Monthly Archives: September 2013

Win-Win-Win?

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My big question as of late was this:

How do I honor God, myself, and my agent when we seem to want different things?

A little backstory: my novel has significant religious themes, ones that are important to me.  (Like, the-core-of-who-I-am important.)  My agent thought it all needed to be toned down in order to sell.  At first, I thought I was going to refuse.  I really did.  I didn’t even look at my manuscript for over a week.

Then, one night, I had an epiphany.  I had thought epiphanies were accompanied by a choir of angels or a visible light bulb illuminated over one’s head, but it turns out that they can be just as quiet as a word crawling into your mind while you try to sleep and making a nest for itself there.

The word was parables.

In scripture, Christ told stories all the time.  Parables.  Lots of people believe that parables were intended to make things easier for people to understand, but that’s not actually what the Bible says.  Essentially, scripture says that parables were meant for some to see … and some to not.

I wondered, Can I bury these truths so deep in my story that those who want to see them will see them– and those who don’t want to won’t?

It seemed like the one and only way to satisfy my agent while also honoring the story I wanted to tell.  It also seemed terrifically difficult.  Shooting for such a minuscule target.  I knew I wasn’t good enough writer to do these edits without help.

So I prayed.  A lot.  And spent time in scripture.  A lot.  And wrote an okay new first draft, a better second draft, third …, showed it to my writing group, wrote another draft or so, and after two weeks of attempting to create a parable, I sent my revisions off to my agent.

Heard from him today.  Thumbs up.

He’s going to send the manuscript out to editors on Monday.

win win

 P.S. If you’re a person who prays, would you pray for my manuscript to find favor with an editor?  I’m sooooooo nervous!

5 Favorite Moments in Narnia

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WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD!  (P.S. If you have not read these books yet, what is wrong with you?!!!) 🙂

5. The end of the world in Voyage of the Dawn Treader.
The lilies!  The stillness!  The water so sweet and the lamb on the shore.

After that for many days, without wind in her shrouds or foam at her bows, across a waveless sea, the Dawn Treader glided smoothly east. Every day and every hour the light became more brilliant and still they could bear it. No one ate or slept and no one wanted to, but they drew buckets of dazzling water from the sea, stronger than wine and somehow wetter, more liquid, than ordinary water, and pledged one another silently in deep draughts of it. And one or two of the sailors who had been oldish men when the voyage began now grew younger every day. Everyone on board was filled with joy and excitement, but not an excitement that made one talk. The further they sailed the less they spoke, and then almost in a whisper. The stillness of that last sea laid hold on them.

4. The celebration in Prince Caspian.
I love that even the trees got their own food:

They began with a rich brown loam that looked almost exactly like chocolate; so like chocolate, in fact, that Edmund tried a piece of it, but he did not find it at all nice. When the rich loam had taken the edge off their hunger, the trees turned to an earth of the kind you see in Somerset, which is almost pink. They said it was lighter and sweeter. At the cheese stage they had a chalky soil, and then went on to delicate confections of the finest gravels powdered with choice silver sand. They drank very little wine, and it made the Hollies very talkative: for the most part they quenched their thirst with deep draughts of mingled dew and rain, flavoured with forest flowers and the airy taste of the thinnest clouds.

3. The creation in Magician’s Nephew.
Singing it into creation.  Yes.

The Lion was pacing to and fro about that empty land and singing his new song. It was softer and more lilting than the song by which he had called up the stars and the sun; a gentle, rippling music. And as he walked and sang the valley grew green with grass. It spread out from the Lion like a pool. It ran up the sides of the little hills like a wave. In a few minutes it was creeping up the lower slopes of the distant mountains, making that young world every moment softer.

2. The resurrection in LWW.
So mighty!

“It means,” said Aslan, “that though the Witch knew the Deep Magic, there is a magic deeper still which she did not know. Her knowledge goes back only to the dawn of time. But if she could have looked a little further back, into the stillness and the darkness before Time dawned, she would have read there a different incantation. She would have known that when a willing victim who had committed no treachery was killed in a traitor’s stead, the Table would crack and Death itself would start working backward.”

1. The reunion in The Last Battle.
Every bit of it.

The term is over: the holidays have begun. The dream is ended: this is the morning.

heaven

 Random 5 Friday is a weekly meme over at A Rural Journal.

In the Moment: the Flipside

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I have blogged before about talking to people when they’re in the midst of an obsession.  Other people.  In their obsessions.

Tonight, that’s me.

It feels surreal, friends.  I am reading over my own words of hope and trying to take comfort in the fact that I have tasted freedom and that, while it has slipped from my hands tonight, it has not left the room.  I feel (mostly) confident that I’ll corner it soon and snatch it back.

My OCD has been so well-controlled for the past four years that I’ve almost forgotten what these moments feel like.  It is different to remember the trench from the ledge above.  It is strange and sad and scary to remember the trench from inside it.

I hate it.

I had some intrusive thoughts tonight– blasphemous thoughts.  They don’t come very often anymore, and when they do, I am usually able to use the tools I’ve learned in ERP to walk myself calmly back out of the storm.  But tonight, there was a hitch, a pause, this tiny moment that started to grow.  I wonder if I’m going to hell.

Stop, I tell myself.  You can’t know.  You might go to hell, but it’s not likely.  Not when you love Christ the way that you do, not when you’ve devoted your entire life to him.

But maybe, I think.

I also think, No way.  Can. Not. Go. Back.  I won’t.  I can’t live that way anymore.

Talked to Mom on the phone.  She said, “You sound like you’re somewhere else.  Your mind is occupied.”  It is.

I feel this weird disconnect from reality.  I haven’t let myself slip into hysteria or full-on terror yet.  Just trying to tiptoe past it.

If I was smart, I’d put in a load of laundry and go listen to my ugly old ERP recording.

I think I will.  Wish me luck.

P.S. I’m glad I can be honest on this blog.  And with four years of freedom under my belt, I have such high hopes that it will be back in the morning.  I’m sorry for those of you who can hardly imagine such an easy out.

Jellicoe Road by Melina Marchetta

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jellicoeI just recently re-read Jellicoe Road for the trillionth time, and you need to read it too.  For the last couple of years, this has taken the spot of my #1 most suggested book.  I can’t recommend it highly enough.

Jellicoe Road is a hard book to summarize, but let me give it my best shot:

There’s a territory war happening between the boarders (at the Jellicoe boarding school), the townies (from Jellicoe/Jellicoe High School), and the cadets (the military academy students who are camping on the boarding school property for the next six weeks).  While the three “factions” negotiate, Taylor Markham– the leader of the boarders– is trying to work out where Hannah, the woman in charge of her boarding school house, has disappeared to, using Hannah’s disorganized manuscript for clues.  The manuscript tells the story of five teens– three boarders, a townie, and a cadet– and Taylor is starting to wonder just how much of the manuscript is fiction.

There.  I know, I know: my description probably doesn’t make you want to run out and read it, so you’re just going to have to trust me.  Let me lay out my reasons why you should read this book:

1) The characters.

Taylor, the vulnerable leader of a boarding school community; Jonah, the cadet with whom she has strange history; Chaz, the townie enemy with a soul; and Raffaela, who sustains them all with her strong beliefs.  Not to mention Ben, the violinist; the Mullet Brothers; Anson Choi; Jessa and Chloe P.; and Richard, who wants to stage a coup.  (And beyond that … the five fascinating teens in Hannah’s unfinished manuscript!)

2) The dialogue.

Melina Marchetta is a master of teenage dialogue.  It’s so funny and spot-on and meaningful and good.

jellicoe23) The masterful writing.

A couple, non-spoilery quotes for you:

‘Guess what?’ Fitz said.
‘I don’t know,’ Jude said. ‘What? Narnie smiled?’ He glanced at her for the first time.
‘When you guys see a Narnie smile, it’s like a revalation,’ Webb said, gathering her towards him.
Jude stopped in front of her and, with both hands cupping her face, tried to make a smile. Narnie flinched.
‘Leave her alone,’ Tate said.
‘I need a revelation,’ Jude said. ‘And you’re the only one that can give me one, Narns.’ 

What kind of freak is this kid who’s giggling hysterically with the girls in the neighbouring beds, each with a crush on the other for being the same age when the rest of the world seems so old?

For reasons he couldn’t understand a sadness came over him and it was then he saw the girl standing on the other side of the dirt road, her eyes pools of absolute sorrow, her light brown hair glowing in the splinters of sunlight that forced their way through the trees.

jellicoe34) The mystery & the way it all fits together like a puzzle.

This book is a bit like a jigsaw puzzle, so at first you won’t understand just how everything fits together.  But it does.  Oh, how it does.  In fact, after you read it once, you might do what my sister did, and immediately re-read it to catch everything you missed the first time.

5) Did I mention it’s funny too?  

There are parts that will make you want to laugh aloud!

So, all in all, Jellicoe Road is deep, funny, sad, poignant, fascinating, original, and well-written.

What are you waiting for?

Books I Would Love To See As A Movie

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Movies that are either in production or at least are surrounded by rumors of going into production:

The Magician’s Nephew | To my knowledge, this one has not yet been confirmed.  But I NEED it.

The Night Circus | This is going to be a sensory masterpiece.  David Heyman is producing!

The Book Thief | The release date was moved to November 15.  OHMYGOSH, there are PHOTOS on the IMDB site!  Fangirling right now.

fangirl

The Fault in Our Stars | Nervous about the casting choices for this, but trying to have faith.  John Green approves!  In fact, of Shailene Woodley, he said, “Also loved what she did. She made me cry, and TFiOS-related things basically never make me cry, on account of how I know what’s going to happen and everything.”

Jellicoe Road | This is currently the most important adaptation to me.  It basically ALL hinges on whom they cast for Jonah Griggs.  Pictures of places they are scoping out for the movie here.

asdfjkl

Books I Desperately Want to be Made into Movies:

The Sky is Everywhere | But I literally can’t picture an actor with a good enough smile to play Joe Fontaine.  Ideas?  OHMYGOSH, IMDB says it’s “in development.”

sheldon

Saving Francesca | I need Will Trombal to be on the big screen.  (Come to think of it, I think this one is actually going to happen!)

Piper’s Son | The answer is always “More Marchetta please.”

Lumatere Chronicles | We need the equivalent of young Eddie Redmayne for Finnikin.

young eddie

Truest by Jackie Lea Sommers | Come on.  A girl can dream, right?

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme over at The Broke and the Bookish.

Best of the Web: On Depression

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bestofthewebMy friend Addie Zierman is an incredible person and an incredible writer.  She recently wrote an amazing blog post for her sons over at A Deeper Story.  I really would love for you all to take a look.

Here’s a teaser:

You want to know why we’re going through the Walgreens drive thru, so I tell you, “Mama needs to pick up her medicine.”

But you’re FOUR now, so that’s not good enough anymore. You want to know why. You want to know what for. You want to know if Mom has a headache or a tummy ache. What medicine? You keep asking me. And Why?

My first instinct is to oversimplify. I consider telling you that they’re Mama’s “happy pills,” but dismiss it almost immediately. It may sound simple, but it’s not the truth. The pills don’t make me content. This is not a magic potion or a jolt of endorphins. We’re not talking about a hit of happiness here.

In the end, it’s much more complicated than all of that. This is about synapses and neurons, about a kind of short-circuiting in your brain that makes everything go a little bit dark for no good reason at all.

To read the rest of “For My Sons: On Depression,” click here.

P.S. Addie has a book coming out next month called When We Were on Fire.  You should all buy a copy!