughter. But I wanted to take a quick second to mark this special day for the blog. Knowing that when I started writing it—I’d never imagined it would become this living document of all these awesome moments on my journey towards my dream of being able to write, publish and share books. Of being able to read more stories told by my people now and hundreds of years ago. Of working with and learning Ogwehoweh languages. Of becoming a parent. It’s been wonderful. I’m so grateful for all of it and I’m definitely looking forward to the next phase of this adventure. Nya:węh for being here for parts of it! Happy writing! Happy Solstice! Happy Solidarity Day!

S. 

I Finished Writing My Book—Now What?

When I first started writing, I looked for any and every bit of advice I could find that would help me. Without a doubt, the best collection of advice I found came in Stephen King’s “On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft.” I first read it in 2006. It’s 2015 now and I’m still unpacking and learning to apply some of what he talks about in this book.

One of my favourite pieces of advice in the book (which was also very hard for me to follow) was about what to do when you had finally finished a draft. Stephen King recommends you put away your draft until you can look at it fresh and start working on something new in the meantime. It’s taken nearly ten years, but I think I finally figured out how to go about doing this. One of the steps I had to learn first was how to write every day. Not so long ago—it was taking me a super long time (years) to finish a draft. I had to learn how to build a habit of writing a little bit every day. Once I figured out how to do that—things went a bit easier.

I recently finished a novella called, The Skeleton Key. This book was a continuation of another novella I wrote last year called, The Vampire Skeleton—a book about what Haudenosaunee vampires might be like today and inspired by a popular story my people have been telling for over a hundred years. The Skeleton Key is just over 40,000 words long. I had a great time writing the first draft of it and I’ll be super excited to release it at some point over the next year.

Once I was finished the draft, I happily posted to Twitter and got some very nice congratulations and encouragement from fellow writers who also do the Monthly Writing Challenge. I have to say that encouragement has made such a huge difference in my writing output as well—giving and receiving it. It honestly feels so great to have a place to actively cheer others on. Before I joined the Monthly Writing Challenge—I didn’t really have that many people to talk to about writing. Now I feel like I have a lot of people to talk to and be inspired by and I’m amazed at how much more enjoyable that has made the writing process.

The next thing I did was think about which project I was going to work on next. I started it the very next day. In all my years of writing—that has never happened to me.

A few years ago, I might have done differently. I might have dove right in and started making changes. I might have started looking for places or people I could submit it to. But over the last year I think I’ve overcome something important. It isn’t self-doubt—I think that rascal will always be present to some degree. But it might have been a combination of fear and self-imposed pressures/expectations. It was like there used to be this tiny piece of me that believed the story I was writing was the only story idea I was ever going to be able to come up with and if I didn’t get it perfectly right—I was going to ruin my chances at being a writer forever. I’m not sure why I thought that or why my fear manifested itself in this way. I just know it made it extremely difficult for me to start working on something else. The only way to work past this was to show myself that it was not true—that I had plenty of stories to tell. And the only way to show myself that—was to keep writing.

I’d written three novels in the fifteen years before I started writing seriously a year and a half ago (and by seriously I mean a minimum of 500 words every day). Since that time I’ve written two novels, two novellas, a middle grade book, two children’s books and several short stories. It’s still kind of amazing to me that I’ve written that much just by doing a little bit every day. But even more amazing to me, is that somewhere along the way, the ideas for books and stories I wanted to write came gushing out, so that in addition to the 7 projects that are almost done, there are 5 new projects in the works and new ideas coming every day. This time around, the problem I had wasn’t finding something to write—but figuring out which project to work on first? And that was a super awesome problem to have.

Happy writing everyone!

S.

A Balancing Act: Returning to Work After Maternity Leave

My writing life has undergone many transitions. My twenties were probably the most turbulent. I was in university for most of them and struggling to make ends meet. Back then I would dream about the kind of stability I needed to be a writer. I had a very specific picture in my mind of what it would take and I planned to achieve it by my thirtieth birthday. I knew exactly where I needed to be when I turned thirty—on my own, in a small house or apartment, with a MacBook, surrounded by books. What I didn’t account for, was the fact that the job I had to help pay for the small house, the MacBook and the other bills that come along with life—would take up every waking hour of my time.

It was this commencement speech, given by Neil Gaiman that helped me to realize one important fact—I was writing more emails than I was writing stories. I would spend minutes, even hours poring over the words of emails, briefing notes and press releases. And even though I for the most part liked the work I was doing—I felt like my creativity had been stuffed in a bottle. I felt like my voice had been stripped away and all that was capable of coming out was branded, careful messaging. My projects were likewise impacted by this state of limbo—of wanting to say things but being uncertain whether or not I should. I hid meaning behind meaning and because I only wrote when I thought I had a full day to do it—there were days and even weeks between my writing sessions.

Looking back, I think this was an important thing for me to go through—this uncertainty, this questioning. It helped me to write a totally strange story that while totally strange—was 100% the story I wanted to be writing. It was filled with characters that practically leapt out of my imagination and even though I didn’t do a perfect job of capturing them the first time around—I’ve had four years to do better. I learned—very slowly—how to write a little bit at a time. Stephen King has written about this, but so has Neil Gaiman, in an article where he says that if you write just 300 words a day—by the end of the year, you have a novel. So last April, I decided to try it—to write as little as 300 words, every day. 

I was pregnant at the time and wondering what would happen with my writing once I became a mother. I knew I wouldn’t stop writing but I still didn’t know what my writing schedule would look like. How could I? I’d never really had one. Fortunately, it all turned out well—I stumbled upon the Monthly Writing Challenge community and for the last year I’ve felt more productive than at any other time in my life. Stories are pouring out of me. I developed a solid writing routine. But then my maternity leave came to an end. And I was to return to work—to a job I absolutely love. Would my writing routine crumble again? I was determined that it wouldn’t—that everything would work out fabulously.

And guess what? It did! I admit the first day was hard. Not the writing part—the part where I had to be away from my daughter. I didn’t want to be away from her and I suppose I still don’t. But I really do love and believe in the work that I’m doing. It makes me feel happy, excited and fulfilled. I’m also lucky that my baby is only five minutes away from my work with my partner and our mothers.

So for the last two weeks, I’ve been waking up at 6:30 and writing until I get my 500 words. My work in progress, which I started three weeks ago, has now grown to 17,000 words! I can go to work with a sense of calm—at least in the writing/creativity sense of the word. That calm means a great deal to me. It helps me to keep balanced between being a mommy and being a writer and being a wife and a sister and a friend and all of the other roles and relationships I maintain. And none of this would be possible if my partner wasn’t as awesome and supportive as he is. I am extremely blessed.

Editing remains something of a challenge. I’m working on an edit of my book The Vampire Skeleton right now and reading this book: Rivet Your Readers With Deep Point of View. I can usually only edit for half an hour or so on the weeknights. It takes me about two or three nights to make it through a chapter, if I’m focussed. It’s a touch slower than I’d like to be moving so my goal is to make up for that in 2-3 hour sessions on the weekends but I’ve yet to implement this structure. I know that I can make these adjustments and that it’s okay to take my time. I suppose in summary—I am feeling enormously grateful. Grateful that I’m still writing, still editing, still doing all of these things that I love and that make me happy. Being a parent. A Wife. An Artist. A Language Learner. And taking care not to become a professional email answerer/workaholic.

Happy writing & editing everyone!
S. 

What I've Learned From Editing

I’m working on the fourth draft of my young adult manuscript. This phase of the editing is what my editor refers to as “line editing”. Essentially, that means she read through my entire manuscript and made specific notes about what lines were working and which ones weren’t. This allowed me to see my strengths and weaknesses more clearly. My job in this pass is fairly straightforward—to fix these lines with her support and guidance.  

I previously wrote about the fun I was having with edits and can honestly say my love of editing has only increased. I’ve learned so much and after tweeting about it, a fellow writer in the #MarWritingChallenge suggested I write about it, so this post is my way of sharing some of what I think I’ve learned with you! Hopefully, something in my experience may help you as well. (And vice versa—feel free to chime in with editing tips you love!)

1. Hire an Editor

I know this probably doesn’t need saying but hiring an editor is a really important step and it wouldn’t feel right to not include it. I probably wouldn’t have learned any of the things I’ve learned if I hadn’t done that. So if you can, gift yourself and hire an editor, trade for services, etc. We are so lucky that there are more and more ways to connect with good editors nowadays. It might seem like a big expense but it was such a great investment. Also, it seems like most editors will be willing to edit a few sample pages to let you see what it will be like working with them and if it will work for both of you. 

2. Write it fresh!

There are a LOT of clichés out there and I’m guilty of using many of them. I think when you read a lot, you wind up being naturally exposed to them and so it gets easy for those clichés to find their way into a first draft—where the goal is to write fast and get the story down. In the editing stages, you have a chance to go back and write those clichés in a unique and fresh way. Here are some examples of clichés I found: 

• Her heart sank
• A wave of anger washed over her
• Tears welled up 

These clichés definitely work (they’re cliché for a reason), so finding unique ways to rephrase them is a challenge. Over the last week, I worked through my manuscript, scribbling on a legal pad, brainstorming ways to make them fresher and still true to the voice of my novel. There are a lot of ways to do this—you just have to be creative. Strangely, this exercise made me fall in love with writing—and editing—all over again. You have to really think about language and what it evokes in the mind of the reader. Very cool.

3. Repetitive Body Language

Characters in my book are constantly nodding, swallowing, frowning and smiling. This was placeholder body language I put there in early drafts but in the editing phase it was time to challenge myself and have my characters use other parts of their body to express themselves. For this, I really had to take a step back and watch what people did. Amateur tip? I watched television scenes where people were scared, happy, angry, confused, etc., and tried to think what they were doing with their body that was telling me what they were feeling. I still think one of the best things you can do here to is read. Get ideas about how other people are tackling body language. 

4. Overusing Words

Look. That. There was (He was/She was). Glance.

I overuse all of these words. To correct it, my editor suggested I do a word search and see how many times I did this. Then they challenged me to eliminate at least half of those. I did a word search in this blog post and found I had used ‘that’ three times in the first three paragraphs. If you’re using Microsoft Word as your processor (as I am), I need to tell you the Search Document bar is your friend. It helps you find the words you use a lot and replace them. 

5. Embracing Rhetorical Devices

Rhetorical devices are just plain cool. Up until this draft, I’d never really looked at how rhetorical devices worked and what role they played in telling a story. I have my editor to thank for this one as well. I really firmly believe that the first draft is the all story. I believe that even more after coming this far through the editing process, but I think in later drafts you have the opportunity to include some of these devices and enhance the manuscript in a very deliberate way. It can be a lot of fun to be really deliberate with your writing. I’ve just started using devices so I’m certainly no expert, but so far, it seems to me they work the best when there’s already raw and vibrant text—the device just helps that text stand out a bit more. But I suppose they could also work where something was falling flat. Okay, maybe I have no idea where they work best—the point is, they can add a really sweet layer to your story when you want to try something special. It might be neat to have some of those in your toolbox. (I was using some without even realizing I was doing it—you really do pick up so much from reading). Again—thank you, editor. 

These are the few I started with: Anaphora. Polysyndeton. Asyndeton.   

6. Dialogue Tags 

“This is embarrassing,” she said.

“I know. Don’t worry. I do it all the time too,” he said.

“Can we fix this?” she asked.

“Yes.” He typed furiously on the keyboard. “Just give me a minute.”

“What are you doing?” She peered over his shoulder.

“I’m showing you how to use dialogue tags properly,” he said.

These are important. They don’t need to be fancy, either. Dialogue tags that are tried-and-true and don’t detract from the reading flow are the simple ones: said and asked. Some editors might not mind if you used other dialogue tags but mine encouraged me not to, explaining that they are best when invisible. There are times when I think fancy ones work (there are a lot of fancy dialogue tags in many of my favourite books) but for the most part, I think it was safe for me to lose the fancy tags and amp up the descriptions of the character showing the emotion I was trying to convey through the tag.

These are just a couple highlights of what I’ve learned from this phase of editing. I’d be writing all night if I tried to cram everything I discovered in here and I know we all need to keep working on our manuscripts! I don’t think anything I’ve shared will come as a surprise to anyone—I’m hardly the first person to write about editing after all! But these were small things that I really found made my manuscript stronger. Once I understand why I was making these changes and got comfortable making them, I started to move through the manuscript a lot faster—yesterday, I made it through ten chapters! It feels awesome to clean up my manuscript and learn more about the craft of writing at the same time that I can apply to my other projects. What about you? What tips are helping you with your own work?

Happy writing everyone! (P.S. I've recently started painting again & this is one of my works in progress I thought I'd share. Slowly moving away from my usual crayon drawings!). 

S.