Writer's Group Update

I am sitting at Tryst now, having just had my latest writing group meeting. We are down to two in the group -- three have had babies in the last few months and are on sabbatical, two have self-selected themselves away -- and so it's just me and Christy dilligently meeting.

Which turns out to be just fine actually. I'm a firm believer in self-selection. The people who are there are the people who should be there. Christy and I are in deep need of a kick start, and so have been meeting every week for the last few weeks and trying to keep ourselves beholden to our internal deadlines. We'll switch back to an every other week schedule soon probably, and we'll also invite a few more people to join us when and where we find them. In the meantime, it's been a nice way to keep motivated.

So, for all to see, I pronounce here what I've promised to give her by this coming Monday:
1 call an editor at Discover to follow up on a query I sent on Monday
2 write the paragraph query I promised Ride so I can invoice them
3 write a first draft of the query I sent to Discover in a kid-friendly format for a kid-friendly magazine
4 spend at least three hours writing on the fiction book
5 pick three lecture topics on Einstein that I can start preparing

I've already done the last one, and am half way through the second one . . .

First Drafts

So . . had writing group meeting this morning, and got feedback on my (very very rough) draft of the first twenty pages of the book. And, of course, I have been snapped right back into OH MY GOD THERE'S SO MUCH TO DO stage. Suddenly I am torn between wanting to edit -- since there were all these great ideas given to me -- and wanting to keep writing writing writing, and get more of the first draft done (I'd say I've written a quarter total). And I can't decide which to do, and of course feel vaguely stymied.

I was, however, reminded again that first drafts are OKAY. I don't know why we need to constantly be reminded of this. But KZ offered a great metaphor for writing -- the first draft is just about nailing in the posts. Like telephone poles. They point the way, they set up the framework, you've got a skeleton. Then, with suggestions from your readers, with your own editing, the second draft is about putting in all the stuff in between. Laying the wires, filling in the details, smoothing the edges, refining the product. I love this metaphor. It's not saying anything I didn't know -- or don't keep reciting in my head "It's ok Karen, this is just your first draft, you'll make it perfect later" -- but it somehow says the same thing in a different way, and I think one constantly needs to be reminded that you HAVE to go through the first draft stage before getting to the final stage. We keep hoping that as we get better we can skip some of this initial b.s. But truly I think the mark of a great writer is simply that they are good editors, and they can take that first draft and polish it up to brilliant beauty.

I just have to be told over and over again, in different ways, that it's ok to write a first draft -- and just because it's not perfect yet is no reason to give up. But it's hard to remember that I tell you. It's hard.

The Subtext

I just got SO side-tracked in the last entry -- 'cause what I really meant to talk about was the panic in my stomach that I have just let people read the first 20 pages. I mean that stuff is virgin territory. No one has read it except for me. And while I have done a wee bit of that "first chapter" honing I talked about -- mostly it's a realio-trulio, first, un-edited, Please-Don't-Judge-Me-On-This draft.

Total panic time.

Meeting #2

Met with the new writing group again this morning. . . and I actually, gasp, handed out the first 20 pages of the book I've been working on. It represents about 1/5 of what I've written so far, but the first part is always the most important thing to get right. It is, perhaps, the ONLY thing.

My good friend Misha Strauss was the first person to get this through my skull, though many writing teachers tried. The first 'graf is ALL. The way she, a philosophy grad student, put it was: A professor has decided by the end of the first page of an essay what grade they're going to give you. There is something a wee bit scary about the fact that the "grade" metaphor delved into my cortex more firmly than any other attempt to explain this concept to me. Decades of being a goody-goody and grade-grubber apparently . . .

BUT, the point is that after Misha told me that, I finally got it. I could, in fact, look at papers I wrote (I was taking courses in Philosophy of Science at UMD at the time) and point at the exact sentence on the first page that turned my A into a B+. And I pretty much never had the problem again.

Whether it's a book proposal or an article or a novel or a query or, hell, a letter trying to get out of paying for a parking ticket, you've pretty much got the first paragraph to convince the reader of your worth.

In the case of this book, I've got the first bit to convince

--a publisher to publish it
--a publisher to give me LOTS of money for it
--a reader to buy it
--a reader to read it
--a reviewer to like it

Now it is, of course, entirely possible that I could write a glowing first chapter and then a horrible book and lose any chance at the above . . . but the opposite isn't true. No matter how good the book becomes, it's entirely impossible to get a decent grade without that glowing first chapter.

So, I handed out the first 20 pages, and hopefully we can hone that baby over and over until it's perfect.

Inspiration! (Or is it Structure?)

We had our first writing group meeting this morning. Wow. I was nervous about it like Mary Tyler Moore throwing a cocktail party. I kept worrying yesterday that I might just forget by accident, and not show up -- like the way people who are afraid of heights vaguely worry they might suddenly jump off a bridge. I kept worrying that the people I didn't know who were coming wouldn't like me and the people I did know and they would walk off like this had been a waste of time. I worried no one would come.

The meeting was for 9. . . by 9:15 we had three people. By 9:45, we had five -- though all people I already knew. Still a really good group, and they didn't all know each other, which helps for rolling ideas around. At 10:30 one woman whom I hadn't met before arrived, nervous because she'd overslept-- but a great addition.

So all in all today we had. . . a playwright, three science writers all in various stages of book writing, a Knight-Ridder editor and UMD journalism professor who wants to start writing fiction, and a security journalist who was also a Bosnia war correspondent. I mean that's some firepower.

What I hadn't anticipated was that we would talk BUSINESS as much as anything today. I'm sure we'll do more editing in the future -- but we have so much to share in terms of how to get motivated, how to write book proposals, how to deal with the people who want their share of the money (agents-- good! randoms who late in the game announce they think they deserve royalties -- bad!), and how to stay organized.

Next time we'll bring stuff to share. . . which is SCARY. I haven't let anyone see what I've written for this Kepler book yet. But in the meantime, I'm totally charged up, and think a bi-weekly burst of energy from this group is going to do wonders for all of us.

SO -- my assignment for our next meeting is to
a) psych myself up for sharing some of my work
b) write three sections from the perspective of the crazy emperor
c) come up with one story to pitch as well as have the info from some magazines to pitch it to.

Mid-Career Writing Group

Hmmm, so both of my last two entries must have been rolling around in my head, since on Sunday, it suddenly became crystal clear what I needed to do. Since a) I want advice from mid-career writers, and b) I have a bad habit of thinking I should do everything alone and MY way, the time has come to form a writing group.

I have now sent this note out to everyone I know, as well as posted it on mediabistro.com.

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I became a freelance writer just so I wouldn't be held to anyone else's timeline. . . but, wow, if that doesn't mean I'm never beholden to anyone else's timeline. I need to inject just a tad more structure into this freelance lifestyle, and with DC's beautiful springtime as the best motivation in the world, now is the time to do it.

Calling all mid-career, freelance writers in the area who think having some truly talented colleagues with whom to brainstorm might just be the boost they need. We're forming a writer's workgroup of 5 to 8 people, to meet at Tryst in Adams Morgan, second and fourth Monday mornings 9 to 10:30, to get the week started off right with coffee, critiquing, and conversation.

Any genre will do -- fiction, non-fiction, journalism, plays, poetry -- but we are only looking for people who are already making their living/enjoying some success as writers. That is, the point of the group will be less to help one get into the field or to offer basic help; more about getting input from seasoned writers in order to really kick your work up a notch to the next level. Current participants include a nationally-produced, award-winning playwright; a science writer currently contracted for a non-fiction book whose last desk job was at Discovery Channel; and myself -- author of three non-fiction books, currently working on a fiction one.

This is an ideal opportunity for anyone at the beginning or mid-stages of a project who is craving both some outside commentary, as well as a burst of invigoration. There's nothing like a group of people asking to see the 5,000 words you swore you would write two weeks ago to keep you on track.

If you are intrigued, please send an e-mail to Karen Fox at kfox@nasw.org with a paragraph or two about who you are and what kind of writing you do. I'll take any questions you've got too. And of course feel free to forward this to anyone you know who might be interested.

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Interested? Contact me!