Novel Writing: In for the Long Haul
by Sandra Gurvis

 

Sandra Gurvis is the author of six books and hundreds of magazine articles. Her titles include CAREERS FOR NONCONFORMISTS (Marlowe, 1999); AMERICA'S STRANGEST MUSEUMS (Carol/Citadel, 1998; 1996) originally titled THE COCKROACH HALL OF FAME AND 101 OTHER OFF-THE-WALL MUSEUMS (Carol/Citadel, 1994); 30 GREAT CITIES TO START OUT IN (Arco/Macmillan, 1997); WAY STATIONS TO HEAVEN (Arco/Macmillan, 1996) and THE OFF-THE-BEATEN-PATH JOB BOOK (Carol/Citadel, 1995). She has also written for People, YM, Entertainment Weekly, Fiction Writer, Woman's World, Parenting, The World and I, Coast to Coast, USA Weekend, Chicago Tribune, as well as for numerous trade and corporate publications and has created travel promotional materials and advertorials. Her books have been featured on "Good Morning America," "CBS Up to the Minute," "ABC World News Tonight," in USA Today and in other newspapers and on television and radio stations across the country; and have been excerpted in magazines, including Woman's Own.Along with being selected for residencies at the Mary Anderson Center in Mt. St. Francis, Indiana, she has won awards for her writing and is a member of the American Society of Journalists and Authors (ASJA). She lives in Columbus, Ohio.

If you're having trouble getting through the long process of novel-writing, you're in good company. Read on to discover how your colleagues-from Wally Lamb to Jacquelyn Mitchard -take the steps f rom " page 1 to "The End."

Interviews by Sandra Gurvis
If a journey of a thousand miles begins in a single step, mine started in 1975, when I was on my honeymoon. My husband Ron and I were driving to Florida and I said, "I've got this novel rattling around in my head, and I want to write it. But I'm afraid." And he replied, "Why? Just do it. There's nothing wrong with trying." Well, you might want to hear that, like Stephen King, Judith Guest, or John Grisham, I penned a first or second draft, sent it off to an agent or publisher and New York and the rest of the literary world came rushing to my doorstep. But that didn't happen; in fact it took me nearly 25 years from the time I penned the first version longhand in a set of five notebooks lost forever in a flood in our basement to just last week when I received the typeset galleys. And it might be a good thing that my initial draft, which basically concerned the antics of myself and a group of friends in college, was washed away because should I ever become famous, someone might blackmail me with it. It was that bad.

Between then and now, I wrote hundred of magazine articles and five other books, mostly nonfiction. But like a song fragment that refuses to be ignored, THE PIPE DREAMERS kept coming back. So whenever I had the time and during one period, I actually worked full-time with two small children to save up the money so I could revise the umpteenth version I struggled with it. And mostly, it wrote itself, like a complex crossword puzzle that slowly reveals its own logic. But I never gave up, and when I became frustrated, put it away for a while. But I always returned to it.

I won't go into the details of publication the dozens of rejections from New York houses, the discouraging comments from agents but I will say that I got to a point where I absolutely believed in it and knew it was ready. The time was right, and I kept my eyes and ears open and found a small publisher. THE PIPE DREAMERS, which concerns the student protest movement of the late '60s/early '70s will be released by Neighborhood Press this April. Every writer has his or her own story. And one of the biggest things that kept me, a sociology and psychology major with no background or contacts in English or journalism whatsoever, going was the gradual realization that I was far from alone. So here are some comments from ten prolific novelists about how they either go under, over, around or straight through the problems and perils of writing that first and subsequent book.

THE CAST OF CHARACTERS:
Lawrence Block is the author of more than 50 books, including 14 Matthew Scudder novels (the latest is Everybody Dies, from Morrow).
Carol Higgins Clark has written four bestselling Regan Reilly mysteries, including the upcoming fleeced (Warner Books). She's also the daughter of novelist Mary Higgins Clark. Tananarive Due is the author of the groundbreaking African-American horror novels My Soul to Keep and The Between (both HarperCollins).

Ernest J. Gaines is a professor and writer-in-residence at the University of Southwestern Louisiana. His books include A Lesson Before Dying (Vintage), A Gathering of Old Men (Vintage) and The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman (Bantam). Rebecca Goldstein has written five novels, including Mazel, The Dark Sister and The MindBody Problem (all from Penguin).She's also a MacArthur FoundationFellow. Judith Kelman has more than four million copies in print with such novels as Fly Away Home (Bantam), Someone's Watching (Crime Line); and the just-released After the Fall (Putnam. Her Web site (http://www.jkelman.com) is geared towards aspiring writers. Wally Lamb is the author of two Oprah's Club picks, She's Come Undone (Pocket) and I Know This Much Is True (HarperCollins). He teaches writing at the University of Connecticut. Sharyn McCrumb is The New York Times best author behind The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter (Onyx), She Walks These Hills (Signet), The Rosewood Casket (Signet) and the just- published Ballod of Frankie (Dutton).Jacquelyn Mitchard is the author of the Oprah pick The Deep End of the ocean (Viking),a New York Times bestseller, and the recently released The Most Wanted (Viking) She writes a syndicated column.
Steven Womack is the Edgar-award winning author of eight novels, including Way Past Dead (Del Ray), Chain of Fools (Ballantine) and the recently published Murder Manual (Ballantine).

 

Step 1: Preparing for the journey

Sharyn McCrumb: "I get all the factual information that I can. For instance, I'm researching a novel on ballad-collecting which used to be called song-catching. I read biographies of song- catchers and books on musical theory and learned how to do musical notation in the fashion of the era.

"In my book about Frankie Silver, I went to where the man she murdered was buried and did research on English law because in 1832 when the murder occurred, that's what was still used in the US. I also read the original court documents and visited the town where the events happened, interviewing descendants of the sheriff and others who'd been involved.

"As a fiction writer, it's my job to take hundreds of facts and structure them so they come alive."

Lawrence Block: "Everything varies from one book to the next. I think about a book for a certain amount of time and start in. I have a great deal of anxiety while I'm writing, particularly if it's a puzzle-type mystery because I have to do the whole thing to see if it's going to work out in the end. I liken the experience to that of divers in Acapulco. They have to time their leaps off the cliff so the tide will be in at the exact moment they hit the water."

Jacquelyn Mitchard: 'I'm a great believer in ritual, so I prepare by buying a large Tupperware box with two flaps. I rip articles out of magazines, and get CD-ROMS, photos, or anything else I can that's related to what I want to write about and throw them in. I then tell my story to my friend , who is also a journalist, who helps ne understand what I'm trying to say.
"I need to see the story as organic, as a living, breathing thing. I read a great deal of fiction before starting to write, sort of like carbo-loading before a big race. I don't dare pick up the most slender of novels when I'm working, because there's always something to be jealous Of." Rebecca Goldstein: "I rarely jot ideas down. But if I can recall them several days or weeks later, I know live got a 'hit' and it's something I'm I play going to write about. Then I play around with the idea and see if it will take off - Sometimes this process takes several years, and other times it starts right away. it varies with each book. But part of the preparation is deciding on the voice, because once you fixate on that, it sticks in your soul and the story starts to pour out. Wally Lamb: "I had a teacher once who pointed out that the world is a very old place. And that all the stories that have been told are already out there. So I read myths) the classics and parts of the Bible. I look through my bag of clippings that I keep when I see something of interest in the newspaper. I make notes on ATM slips and envelopes. I'm looking for a cross between the
mythical or archetypal and the contemporary here-and-now. Then the story comes to me, it may be in the form of an image) or the voice of a character beginning to speak."

Step 2: Dealing with ...beginnings

Ernest J. Gaines: "For me, this is the most difficult, because I'm starting fresh. But I stay and work at it, going over and over it until it's right. Sometimes I get stuck, so I keep changing things around until it's moving in a direction that I like."

Rebecca Goldstein: "Sometimes I have to trick myself into thinking, This is only a short story, I'm only going to do it for a little while. That way, it's not as formidable, because the thought of spending years of your life working on something can be terrifying."

Judith Kelman: "The anticipation is my favorite part. I like the idea of starting and getting everything going. It's wide open and in a state of flux. It's a nice, energetic time. Anything ispossible."

Step 3: Dealing with...middles

Steven Womack: "After the initial elation of beginning something new wears off, you've got this long stretch of writing to do. Sometimes it feels good and other times it doesn't. But you slog through it anyway, taking it one scene at a time."

Tananarive Due: "The middle is the toughest. You've been living here a while and haven't finished; it's easy to second-guess yourself and panic. But you can't let the voices of doubt take the driver's seat or you'll never finish."

Carol Higgins Clark: "I work on it every day. I know my characters and have a fairly good idea of where the story is going. Since my books generally set within a period of a week, I keep a posterboard with days listed and what's going. If I get bogged down in the middle, I look at the board and see what I'm aiming for or add more, if that's what's needed. The point is to get something out of each working session."

Step 4: Dealing with...endings

Jacquelyn Mitchard: "My favorite part is the almost-end. I know what's going to happen, and that usually includes the last sentence. You can allow yourself the luxury of breathing without the fear that you'll never finish. And the last few pages are luscious, because you've broken the back of the story and can see the place where you're home free." Steven Womack: "I compare the ending to completing a marathon, where you get that final burst of energy. I work constantly; one day I typed 22 pages. But after I'm done, I have a slight down period and somtimes even take a couple of months off before even thinking about another novel.
Some authors finish writing in the morning and start on a new project that afternoon."
Wally Lamb: "The ending is a time of relief. By now, I've figured what the story's about and what it means. This is also when I come up with the title, because that doesn't come to me until the process is almost complete."

Step 5: When are you grooving?

Steven Womack: "I'm unaware of time passing. I look up and a whole day has gone by and it's getting dark outside. That's a great place to be."
Ernest J. Gaines: "The dialogue and narrative flow naturally, and you feel good about what you're doing. But even when things are going well, you have to be disciplined and patient and keep working at it. I have a definite schedule every day and I'm at my desk from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., no matter what."

Tananarive Due: "The writing goes quickly and there's not a lot of time for reflection. The story seems bursting to tell itself. For example, I went back to notes that I'd made two years previously and they pretty much followed the way the book came out. I knew then that I'd produced solid work."

Carol Higgins Clark: "It's got to be fun. In my third book, I thought I had to make everyone depressed and my editor called me and said, 'Stop writing! This is not funny!' So I started over again, and it felt good. I didn't lose everything, but just sort of rearranged it." Sharyn McCrumb: "I come from an oral tradition, so I'm a great believer in reading out loud. if it flows smoothly and doesn't trip up on my tongue, then I know it's on track." Rebecca Goldstein: "You work yourself into a state of enchantment and involvement. if you can't totally engage yourself in the writing, then something is wrong."

 

Step 6: Getting unstuck

Judith Kelman: "I look on writer's block as a speed bump: If you push too hard, your internal gears will stop. You need to slow down and spend some time developing what you want to say and how to manage your characters."

Wally Lamb: "I get away from the computer. If it's a nice day, I'll work outside. There's something about having a pen in hand and being able to scrawl on a notepad that dislodges things for me."

Sharyn McCrumb: "I go for a walk, do the dishes, clean something. Then I go right back to it. After all, I can always keep revising it until it's got the resonance I'm looking for." Tananarive Due: "Sometimes you're in a negative space due to outside factors, such as family or money, and you're overcome by a sense of inadequacy. That's when I read something else, or talk to another writer. That gives me a sense of perspective."
Jacquelyn Mitchard: 'My unconscious mind needs time away from the actual writing. But that doesn't mean that nothing's getting done. It's like the theme music in a movie: You don't know it's there, but it's always playing. So I go put water sealant on the kids' shoes. And then the next day everything's fine."

Step 7: What are you scared of?

Wally Lamb: "When I wake up in the middle of the night with an extreme sense of dissatisfaction. The story is troubling me, and I know I'm off track. I think, Oh gee, why am I doing this? Maybe I'll give this up. But it often means I'm getting ready for a breakthrough or the story is swerving in a direction I'm not prepared for. Discouragement is part of the creative process." Jacquelyn Mitchard: "When I think this is stupid, lame and trivial and that 50 other people have already written about it-and that readers are going to feel the same way. But then I realize that the
courtship period has passed and that nothing is without its flaws."
Sharyn McCrumb: "For me, this happens on page 70. 1 storm out of the office in a rage, convinced that I've produced something worthless. Then my husband says to me, 'What page are you on?' I tell him, he sighs, and says, 'Get back in there!' I do, and the feeling passes on its own."
Judith Kelman: "Without self-doubt and that internal editor, your work gets stale. It's when you believe that everything you do is wonderful that you get in trouble. Writing is the perfect balance between self-confidence and self-doubt, with a bit of self-delusion thrown in."

Final Advice

Due: "Don't give in to doubt. You've got to keep working at it and can't afford to let yourself dance around the actual writing, even if your novel doesn't sell. Finish what you start and follow it through."

Gaines: "Six words: Read, read, read and write, write, write. Be aware of things around you, of nature and people. You have to have the desire and discipline to perfect your craft and to do it every day."

Clark: "Find your own voice and don't try to copy anyone. Go to a writers' class or group and get feedback. Be able to define your story in a sentence or two."
Block: "Recognize that there are no road maps and that how you feel about the book may not necessarily reflect its quality."

Womack: "Be willing to take chances. I spent the summer working on a spec novel, in a totally unfamiliar genre. It had been rattling around in my head for years and I'm now on my third rewrite. Just keep writing until you get through it."

Goldstein: "Revisions are important; I constantly revise. Even if I'm in a rush to get to the end, I go over and over the material."

Kelman: "Read everything in a very critical way; it's amazing how many writers don't do this. It's like being a surgeon without ever having witnessed an operation."

Lamb: "Drop the illusion that you're going to write a wonderful first draft: The revision process is where the real creation occurs. You may write for yourself initially, but as you refine your work, you should start to take in the needs and desires of readers."

Sandra Gurvis is the author of six books, including THE PIPE DREAMERS (Neighborhood Press, 2000) and CAREERS FOR NONCONFORMISTS (Marlowe, 1999) which was a selection of the Quality Paperback Book Club. She is working on a nonfiction book, WHERE HAVE ALL THE FLOWER CHILDREN GONE?, due out from University Press of Mississippi in 2001. Information about THE PIPE DREAMERS can be obtained from www.neighborhoodpress.com or from Sandra's Website, www.sgurvis.com

Adapted from Fiction Writer Magazine [insert URL and hyperlink here], April, 1999. Reprinted with permission.