More Questions from Blog Readers

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questions from blog readersHave you ever doubted your ability as a writer?
Yes. Usually daily.

Would you ever consider writing a biography or non-fiction book?
Never say never, but for right now, I’m only interested in writing fiction. I am in love with the power and freedom of it.

How did you begin your journey to writing?
First by telling stories verbally and through pictures as a child– and then eventually using words once that trusty alphabet entered my life. I can’t remember a time when I didn’t love stories. I wrote through childhood and my teen years, then studied creative writing in college. After undergrad, I spent three years reading book after book to cultivate myself for future writing, and then I jumped.

When does your book come out?
September 1, 2015!  Add Truest on Goodreads! By the way, I cannot wait to show you guys the cover.  Stay tuned: the big reveal will likely be in February.

How do you have such an active writing life without drinking coffee?
Ha! Good question. I just have never been a coffee drinker. I actually don’t drink anything with caffeine in it. Creativity energizes me. (Though, let’s be honest, it can exhaust too!)

Is writing fiction something that should be left to “writers,” or are people from other walks of life wise to try?
All writers were “people from other walks of life” until they started writing.

Have you ever had paranoia or hallucinations in addition to your OCD?
Not hallucinations, but yes, paranoia. And it was ugly, ugly, ugly. I was trapped inside distrust, fears, and hellish lies. The paranoia is what finally prompted me to seek help– shortly thereafter, I was diagnosed with OCD. The paranoia inspired Truest.

Do you think the Bible is literally true, and do you think someone needs to believe that to be a Christian?
I think most of the Bible is literally true, though I think that some parts of the Bible are stories and poems with truth in them. I think that someone needs to believe the gospel (the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ) is literally true in order to be a Christian.

How do I protect people in my life if I’m writing a memoir?
Change names and details. Wait till people die. Or take Anne Lamott’s advice: “You own everything that happend to you. Tell your stories. If people wanted you to write warmly about them, they should have behaved better.”

What makes you an Evangelical?
Well, Evangelicalism is “a world-wide Protestant movement maintaining that the essence of the gospel consists in the doctrine of salvation by faith in Jesus Christ‘s atonement.” I fall decidedly into that category. Evangelicals generally believe in the concept of being “born again,” the authority of the Bible, the critical importance of Christ’s death and resurrection, and about sharing this good news with others. That’s me all over, though I will stipulate that my “sharing the good news” might look different than others’ evangelism. Some people go door to door or give our tracts on street corners. I chose to write a book that expresses my worldview.

What else would you like to know?

3 Tips for Being Intentional with Setting & Description

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3d interior render of empty white room with big windowAs I’ve said before, I’m not naturally good at description in my writing. It’s an area of weakness of mine, but since I’ve identified it as such, I can make intentional efforts to supercede that weakness.

1. I try to choose a location– or a location within a location– that lends itself to sensory detail. Instead of setting the scene in a regular old room, why not on the roof? Or in a church belltower? An abandoned greenhouse? A former-insane-asylum-turned-boarding-school? (My friends were creeped out by that one and steered me away from it. Ha!)

Figure one. I really believe this place is going to find its way into one of my stories one day.

greenhouse

2. I use photos, lots of photos, for reference. The internet is my friend: Pinterest, Tumblr, Google Images, We Heart It. I actually think people would be shocked to learn how much time I spend looking for images– but the pictures help me find the words.

Figure two. I’d have a hard time describing such a scene as below without the image.

bed

3. I write the senses at the top of a document and go scene by scene, asking what the characters could see, hear, taste, smell, or touch in that particular scene. This sensory document for Truest ended up to be fourteen pages. Then, back through the manuscript to graft the details in so that readers don’t see the seams.

Figure three. The red means that I ended up using the detail.

details

Your turn, writers: what are your best tools for setting and description? Does it come naturally to you, or do you have to “fight for it” the way I do?

Beyond a Reasonable Doubt

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Janet (ocdtalk)'s avatarocdtalk

by kittisak freedigitalphotos.net by kittisak freedigitalphotos.net

Well, I had an interesting week. I was impaneled on a jury for a criminal case, and was also selected as the forewoman for that jury. (Before you get too impressed, I was chosen at random).

Each of us on the jury listened intently, not only to all of the evidence presented in the case, but also to the words of the judge, who continually stressed to us that in order to arrive at a guilty verdict, we had to be convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant did  indeed commit the crime for which he was accused. The judge went on to say that while most people know what beyond a reasonable doubt means, it is a difficult concept to actually explain.

Not surprisingly, my thoughts turned to obsessive-compulsive disorder. As we know, doubt is what fuels the fire of OCD, so much so that…

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Talk Therapy vs. ERP Therapy

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Therapy through Magnifying Glass on Old Paper.Sometimes I give talk therapy a rough time on this blog– but, please know that I am not against talk therapy (I see a talk therapist weekly for panic and adjustment disorder). I am merely against talk therapy for OCD.

I spent about four years meeting with talk therapists about my OCD. Once a week, I’d sit down, talk about my fears and confess my struggles– and my therapist would reassure me.  In other words, it was a one-hour compulsion fest.

Not good.

Every single OCD expert will tell you to skip talk therapy and do exposure and response prevention (ERP) therapy.

Look, I get it: talk therapy is easier. In fact, in comparison to exposure therapy, it’s a walk in the park and ERP is a walk in hell.

But it’s not effective for treating OCD.

Talk therapy, which is lovely and helpful and beneficial for so many other disorders, naturally enables many OCD compulsions.

Four years in talk therapy didn’t make a dent in my OCD. Twelve weeks in ERP therapy mastered my OCD.

It’s just about know what treatments are effective. Band-aids go on scrapes, insulin is used for diabetes, chemotherapy for cancer, ERP for OCD.

I do love my talk therapist, but I don’t ever let us venture into the realm of treating OCD. Yes, we draw parallels– all the time, actually!– but I know that if my OCD flares up, I will turn to an exposure, not to a compulsion.

Have questions about ERP therapy vs. traditional talk therapy?  Let’s chat!

The Darkest Days

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artwork in retro style, woman and cup of teaThere is a little Caribou Coffee in Long Lake, Minnesota, where I sat one morning since I’d arrived too early to my visit to Orono High School. I stared at my steaming hot cocoa and repeated to myself: You are going to hell. 

Swallow that down, I told myself. You are going to hell, and there is nothing you can do to change it. This realization is your eternal reality.

In the car, I’d been listening to “Spirit” by Switchfoot on repeat: I’ve found all that I want, all that I long for, in You.

It was true then. It’s true now. But in those days, it was a truth that I imagined fell on deaf ears. Spirit, come be my joy.  It was the cry of my heart, but I knew I was damned and that joy would be forever inaccessible to me.

I can’t detail exactly how creepy it is become a cardboard person.

To ride the rollercoaster to the deepest depths and then to climb off there.

A reader asked me if I’d ever felt like God wasn’t with me through the storms of my life.  Have I felt that way? Yes, intensely.

But I was wrong.

Praise God I was wrong.

All these years later, God has stormed in, torn off my blindfold, wrapped me in his arms, and repeated truth to me till I came to believe it.

Do I still have moments where I doubt? Yes.

But my anchor holds.

I wrote this to remind myself of the truth– the truth that no disorder or devil can withhold from me because my God is stronger:

anchor manifesto

“Mental Illness” vs. “Brain Disorder”

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brain disorderI’ve seen the term “brain disorder” cropping up all over the place– a replacement for the term “mental illness.”

I like it.

It’s a better description, sounds more clinical (to me), and is free of the baggage that comes with the phrase “mental illness.” I think it suits the sufferer better too– it frames the person as a victim of a sickness instead of as a culprit. It’s more of an noun than an adjective. (Yes, yes, I know “mental illness” is a noun too, but so often we hear it used as a descriptor: she is mentally ill.  I don’t think people would say, She’s brain disorder-y.) It gets to be what it is: an affliction.

I’d love to hear your thoughts: do you like one term more than the other? Or would you suggest something entirely different?

Image credit: Dierk Schaefer

Tweet: “Mental illness” or “brain disorder”? Does it matter what we call it? [via @jackieleawrites] http://ctt.ec/oPbef+

Author/Editor Disagreements

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disagreementWhat happens when an author and her editor disagree?

I’ll admit that not knowing the answer to this question is what started my intense bouts of panic, which started almost immediately after I was offered my book deal.

Now, nearly one year later (the first panic “attack”– I’m not sure it was a full-blown panic attack, but that is the best way that I can think to describe it– occurred on November 22, 2013), I have an answer to that question, though, of course, I can only answer from the perspective of my own partnership with my brilliant and beloved editor at Katherine Tegen Books.

She let me win.

Granted, I took nearly every suggestion she gave. She really is a genius when it comes to YA literature, and though feedback often stings, in almost every case, I could see why she made the suggestions, and when I took them, I loved the results.

There was only one thing– and it’s a big SPOILER, so I can’t share yet!– where she and I were on opposite sides of the fence, and I stressed and stressed and stressed.  Panic rolled off me in waves. I was sick over it, and cried my heart out to my team, prayed for a solution from God. Finally, I just explained my reasoning for my decision, detailing how important it was to me, and my editor said, Then let’s do it your way. I get it now. But we’ll work on it.

And we did.

And Truest is better for it.

She also let me win several smaller victories too, once I explained my reasoning. She has been so, so respectful of the fact that this is my story– my baby— and she wants me to be happy with it.

I am.

You guys, I cannot wait for you to read my story.

[Rambling Thoughts on] Self-Publishing vs. Traditional Publishing

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self pub vs trad pubI often see people falling into the camp of “If I Can’t Publish Traditionally, I’ll Self Publish,” and I think that’s a dangerous place to vacation, since there are pros and cons to both sides. In my (amateur) opinion, it’s better to examine both sides thoroughly and choose which avenue suits you best and then go after it.

Obviously, in traditional publishing, there’s the benefit of having a publishing house to help edit your book, format it, market it, etc., but then again, your royalties are significantly less than if you self-publish (we’re talking maybe less than 15% for traditional and about 70% for self). In self-publishing, you have total control of everything (your book’s content and cover, your marketing plan, etc.), and in traditional publishing, you lose a lot of that control. On the flip side, you’re working with experts who can often push your writing past the brink of your own talent and into a whole new level.

Sometimes I talk to people who say, “Well, if I can’t get a traditional book deal, then I’ll just self-publish this story, write another book, and hope to publish that one traditionally.”  My concern with this is that if your self-pubbed book doesn’t sell well, you’re going to have one more hill to climb to get an agent for the next book. In other words, if an agent sees that your self-published title didn’t sell well, it’s going to be an even bigger gamble for them to take you on.

That’s why I say to just stick to your guns.  Make an informed decision of what you want and go after it.

That might mean abandoning your first story (or second or third) to the bottom drawer while you work on crafting a new story.

And that, my friends, is hard.

I poured four years of my life– blood, sweat, tears, joy, sorrow– into writing Lights All Around, and for it to not get an agent was tough.

But I will tell you right now: it wasn’t ready. It really wasn’t.  Oh, how I thought it was!  But, now, three years later, I can’t tell you how glad I am that it’s in the bottom drawer and that Truest will be my debut novel.

Consider the alternative: what if I had self-published Lights All Around?  Well, I know now that I would not have had the resources to promote and market it, so I would have had piddly sales. Then, when I tried to sell Truest, I’d have had to explain my lack of sales. And even if I’d still gotten the book deal for Truest, I’d probably be ashamed that I had this sub-par first novel floating around out there.

I repeat: I did not think it was sub-par when I was querying it. It was the best I had to offer at the time. But really, I was just cutting my teeth on writing fiction. I had so much to learn. My gosh, I STILL have so much to learn.

Anyway, I know this post is all over the place, but I hope that it sheds some light on things to consider as you determine which route is best for you! Would love to hear your thoughts in the comments below!

Books I Re-Read LIKE A BOSS

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HK.ColinI’ve heard all the reasons before for why people don’t re-read books– and I’ll allow each his own– but I really can’t understand it. Refusing to re-read favorite books is, to me, the equivalent of saying, “Why would I want to hang out with my best friend? I’ve done that before, and there are so many new people to meet.”

Can. Not. Fathom.

Did you know that I listen to The Chronicles of Narnia nearly every single night as I fall asleep? They are my faithful bedtime story, and I never get sick of them. I’ve been known to listen to The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe multiple times in a row: I listen, it ends, I start it over, it’s all good. One time I listened to The Horse and His Boy something like five or six times in one month. Every year I plan to keep track of how often I read these books in the course of a year, but sometime halfway through, I lose track.

The Book Thief is always, always a fantastic re-read.  The snowman in the basement and the hair like lemons and the sun painted on the wall. This book is one of the novels that changed my life, and returning to it is like returning home, like finding myself in the space where the light flipped on in my writer heart.

I could never tire of re-reading The Last Unicorn. There are lines in this novel that are like friends to me. I could never tire of them. Every single time I re-read them, I feel astonished, as if I just found a diamond resting under a leaf. I would surrender wheelbarrows of unread manuscripts just to make sure that I could keep this one in my possession forever.

Then, of course, there’s scripture– which is the only living and active book I know. I will re-read this one for life. (And, yes, I meant that two ways.)

How about you? Which books can you read over and over and over again?  Or– if you don’t re-read– try to convince me you’re sane. 🙂

Image credit: HK.Colin