inspiration and small signs

I blogged about them here: http://ghpolisner.blogspot.com/2010/10/inspiration-and-signs.html.

-gae

Under Cover Blues

I had planned to blog about my cover for The Pull of Gravity today, because after a first-cover misstep (ugh, don't ask, it was horrible), I got an email on Thursday containing the cover of my dreams.

The Cover Gods Had Interceded.

Giddiness ensued.

My kids and my mother went crazy. ;)

Ok, fine, my agent and I went crazy too.

I imagined coming here today to tell you how cool, hip, whimsical, smart, funny, graphic, and iconic it is and how I can't imagine a teen or grown-up alike walking by it without wanting to pick it up. I imagined how fun that post would be to write. Did I mention I was giddy?


But What the Cover Gods Give, the Cover Gods Taketh Away

(also known as: and then came yesterday...)

That's a long story made short, but suffice it to say, yesterday morning I got an email from my editor saying not to get too excited, that, while the creative dept. agrees and loves the second (new, shiny, fabulous) cover, sales & marketing is set on the first (don't get me started) cover.

Giddiness gone, misery ensued. Er. ensues.

After the email, I went through the well-known stages of grief:

Denial,
Anger,
Bargaining,
Biking,
Crying,
Whining,
Posting My Misery on Facebook,
Depression and
Acceptance.

Ok, I may have stopped short of Acceptance. We'll see how today goes.

In the meantime, I'm praying. You know, in my I-don't-really-believe-in-praying sort of way. I'm praying that people will come to their senses. The cover gods were there for me once. Maybe they'll be there for me again.

After all, it took me ten years+ to get to this point, they wouldn't desert me now. If they do, I'll be sure there is no (cover) god.

-gae

Hats for Sale

It's been one of "those" (two) weeks. Where I'm juggling hats frantically (mother, lawyer/mediator, writer, wife, friend). When the only hat I really want to don is a swim cap.

I've had a few mediation sessions and two mediations come to the drafting point (which now only means reviewing the 40-page agreements my partner writes -- as opposed to when I used to write them and my old partner did the reviewing, a smart change I made to my practice when I got my book deal, but which still requires several combined hours of my time); son One (15) has been preparing for PSAT's and needing rides places; son Two (12) has been juggling school/homework with travel baseball AND a new travel basketball team (and games and practices for both!); it's been the school physical/orthodontist/eye doctor/dentist (please, let's not count cavities) time of year; a dear friend's daughter desperately needed help on her college essays; and my revisions on my option book are taking way longer than I want (the book, despite lots of slicing away at dead weight is now about 20 pages longer and I am only half way through). And, of course, there are dishes and, ahem, laundry to do.

In the middle of that, something that should have been awesome happened: the rough final of my book cover for The Pull of Gravity came in. Except, instead of the moment I'd been waiting for, you know, the one where golden light streams down from the sky and book angels sing, I was underwhelmed both with the cover art and the tagline, and I spent the next week arguing (sweetly) via email with my editor and assistant editor about my concerns and frantically redrafting "suggestions." The cover has gone back for some tweaks. We shall see if there is golden light from the heavens still to come...

At any rate, with all of these hats flying, is it any wonder that all I really want to do is this?:

I know, I know. For a lot of you the answer may be, "um, yes?" But for me, that place, those moments, are bliss. Heaven on Earth. And some days even, salvation. A place where all the other hats drown (too harsh? er, melt away) and there's only me, the water, and sky.

And, the other "Pod" swimmers who completely understand what this means. And agree, wholeheartedly.

And with the temperatures dropping (a few days last week were barely above 45 with water temps a brisk 55 - 58) the Open Water Season is rapidly coming to a close. Honestly, I don't know what I'll do without it.

Meanwhile, another week is here. With it comes the juggling of hats. Luckily, if I have anything to say, one of those hats will be an ugly, magnificent swim cap.

I Refuse to Blog this Week

as I am overwhelmed by revisions. Let's just stare at the water instead:

A moment among moments...

About a year ago October, after years (and years) of trying, as most of you know (ad nauseam) I got my first book deal - for my YA novel, The Pull of Gravity.

Since that moment, there have been several moments, that have been surreal, exciting, wonderful: the look on my boys' faces when I told them I had finally succeeded; the moment I called my husband (my sister, my parents) to tell the good news. The first time I sat in the small, sleepy office of my editor, the incredible Frances Foster (Holes (Sachar), Someday this Pain Will Be Useful to You (Cameron) The Wall (Sis)) in the flatiron building in NYC and listened to her gush on about the characters in my novel.

The moment I opened a check from Macmillan in the mail. :)

But the truth is, there is one moment above all others that truly stands out in my mind: December 4, 2009, when some of my best friends I've known "forever," came togther with some of my best friends I'd never, until that very moment, even met (and who had travelled across the space-time continuum to be here -- okay, at least from as far away as Virginia, Seattle, New Mexico and, you heard me: Scotland) to celebrate my small moment of success with me.

It was a once-in-a-lifetime night that I'll truly never forget, and I hope in some way to return the love and support shown me to each and everyone of them. Even those who could only be there in spirit (you know who you are).

In the meantime, here is a tiny glimpse into one captured moment of it. A toast by my dear friend John Aragon, writer -- and human being -- extraordinaire.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mWeBJjB_B5o

Happy Monday. I hope each of you has the chance to share at least one evening like this one.

-gae

Where Stories Come From . . .

This morning after my swim, as I floated and stared up at a sky so pure blue-gray that its solid, monotonous color was the only thing in my line of vision save for those little floater things (you know, the little paramecium that slip along the periphery of things, viscous, scientific and strange), a line came to me that I knew would likely be the last line of the novella I am working on, if, in fact, the novella ever comes to full fruition. And, trust me, it may, or may not.

That, and a conversation last evening with my dear friend Evelyn's husband, the gorgeous and gregarious (if slightly giddy ;)) Karlito, got me thinking again about where my stories come from -- my beginnings and middles and ends -- and how differently I seem to write than many of my friends who (enviably) write from well-formed ideas reduced to detailed outlines, their chapters and plot (oh dear god when will I EVER learn to plot?) mapped out before them in bulleted, organized glory.

I write with no such bulleted, organized glory.

For example, evolution of The Pull of Gravity: I read an article about this guy, see, and something about him intrigued me and I found myself wondering what his real life might be like. How what he had done (set out to walk across America to lose weight, in this case) would affect his marriage and, more importantly to me, his children, his family.

Here. This is a real photo of him walking:

He became the first central character driving the story, except that I knew that the story would be told from his son's perspective (I do not remember if the real guy has a son).

The second thing that happened was, as I was thinking vaguely about the story, my younger son spiked a fever, which brought the first line of the book to me, and the few lines that followed:

"A fever was what started everything. That, and the water tower, and the cherry cola. Well, also, Dad and his condition, and Mom being in Philadelphia and all."

Nothing else about the story had come to me yet. But I just started writing, and eventually a story unfolded.

Little known fact (nearly forgotten by me): the first working title of the book in my computer files was Fat Man Walking -- a far cry from Steinbeck, The Scoot, and the Pull of Gravity, now just The Pull of Gravity, eh?


Anyway, this is how I write, despite that all I had in this case was a character or two, some lines that appealed to me, and my own desire and intrigue. Lord knows how I got here from there.

For example, evolution of Jack Kerouac is Dead to Me:

The title came to me one morning as I woke up. Nothing but that title. There was a reason that Kerouac was on my brain, and I was ruminating on my next YA, but other than that, and the sudden realization that somehow butterflies were also to be involved, I had little else when I set the manuscript in motion. How the rest unfolded remains a mystery to me.

For example, evolution of Frankie Sky:

The first line, "The first time I see Frankie Schyler, he’s diving into the deep end of the Lawrenceville Country Club pool," came to me together with an image of a small boy, angelic looking, diving confidently into a swimming pool surrounded by onlookers, appearing to swim sort of miraculously, then drowning instead. I was in the pool, underwater, when the image came to me.

All of my stories are like this -- springing from bits and pieces, vague ideas, images that pull at me, call to me while I swim, or drive, or sleep. I suspect this is not the best way to write, and worse, I suspect it is why, while my writing is repeatedly praised, editors continue to struggle with my stories, my plotting, the way things unfold in my novels, over and over again.

Perhaps it is not the best way to write, but so far, it's the only way I know how.

How do your stories come to you?

How to REALLY be alone...

hey.

my blog post this week is here, at my young adult friendly blog:

http://ghpolisner.blogspot.com/2010/09/how-to-really-be-alone.html

thanks for reading.
gae