The Secret Books of Gabendoor

My writing started with deams. I would head for bed and as I fell asleep I would visualize a scene. The scene kept repeating several times a week until I finally wrote it down. I’ve come up with things in other ways too. I’m an “organic” writer vs. an outliner and planner. I never know what will happen next. Most of the time I dream the current situation and the characters start talking and acting as I fall asleep. They don’t always have all the details worked out, but when most of it fills in, I head for the keyboard. I can never dream ahead. As I type the story will take strange and unexpected directions. Other times I have to work out a situation and what I do is start discarding the obvious. For example in the first chapter of The Book of Second Chances, I needed a wizard to come to earth from “someplace else.” I didn’t know where from or to yet or who they were or why they came. But… I didn’t want them flying in on brooms –done before No spell where they suddenly pop in –done before No beaming like Star Trek - done before but that’s what I wanted. It was storming out and and I got the idea of a whirlwind - but Dorothy did that in the Wizard of Oz. I took that idea. Made it a whirlwind. Renamed the whirlwind to a journy wind. They are small. I visualized it as plumped with bulging forms and off balance making it wobble so I added two more wizards for the effect. Then the journey wind burped out three forms and blew away. I decided traveling inside such a wind would mess your hair, but what else would it mess up. I decided it would mess up your clothes so bad that you might be wearing my pants and me your top, etc.

Another favorite was a shadow creature that the story didn’t really need. I was talking to my father in law, Chet. When you meet Chet he always says, “Did I tell you about the time I almost got hit by a train?” If you say, “Yes, Chet, you did.” He answers with, “Well it happened this way…” Ha! He will always tell it again. Then I thought it wasn’t his fault. He’s haunted by a shadow creature you can’t see and it makes you repeat stories. I named it the Tellagain. That got me thinking about similar creatures and came up with the scritch, the trundlewraith and many more. Now I have s section at my web site (www.gabendoor.com) that is filled with shadow creatures other people have submitted. Creativity (and fun) comes from many places and many forms.

Some comments I made last year to a young person wondering about writing and not having an education. I came across these comments I had passed on to her. I thought I’d post them.

 I don’t have a degree (shame on me). Short 15 credits in a foreign language back in the 70’s. Much of my life I did like to write thoughts on life, musings and ideas. About 8 years ago I decided to write a book. I had no clue how to write or even how to format things properly. I typed away until I had about half a million words and decided I had better get some help to figure out what to do with all that. The first thing I found was my word count would make about three books.I got a couple books on writing. They said to start with a first person point of view, I was omnipotent. It was the first I heard about point of view. It said to keep it simple with one or two main characters. I had people running all over the place. The books said to have a straightforward linear plot (whatever that was). I had a multi-thread plot with subplots upon subplots.

I tossed the books out and took a class at the local

Loft

Literary

Center. I found the instructors a bit snooty. They told me that real people and especially characters in a story don’t talk to themselves. I do, so I dropped the class.I joined an online writing workshop. You trade chapters and reviews. I became a prolific reviewer. I learned a bunch by looking at what other wantabees were doing. The members told me not to quit my day job. They had a ranking system with the reviews. 1 = low and 5 = high. They ranked plot, professionalism of writing, characterization and more. Because I still didn’t grasp what a comma was and where they go, among many other things, I consistently got 1’s. After six months I could squeak out a 2. I celebrated when I got a 3 in something. I forget what.

The other members still ripped my work apart and told me to give up. I stepped up my reviewing and started to see different things about point of view. In the bad writing I saw, I began to see what made a character that held my attention and why others put me to sleep.

I started another novel on a whim. I got 5’s. I reviewed more and learned more. I won an “editor’s choice” award (not worth even a cup of coffee, but a moral boost.) Other reviewers asked to see more chapters. The original group started to ignore me. The new batch of reviewers urged me to submit the novel.

Because my fingers are tired and I told myself not to be so verbose – I landed a contract for a five book young adult fantasy series, “The Secret Books of Gabendoor.”

I teach two workshops about writing. One essentially has a theme of “Just start writing.” I talk about how not to let formal classes on writing, books on writing, friends or anyone influence you to focus on the technical or “how to” part of writing. Focus on the aspect of writing that brings you joy or some sort of satisfaction. Start writing! When you have a bunch of chapters done, then SLOWLY start learning about point of view, setting, description, characterization, dialogue, dialect, and oh, those comma things. Edit what you have each time you learn something new, like dialect. But, always, always write more with a spirit of fun, with a passion, with laughter, or drunk. Be driven by what it is you personally enjoy about writing! Join a peer review group. Grow a thick skin and go for it!

Title: Young Authors Conference
Location: Bethel University, Arden Hills
Link out: Click here
Description: Success Beyond the Classroom (SBC) is a small non-profit organization that provides multiple opportunities for thousands of Mpls/St. Paul metro area students to stretch themselves beyond their classroom experiences. Feel free to visit their website found at www.successbeyond.org

I\’ll be taking part in one of the programs, SBC’s Young Authors Conference.

Here is some information about the event.

This year will be our 19th annual Young Authors Conference (YAC). YAC is a hands -on, brains-on writing experience offered to Mpls/St Paul area students in grades 4-8. We expect a group of 800 - 1,000 students to join us daily at Bethel University, Arden Hills, to work and learn with a variety of authors, poets, songwriters, illustrators and teachers of writing. These young writers are chosen specifically because they have talent or a deep interest in writing.

We are offering two dates in January, January 28 and 29 (possibly just one of these dates depending on registration numbers). We also offer dates in May. At this time, I am inquiring about your interest in the January date(s). The theme for this year\’s event is Honor Your Story - Think Deeply - Write Generously. The theme will inspire young writers as they explore their writing talents and interests. Our keynote, Tou Saiko Lee, will start each day with an inspiring and engaging performance using spoken word and hip-hop to demonstrate the power of writing in his life. He will be joined by his grandmother, Youa Chang. She will perform a form of ancient Hmong poetry chanting known as kwv txiaj. They have performed together many times and will certainly offer a powerful and inspiring opening each morning as Fresh Traditions, the name of the group, pairs two generations onstage together.

Typically, we invite 20 + authors to join our roster each year. Students who have attended YAC in prior years say:

I feel like it\’s a writing paradise here.
Writing is an extension of your soul. It comes from your imagination and heart.
It was such an awesome privilege and I\’m so glad I got the chance to have this experience. It made me more determined to write.
I would absolutely, no way, change this day. It was my favorite field trip ever.
At first I was scared to come here, but this was an illuminating experience.
I should be proud (which I am) that I got chosen to do this. I am an awesome writer!

Gina Jacobson
Success Beyond the Classroom
3055 Old Highway 8, Suite 302
St. Anthony, MN 55418
phone: 612-638-1521
fax: 612-706-0811
website www.successbeyond.org

Start Date: 2009-01-28
End Date: 2009-01-29

I’m a “starving artist” and workdays, including Saturday, so Wednesday is my day off. Today I began working on props to use at book signings. I picked up some great purple fabric to use as a table covering. At the same store, I found a cool globe on an antique stand. I got that too. I began working on it today. I took it apart and started painting it. I’m going to make it the world of Gabendoor, from my story.

I spent more of the day putting a new hard drive in my second computer. We had a thunderstorm and the drive crashed. Thankfully, my writing files are backed up in four places.

I’m looking forward to starting book 3. The name is The Book of Twisted Truths. I have some rough ideas for the story line.

I still have work to do on a marketing plan so I can begin setting up book signings and other events.

series. It’s a bit of chance and a bit of “bull.” If you read my last post you’ll see how I came up with the first book, The Book of Second Chances.

When I submitted to my publisher, one requirement they had and still have is for a minimum of a five book series. Now, (hope they don’t read this) I only had the one book. I had no ideas for other books but felt confident I could come up with at least five.

For Chances, I needed a name for the world where the story takes place. I was driving to work saying nonsense syllables and words and stumbled on Gabendoor – totally made up on the way to work. When Windstorm showed interest in The Book of Second Chances, they wanted to know what the name of the series was. On the spot I made up “The Secret Books of Gabendoor. When they asked what the second book was, I had to think fast and answered, “The Book of Broken Promises.” They said they liked the name and the concept of a library of secret books. They asked what the third was and I said, “The Book of Twisted Truths.” When they asked about four and five, I said I was sorry but only had vague ideas but no outline as they required. Thankfully they liked the Book of Second Chances well enough to let the matter drop. The trouble was, I had just named the second and third books before I had even thought about what they were. It all seemed to work out though. The Book of Broken Promises is at the publisher and I’m about three chapters into writing the Book of Twisted Truths.    

I left work early to go to a neighborhood block party. I had put a little announcement in each neighbor’s mail box a couple days earlier. I couldn’t believe how so many of them came right over to me saying they didn’t know I was an author. I’ve lived there for 20 years and say hi to everyone. I wave, they wave, but now they want to get to know me. That seems soooo strange. I’m still just me.

What really is special is The Book Factory, knowing that what I wrote is bringing some fun to their lives. That counts more than any fame. My boss at work purchased a copy to read to his daughter. She’s 19 and a quadriplegic with some other health issues. He reads to her every week. He told me he was reading chapter one to her and noticed she had her eyes closed. He stopped reading thinking she fell asleep. She opened her eyes and asked why he stopped. When he told her why, she told him the story imagery was so vivid she was imagining the story as he read. He read a bit of chapter two, to give her a hint that Windslow was in a wheelchair.That caught her attention and she became excited about a story that would have someone like her in it as a hero or heroine.  She couldn’t wait to wear her dream-slip wrist band. Either the band she had was a youth size or the adult band just won’t fit her arm without causing circulation problems. I told him about the web section of different types of dream-slip bands and how there were many forms. I told him I’d make one of the special dream-slip bans that are made from a leather thong.Today I work from 8:00 AM to 9:00 PM. I’ll get home about 10:00, eat and unwind a small bit. It will be about 11:00 before I have a chance to make that dream-slip wrist band, but I will even if I have to stay up all night. It’s not about the fame, it’s about a girl in a wheelchair that has nowhere the privileges and conveniences I have in life. It’s about having the ability, through my writing and imagination, to provide her a moment of enjoyment.

Being published is a lot of work. The moments I’ve with The Book Factory are the moments that count and put a smile on my face. There are a lot of things that might make me stop writing. But if only one Book Factory Member asked for another book, I’d be there at the keyboard, doing my best to fulfill that obligation. It matters.

A friend asked me about being excited that my book was out. I ended up emailing this message as a reply and thought others might like to know how I feel about “fame.” __________ The excitement is funny. I’m not that excited, still biting my nails. The hard thing for me is accepting that people like the book. That’s the first thing I want to know. No matter how many people have said the like it, I keep waiting for that one person to say they hated it. Then my reaction would be, “I knew it. I didn’t think it was that great either.” How strange is that? It was fun to see it in finished form. I got some pre-release copies and they looked great. Actually, I was worried about Windstorm. They have a dark history. Originally they were a small press that got into financial trouble and were scamming some writers. They folded and new owners purchased the assets and changed the name to Windstorm. I researched them and found complaints of poor quality. I never could find one of their books on a book shelf. Most of the information was very old, closer to the buy-out time. They seemed legitimate but I was still waiting to find out it was all a hoax, even though I never had to give them a cent. I found out more about small presses and they are medium, but still closer to small than large. When I got the book, I thought it looked great, but a bit thin. Then I looked at the type size. It’s small. They want all their Blue Works division books to be 288 pages. They adjust the font size and margins to make it all fit. Windstorm didn’t like the ink for the cover saying it looked “muddy.” I did notice it tended to flake at the cut edges. They asked the printer to change the ink. The final ones do hold up better. Getting a shipment of books was exciting for a minute. All these boxes showed up with 150 books. Then I read the invoice. Almost $1200.00 Whew. That settled me down.

A friend has a daughter injured in a car accident. She’s 19 and a quadriplegic. He reads to her each week. I gave him a copy of my book to read for her. I came to work in the morning and he grabbed me right away to tell me what happened. He was reading and noticed that half way through chapter one, she closed her eyes. Thinking she had fallen asleep he stopped reading. (Me listening to his story, I thought he bored her). She opened her eyes and asked why he had stopped. When he told her why, she told him she loved the descriptions and could visualize everything. She said she was watching it like a movie in her imagination. He read enough into chapter two to mention “chair.” She got very excited and begged him to read more saying it couldn’t be true—the hero in a story in a wheelchair. She’s very excited to continue. A strange thing is the first agent that rejected my book said the descriptions got in way of the story.
My friend said his daughter has never closed her eyes for a story before. He called his daughter on the phone from work yesterday and asked me to talk to her. She uses a headset to talk. She wanted to tell me the story already meant a lot to her. I had given my friend a silicone dream-slip wrist band for her but it was too tight and could cause circulation troubles. I have several different dream-slip bands I made up on my web site. Last night I got home about 10 PM and stat up until almost midnight tying several leather thong wristbands from the web site. (They are a lot easier to draw then actually tie, I found out.) Now she can dream-slip and is very excited about the concept.
 

I also did some book binding and made a dictionary sized Book of Second Chances with a leather cover, studs, strap with acorns to hold it shut and the works to match the book in the story. There is a hidden switch that makes the acorn glow and if you slam the book down hard the studs flicker and light up. (I have too much of something flowing in my head). I intended it as a stage prop for book events, but decided to make it a guest book or a second chance book. All the pages are blank as in the story.
 

I gave it to my friend so his daughter could be the first to sign. She can’t use her hands but had a stamp made up with her signature on it.
 

The point of all this being, it’s stories like this, it’s reactions from readers that makes it all worth doing. If another book never sold, I’d know the whole effort was one to be proud of. I had another fan who read the manuscript with her mother on a writing workshop. For school they had to dress up as their favorite character from a book. She dressed up as Hillary from my book. Then she had to have the teacher email me to verify she wasn’t just cheating on homework.

 

One last aside (can you tell I’m bored at work?). My nephew must read and review a novel for class. He picked mine and asked Uncle Mike to “give him the good inside stuff.” I told him “No cheating!” read the book. I had to laugh because my sister said he figured he would have to really read it. He did and then asked me lots of questions. When it went on very long I suggested he had enough for his assignment. Then he revealed that he had already turned it in, and these were questions he had but my sister wouldn’t let him ask me until later. So I earned another smile by knowing someone enjoyed it

Yes, writing can be difficult some times and easy other times. I’m at one of those hard times. It happens when I have to thing up names such as bitterbun. I like names like that, a mix of two things. Sometimes I change them to Bitterbrun, just to be different. My readers like the wacky names but it isn’t easy. 

Somehow the name needs to fit the character. We aren’t born that way are we? Do our parents name us and we grow into the names or maybe parents are psychic? I don’t know. I only know that waiting for a name to pop into my head takes time. The story waits. I’m working on book three now, The Book of Twisted Truths. I have a race of people that are invading the main continent of Gabendoor and I need a name for them. The challenge is coming up with a fun name that in itself can be a twisted truth. So the story waits and waits as I walk around sounding out different words and combinations to myself as I walk the dealership lot.

YES I sell cars to pay the bills. What a boring job until a customer comes in and not many do come in lately.  I walk around with a tiny tape recorder in my pocket. Hm… maybe they should change that name. It’s a digital tape recorder, no tape. Is it then a digital recorder? I still call it a tape recorder but maybe I shouldn’t.  

Molly Folly Sallyforth, a popular character in all the books.

Sometimes writing is hard, sometimes easy, sometimes the stories refuse to cooperate. Book three, The Book of Twisted Truths, is running me ragged.

The characters are running the show and have made me make several changes and I’m only at chapter five. Readers have put on some pressure too. They enjoy the “creative names” and the new and unusual animals in each book. In book three there is a chamelion. No, not a chameleon, a chamelion. I don’t want to give anything away, but the chamelion was supposed to belong to one of the characters who associates with the bad guys. The chamelion refused, fought me and finally just took itself out of the scenes it was in and latched on to Trish, Windslow’s and Hillary’s mother.

I got over that and then Trish started acting up, not cooperating and went off on her own independent dream-slip. Okay, I can deal with that too. Now I’m stuck with some of the changes the Sallyforth Triplets forced on me and I have to rename several characters and geographic oddities in Gabendoor. I really would like to just sit down and write, but can’t. The characters all refuse to move until I catch up with the changes they want. I guess I had better get busy.