Advice for a Teen Writer
June 8, 2010
What would you tell a high school kid who wants to write?
by Rebecca Cantrell
OK, I’ve decided to name my high schooler. Her name in Mina, because that’s the main character in my YA novel and so she’s the high schooler I hang out with the most. Thanks, Mina, for wanting to carry on the tradition of the written word. It takes a special high schooler to recognize that and make it a goal.
Writers read. Writers have to love to read. And they have to do lots of it. One of the things that I hate the most about being a published writer is that I don’t have as much time to read books as I used to. When I was a kid and a teenager I was constantly holed up someplace with my nose in a book (I still am whenever I get a chance). Turns out, it’s all research and practice, not daydreams and time wasting. It’s my JOB.
Writers write. Lots of people talk about being writers or what they are writing. But a real writer writes, and a lot of the time. Words on the page stack up into books. Words in the air don’t. It’s fun to talk about writing, and there are a ton of things you will do that aren’t writing that still contribute to the book. But it all comes back to words on a page.
I hate to tell you this, Mina, but it’s tough to make money as a writer. In most careers you can learn your craft and work very hard and you will be financially rewarded. Writing, like most art, isn’t always like that. Money is important for food, shelter, and peace of mind. You can either figure out how to earn more or how to make do with less. But don’t get in the writing for the money as it’s statistically unlikely to follow. Still, I know you’re tough enough to persevere in that face of that. You’ve thrown down with vampires. The publishing industry, while sometimes perceived as similar, is not that bad.
Have fun. That whole tortured writer myth? Way overworked. I know a lot of happy and well adjusted writers. You don’t need to drink, do drugs, engage in complicated sexual dramas or perform other high risk acts to become a writer. You can simply enjoy doing it. You don’t have to act like every edit is a cut that wounds your soul. You can view them as ways to help your work read better, clearer, and more true. I love to write. I love to edit. I love to cut and add and re-vision. It’s not always easy, but I have a really great time.
Good luck, Mina! And know that many other writers will be there to help you along the way. Including me.
If I Win the Lottery
May 25, 2010
“If you won the Lottery, would you quit writing? If not, would the guaranteed income change how and what you write?”
But I don’t write because of invisible dollar signs. I write because of invisible voices in my head. I write because I am a crazy obsessed person who can’t stop writing. I wrote for years before I even thought to send something out to be published. Being published was the lottery. And I won it and I love it. I think it’s easy to get caught up in worrying about the money and the numbers of books sold (things largely outside our control) and forget about the pure joy of writing.
Don’t get me wrong. If a big pile of money comes out of this whole writing thing, just like the next writer, I will install a pool in my basement full of gold coins and swim around in it like Scrooge McDuck. Although I might have the coins sanitized first because who know where they’ve been. 
The Joys of Social Networking?
May 18, 2010
“Do you like doing all the marketing, social networking and other obligations of modern book publishing? Or would you prefer to just sit in your room writing, with no business-side duties?”
by Rebecca Cantrell
Not counting being a mother, what I love most of all writing in a room all by myself without anyone bothering me. Since I am a mother, I only write during school hours and after bedtime. And now that my son is getting older bedtime is getting later. The social networking and promotional stuff drives me nuts. Every morning I read my email on my old personal account, my Rebecca Cantrell account, and my Bekka Black account. Then I check my messages on Facebook and Twitter. I’ve abandoned MySpace, so if you’re trying to contact me there go to another portal.
After I deal with all of those messages that are so urgent they can’t wait until just before bedtime, then I’m allowed to write. Except not really. There are a ton of other promotional details: book giveaways, blogging, mailing copies to bloggers and reviewers (I can go through that automatic mailer machine at the post office so quickly people have been known to line up to watch me), getting those book trailers in shape, booking a blog tour. And every one of those things that I don’t get to make me feel horribly guilty because I’m clearly not doing all I can to sell my books. And if they don’t sell, I don’t get to write more.
I have met some wonderful people online and at conferences and made friendships that I treasure so it’s not like I hate every minute of it. I am completely humbled every time I meet someone who chose to spend $25 hard-earned dollars and at least eight nonrefundable hours of their lives reading my book. As sappy as it sounds, every time someone says “I read your book and I loved it!” I actually get tears in my eyes. It is so amazing.
But I’ve discovered one thing since I sold A TRACE OF SMOKE a few years ago: it’s really all about what I do in that room all by myself with no interruptions. It’s all about words on the page, words that will turn into a book if I just give them the time and the care that they need. So, I’ve cut back everywhere that I dare so that I can do the part of the job that I love best, and the part that readers treasure most: listen to the characters tell me a story.
Finding Humor in Darkness
May 4, 2010
What was the most fun scene you ever wrote?
by Rebecca Cantrell
Most scenes—with the exception of those that are frightening or that reflect some horrible historical event—are fun to write. I love putting my characters in a tight spot and watching them get out of it. I relish describing a place that hasn’t existed for seventy years until I can feel it and see it and smell it and hear it. I enjoy tearing through complex action scenes and the questions I need to answer (how far off the ground is a zeppelin’s gondola windows when it docks?). But mostly I love witty dialogue and the unexpected. Since the Hannah Vogel books are set just before and during the Nazis’ rise to power, they are not filled with laugh a minute gags, but some of the characters continue to be funny even in the darkest of moments.
In A Trace of Smoke my favorite bits were when Hannah was thinking about her brother. He was a funny guy. When I took him out of the book, I gave some of his best lines to other characters just so readers could get a feel for a man who was brave enough to walk the late night streets of Berlin with nothing but a red silk dress, wit, and bravado. Hannah has some of that famous Berlin sarcasm herself, and she seems intent on getting funnier in each book.
In A Night of Long Knives some of the funniest lines went to British spy Sefton Delmer, who was based on a pretty darn witty historical character. He had unflappable British cool down pat, but Hannah holds her own. I just finished A Game of Lies and Hannah’s funniest moments are when I got her stoned on opium (it was prescribed as a painkiller, just to keep her reputation clear). In her normal state she would never dance around a restaurant to imaginary music, flirt with the croupier, hike up her dress to show off her bruise, or…well, I can’t say, but man was I surprised.
And surprises are good. Surprises and fun enrich reading, writing, and life.
Favorite YA book? How about favorite library?
April 6, 2010
I hate these favorites questions. I don’t play favorites. But I know, as someone who now writes YA, I’m going to run across this question again. So, I’m giving it a try. But it’s not definitive.
From the time I could read, which is before I remember but my mother says I was about three, until the time I had to get a job, which I sadly do remember and I was thirteen, I read a book a day. Or more. So, that’s about a decade or 3,650 books. I still read a lot, but not that much. If I had but worlds enough and time…
I read anything I could get my hands on. As a child and now as an adult, I read way above my age level and way below. I read sci-fi and fantasy and detetectives and literature straight from the library’s reading list. I read romance and thrillers and suspense and comedy. The summer after fourth grade I read nothing but Shakespeare plays. Yes, I know that’s weird, and yes, I know I was awfully young to be doing that, but I decided it was something I needed to add to my education.
I went through lists of YA books to remind myself of what other kids read as teenagers so I could write this blog. It was a wonderful stroll down the pages of my reading history. But I don’t have a single favorite. I have too many favorites to list.
So I decided to wimp out and pick a category I seem to have read the most deeply in. That category? The outsider coming into or leaving a community and trying to make her way (not a big leap for a kid who went to 21 schools before graduating high school).
In this category I count: The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton, We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson, Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkein, The Diary of Anne Frank by Anne Frank, Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein, and This Boy’s Life by Tobias Wolff.
But that still doesn’t leave me room to talk about all the wonderful nonfiction (Little House on the Prairie? Farley Mowat? Gerald Durrell? James Herriot?), horror (traditional Dracula, Frankenstein, Dorien Grey, Stephen King), sci-fi and fantasy (anyone grok my Heinlein phase? Jules Verne, H. G. Wells), romance (OK, I don’t remember titles, but I sure remember some scenes very vividly) and and and…
I have to stop now. I feel a strong urge to go read a book.
Technology: Or why I love my iphone too much
March 22, 2010
Technology:
is it making your writing easier or standing in the way of your creative side?
By Rebecca Cantrell
A few years ago I got an iphone. My friends without smart phones mock me for my addiction. I use the calendar, check my email, find out where I am when I’m on tour, find restaurants that deliver in strange cities, and take pictures. Heck, I even use it to make and receive phone calls!
I love my iphone so much, I wrote a novel on it. Well, I didn’t actually thumb it in but…OK, here’s where I fess up. I’m writing another series as Bekka Black. The first one is called iDrakula and it’s a cell phone novel. It’s a retelling of Bram Stoker’s Dracula using only text messages, emails, web searches, and a 3-5 cell phone movie. It’ll be delivered on multiple platforms, but I’m not allowed to say which ones yet. Without technology, it would be unthinkable.
For the Hannah Vogel books I use the Internet to find pictures. There are so many amazing black and white photos of Germany in the 1930s. And with my computer (and sometimes just my trusty iphone) I can tap into all of it. My next novel, A Night of Long Knives, opens with a zeppelin jacking. Someone posted pictures of them as a baby on the Graf Zeppelin. They had pictures of their cabin, the control room, the gondola, everything. It was a fantastic resource.
Of course it all takes up waaaay to much time. Or, maybe it doesn’t. Maybe that down time I spend screwing around on the internet is really a way for me to recharge my creative batteries…does anybody buy that?
Favorite Superhero?
March 9, 2010
My favorite superhero?
The Tick. Hands down. For those of you who aren’t familiar with him, The Tick was a cartoon that ran on Saturday mornings on Fox in the 90s. Even though I was a grownup by then (I owned my own car, house, and cat), I still got up at the ungodly hour of nine (or maybe it was ten) to watch it. Later, I would have a child and never sleep in past seven for ten years and counting. But back then getting up at nine (or ten) on a weekend was a big deal.
Du-dwee-du-du-du-dwee-dou. The theme song still plays in my head.
The Tick is nigh invulnerable. He wears a giant blue suit with antenna on his head that cannot be chainsawed off. And his sidekick is a former accountant named Arthur who found a supersuit at a garage sale and flies around like a moth (but everyone calls him a bunny). Arthur worries about their damage deposit when the Molemen tunnel in through the basement and trash the apartment. He does complex math problems in his head. And he does his own taxes.
Together they battle evildoers. Nobody is ever killed, although Thrackazog does get sent back to Dimension X via a process that sounds fairly unpleasant. But that’s what you get if you try to conquer earth by cloning The Tick from his mucus.
Why do I love The Tick? Because he’s gentle. Nobody is killed or even hurt. The Tick protects puppies (OK, it was a capybara, but how was he to know?), babies (OK, it was the evil Mr. Mental), and citizens everywhere. Why else? Because he’s funny. Where else can you get a line like this one from The Terror to his son (who is doing evil deeds to spend time with his father): “I want you to do something bad. Not badly.”
I just don’t think we hear enough adverb jokes in superhero shows…
Hope to see you all at Left Coast Crime!
Writing Beverage of Choice?
February 8, 2010
What is your writing beverage of choice?
My beverage of choice: Iced Soy Chai. My favorite chais are Tazo and Stash, plus whatever they use for the vanilla chai up at the Aloha Theater in Kainaliu. Sadly, they’re not open all morning or I’d be up there sucking down vanilla chais with foam all day long. None of these come in chocolate caramel versions, CJ, but maybe they’re better than nothing.
I used to swear by Earl Grey. I even had the London Fog, with vanilla syrup and foamy milk from time to time. But as I descend into the darker and colder years of Nazi-ism, I’ve found I like to be a little cold when I write. Earl Grey doesn’t taste right iced. It’s drinkable, but not the same. And I can’t hear Patrick Stewart’s voice saying “Earl Grey, cold” somehow.
Living in Hawaii it’s not that easy to find some place where you can bundle yourself up in a long sleeved shirt and write without overheating, especially when drinking hot tea (how did the British do it in India?). I know, I know, that’s just my cross to bear and no one scraping ice off their car right now has a lick of sympathy. I’m not expecting any.
This is where I must confess that I write in Starbucks. I know I should feel guilty about this, and I do. In my defense, I have tried to go to every single independent coffee shop within a half hour of my house and none of them but the one Starbucks lets me sit undisturbed and write for hours and hours and hours. Most want me out within thirty minutes, and my pocketbook and bladder can’t afford to buy a new cup of tea every thirty minutes. I’d spend more time in the bathroom than writing.
So, what’s YOUR favorite beverage? And is it seasonal, for those of you with seasons?
The Death I Never Got to Finish
January 5, 2010
What’s your favorite scene your editor asked you to cut?
OK, who of us has NOT been looking forward this question? We finally get to pull out that stuff we always wanted to show. I tend to write in a skeletal form and add layers, so my edits are more of “add more” than the “delete more” variety.
But in the first version of A Trace of Smoke I wanted the murder victim to have a voice. I wanted us to know him and love him on his own terms so we could understand what Hannah lost when she lost her brother. So, I had him talking from beyond the grave. Sadly, I could never make it work. My writing group never got it, and the first question my future agent asked was, “If I agree to represent you, would you be willing to consider removing the dead brother’s voice from the manuscript?”
I said I was and I did and by and large I managed to work all the facts and feelings into the novel. I had, however, let him narrate his own death and there was no way I could do that the same way from anyone else’s point of view.
Here it is, slightly edited so it doesn’t have any spoilers:
It happened here. I feel it. He came from shadows. My murderer.
At first I felt no fear. We walked toward the factory through cold night air. Two hours later there would have been workers, but not yet that day. Light glinted off wet cobblestones. Reflected off his set and angry face.
I was still glowing. I told him about love. That it comes once a lifetime. We can’t escape it when it does. It transfigures the world. I hadn’t expected to find it, hadn’t believed in it, but it had found me. Love was suddenly simple and true. R loved me like that. And that is how I loved W.
Walking with the murderer, I knew. It wasn’t about getting old and weak. It was about trust and openness. I never opened up to a man before. I had never trusted the way that R trusted me. But I did trust W like that. And it made all the difference. I held out my hands to him, beseeching him to understand.
He only said, “I heard you.”
He hit me once, right in the chest. I almost laughed. Such a crazy place to hit someone. Metal clattered against stone. The knife, dropped.
I fell. Muddy water seeped into my dress. Could I scrub it out? Not water. Blood. Puddling around me. Nothing would ever be clean again.
The bastard stared at me. He folded his arms across his chest. He squatted down to watch me die. How could he hate me so?
I stared into his eyes while gray lightened the sky. I got colder and colder. I shivered, too proud to speak. I thought of W and our one night. How I screwed around too long before figuring out that I loved him. I did not want to lose him so soon after finding him. I thought of you and Anton. Your lives going on just the same. And I felt alone on the wet ground.
He just watched. The last sound I heard was my chattering teeth.
He never made a sound.
Writing or directing?
December 22, 2009
If you couldn’t write, what would your creative outlet be?
As a writer, I love telling stories with words. Taking that away would be very difficult for me. Assuming I had to do something else, I would tell stories with pictures and sounds. I would be a film director. I haven’t the skills or training, so no one in the Director’s Guild needs to worry, but if I’m dreaming, I might as well dream big.
Writers, by and large, labor alone. Directors have to assemble a team and call on the strengths of others. I love hiding in my little cave and writing (I know, Kelli, I probably love it too much), but back in my Silicon Valley days I also enjoyed working with a team of talented people who had a shared vision. Software development is not that different from directing: get the best people you can on board, motivate with the story you want to tell, and then help each team member to excel. Maybe I could even hire that famous film editor, CJ Lyons.
I envy the control that directors have over viewers. They control your gaze in a way that writers don’t. Readers can always skim over words, turn the page if they don’t like. But in a theater, the director can make you look. Viewers can walk out of the theater, but I’ll wager that many more readers skim than movie goers leave in the middle. Director control the pace at which the story unfolds. They can make you look at a muddy shoe until they’re sure you’ve seen it or cut to an eye and then away so quickly that you’re not even sure what you saw. For the duration of the film, they own your eyes.
Directors can also delegate things that writers can’t. If I have Hannah walk into a 1931 gay bar in Berlin, I have to research that bar, find pictures, maybe some eyewitness accounts. As a director, I can just hire a set designer and trust that they will get it right (I only hire the best, remember?).
But in the end, I love the research I do for my books too much to want to let it go. I love building the entire world of the story all by myself, knowing that each word, for better or worse, is the word that I chose. I love imagining that every reader is seeing a slightly different vision of my book. All in all, I’d better hope that I get to keep writing. But I sure wouldn’t mind having a personal assistant!