Kris and I recently gave a talk about how we write together. Like an old married couple (think the vignettes in When Harry Met Sally, finishing each other's sentences, saying the same thing at the same time), we told the story about how we met at the firm (a very pregnant Kris interviewed me), how we discovered we both loved writing (talking late one night while working at the firm, wine in hand), and the genesis of The Pecking Order (a particularly long, pointless, billable-hour-sucking meeting that ended in a decision to, yes, have another meeting). We praised the benefits of having a writing partner to share in the struggle, the disappointments, and the joys, and we also explained our process. And it goes a little something like this (hit it!): we loosely outline two chapters; Kris writes one chapter, I write the other; we switch and edit; we switch and edit again; and so on and so forth. And we do this all over email, putting our edits and thoughts in bolds and brackets, so our drafts end up looking like this (note, real live excerpt from early working draft of The Pecking Order): “You’re right. A little harmless flirting never hurt anyone. I should let myself have fun. I work hard and I deserve it,” I say [uncorking our first bottle of wine] [delete – we have a lot of champagne going on….popping the cork on our first bottle of champagne.]
Then we each put the latest version in our respective running documents (on our respective laptops), which may or may not match each other at any given point, depending on whether I remembered to email the most recent draft to my work account or Kris could access the document on vacation or the planets aligned and the heavens smiled on us, making all things domestic and career-related run smoothly. Goodness gracious, it's a lot of work just to type our process . . .
Some time back, my mom (who is ridiculously more technologically advanced than I am) questioned why we weren't using google docs. She might as well have asked why we didn't have the robot prepare dinner or why we didn't drive to work in a hovercraft. We ignored her. For years. Until we finally tried it last week. And people, let me tell you, google docs is all that. You can store documents online and choose who to share them with. Much like a yahoo or gmail email account, you can access your document from anywhere with internet access. Now, we have a single running document and anything we write, be it a single sentence or entire chapter, goes into that document. No more passing bolds and brackets back and forth through email - one of us can open the document and make edits that the other can see simply by logging in. It's genius, I tell you, and not just for writing teams--it's a good back up system for any writer, and ensures you have your manuscript at your fingertips anytime, anywhere.
So, yea, I guess I should have listened to my mother the first time.
Showing posts with label writing process. Show all posts
Showing posts with label writing process. Show all posts
Friday, November 20, 2009
Monday, February 2, 2009
Two Roads Diverged...
Kris and I are at a crossroads of sorts. (By the by, each time I use the word “crossroads,” I picture that scene from The Muppet Movie where Kermit tells Fozzie to turn left at the “fork in the road.” In perfect Muppet fashion, they soon come upon an actual giant fork stabbed into the ground.) Kris recently returned from her great European adventure and is settling back into American life, so it’s to be expected in her case. Me, I’m stripping wallpaper—not the kind of activity that generally raises life-altering questions, but there you go.
In a nutshell, we’re wrestling with our writing habits—whether we’re disciplined enough to become writers. (I also wonder whether one “is” a writer or “becomes” a writer, but I’ll save that for another day. Let’s just say we wonder whether we’re sufficiently disciplined to write for a living. Or to even get published once, for that matter.) As rabid fans of those who purvey the written word (we are the literary equivalent of groupies), we often search for information about authors we love. What inspires them? How did they start? What makes them tick? We are particularly interested in writing habits and advice for writers. For example, on her website, Jodi Picoult explains she has a firm discipline. She doesn’t believe in writer’s block, because in the early days when she had to fit writing around her children’s schedules, she couldn’t afford the luxury of writer’s block. She generally writes all day, every day, but not on weekends, and she writes rather quickly.
We don’t write all day, every day. We sometimes go days, nay weeks, on end without writing. We both have small children to raise, dinners to cook, paychecks to earn, and, in my case, moldy wallpaper to strip. There are soccer games and classroom help and rare, stolen, intimate moments with husbands. We exercise, clean our houses, and catch up with friends on occasion. I’ll be honest. At night when I finally have a couple of free hours, sometimes Cabernet and a good book seem infinitely more enticing than a blank word document and a mocking cursor. And yet, we both want (dare I say, need) to write. We both crave creativity. But do we want it badly enough to devote every spare moment to it? And if we have to question our dedication, do we even have any business writing in the first place? After all, Ms. Picoult has three kids, and she managed to make it work.
Of course, I’m terrified a potential agent will read this and question our work ethic. (Note to agents: if you show us even the whisper of interest, we will spin straw into gold for you.) And then I have to remind myself: we have written a book. We wrote over 250 pages while working at the kind of law firm you read about in Grisham novels. We wrote briefs and motions all day, six days a week, and then stole time in the early morning and evening hours to create The Pecking Order. We have effectively rewritten the book twice. We spent countless hours on the synopsis, outline, and query letters, not to mention time spent researching agents and publishers. The fact that we’ve recently taken a much-needed breather from daily novel writing(during which I wrote a short story and Kris wrote two short stories and took a writing class), does not diminish our previous efforts; it does not portend a future devoid of creativity.
As that most admirable of writers, Elizabeth Gilbert, says, it’s natural to be disappointed in both the substance and process of our writing. But, it is important that we continue to write, nonetheless—that we continue to put our work, our soul’s language, out there. According to Ms. Gilbert, strict discipline in writing is sometimes overrated, but self-forgiveness is essential.
And so, I forgive myself for not writing in every spare moment. I, for one, needed a break. I needed to do something mindless—something that, unlike writing, was finite. At some point, I will have stripped my wallpaper and repainted my bathroom and I’ll reevaluate my time. For now, I’m staring at that giant fork and taking the “easy street,” knowing that the road runs both ways, and I’ll be back here again in no time, hopefully refreshed and ready to charge (pen in hand) off the beaten path once again.
In a nutshell, we’re wrestling with our writing habits—whether we’re disciplined enough to become writers. (I also wonder whether one “is” a writer or “becomes” a writer, but I’ll save that for another day. Let’s just say we wonder whether we’re sufficiently disciplined to write for a living. Or to even get published once, for that matter.) As rabid fans of those who purvey the written word (we are the literary equivalent of groupies), we often search for information about authors we love. What inspires them? How did they start? What makes them tick? We are particularly interested in writing habits and advice for writers. For example, on her website, Jodi Picoult explains she has a firm discipline. She doesn’t believe in writer’s block, because in the early days when she had to fit writing around her children’s schedules, she couldn’t afford the luxury of writer’s block. She generally writes all day, every day, but not on weekends, and she writes rather quickly.
We don’t write all day, every day. We sometimes go days, nay weeks, on end without writing. We both have small children to raise, dinners to cook, paychecks to earn, and, in my case, moldy wallpaper to strip. There are soccer games and classroom help and rare, stolen, intimate moments with husbands. We exercise, clean our houses, and catch up with friends on occasion. I’ll be honest. At night when I finally have a couple of free hours, sometimes Cabernet and a good book seem infinitely more enticing than a blank word document and a mocking cursor. And yet, we both want (dare I say, need) to write. We both crave creativity. But do we want it badly enough to devote every spare moment to it? And if we have to question our dedication, do we even have any business writing in the first place? After all, Ms. Picoult has three kids, and she managed to make it work.
Of course, I’m terrified a potential agent will read this and question our work ethic. (Note to agents: if you show us even the whisper of interest, we will spin straw into gold for you.) And then I have to remind myself: we have written a book. We wrote over 250 pages while working at the kind of law firm you read about in Grisham novels. We wrote briefs and motions all day, six days a week, and then stole time in the early morning and evening hours to create The Pecking Order. We have effectively rewritten the book twice. We spent countless hours on the synopsis, outline, and query letters, not to mention time spent researching agents and publishers. The fact that we’ve recently taken a much-needed breather from daily novel writing(during which I wrote a short story and Kris wrote two short stories and took a writing class), does not diminish our previous efforts; it does not portend a future devoid of creativity.
As that most admirable of writers, Elizabeth Gilbert, says, it’s natural to be disappointed in both the substance and process of our writing. But, it is important that we continue to write, nonetheless—that we continue to put our work, our soul’s language, out there. According to Ms. Gilbert, strict discipline in writing is sometimes overrated, but self-forgiveness is essential.
And so, I forgive myself for not writing in every spare moment. I, for one, needed a break. I needed to do something mindless—something that, unlike writing, was finite. At some point, I will have stripped my wallpaper and repainted my bathroom and I’ll reevaluate my time. For now, I’m staring at that giant fork and taking the “easy street,” knowing that the road runs both ways, and I’ll be back here again in no time, hopefully refreshed and ready to charge (pen in hand) off the beaten path once again.
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