SinC-Up Blog Hop

I was tagged for the September Sisters in Crime SinC-Up for Bloggers by my dear friend,  Linda Townsdin, who is an active member of Sisters in Crime (SinC) in the Sacramento, California area. I, too, have been a member of SinC for many years -- uh oh, I wonder if I remembered to renew this year -- and have learned a great deal from the online resources of this national mystery writers' organization. Though my publishing credits are in young adult (YA) fiction, I've been working on adult mystery novels a lot longer than YA. Finishing them and getting them published -- well, that's a different story! I've been an avid reader of mysteries, especially those by women authors, ever since I discovered Agatha Christie and Dorothy Sayers in my early twenties. A long time ago.

The Blog Hop invites us to answer questions about ourselves as an author. Here are the ones I chose:

Which authors have inspired you?

I remember checking my first Agatha Christie novel out of the library and getting so excited I ended up reading all of her books, and then when I could afford to buy them, reading them all again and again. And then, when someone suggested I try Dorothy Sayers and her Lord Peter Whimsy series, I was blown away and did the same thing with them. I was very young and all I was writing at the time was poetry. Suddenly all I wanted to read were murder mysteries. My strong preference has always been for the female voice in this genre. At the moment, I'm gob-smacked by Louise Penny and her Armand Gamache series. I've read and re-read the series more times than I want to admit trying to figure out how she does that seamless switching of POV. And also, just because I want to hang out in Three Pines with those characters. I've recently done the same thing with Laurie R. King's series featuring Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes. In middle grade and young adult fiction, the authors that have had the most influence on me are Madeleine L'Engle, E.L. Konigsburg, Laure Halse Anderson, Virginia Euwer Wolff, Cynthia Rylant,  Sharon Creech, Jacqueline Woodson, and Linda Sue Park. And poets whose work keeps me going are: Diane Glancy, Lucille Clifton, Naomi Shihab Nye, Joy Harjo, Mary Oliver, William Stafford . . . the list goes on and on.

What's the best part of the writing process for you? And what's the most challenging?

I love almost everything about the writing process, so let me just get the challenging part out of the way first. Wanting to start something new but feeling paralyzed sucks. The enormous gap between what's in my head and what comes out on paper (or the computer screen) can be terribly frustrating. Fortunately, I enjoy rewriting. And I've noticed that my favorite authors write about many of the same things over and over and over again, so I'm assuming that means even they are still trying to "get it right." The best part of the process for me is when a brand new character starts talking in my head (and talking and talking and talking) and suddenly I can't wait to get the words down. I love the way that part of the process flows, how consuming it is, yet how energizing it can be. The puzzle of a novel (compared to the much briefer form of a poem) taps into a different set of problem-solving skills and I have a really good time tracking threads through the story, making sure all the details make sense and work the way they must.

What books are on your nightstand right now?

Hope's Edge: The Next Diet For a Small Planet by Frances Moore Lappe and Anna Lappe. This is the 2003 follow-up to Diet for a Small Planet, still timely and a fascinating look at the many ways committed people around the world are challenging the status quo of food production and consumption. I'm enjoying it a lot.

The Long Way Home by Louise Penny. I am in love with Penny's characters and setting in her Armand Gamache series and have already read this most recent one twice.

The Elusive Mrs. Pollifax by Dorothy Gilman. I've recently started re-reading some of the mysteries that I enjoyed many years ago. Let me just say that I'm appreciating Emily Pollifax in a brand new way now that I'm nearly her age. Enough said.

Covered Wagon Women: Diaries & Letters from the Western Trails, 1840-1849 edited by Kenneth L. Holmes. One of my favorite birthday presents this year -- the first two volumes in this series. This period of women's history in our country has always fascinated me.

Chopper! Chopper! Poetry from Bordered Lives by Veronica Reyes. Another fav birthday gift. An amazing voice from East LA. I'm loving her.

Skirt Full of Black by Sun Yung Shin. My first reading of this Korean American woman's poetry. She grew up in Chicago and now lives and teaches here in Minnesota. The way she pushes linguistic boundaries and form reminds me a little of my hero, Native American poet, Diane Glancy. Powerful work.

In my Kindle queue:

Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson

The Monogram Murders by Sophie Hannah; Agatha Christie (a new Hercule Poirot)

The Murder at the Vicarage (Miss Marple #1) by Agatha Christie

The Mysterious Affair at Styles (Hercule Poirot #1) by Agatha Christie

Lucky Us: A Novel by Amy Bloom

Writing Wild: Forming a Creative Partnership with Nature by Tina Welling

THIS WEEK'S DRAMA QUEEN ACTIVITIES

DRAMA QUEENS IN THE HOUSE celebrated its one-month mark last week with a book launch party hosted by dear friends, Patricia Ewer and David Mangen. It was a terrific evening and I enjoyed every minute. Great friends, food, conversation. Fun reunions and unexpected connections. Book sales, book signing. . . great fun! Patricia and I have been friends since the 1970s when we worked together at the Children's Theatre Company in Minneapolis.




BOOK LAUNCH PHOTOS:

Book sales & signing

Old friends from UWW

Reading a chapter

In the middle picture, Gorden Hedahl (one of my professors from UW-Whitewater in the early 1970s) catches up with Chery Davies Day.  Back then Gorden was Professor Hedahl, and he directed LOOK BACK IN ANGER during his first year at UWW. The production featured Chery and yours truly. Julie Weaver (not pictured) and I met when we were both actresses at Theatre L'Homme Dieu in Alexandria, Minnesota. I missed the photo-op when she and Chery were sitting in the kitchen eating burritos and discovering they know each other's sons (who were in a band together) though the two of them had never met. It was that kind of evening.

My submission to #WeNeedDiverseBooks campaign

On May 1st, Ellen Oh (www.EllenOh.com), along with Cindy Pon and Malinda Lo from the wonderful DiversityinYA.com website kicked off their #WeNeedDiverseBooks campaign on twitter, tumblr and FB. The campaign was launched in response to BookCon's all-white male panel on kid's lit and immediately went wild across all platforms. The first day of the campaign, people were asked to hand-print a sign and post pictures demonstrating their commitment to diversity in books. This was my submission. Thanks to Ken Williams, daughter Jennifer Williams, and husband Gordon Nakagawa for allowing themselves to be visual aids for the cause (and for my book promotion).  

Q&A on Linda Townsdin's blog

Last and definitely not least, yesterday the Q&A exchange I had with my best friend, Linda Townsdin, was complete when she posted my answers to the questions we picked on her fabulous blog, A Writer's Journey.  

Check it out here: http://lindatownsdin.com/2014/05/05/julie-williams-drama-queens-in-the-house/

As a writer, the writing itself comes first. Second to that for me is thinking about, reading about, talking with others about, and writing about the writing process. After that (way after that) comes the marketing and promotion. This interview is a happy convergence for me (and I hope for you). I had a lot of fun doing it (usually a good sign) and learned something about myself and my process.

It's been a busy week. I think it's time to grab the rake and head for the garden before it rains again.

LINDA TOWNSDIN -- FOCUSED ON MURDER

Linda Townsdin, the author of FOCUSED ON MURDER (published in February), has been a dear friend and constant inspiration for many years. We grew up together in small towns in Northern Minnesota where we attended the same junior-senior high school. For years we’ve visited as often as we’re able, sometimes taking long road trips from our homes in California back to Minnesota. And in between visits we kept up a written correspondence that has now morphed into daily emails. She’s my first and last reader (of everything I write). And although our work paths appear somewhat different on the surface, our creative lives have run parallel, intersected, and hop-scotched in the most delightful ways for all these many (many) years. FOCUSED ON MURDER is a fast-paced, exciting mystery with an engaging protagonist, the first in a series featuring the adventures of photojournalist Britt Johansson. I’m pleased to have Linda as a guest blogger this week.

Linda and Julie on a road trip

What drew you to writing and publishing murder mysteries? 

I love reading stories about Northern Minnesota. I’m attracted to the small communities, lakes, weather and American Indian spiritual philosophy. I wanted to create my own story world and now that I’ve done it, I love it. It’s like reading a book and writing it at the same time. So satisfying!

   

What is your process?

I’m writing a mystery series and my primary cast of characters will always make an appearance. My story idea is usually based on a social issue that haunts me, and then I have a rough idea of what’s going to happen. The first scene often comes to me in a flash, and sometimes the end materializes the same way. But I never know which new characters will pop up, or what twists and turns are coming, and that discovery is the most fun.

Is your protagonist like you?

When I first imagined Britt, I thought I was creating someone almost the opposite of me. She’s 34, tall and athletic, a photojournalist willing to make people uncomfortable to get her photos, blurts out whatever she’s feeling or thinking, and doesn’t like to delve too deeply into her own psyche.

I would have made a terrible journalist because I wouldn’t be able to ask hard questions and put people on the spot. I’m deliberate where’s she’s spontaneous, and I’m a ruminator. 

And yet, I wonder if there isn’t a shadow side of me that harbors some of those characteristics. Why do writers choose a certain type of protagonist and subject matter?

In addition to following the murder of a local coed, and getting involved in a dangerous high-stakes crime that requires every ounce of her strength and skill to make it out alive, at the core of my story is Britt’s decision whether to stay in Spirit Lake or go.

I’ve moved quite a bit in my life—my grandmother used to say I had wandering feet. I don’t wander that much anymore, but the desire is still there, and I still feel the loss that happens when you give up something to get something else. 

So I created a character who longs to go and longs to stay and through following her adventures, I get to explore some of my own feelings about what that has meant to my own life.

And, since writing about Britt, I’ve become much more physically active, and I take more risks. Not Britt’s kind of risks, but the kind that build confidence in small ways every day. Is there a connection? Has my inspiration inspired me? I hope so. I look forward to how else Britt might inspire me in her next adventure.

[Thanks to Donald Maass, http://writerunboxed.com/ for his thoughtful blog post on April 2, 2014 that prompted me to think about why I chose certain characteristics for Britt Johansson, my protagonist in Focused on Murder—A Spirit Lake Mystery.]

Linda Townsdin worked for years in communications for nonprofit and corporate organizations, most recently as writer/editor for a national criminal justice consortium. Her work included editorial and marketing assistance in projects involving cybercrime, tribal justice and other public safety issues. Her short fiction has been published in several anthologies, including the 2013 Capitol Crimes Anthology. She lives in California with her husband, and wouldn’t trade her childhood in Northern Minnesota for anything.

You can get a copy of FOCUSED ON MURDER on Amazon.com at http://tinyurl.com/nkmh2xe.

To keep informed on Linda’s work, check out her blog at http://www.lindatownsdin.com 

And/or you can follow her on her Facebook author page: http://www.facebook.com/LindaTownsdinAuthor

Publication Day for DRAMA QUEENS in the house

The dedication in my book reads, "To my daughter, Jennifer, and our jumble of a chosen family." Here's a picture of Jennifer at 16 accepting bouquets of flowers after a fabulous dance concert. Like the book's main character, my daughter is biracial. She's also tall and beautiful, smart and funny (with a huge laugh), deeply perceptive and good at anything she does. It's accurate to say that along with my many years in the theatre, she and the other members of our diverse and nontraditional family are the inspiration for this novel. That's what I love to write about -- family ties, relationships, all the ways we struggle to discover who we are and find the right path for ourselves in life.

Of course, in the act of writing, Jessie took off on her own (the way characters do) and became someone different from both my daughter and myself. Still, it was a relief to me when Jennifer read the final version of the book and gave it (and Jessie) her stamp of approval. I'll share more later about the other people who inspired this story.

Today we are celebrating a long writing, rewriting, editing, and publication process that has finally come to fruition.  Today you can buy the book (online at B&N, amazon.com, many other sites, as well as in bookstores). And you can find it in libraries, too. I hope you get your hands on a copy. I hope you read it and fall in love with Jessie and her crazy jumble of a chosen family. I hope you'll let me know if you do!

One Week Until My Book Comes Out

My new book, DRAMA QUEENS IN THE HOUSE (Roaring Brook/Macmillan) comes out next week. Tuesday, March 25, 2014 to be exact. I've been working on this particular book for nearly 10 years. The most intense work, of course, took place in the last three years since I signed my contract and went to work with my editor at Macmillan. The book has morphed and shape-shifted more than once during that time! And now, finally, here we are. Book launch ready. The book. And me. With only a week to go, I'm doing the things I know to do like: finalizing lists of all the people I want to share my excitement with, checking to see that local bookstores have ordered it, talking with their event coordinators to find out what I can do to help sell the book, agreeing to do some guest blogs and book give-aways -- those kinds of things. But am I ready?

Yes. And no. Excited. And terrified. I love my main character, Jessie, and her crazy nontraditional family. I'm so glad I got to go along with Jessie during a really important year in her life -- one where she has to deal with a lot of change and where she discovers some really cool things about herself and her place in the dramatic world of her family's theatre company. Jessie and I share a sense of humor, but she's a lot more outgoing than I am. And her family? Uh, yeah. A LOT more outgoing than I ever dreamed of being.

So as I sit here, crossing to-do items off a long list, I find myself feeling like the girl in the picture above. That picture of me was taken when I was Jessie's age -- 15, about to turn 16. Pretty smart, a reader, an artist, more introverted than extroverted except when I was performing. Then a miracle happened. All my self-consciousness disappeared and I became whatever character I was playing (from head cheerleader on pep rally days to my first dramatic onstage role as Tessie Hutchinson, the wife and mother who is stoned to death in Shirley Jackson's THE LOTTERY). When I defied my mother and the rules of my mother's religion and played that role (which, incidentally, won a best actress award at a regional competition), I had never even been to see a live theatrical production. That was about to change dramatically -- let's just say from then on the theatre was in my blood and nothing was ever the same again. Did I stop being introverted when I wasn't onstage? No. Not then, not in all the years since.

But the theatre gave me a voice. Maybe I should say -- gave me many voices to choose from. And the performance of those voices led me to writing poetry and stories and novels. And that led me to teaching and directing, which led me back to performance and writing and publishing . . . 

There's a lot to be excited about. Next week my book comes out.  It's the first I've written that draws its inspiration from my many years in the theatre and I hope it won't be the last. 

Macmillan:  us.macmillan.com/dramaqueensinthehouse/JulieWilliams

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Drama-Queens-House-Julie-Williams/dp/1596437359/ref=tmm_hrd_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1395176055&sr=8-1

Barnes & Noble: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/drama-queens-in-the-house-julie-williams/1115382352?ean=9781596437357

Got Cover Art!

All of Jessie's world is a stage, and she's determined 

to become a player.

A lot has happened on the "book front" since I last posted. The title has gone from the original, It's Not the End of the World to All the World's A Jumble, and has finally been nailed down as DRAMA QUEENS IN THE HOUSE! It's been edited and copyedited and revised and revised and revised. And now the ARCs (Advanced Reading Copies or bound galleys) are done and making their way out to all the places publishers send them. 

Here's what the book is about:

Sixteen-year-old Jessie Jasper Lewis doesn't remember a time in her life when she wasn't surrounded by method actors, bright spotlights, and feather boas. Her parents started the Jumble Players theater, and theater is the glue that holds her crazy family together. But when she discovers her father is cheating on her mother with a man, Jessie feels like her world is toppling over. And then, on top of everything else, there's the delusional aunt who is predicting the end of the world. Jessie certainly doesn't feel ready to be center stage in the production that is her family. But where does she belong in all of this chaos?

I'm really happy with the new title and the cover art.  The process of writing and selling and rewriting (and rewriting and rewriting) a book is such a long and intensive one, it's almost anticlimactic to have it suddenly done.  But then the ARCs arrive and it's an enormous thrill to hold the bound copy in my hands and know that in a few months the actual hardbound book will be coming out! (March 2014 from Roaring Brook/Macmillan) 

Blog-o-Sphere Featuring: Nina Kidd

Paul Beier and Celia with F7, May 1989

“The Next Big Thing” or Blog-o-sphere Project, is a fun way for writers all over the world to connect and share information about their current writing project or upcoming book. One of the writers I tagged to participate in Blog-o-sphere is a dear friend of mine from Southern California, Nina Kidd. I'm most familiar with Nina's fiction writing (which is fabulous) so am excited to learn more about her current project, a work of nonfiction, and to post it here.  Thanks, Nina!

Nina Kidd

In the Blog-o-sphere Project, one writer tags another writer who answers a set of interview questions and then tags five more writers. I was tagged by a Renaissance woman: poet and actor, teacher and visual artist as well as generous friend, Julie Williams. I used a bit from Julie’s wonderful YA novel in verse Escaping Tornado Season, to illustrate Vividly Visual writing for my writing MFA lecture at Vermont College of Fine Arts. Julie has been kind enough to allow me to guest blog my answers on her blog site.  Thank you so much, Julie!

Here it is. . .

What is the working title of your book?

Paul Beier: A Scientist Speaks Up

Where did the idea come from for the book?

As I began nosing around about what was wrong with the  group of mountain lions that live in the Santa Monica Mountains in Los Angeles, repeatedly people sent me to one mountain lion expert. I soon found out that Dr. Paul Beier is more than a mountain lion man. By the time I met him Dr. Beier had became a world expert on wild lands conservation. Even better, he is a master at partnering with and persuading stake holders across the board to take positive action to save threatened wild species by conserving their travel routes, mile by mile.  His strategies for building and conserving wildlife corridors have given a hopeful face to 21^st century wildlife conservation worldwide.

I had to tell Beier’s story to kids for its adventure and grit, but also in hopes they will eagerly join in the adventure of exploring the wild and helping it survive wherever they are.

What genre does your book fall under?

Narrative nonfiction for readers 9 to 12.

Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie version?

Hmmm… Bearded, sinewy, with shifting colors of:  the wide eyed idealist, cornball charmer, the Sherlock Holmes logician, Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird in the courtroom, but with a spitball streak of devilment: Ewan MacGregor, or Aussie Simon Baker (plays Patrick Jane, in TV’s The Mentalist)

What is the one sentence synopsis of your book?

 Again and again the important people shoved biologist Paul Beier aside when he explained how to save the mountain lions and other animals slowly dying in the shrinking wild lands among California’s suburbs; but Paul’s idea was more powerful than any of the big guys and now it is saving struggling species around the world.

Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?

I’ll represent myself to trade publishers, starting with the editor who suggested it.

  

How long will it take you to write the first draft?

I should have a first draft done by the end of this year.

What titles would you name for a comparison to yours?

Pamela Turner’s A Life in the Wild: George Schaller’s Struggle to Save the Last Great Beasts;  Charles and Emma by ­­­­­­­­­­­­­Deborah Heiligman; The Elephant Scientist by Caitlin O’Connell, Donna M. Jackson and Timothy Rodwell

Who or what inspired you to write this book?

An idea: Instead of the old Conservationists Fighting Builders and Developers scenario, wildlife corridors for animals, birds, insects (and even plants) is a proactive specific plan that local communities can put into action with the assistance of scientists. Paul Beier’s plans are showing us that humans and the wild can be good and respectful neighbors. We can slow, even stop many of the animal extinctions that we are causing. Once young readers catch on they can look at their own hometowns in a new way. Kids can see animals, and even plants, on the move beyond their own back fences or even in their own garden. As Paul Beier says of finding and preserving wildlife corridors, “It’s exciting because it connects people to the land.” 

 What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?

Mountain lions! How can a mountain lion, the size of a St. Bernard dog, kill a moose -- an animal five times its size? How does a scientist find one and put on a radio collar to follow it?  What do you think of a person who crawls on his belly in thick underbrush, alone and unarmed, to reach a female mountain lion and examine her newborn kittens?

I’m tagging ---

Leda Siskind at http://www.throughthetollbooth.com
Gretchen Woelfle at http://www.inkrethink.blogspot.com

Nancy Bo Flood at http://www.kidswriterjfox.blogspot.com
Keri Dearborn at  http://animalbytes.blogspot.com/2013/04/the-next-big-thing.html