I've thought a lot about this today. My goal has been to find the narrator's voice. I have the story. Once I can find that voice I think it will all fall into place. At least that is how it happens in my head. I originally started with one idea that I thought was going okay. It wasn't a slam dunk, but it was working okay. My narrator was telling the story. The problem, again, was that his personality was not coming through. I was missing his voice.
I go into the library to write and people ask me, "How's NaNoWriMo going?" or my NaNoWriMo buddy will say, "It looks like you're keeping on track." It's hard to give a simple answer to people who know I am trying to complete a novel or 50,000 words in one month. It's almost the halfway point. How am I doing?
I've thought a lot about this today. My goal has been to find the narrator's voice. I have the story. Once I can find that voice I think it will all fall into place. At least that is how it happens in my head. I originally started with one idea that I thought was going okay. It wasn't a slam dunk, but it was working okay. My narrator was telling the story. The problem, again, was that his personality was not coming through. I was missing his voice.
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It's National Novel Writing Month and I am revising a middle grade fantasy that I wrote during last year's NaNoWriMo about princesses and cats and a changeling. This year I have the advantage of actually knowing what my story is about and having figured out the majority of the details. I completed a pretty good draft last year, and I felt fairly confident about it. Then I attended a Highlights Workshop where it was critiqued and I was able to talk to several people about the problems I still needed to address.
I have to admit, I was paralyzed for the first two days of this challenge. Plus, I wanted to finish up a couple of other projects before I dove into this one again. But I thought about it in my head. Okay, in truth I was trying to remember what this story was even about. |
I remember the excitement of visiting the public library as a child. The magic and suspense of reading favorites like The Velvet Room and The Secret Garden tugged at my imagination. Biographies of George Washington Carver and Betsy Ross allowed me to see the lives of those who came before me and to appreciate their accomplishments. Poetry collections like my favorite The Tall Book of Poems, which I took with me on sleepovers, introduced me to a range of poetry where I could consider how the placement and rhythm of words affected your mood – sometimes bouncy, other times melancholy. Plus, I really loved the way that book felt in my small hands. My goal in writing children’s books, I think, is an attempt to recreate those feelings, those early years of reading books where everything seemed possible.
I received an M.F.A. in Writing for Children and Young Adults from Hamline University and won the Karen and Philip Cushman Late Bloomer Award from SCBWI. I worked as a Children's Librarian for 20 years and still prefer to read books written for young people. I have two Cavapoo dogs named Prince Albert and Daisy Wu, and a black kitten named Mortimer. I am married and split time between homes with my husband Rod in Dayton, OH and in Cadiz, KY where we enjoy our pontoon boat on Lake Barkley.
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