James Rafferty Blog

Writer's Notebook: Writing on the Road

I'm sitting in an airport and getting ready to take my third trip by air this month.  This one is the long one -- by the time I finish the two legs, I'll be on the other side of the world. 

Travelling that much and that far is mostly an endurance contest, but it's also a time of long hours without distraction.  In other words, these long airplane trips are an excellent place to write with minimal disruption. In my case, I've done plenty of business writing on a plane, but sometimes also have the time for personal writing, particularly when I'm travelling at off hours such as on the weekend. 

As regular readers of this blog know, I've written one novel and am more than halfway through the second one. I'd estimate that half or more of these words were originally composed on either a personal or business trip, with much of the writing done on airplane trips. My current approach is to write using a wirebound, hard copy notebook.  The three subject binders targeted to college students work well.  

You may be thinking -- oh, how primitive -- writing with pen and paper.  Truth is, I've written a lot directly on the computer as well, and that works well, but it is less practical on long flights.  Only a fraction of the seats in the economy section have power and in my experience, four hours is about the practical limit on battery power, unless you want to schlep around extra batteries (I don't).  Worse than that, once the passenger in front of you leans their seat back, using a laptop is difficult or impossible. 

Now there is a much better alternative which is conducive to writing on a laptop -- train travel -- but it's only available on woefully few routes in the US.  I do love my trips on the relatively high speed Acela between Boston and New York or Newark, but I don't get to do that often. 

So, even when the flight attendants have ordered you to shut down all electrical devices, I can keep writing until the airplane pulls up to the jetway.  And the words turn into chapters, and eventually into completed books or stories. 

If you're a writer, do you write on planes or trains?  Do you ever write hard copy or is it all strictly on a computer device?  Do you have a favorite computer or one of the newer mobile devices for doing such work?  

If you're a reader, do you have a favorite activity for whiling away the long hours on a trip?  

Writer's Notebook: 'Tis the Season

I'm at home after a busy December in the workplace and am feeling grateful for the chance to gather with family and celebrate Christmas and the New Year.  We have visitors and thought we might go out for dinner before attending an evening service, but all three of the restaurants we called were closing by 4:00 pm.   So we'll prepare our own dinner and then I'll tend to my role as a member of the chancel choir for our church service.  

During the past month, I've pushed a new product release out the door at work, but in the nooks and crannies of the evenings, I also wrote the latest chapters of my work in progress, a second novel.  My tools for the latter quest have been simple: a notebook and a pen.  Later on I'll enter this text into my PC, but I do a lot of writing while travelling, so the simplicity of being able to write without concern for power outlets, the vagaries of the Windows OS and the latest instructions from flight attendants has a distinct appeal.   

As I look back on my writing this year, I filled up over half of a three subject notebook that I purchased last summer.  Just a couple of days ago, I stopped in at the local Staples and bought another notebook, the third one for this particular novel.  I'm past the halfway point, so I expect I'll fill this one and perhaps get one more for the final chapters.  

Lest one think I'm strictly old school with respect to my writing tools, I also do a lot of writing on the PC and typically do all of my editing there.  I wrote earlier this year about my favorite new software tool OneNote here and here.  OneNote continues to help me organize the chaos of my active projects both at work and home.  They have a useful password feature, so OneNote is also a fine repository for the hundred or so usercodes and passwords that attend to one's online life.  It's very lightweight compared to Microsoft Word, so I use it to capture notes on my writing, ideas for future stories and even snatches of dialogue for chapters that haven't been written yet. 

Much of the computing buzz this year is about netbooks and tools for online reading such as the Kindle.  As a writer and reader, I'd love to have better tools that combine writing and mobility and I expect I'll go in that direction more and more.  However, in the year of the new normal, with tightened budgets and a son in his first year of college, I'm being much more careful about my financial outlays.  

I'll close this piece with a photo of my writer's library, a set of reference books I can turn to when I want a refresher on editing or want to clarify an arcane point of syntax or punctuation.  I took the time to get organized in this way recently and it feels good to have rescued these books from dusty exile in other parts of our house.  

This is a great time to be a writer as the possibilities for creating prose and bringing it to completion are so much robust than the early days of my business career, when word processors were $10,000 dedicated machines and most writers could only dream of an electronic tool that would collect text as it was written and allow for editing without the pain of re-typing a manuscript.  

If you're a writer, what are your favorite tools of creation?  Have you gone more electronic or mobile recently, and if so, how have you done it?  If you're a reader, are you reading books or checking out magazines online?  

And finally, let me offer my best wishes for the holiday season however you may celebrate it.  I've enjoyed the interaction with readers of the James Rafferty Blog this year and have gotten an excellent response to my re-branding of the blog to focus on writing and travelling.  Thanks for reading and commenting.  I also want to thank my online writing group, The Writin' Wombats who reside on Gather.com and many other places.  The wombats have been an amazing resource as friends, sounding boards, writers, critique partners and readers.  They continue to enrich my writing and personal life. 

Writer's Notebook: The Changing Face of Publishing and the Book

I recently read a very good post by blogger Mike Shatzkin about the future of the agent's job in an era where e-publishing is more common and big agent paychecks become much less common.  We also had the recent fiasco where Harlequin announced a self-publishing venture tied to their brand and immediately got hammered from all directions.  Clearly the publishing industry is going through an evolution and the rules are changing, but where will it go?

I certainly don't pretend to have the answers, but I've spent the past two and one-half years as an aspiring writer with a completed first novel and have looked at a number of different possibilities for getting that novel published.  I'm also past the midpoint in writing the first draft for my second novel.  So I've got some skin in the game and am very interested in seeing how publishing business models will change and how to get my books published in a way that will reach lots of readers. 

I'd prefer to go the traditional route of getting signed by an agent and published by a mainstream publisher, but there are other routes out there.  Just within the confines of my writer's group, the diverse and eclectic Writin' Wombats, we've got several writers who been published using the traditional approach of working through an agent, several who have self-published and built a readership that way, a few who have affiliated with small indy publishers that use POD (Publishing On Demand) techniques and one writer who has turned his self-publishing venture into a publishing company and is signing up other writers.  

The alternatives to the traditional publishers are numerous, but there are issues. In either the self-pubbed or indy publisher route, the writer must be prepared to do a substantial amount of self promotion to establish their personal brand and build a network of potential future readers.  Readers will want to have assurances that the quality of the indy or self-pubbed books is up to snuff, so there needs to be various new types of filters, such as reviewers who offer online book reviews and in essence, act as the first reader. 

What are your thoughts?  If you are a writer, have you gotten your books published?  Would you consider a non-traditional publishing path?  

If you are a reader, have you read self-pubbed books or content published by indy presses?  If you have, how did you find out about them?  Which ways do you think that books will be published in the next few years and will they be successful?   

These topics are fertile ground for discussion and I expect to write several related posts going forward.   

Writer’s Notebook: Collaborative Interview with Pat Bertram

 One of the joys of online communities is the chance to meet other writers.  I met Pat Bertram when she entered the Tru TV Crime contest on Gather.com and immediately liked her writing.   She also started a writer's group on Gather.com called No Whine Just Champagne which brought together writers to discuss writing craft, building stories, getting published, how to promote writing and a myriad of other topics related to writing.  She's currently doing a whirlwind tour of the blogosphere, talking about her newest book, Daughter Am I, just published by Second Wind Publishing.  Today she's my guest on the James Rafferty Blog as part of our Writer's Notebook series. 

Pat and I seem to have some similar ideas about writing, though she's finished more novels that I have. Let's have at it.

James: Pat, one of the intriguing aspects of your writing is that you haven't settled on a single genre. Do you have any thoughts about why your writing went in that direction?

Pat: It simply never occurred to me to pick a genre and stick to it. I remember when “genre” signified formulaic stories and mediocre writing, and I wanted to be a better writer than that. I also wanted to write books that had more than a narrow appeal. Libraries and bookstores used to be set up with a mystery section, a romance section, a science fiction section, and then all the rest of the novels. That’s what mine are — “one of all the rest”. Though that isn’t a genre. Drats.

James:  I had a similar experience.  I’d come to like books that had depth – great stories painted on a large canvas that challenged the reader.  I set out to write a book like that.  But it took me a long time to finish that first novel Growing Up Single, and by the time I had, the publishing industry had swung strongly in the direction of genre fiction.

Pat: With the huge proliferation of books published every year -- over 500,000 in 2008 --it’s almost impossible for readers to find new books by new authors unless the books are genre-specific, but it seems as if we all miss out when the emphasis is on genre.

James: A while back, we talked about how the best of all worlds for a writer might just be to establish their own genre. For example, Scott Turow did very well by opening up the legal drama genre and was quickly followed by John Grisham. Have you made progress in the direction of establishing your own distinctive genre?

Pat: I wish! After Wanda Hughes read my books, she sent me a message saying, “I now see what you mean about an unnamed genre. Kind of a big picture conspiracy, behind the scenes machinations and how that affects the little guy (or gal) on the street.” So, “conspiracy” could have been a good genre name, but I broke the pattern with Daughter Am I. Daughter Am I is more of a mainstream novel, though it could be classified as a mystery. My work-in-progress is a tongue-in-cheek apocalyptic allegory, which is a weird sort of story even for me.

The unifying theme in all of my books is the perennial question: Who are we? More Deaths Than One suggests we are our memories. A Spark of Heavenly suggests we are the sum total of our experiences and choices. Daughter Am I suggests we are our heritage. So, perhaps my genre is “identity quest,” though I can’t see that as ever being a big draw. My only hope is to build an audience for “Pat Bertram’s books.”

James:  Who are we?   I like that.  I think that sooner or later if the novelist wants to get beyond strict entertainment, he or she needs to take on bigger themes and say something about them in story form.  My favorite novel of recent years, Damascus Gate by Robert Stone, was set in the period of the first intifada in Jerusalem.  The novel could be seen as simply the narrative of a journalist facing a mid-life crisis, but he manages to weave in quests for spiritual enlightenment, vivid descriptions of day to day hell in the Gaza Strip and a romantic encounter with a potential soulmate.  If you want to understand why the Israeli – Palestinian conflict is so intractable, this book lays it out, but still manages to drive forward with a compelling narrative that kept me hooked from beginning to end. 

Pat: Most books that go beyond genre, and even many of those that don’t, seem to have some sort of quest at the heart, and mid-life-crisis certainly falls in the category of “identity quest.” It seems as if Damascus Gate is not only the story of a personal search for identity, but the search for a people’s identity or a country’s identity.

James: As a reader, my roots were in science fiction, but that eventually led me into the classics, literary novels and other genres like murder mysteries, as I followed paths carved out for me by my favorite writers. What would you say are your influences?

Pat:  I like to read novels that have it all -- mystery, adventure, romance, a touch of strangeness, a bit of truth -- but since I can’t find that sort of novel very often, I settle for just about anything. Non-fiction, genre fiction, literary fiction, whatever is at hand. I used to real a lot of science fiction, but when the science fiction gave way to science fantasy, I lost interest -- I like my science fiction rooted in the human world. If Kate Wilhelm were still writing science fiction, I’d still be reading it.

James: Yes, that kind of humanistic science fiction exerts a pull on me, though I’ve now got expectations that a strong SF story or novel will bring me to another place, tell a compelling and have a strong prose style.  I’ve recently been reading a Best of collection from one of the recent years and I’m impressed by how many of these stories really work for me.

Pat: One of the few books I’ve read recently that pulled me into another world was Heart of Hythea by Suzanne Francis. Her world mirrored ours enough that it was easy to get into the story and stay there.

James: Are you writing to reach a particular kind of reader?

Pat:  In a way, I’m the reader I was writing for. There were stories I wanted to read and couldn’t find, so I wrote them. The dichotomy of this is that I always wanted to reach a large readership, so it would have been more practical to write books that a large number of people would like.

James:  As writers, we need to be passionate about our stories.  The process of writing a novel is grueling enough, but the quest would seem impossible if we lost faith in what we’re doing and who we’re writing for.  When I do public speaking, I’m always thinking about who the target audience and  want to give them something special they won’t get from another speaker. In a sense, that’s much like the process of writing for that ideal reader.  We write and hope the reader will get it; sometimes they’ll see themes and connections that go beyond our conscious intentions.

Pat: Even though I write the books I want to read, I am always aware of potential readers and how best to show my vision so that they will be able to share it.

James: We've both entered writing contests and lived to tell about it. Would you do that again? Did you learn anything in particular from those experiences?

Pat: I don’t intend to enter any other major writing contests, though I might if I can figure out how to make it work for me as a promotion tool. I didn’t learn much from the experience, though I gained a lot. I’ve made many friends, I’ve become involved in a couple of writing groups that were offshoots of the contest, and in a roundabout sort of way, I became published because of the contests.

James:  Yes, novel writing contests feel like one of those necessary experiences that are good to have behind you.  We learn from them, but they are time consuming and the odds of winning in a large contest are quite slim.  But it is like a trial run for the whole process of building networks and promoting your work.  And getting to know the other writers I’ve met through the contests has been the lasting benefit. 

Pat: I was going to mention about how the contest was a trial run for networking, but recently I’ve become shy about asking people to read blogs or leave comments, let alone vote for an entry. It seems such an intrusion. I’d never again be able to do the kind of campaigning that was necessary for those online contests.

James: You've been very active in blogging and other forms of social media. Have these helped to build a readership? Do you actively measure the results of your community building?

Pat: Most of the people who bought my books came from the social media. Although I have thousands of “friends” there is no real way to measure my community building or to know if what I’m doing is effective.

James:  In my day job as a product manager, we’ve started to focus a lot on improving our online presence and Google (i.e. search engine) rankings.  Building a community through social media is a long, drawn-out process.  Getting people to buy books from writers they meet online feels like a paradigm shift, as mass media promotion (the old style) is augmented or superseded by social media.  I suppose actual book sales will be the key metric, but they are a lagging indicator.  

James: If you just had to choose two channels of social media, what would they be?

Pat: One channel would definitely be blogging. Something I never expected when I set up Bertram’s Blog, is how much I like writing and publishing my articles. I feel safe on my blog, away from the ratings rampage of other sites, and it gives me the freedom to say what I want. I don’t write about controversial topics, so I don’t have the viewers that other blogs do, but still, for some reason, my readership is growing. As for the other channel -- I couldn’t choose just one. I have discussion groups on both Facebook and Gather, good friends on both sites, though lately I’ve actually been meeting more people on Facebook. What I would like is to find another channel, a different and effective way of introducing people to my books, but so far I haven’t found it.

James:  Pat, if there is another effective social media channel for reaching potential readers, I have every confidence you’ll be at the forefront.  Thanks for joining us on the Writer’s Notebook series of the James Rafferty Blog.

Pat: Thank you for inviting me to be a guest on your blog, James. I’ve always enjoyed your comments on the Gather discussions, so having this opportunity to talk with you has been a real treat.  

 

Pat Bertram is a native of Colorado and a lifelong resident. When the traditional publishers stopped publishing her favorite type of book — character and story driven novels that can’t easily be slotted into a genre — she decided to write her own. Daughter Am I is Bertram’s third novel to be published by Second Wind Publishing, LLC. Also available are More Deaths Than One and A Spark of Heavenly Fire.

Writer's Notebook: Writer Idol at the Boston Book Festival

In my last post, I talked about my fun experiences attending the Boston Book Festival.  The event brimmed over with sessions that were helpful for writers who are on the path to publication.  

The first of these sessions was called the "Guided Open Mic," with our expert guide being author and investigative TV journalist Hank Phillipi Ryan.  Here's a picture of the Arbor Room of the Boston Public Library, where that session was held. 

I got a chance to do a reading at that session and had hoped to get my work read at a second session.  This one was across the street at the Old South Church about an hour later. 

Imagine this scene.  The room is packed with about 250 people.  Up on the stage, a panel of four publishing industry veterans is assembled, with representation from the literary agent, editing and publishing communities.  The session was named Writer Idol. 

Now that you've had a chance to visualize the scene, here's a photo of the session as it was about to begin (it's fuzzy, but you'll get the sense of it). 

The ground rules for Writer Idol were:

1. Participants were asked to bring in a 250 word beginning to a novel or piece of non-fiction and state the genre.
2. The entries were put in a box and a woman actor pulled them out and read from them.
3. There were four judges: a couple of agents and two other people from publishers.
4. The entries were read until two of the judges raised their hands to stop.

Depending upon your perspective, this might seem like either a writer's dream or, more ominously, their nightmare. 

 

I would estimate that about 40 entries were read over a one hour period.   My entry didn't get read, but the process was fascinating, a kind of live slush pile. The judges had different perspectives, so sometimes one hand would be raised but the reading would continue. Only a few pieces were read through to the end.

 

The process was anonymous; nobody knew who the writers were. However, there were some passages where the audience totally broke down with laughter, which no doubt was tough for the writers of those pieces.

For example, it turns out the judges REALLY did not like references to certain bodily functions that get activated when a character gets squeamish. TMI, I guess. There were three entries or so that went there; they all got shot down immediately.

Other no-no's included overuse of flowery adjectives, misuse of large words, and overuse of cliches. I'd imagine most writers that participated in a writing group wouldn't be surprised by these things, but seeing the panelists stop the reading because of these gotchas offered powerful reinforcement on these do's and don'ts.

 

My conclusion: Great session.  It's one thing to hear about what agents and editors want to see -- or not see -- but it's quite another to see it all play out in real time.  If you submit your work to an agent, they'll read what you submit and analyze it line by line just as they did here.  So, yes, you want to make your work compelling AND avoid miscues that will take the reader out of the scene and cause them to move on to the next item in the slush pile. 

 

That's it for this post, but I'd like to mention that I'll be having a guest blogger join me later this week on November 19.   Pat Bertram, author of Daughter Am I and two other novels published by Second Wind Publishing is on a whirlwind blog tour this month.  She and I have a lot of fun chatting together online and we've collaborated on an interview where we both talk about our writing and muse about topics such as writing outside of typical genres.  Please join us. 

Writer's Notebook: Boston Book Festival

Saturday I treated myself and took the train into Boston for the first ever Boston Book Festival.  What a great event.  I hope there will be many more which follow.  

I found out about the festival from the excellent folks at Grub Street, who also sponsored several of the sessions. 

Despite a shaky weather forecast, thousands of people were in attendance.  I grabbed a quick lunch, then headed over to one of the main venues, the amazing Boston Public Library.   I headed for the Abbey Room, soon to be the site for a session called "Guided Open Mic." 

On the way, this is what I saw: 

The Abbey Room is in the old part of the library, just across from the outdoor portion of the festival.  I headed out the door and stepped across Dartmouth Street (closed off for the day) and over to the booths of the festival.   Even with the threat of rain, one tent housed the festival stage and a variety of muscians, mostly from the local Berklee School of Music.  For a few minutes, I watched an artist named Liz Longley, who sang original songs, played keyboards and was backed by a tight quartet.  

The Fall colors flourished despite the rain, as seen in the following photo I took near the music tent. 

Time to head back to the library.   Along the way, I spotted this very cool banner advertising the festivities.  

 

Back at the Abbey Room, I signed up for the "Guided Open Mic" session. Our host was the very energetic Hank Phillipi Ryan, who is a TV news journalist on Boston Channel 7 and moonlights as a writer of 3 published novels in the thriller genre.  The event premise was simple.  Writers were invited to read a 3 minute excerpt from their work.  Earlier in the day, I printed out the beginning of a story I'd written earlier this year called "Fifth Season."  Hank offered started the session by offering us her tips on reading in public.  Most of it boiled down to "practice, practice, practice", though she also suggested we be very careful in choosing our selection and read the excerpt in a way which will keep listeners engaged.  

I thought the session worked very well.  It quickly became clear that good writing alone was not enough to carry the day in a reading, but several writers got the attention of the audience and held it.  After each reading, Hank offered a quick constructive critique on what worked and what needed improvement.   I got a chance to read my excerpt about 15 minutes into the event.  I speak a lot at conferences, but definitely had a few butterflies when it came to reading from my own work in front of an audience.  Afterwards, Hank suggested I needed to be more careful in choosing my microphone position in order to be able to look out and engage the audience.   The early part of the story that I read mainly introduces the characters; she suggested the excerpt needed to have more happening.  And more does happen -- later in story.    

The event continued for over an hour and lots of writers got a chance to read their work.  I felt I learned a lot from this and feel I'll be better prepared the next time I do a reading.  

Later that day, I attended another writer event, this one called "Writer Idol."   I'll write about that in my next post.   

Writer's Notebook: Signs of the Seasons

Fall in New England is one of my favorite seasons.  I've lived in New England most of my life, but never tire of the variety this season brings to us. 

Yesterday, I rode with a business colleague through New Hampshire and Vermont.  It was Columbus Day, sometimes celebrated as a holiday in the United States, and often touted as a great weekend for viewing foliage.  Well, in most years, you won't see much but bare trees in Northern New England by the time that weekend rolls around.  Happily, this year is an exception.  We had copious amounts of rain in the Spring and enough during the summer so that the foliage this year is rich in colors of gold, harvest brown, and pumpkin orange, and many shades in between.  Smoke from wood fireplaces drifts in the air, stirring ancient urges to gather around the warmth.  As the temperature drops, we develop a taste for hearty meals such as stews, curries, and ragouts, washed down by mugs of hot cider, cocoa and pints of auburn ale. 

Frost warnings permeate the weather forecasts, but often the days are still warm enough to enjoy our favorite outdoor activities, be it tossing a football, riding a bike, hiking a trail or walking with your pet. 

For a writer, autumn presents backgrounds that tickle the senses, but the season also works as a metaphor for the passing of years and the progression toward mortality.  I've included scenes of Fall in my novels and the nip in the air, variegated colors of leafy canopies and harvest aromas can transport the reader directly to that destination, bringing it alive. 

As a reader, how to you react to seasons in writing?  Do authors draw you in with the vivid descriptions of the change that Autumn or Winter brings?  Or is there a hidden terror in these periodic changes of life and its rhythms? 

If you are a writer or another type of artist, how important are the seasons in your work?  Do they inspire you?  Do they transport your characters to new realizations or spiritual yearnings?  Let's talk about the seasons and how they affect your art.  

Writer's Notebook: Creative Blogs

It's been a busy Fall for me and I've been enjoying the transition from the summer here in southeastern Massachusetts.  I got back from a trip last weekend and discovered, much to my surprise and delight, that my friend Pat Bertram, author of Bertram's Blog, had been nominated for a Kreativ Blogger award for her blog AND passed the nomination for that same award and recognition to this blog.  

The award looks like this:  

I'm very pleased to be nominated for this award and it's much more meaningful when it comes from Pat, a blogger and writer who has done a remarkable job in the blogosphere and other social media in leading discussions about writing in a way that builds community among writers and helps us all get better at what we do.  

About six months ago, I recast this blog to focus primarily about writing and travel, with occasional forays into other areas such as personal technology and music.  I still find it hard to make the time to post regularly, but I'll continue to post when I've got thoughts, pictures or other cool discoveries to share.  So, to Pat Bertram and Bertram's Blog, thank you very much.  

Now for the fun part -- passing on the nomination to three other deserving recipients. My stint in the blogosphere has included lots of interaction with both the community of fiction writers and with my many colleagues in the telecommunications industry.  I blog on matters related to Voice over IP for the Dialogic Corporate Blog and like the split of keeping my business blogging mostly separate from this more personally focused blog. 

So what do I like in a blog?  I like people who are innovative and use their diverse backgrounds and expertise to comment on topics in multiple areas, bringing new insights from these connections.  

With that in mind, I'd like to nominate the following blogs for the Kreativ Blogger award:  

Fractals of Change - written by Tom Evslin - I've known Tom since we worked together on fax standards in the early Nineties and he's had a fascinating career and so-called retirement in the time since.  After leaving his post as CEO of Voice over IP startup ITXC, Tom launched his blog.  He comments on a broad range of topics ranging from the high tech world to public policy.  Like me, he is also a writer and self-published a novel a couple of years ago.  His is a fine blog that I enjoy even when his busy real life reduces the number of posts.  

Communications - written by Brough Turner - I've known Brough over ten years and he has typically brought keen insight and a unique slant to whatever catches his eye.  This past year, we've worked together at Dialogic, and it has been fun to be able to talk without the constraint of being competitors in the workplace.  In his blog, he tracks topics such as the pace of broadband development throughout the world and the social implications as people from third world countries suddenly have tools that connect them with the rest of the world.    

Coming full circle, the third blog I'd like to recognize is from a writer that I've gotten to know over the past two years from our online writing group on Gather.com.  The blog is The Paper Tiger, by Other Lisa aka Lisa Brackmann.  Lisa blogs about writing, her cats, life in Venice, California and, most of all, about her many visits to mainland China.  Lisa is a fine writer and her first novel Rock Paper Tiger, set in China, is due out next spring.  In her blog, we get a current view about what's happening in China for real people in places such as bars, restaurants, museums and so on.  It's not political so much as chronicle.  Lisa offers fascinating glimpses from a western perspective into an often hidden country. 

So, I hope my readers will take a moment to check out these blogs and see if you like what you read.  Please let me know what you think or if there are other blogs you think are a good fit for the creative blog criteria I outlined.  Until the next time  . . .

Writer's Notebook: Road Trip

Road trip.  The very words still set me a-tingle.  This summer has been a time of several trips and I've seen a lot, ranging from mountain vistas to vineyards to tossing seas.  As a writer, I've always mined my trips for material and one of my favorite things to do in a novel or short story is to take the reader to a place that I've been and try to bring it to life.  Set the scene, paint the details, sketch the moment.  Ah, that's part of the joy of writing.  

Tomorrow I go on my most common type of roadtrip, an airplane trip where I do a flyover of the countryside.  You see a lot less during the trip itself, but I find the many hours aloft are a fine time to dive into the details of writing extended scenes with few distractions.  I do most of this kind of writing longhand, which is highly portable and can be done at any time during the flight.   No need to boot the looseleaf notebook or close the pages just because the pilot wants to land.  

My last few trips were on the road.  I took my oldest son to college in western North Carolina recently and he and I drove through ten states over two and one-half days.  For me, the new places were in the middle:  Route 81 crosses from Pennsylvania into Maryland, West Virginia and Virginia in short succession.  

We started the second day in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, the very name a harbinger of what was to come.  For on that day, we started in a rainstorm, then cleared a mountain passage on Route 78 and watched at the clouds broke, revealing the road which lay in front of us.   Within an two hours, the clouds had vanished and sun accompanied us for the rest of the trip.  

Around lunch time, we passed into West Virginia and decided to look for lunch in Martinsburg.  My wife family had settled in that area about 300 years ago, so we were curious about the town.   We drove through a residential area for about 10 minutes and began to wonder where the town center was, but finally discovered it.  The local architecture is beautiful, a mix of art deco and victorian styles, without a lot of more modern changes.  Here are a couple of samples of what we saw: 

After lunch at a Mexican restaurant downtown, we explored further -- the railroad station was just a few blocks away.   Martinsburg has a heritage of railroads and we saw an example in the roundhouse that was just across the tracks from the more recently modernized station.  

 

As all railroad buffs know, the roundhouse is where you would turn around the train in order to be able to change directions and go onto another track.  A much smaller example is found in San Francisco with their cable cars, but I'd never seen a fully enclosed building for this purpose.  Martinsburg clearly does not have a booming economy, but the people were very friendly and opened up when we mentioned the existance of family in the area.  

The road trip continued.  Our most spectacular day was on Friday morning, as we rode from Roanoke, Virginia to Tennesee and then into western North Carolina.  Here are a couple of glimpses of our vantage points:  

 

The mountains awed us as new scenes leaped up after each turn.   The two samples here are just examples of the many beauties to be seen on a drive through the Blue Ridge Mountains.  

I recently mentioned to my writing friends how remarkable I found these mountain vistas to be.  I have a feeling I'll be seeing mountains jumping into my fiction very soon.   And now, time for that next road trip.  

Writer's Notebook: Songs about Ireland

As readers of this blog know, I love to write fiction.  One of my other huge interests is music and from time to time I write songs. The reason I bring it up is that I'll be playing this weekend at an open mic night in Medfield, Massachusetts at North Street Coffeehouse.  

For the occasion, I've decided to play the two songs I wrote about my travels in Ireland.  As you might expect for a writer, there's a story behind each song.  Twenty-two years ago, I took my first trip to the isle and loved the unique character of its towns and villages.  I also had heard about Irish music, but the scene at small clubs just amazed me.  In place after place, musicians would gather in a corner and play a wide variety of Celtic music.  This was my real introduction to the Celtic sound and I couldn't get enough of it.  I thought about my experiences for quite a while, then I sat down and started to write a song.  The result was Irish Man.  I recorded a version for a song contest last year and you can hear it here on Gather.com.  

Last summer, I went to Ireland again, this time on a business trip to an area southwest of Dublin.  On the first trip, I hadn't spent much time in Dublin, so I made a point of taking a bus into town and checking it out.  Ireland had changed a lot since my first visit and Dublin is at the epicenter of the economic changes going on.  In Europe, the phrase they use to describe Ireland is the Celtic Tiger.  By the time I arrived, Ireland was beginning to feel it's own downturn, but the economy was still much stronger than what I'd seen on the first visit.  Dublin is a great walking city and I wrote about my walk through parts of town in another post here.  The city is steeped in history and in strolling from place to place, I kept running into references to the many writers who had lived and gone to school in Dublin.  I wanted to capture a bit of that, and that became the nugget for another song.   About a month ago, I decided the time and had and started writing words.  Perhaps thirty minutes later, I had all of the music and my first pass at the lyrics.  The song is called Dublin Walk and builds on the impressions built up by several walks through the city that week. 

I've played Irish Man in public many times, including once earlier this summer for a church group.  But this will be the first time I've played Dublin Walk for anybody other than my family.   I'm looking forward to it.  If you're in the area, stop by.   As an added bonus, my son has a band and they also will be playing.  The last time I went to this coffeehouse, we had a great night listening to all of the local talent and the headlining act.   This should be fun.