HOOKS in Mary Buckham's online class

If you've never taken a writing on-line class with Mary Buckham at WritersU, I highly recommend it. In this two week class we're working on the first five pages only. For the first week, we've written and rewritten our first paragraph and a couple after that to increase our hooks so those editors/agents will keep reading long enough so we can get published and then the readers will keep reading.

Hooks sound so simple but I've spent many hours this week on three paragraphs--more time than I'd spend on revising three chapters of Hada.

I'm work-shopping the sequel to Hada that I wrote during the last NaNoWriMo. I must say, Mary's class has strengthened Lilli's character in just the three beginning paragraphs that I've pondered over this last week.

Another surprise for me: hooks not only hook, they deepen character!

Quote to Live Life Creativity

My friend, Grace, sent this quote she found:

"Be brave enough to live life creatively. The creative is the place where no one else has ever been. You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. You can’t get there by bus, only by hard work and risk and by not quite knowing what you are doing. What you’ll discover will be wonderful. What you’ll discover will be yourself."

"The wilderness of your intuition"...YES!

Teacher/Pupil Quote

Creative activity could be described as a type of learning process where the teacher and pupil are located in the same individual.

- Arthur Koestler


Someone sent this quote to me today, and I have found it to be true, especially the last two years I've spent working on the second and third draft of my novel, Hada, and editing several of my short stories. I've been the pupil as I learned from books, on-line and on-land writing classes, and from experience. The experience part is when I feel the teacher within me guiding the pupil that is within me too.

How amazing it is to be alive on this plane.

Reading on Cement

I've often wondered if I would like a Kindle or some such, and maybe I would. But I love the printed novel to hold in my hands.

Today in Berkeley, at nine thirty a.m., when I dropped Mitchell off at his office, I drove through the parking lot and there was a young woman, maybe in her thirties, dressed in jeans, a pull-over sweater, and a light scarf around her neck, sitting on the curb of the motorcycle parking spot (no motorcycle there). She was engrossed in a novel. At her side was a small bag from the Garden Bakery (downstairs from Mitchell's office) that she dipped into as she turned the pages, breaking off sweet tidbits to munch and to embellish her enjoyment of the book in her hands.

Somehow the scene wouldn't be the same with a Kindle.

Mermaid's Chair

Sue Monk Kidd did it again. I thought The Secret Life of Bees was outstanding, now her latest book, The Mermaid Chair, has me glued to it. I have only 69 more pages to read and I'm in the middle of all the paperwork due for my ten teacher interns...I still have twelve more visits to their schools before the last week of May...but here I am carrying The Mermaid Chair around with me to read every chance I get.

As a reader, I am engrossed in the story...fabulous characters! And, reading as a writer, I'm marking all the copious and amazing metaphors and sensory details she writes. I've been addicted to Ann Patchett lately, but Sue Monk Kidd is strong competition for my attention in the few hours I have free to read every day.

Going back to Egret Island now...see you there.

Persistence Is A Good Word for Today or Any Day

Calvin Coolidge said:

"Press on. Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence.

Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent.

Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb.

Education alone will not; the world is full of educated derelicts.

Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent."

The Right Word

In Janet Burroway's book Writing Fiction, I found another quote that made me think about the importance of my Hada revisions.

Mark Twain said: "The difference between the right word and the almost right word...is the difference between lightning and the lightning bug."

Let's go for the lightning.