A Taste of Christmas with A Taste of Home

I'm excited to show off the cover for A Taste of Home, a historical Christmas novella that I absolutely love. It's releasing just in time to get everyone into the Christmas spirit!

The story takes place in the early 1900s in Salt Lake City, and it features a hotel that's still operating today. We went there for our 20th anniversary trip, and I knew right away that I had to write about it.

Here's what the Peery Hotel looks like today:

Viewed from above, it's shaped like an uppercase E, with a long wing that connect the three arms. That layout allows every room to have natural sunlight. Plus, it just looks cool.

Here's the back cover copy: 

From USA TODAY bestselling author Annette Lyon comes an enchanting Christmas novella: Claire Jennings is headed home to spend Christmas with her family, riding the train with Will Rhodes, who grew up across the street. He may be twenty-one now, but she can’t forget his torturous teasing from their school years.

At the rail station, Claire learns that her home is under quarantine because her little brother has measles. She’s stuck in town, away from her family, on her favorite holiday. Will stays behind with her, and as Christmas Day approaches and her homesickness deepens, she discovers that perhaps he has changed in more ways than one.

And here's the awesome cover:

Isn't it pretty?!

More than one reviewer has compared the story to L. M. Montgomery's style and the characters to Anne and Gilbert. If you know me at all, you know that is one of the highest compliments I could possibly receive!

Evidence: A shelf in my office devoted to all things L.M. Montgomery,
including a first edition Windy Poplars.
Not pictured: the 5th and final volume of her journals.
Yes, I'm a total Lucy Maud junkie.

For those who have read the Silver Bells collection from the Timeless Romance Anthology series, you may remember the story from there. It's now available a standalone single!

You can pre-order it now for only $1.49, and it'll automatically download to your device on midnight of release day, November 28. (Depending on your time zone, you could get it an hour or two early!)

Get A Taste of Home at the following retailers: 

Amazon

Barnes & Noble

iTunes/Apple

Kobo

Smashwords

*This site uses Amazon affiliate links.

Where I Get My Inspiration

Note: My Timeless Romance Anthology is now available! Get it HERE for Amazon or HERE for iTunes. Other purchase links below.

Inspiration is like a pile of Lego blocks.

Recently on Facebook, someone (I’m forgetting who, unfortunately) tagged me and several other writers to ask where we find our inspiration.

I wasn’t sure how to answer because the term inspiration can be defined in so many ways. Did she mean how do I find ideas? How do I find the inspired rush that drives me to the keyboard? Something else?

I never did get around to answering the question when it was posted, but it’s been tumbling around in my head for some time, so I thought I’d tackle it here from the perspective my 20+ years of writing seriously (plus another 15 of dabbling in it).

INSPIRATION AS AN IDEA GENERATOR

Finding things to write about is one type of inspiration. Finding ideas isn’t the hard part; they’re everywhere. Finding good ideas with a fresh angle that are interesting and worth pursuing is a big trickier. In my experience, the good ideas are the ones where at least two very different things suddenly come together in your head in a new way.

The trick is making yourself open to absorbing all kinds of input and then letting your brain play with the resulting stack of Lego idea bricks to see what kind of thing you can make with the new blocks you found.

The magic of a shiny new idea, at least for me, often happens when my brain takes two pieces of information that seem utterly unconnected, clicks them together like Lego pieces, and I suddenly have a shiny new “what if” scenario that gets me so excited I can’t stop thinking about it. 

And you can’t plan for the kind of sudden click (or collision, however you look at it) of ideas. It happens unexpectedly, unpredictably. That’s part of the magic of the creative process. 

So if you can’t pencil in that you’ll have a flash of brilliance at 1:34 PM on Tuesday when you need an idea, how exactly do you make sure you’ll have great ideas when you need them and that you won’t run out of them?

(1) Constantly Fill Your Well

Be aware of what’s around you. Soak it all in. Keep up with current events where you live and abroad. Read up on weird trivia. Read a lot: novels in your genre and outside it, nonfiction, magazines, and more. I’m not a fast reader, but I do read regularly and a wide variety of .

People watch then think of ways to describe that mannerism the man over there made. Or come up with a good (non-cliché) metaphor to describe the way the lake looks right now. This mental kind of game is especially big when I travel to a new place. I go out of my way to notice colors, smells, and sounds. I pay attention to how people behave. What the food is like. And so on. My creative inner child have fun with the building blocks. I have no way of knowing which details will eventually show up in a story, so I drink it all in. The more that’s in the well, the more variety of Lego blocks my mind has to play with and land on an unexpected combination.

When I’m in a new place, I take pictures to trigger my memory. I take notes that day but often after the fact rather than in the moment so I don’t miss noticing anything, and so I can immerse myself in an experience.

By filling your well up with outside stimuli, you’re giving your creative subconscious the Lego blocks it needs if it’s going to build something cool. Be sure to give it plenty of supplies for the job. 

Other ideas: Read and watch the news and imagine scenarios from the victims’ perspective and from the perpetrator’s. Law enforcement’s, too. Watch news magazine shows and imagine what really went on in those people’s lives. Sometimes I get ideas from songs, but that’s usually on road trips when I’m listening to the same album over and over because a child insists on it, and because the long hours of open road let my mind wander.

Mental wandering, I’ve found, is key to landing on great ideas. Mundane chores and activities are fabulous for letting the creative mind meander through the creative well so it will come back with ideas. That kind of wandering rarely yields fruit if you’re stressed out and trying to force it. 

I’ve had ideas (and even solutions to big plot problems) pop into my head while mowing the lawn, doing dishes, vacuuming, sorting laundry, drying my hair, taking a shower, and (as mentioned already) driving long distances. Note that in all of those activities, chances are, I am in a relaxed state, and in many of them I am physically moving. For me, those elements are often key for the best brainstorming.

In contrast, the more I try to force an idea to show up RIGHT NOW, the more likely my creative brain will panic and retreat. 

(2) Make Yourself a Small Box and Get Inside It.

A completely different way of being inspired with new ideas came about for me after I joined forces with Heather B. Moore and Sarah M. Eden with the Timeless Romance Anthology series. Each story I write for the series has a specific theme on top of being either historical or contemporary (very different animals themselves). We’ve consistently put out 3 to 4 collections a year for some time now, so I always have another novella deadline around the corner.

That sounds pretty terrifying, but as it turns out, the thematic requirements haven’t been restrictive; they’ve been utterly freeing. 

It reminds me of a board game that some family members were chosen to be beta testers for. They brought it to a family dinner, and we all played. The game had cards with abstract shapes and lines all over them, and depending on how things went, sometimes you could get points for finding any object on a card, or you had to find objects belonging to a specific category (fruits, vehicles, school supplies). At first, we assumed that the free-for-all turns would be easier because no object was off limits. But without exception, the free-for-all turns were when we all choked, unable to see much of anything. 

But give us a specific category, and we could spot pictures everywhere (Look! Grapes! That’s a pineapple. I found an apple, orange, and strawberry. Ooh, a pear!) And on it went. The more specific the requirement, the easier it was for our minds to see patterns.

My experience with the anthologies has been similar: If someone were to tell me to write a short story or novella about anything at all, in any genre, right now, that could be tricky. But give me clear parameters (e.g. a paranormal historical romance set during Halloween, like our next Timeless collection will be), and suddenly, ideas start popping up all over the place. 

Case in point: A few months ago, knowing I needed to write my All Hallows’ Eve story, I drove past a cool old church at night. I noticed a light on above a door, coming through the window above it. Immediately, I thought of how cool it would be if there were a ghost in the building, and I was seeing its light through the window. 

As I drove on (likely to pick up a child from some activity), I knew I’d landed on the seed of the story that will be in that collection. The story itself didn’t show up until later, after I toured the church and another local historic site, but I knew the story would involve a ghost and that church window. (See the news below about when to expect that collection!)

Quite often, the smaller the box you must work inside, the easier the ideas come to fill it. If you don’t have a box given to you from an outside source, create one. Look online for writing prompts to create a box. You may find a new book idea, or you may have fun with a writing exercise. Either way, it’s worth your time. 

INSPIRATION TO ACTUALLY WRITE

This is another way of defining inspiration, and it’s a different ball of wax entirely. I’d go so far as to say that for the most part, it’s a myth.

Sure, writers all have moments of feeling drawn to the keyboard, and those moments are probably what first lit the excitement inside us about writing in the first place. But those moments are usually fleeting and spaced far apart. 

Life gets in the way (so does the internet and so many other things), and then the writing doesn’t happen. If you write only when inspiration strikes, it’ll take you fifteen years (or more) to finish the first draft a project. Along the way, you’ll probably take several detours by starting ten other shiny new projects . . . without finishing any of them, either.

A truth: Often getting a writing session started is the hardest part. The muse, the inspiration, simply isn’t there. Even after writing for as long as I have, getting down to work can be a battle. I know that if I force myself to start pounding out words, and especially if I give myself permission to have those words be garbage instead of feeling the pressure to make them all perfect, then within fifteen minutes, I will almost certainly slip into the magic of flow. The inspiration will show up, and the writing session will become productive and even fun.

The order of those events is key: Before inspiration to write strikes, you have to start writing without it.

I have to work without out any inspiration or excitement, at least at first. I have to force myself to write, knowing that the only way out is through. Sometimes I’ve put in the work, and every word was dragged out of my fingers kicking and screaming. That can happens for days or weeks or months at a time, so I start thinking that I really do suck at this thing, and I’ll never feel the creative rush again.

But if I keep showing up and producing words, the inspiration eventually does show up, and suddenly, I never I remember why I do this crazy thing, and I never want to leave the keyboard.

That feeling is pretty darn amazing. But it’s not something I can sit around waiting for. It won’t come that way. You show up first. The muse will eventually see that you really do take your writing seriously. As a result, it will start to show up at a certain time because she knows she can count on you to already be there.

For more on inspiration and writing, I highly recommend Elizabeth Gilbert’s TED talk on the subject. I’ve watched it several times over the years, and I get something new from it every time.

  

THREE PIECES OF EXCITING NEWS! 

FIRST: On August 3, watch for the release of the All Hallows’ Eve collection from Timeless Romance Anthologies, featuring guest contributors Elana Johnson, Jordan McCollum, and Lisa Mangum, in addition the three of us who appear in each volume (Heather B. Moore, Sarah M. Eden, and yours truly). Find its beautiful and creepy cover HERE. This is where my ghost story will published!

SECOND: The next volume after that celebrates the Christmas season: Under the Mistletoe will be released mid-October, in time for readers to enjoy it in the weeks leading up to the holiday season. Here's the link to the cover reveal. We have some great guest authors on board for it!

THIRD, AND FOR THE MOMENT, MOST IMPORANTLY:

The Annette Lyon Collection from Timeless Romance Anthologies is LIVE, and the reviews are starting to come in. Snag it now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, or iTunes, and watch for the blog tour later this month.

Author Interview: Joanna Penn

Some time ago I stumbled across a blog post (how and where I don't recall). I was immediately impressed and had a feeling I'd be smart to follow it. I promptly added the blog, The Creative Penn: Adventures in Writing, Publishing and Book Marketing, to my Google reader.

I'm glad I did.

The author, Joanna Penn, has written four books and seeks out all kinds of tips, sites, and helps about writing, publishing, and marketing. She's a great resource for all writers, whether they're doing freelance work, shooting for traditional publishing, or blazing their path on the indie route.

(Is it just me, or does she look a little like Elaine on Seinfeld? And you know how I love me some Seinfeld.)

I enjoy Joanna's posts, Skype interviews, and energetic personality. She's a great tweeter; if you follow me, you've probably seen me re-tweet her, many times.

Her first novel, a thriller called Pentecost, is out now on Amazon.com in print and Kindle formats. Buy it TODAY, Monday, February 7, for a chance to win one of her great prizes. (It's all of $2.99. That's less than a good burger, and I'm betting the enjoyment will last a longer than one too! See details on the book's Facebook page. Link below.)

Watch her book trailer (I dare you to not be intrigued by it), and then read my interview with Joanna:

You started out with technical writing and other non-fiction. When and how did the fiction bug bite?

I’ve always wanted to write fiction but I was crippled with self-doubt for years because I thought I had to write prize-winning literary fiction or nothing at all. Then I looked at what I love to read—fast-paced, action-movie style thrillers—and decided to write one of those. I finally attempted to write fiction during NaNoWriMo in 2009, and that became the first few chapters of Pentecost. I loved the process of writing it and I’m already planning the next one. I can’t believe I waited so long!

Where did the idea for Pentecost come from?

I have a Masters in Theology from Oxford and also a post-graduate diploma in Psychology, so I was always going to use my academic knowledge in my writing. Religion, mythology and the supernatural fascinate me so I wanted to explore some of those areas. I also wanted a topic that resonated with people and where the fiction could hang on established tradition. Pentecost and the Acts of the Apostles are known to Christians, but I took the basic idea and then extended the story further without impinging on what the Bible says.

The premise of Pentecost is that the Apostles took stones from the empty tomb of Jesus and wore them as a symbol of their Brotherhood. These stones were empowered at Pentecost and handed down through generations of Keepers who kept their secret, but now the Keepers are being murdered and the stones hunted by those who would use them for evil.

The specific idea came to me when I was in Venice at St Mark’s Basilica looking up at the Pentecost mosaic and I realized that little is known about the Apostles, so it would make for an interesting theme.

What research did you have to do for the book?

As the story ranges across the world, I spent a lot of time researching physical locations. I have been to many of them but had to refresh my memory (e.g. Jerusalem) but also had to write from research for Tabriz, Tunisia and Santiago de Compostela in Spain. I used websites and also Flickr.com for photos to write more visually. I also researched Carl Jung and The Red Book, his journal of a breakdown that I used images from. The synchronicity was incredible as Jung painted a pillar of fire emanating from a stone, which of course, I had to use in the book!

What was the most interesting thing you learned (either for the book or about research)?

The hunt for the stones of the Apostles centers around the locations where their relics are kept, so I did a lot of research on where the twelve men died. Little is written about what happened to each apostle after the book of Acts. Peter’s crucifixion in Rome and John on Patmos are well-known, but for others there are conflicting traditions. So I took as much as I could and then fitted the story around that, which meant that I learned a lot about the Roman Empire and early Christian world.

What is your writing style? Are you an outliner or a by-the-seat-of-your-pantser? Somewhere in between?

I started off by writing the scenes that were playing in my head, mainly the opening and climax as well as scenes in Jerusalem, Venice and Rome. Then I did an outline to join those together with a coherent story. Of course the outline morphed as I continued writing, but it was a good guideline. I used the outline as more of an editing tool to track what I needed to change in the second draft. One lesson learned was that I should be using an outline earlier for faster production of the first draft but still leave room for change as I write each scene.

What is your typical writing schedule like?

I’d describe myself as a binge writer! I have a day job and now two blogs as well as a podcast and videos to produce (and a life!), so I have to balance my time. In my productive writing phase, I was up at 5am to write 1000 words before my day job and then scheduled four hours on a Sunday to immerse myself for a longer session. I’m currently in "gathering" phase for the next book and not writing fiction at all, although I write every day for the blog and other places. I anticipate gathering ideas and research for the next month at least before I start another binge writing phase!

From another interview, I gather that you have a “regular job” four days a week. How soon do you foresee the day when you can write full time?

Yes, I work as an IT consultant four days per week, and it is a mixed blessing! I like the income, which means I don’t have to write for money, only for pleasure. I also enjoy the social side and my work is intellectually stimulating in a different way. Fitting everything in keeps me motivated to write, so I’m pretty happy with this way of life at the moment. I do want to be a full-time writer/blogger/speaker, but I see that as maybe two years away at the moment, and it will be a portfolio-style career. I enjoy the writing, but I also love speaking and blogging.

How did you make the decision to self-publish your novel?

I’m basically impatient and a fast worker. I hate to sit around waiting for anything to happen. With Amazon Kindle, you can have your book published in 24 hours, and with print-on-demand, your print book can be for sale in 3 weeks or less. I have a market ready to buy it, as I have built an author platform, so it seemed crazy to wait. I also hate the negative energy of rejection and would rather try to get a book deal by getting publishers to notice me than chase after them.

There are more stories now of self-published books being picked up by traditional publishers after they achieve great sales. So it’s win-win. I carry on writing and marketing, and whether or not I get a book deal, I am selling books!

What is the most important thing writers hoping for self-publishing success to know/do?

It’s critical to use a professional editor for both editorial review and copy editing. You cannot pick up all the problems in your book yourself, and you need your book to be a professional final product. Self-publishing gets a lot of criticism for lack of quality, so please organize editing. Professional cover design is important and will help your book stand out for good reasons.

Building an author platform is also critical because no one will know your book exists otherwise. There’s lots more info about publishing options HERE.

Social media seems to have played a big role in your success to date, Twitter especially. What advice do you have for writers feeling overwhelmed by the idea of social media? (Where should they start, and/or what has made the biggest impact for you?)

It’s important to be into social media in some way now. It’s expected by publishers and agents as part of your author platform, and it’s critical for independent authors as a marketing angle. But you need to choose what is best for you in terms of personality and audience. Different sites have different audiences as well as etiquette and ways to be successful.

I love Twitter, and it’s my focus for social networking although I do use other sites. I made a conscious decision to grow my influence there, so I dedicate time to it. A big mistake people make is to scatter-gun their efforts, and then they achieve nothing and give up. It also takes time. I’ve been on Twitter nearly two years now and spent the first six months in the wilderness like everyone else! Here’s a longer article on how to use Twitter effectively.

Which authors have had the biggest influence on your own work?

In terms of fiction in the thriller genre, I love James Rollins, Matthew Reilly, Michael Crichton and Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child. In order to share more of the books I enjoy, I’ve started a new blog for lovers of the mystery and thriller genre, Mystery Thriller TV. Come and check it out if you’re a fan of the genre!

Any additional advice for aspiring authors?

The publishing world is changing, and opportunities are growing for authors who are willing to write and promote themselves. Ebooks now outstrip paperback sales on Amazon.com, so you can get your work out there without barriers to entry anymore.

If you have ever dreamed of writing a book, now is a brilliant time to do it!

To find out more about Joanna, check out The Creative Penn, the Pentecost novel web site, or follow her on Twitter. To follow the her book launch and see the details about the launch contest, LIKE the Facebook page for Pentecost.

Good luck, Joanna!

This Is Why I Write

The feedback I've had from Band of Sisters has been very much what I hoped it would be rather than what I feared it might be. Actually, the response has exceeded my expectations. I went in pretty scared.

After all, I was writing about deployment: a huge topic, one that's timely, sensitive, and one that so many people not only know about but have been through firsthand. And I'm brazen enough to attempt to capture that experience when I've never been through it?

Yet that's what I set out to do.

On one hand, that's kind of what fiction writers do every time they sit down. Beginning writers' work often tends to be largely autobiographical, but eventually, if you've written long enough, you move past that and invest in stories and characters several steps removed from yourself.

My first book was a mixture of the two: I included bits and pieces of things I knew personally (I went on lots of Uintah hikes as a teen. I was hit in the head with a rock at recess and needed stitches. I performed in Into the Woods. All of those show up in the book in various ways.)

But I also addressed things totally foreign to me, such as what it would be like to marry a man already sealed to another woman. That element is a huge part of the book, and I had to emotionally go there to figure out how Brooke would handle it and how Greg would approach the idea of marrying again.

After Lost Without You came out, my aunt, who is a second wife herself, went to my mother and asked, "How did she know what it feels like?"

Yes! I got it right! The only response I had for that was, "I guess I imagined well?" That's the kind of reader feedback that makes you want to do a dance in the end zone.

As I wrote Band of Sisters, I talked with many military wives who had been through or were currently dealing with deployment. Two of them I've known for many, many years. I'd also watched firsthand as one of them went through a deployment (and thoroughly picked her brain).

In spite of my work, I feared it wouldn't land well. Maybe I'd offend because I didn't do justice to the pain or the reality or fully express my respect for the military.

One concern I had is the fact that there is no "typical" deployment, so any woman who'd been through it could say, "That's not how it was." More, what my characters experience as National Guard wives who live in regular neighborhoods is totally different from what a woman would experience if she lived on a military base during a deployment.

What would a military base wife think reading it? Would she think I got all the details wrong? I could see someone rolling their eyes and going, "There IS no Army base in Utah. Duh." But there are hundreds of Army families here. Utah soldiers have died fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. A street near us was recently renamed after one of those fallen soldiers. He did fight with the U.S. Army, even if there's no Army base here. (But Camp Williams is here!) I couldn't very well put that kind of disclaimer on the book, so I held my breath and hoped those deeper into the military would give me the benefit of the doubt.

I chose to write about Guard wives for a couple of reasons: first, because those were the kinds of women I had the most contact with, and my research would be more accurate using their information. But also because, frankly, it's tougher to not be on a base during a deployment. The Guard tries hard to support families in a variety of ways, but when push comes to shove, they simply can't scratch the surface of the support and benefits other families get by default from living on base.

When you're in a regular old neighborhood, likely with no other military anyone nearby, no one gets it. Even a simple conversation about what's going on with your soldier turns into a pain the neck rather than a comfort because you have explain acronyms or this particular element of the military. You can't just get a worry off your chest with a simple sentence or two.

I worried and worried and worried. I went into the project without much knowledge, so I relied heavily on several military wives for information and then, armed with that information, I tried to imagine how each of my five (very different) characters would react given their ages, circumstances, personalities, etc.

With all military details, I relied on my primary resources, down to what ranks the husbands would realistically have and why. Even though I didn't randomly make stuff up, I still mentally bit my nails to the quick waiting for people's reactions. To my huge relief, the response has been overwhelmingly positive.

I recently got an e-mail from a two-time Vietnam vet who read the book and sent all his veteran friends the same message he forwarded to me, a long letter about how during the times of his deployments, he "knew" what his wife and children were going through while he was away, but he didn't "understand" until he read my book. He proceeded to tell these vets that they should all, Mormon or not, read the book so that they, too, could understand.

Another military wife, whose husband had recently returned from Iraq, downloaded the first three chapters from my website and then e-mailed me. She first admitted she never reads LDS fiction but decided to read those chapters then went on to say that even though she's a tough cookie, I wrenched a few tears out of her (something she hated to admit) because, in her words, I "nailed it."

A couple of times a week I get similar e-mails, many from women about to enter a deployment, others from women who have already been through it, and even from non-military readers who are grateful they've learned a bit what it's like and can better support a military family they know.

And then there are the other letters. The ones that have absolutely nothing at all to do with the military aspect of the book. Letters that say things like, "Wow. I realized that I'm a Nora. I saw so much of myself in her, and I learned I need to change."

Below is a snippet of an e-mail from a military wife:

I just wanted to let you know how well you portrayed what it's like. I really did relate to each woman in one way or another. The emotions in your book were very accurate and very real. The loneliness, anger, fright, feeling like you are going crazy over and over again. All of it. In fact, by the time I was done reading, I was sure that the only way you were able to portray it so well was because you had been through it yourself. I was quite shocked when I read your bio at the end and it talked about your research for the book. You did a VERY good job in your research. This is a book that I think every person in America needs to read. People just don't understand what it like. And a sign that says "you just don't get it" is so accurate. People try to relate to you and of course they try to to empathize with you, but when put in that situation, it really just makes you feel worse. . . . I have had so many feelings regarding our mobilization and it really was hard. I truly believe that I wouldn't have been able to get through it with out the gospel in our lives.

She went on to describe having a conversation with her son about whether Daddy would die (something NO mother should ever have to do) and other struggles she experienced. She wants her husband to read the book so he has a better idea of what she went through. She closed her note with the hope that I'd write a sequel or two.

When I finished reading her words, I had tears streaming down my cheeks. This went way beyond dancing in the end zone.

And I thought, THIS is why I write.

Writing Journey: Writer Weirdness

Being that it's New Year's Day (and I'm out of town), I'm cheating by re-posting from my archives from when I literally had what, two readers? Below is literally my very first post, and since it happens to be writing-related, I thought it'd be a good fit for my Writing Journey series.

(As a side note, the scene I refer to the beginning was for Hannah's injury in Spires of Stone.)

Enjoy!

*****

Not long ago, I pulled one of my many reference books from my office bookshelf so I could get a few details for an upcoming scene I’m writing.

Holding the book in my hands, I immediately felt transported back to the time I first read it, and I had to smile. Suddenly I felt sentimental.

It was the Christmas holidays, visiting my in-laws, during the time I was still a hopeful writer who hadn’t yet been published. I remembered the manuscript I was working on and why I needed this particular book to help me with certain details—and I still remember what those details were. Snow fell; holiday cheer abounded; carols drifted through the house.

And here I was engrossed in Body Trauma, where every chapter follows an organ system, explaining injuries and how they affect the human body—and even better, how those injuries can be used by writers in their work.

I know; you don’t have to tell me. I’m morbid.

It’s great to be reading along about blood and guts, then have the author insert something along the lines of, "Use this injury if you need your character’s future to be uncertain," or "This is a good one to use if a character needs to be ill, recover, and then relapse."

Okay, so I’m not just morbid; I’m weird.

I’m aware of that.

But sometimes I forget that others don’t share my bizarre curiosity.

You should have seen the faces of my brothers-in-law when they saw the book. "Light reading, huh?" they asked as they inched away from me.

"No, really, it’s so fascinating," I said as I stepped forward, eager to share gems I had just learned. "Did you know that if someone has a bad impact—say they fell from a cliff—and it’s so bad you can’t tell where their face is, you look for air bubbles?"

They sank into the couch, eyes wide with horror.

The reality is that I am weird.

I’m a writer. That makes me a little bit off the beaten path.

How many other people do you know who have conflicts appear in their imaginations in the middle of the night? Who else hears people talking in their heads (and no, they don’t need medication or a strait jacket). Who else finds joy in the discovery of new information that will help make their pretend world a little closer to reality?

And how many people do you know who are so obsessed punctuation rules that they cringe when they see a T-shirt with a comma splice?

So yes, I’m weird. And I celebrate that weirdness.

Weirdness is the quality that brings me the wonder of the written word, characters, story lines, creation, and so much more. It’s what brought me to the place of—finally—getting published.

And yes, in case you’re wondering, that first manuscript I read Body Trauma for did end up published several years later, complete with injuries for three victims of a drunk-driving car accident.

That book is now known as At the Water’s Edge.

A few months after reading Body Trauma I brought my next bit of light reading while visiting family—Cause of Death. I had to chase people around the house so they’d pay attention to the diagrams of autopsies. "No really. Check this out! It’s totally cool!"

They’d block their eyes and run the other way, saying, "Man, are you kidding me?"

Sheesh. Some people just can’t appreciate a good reference book.

(Originally posted July 21, 2006)

Writing Journey: Part XVIII

Catch up on the rest of this series HERE.

After publishing that military wives article, the topic wouldn't go away. I had pages and pages of thoughts and feelings and events these five women had poured their souls into. I felt as if they'd let me into a corner of their hearts and lives. It was an honor that a mere 1200 words didn't do justice to.

It just wasn't enough. I had to do more with it. I was driven to do more. Other people needed to understand what deployment was like for those at home. I hadn't had a clue until I interviewed these remarkable women.

Maybe I could write a longer version of the article and sell it to a bigger magazine, I thought. But even that didn't quite sit right. I wasn't sure what I should do, but I had to do something.

About that time, I had difficult moment during a Christmas Enrichment night. I ended up in the lobby feeling a bit sorry for myself, and what happened over the next few minutes turned on my writer brain.

I suddenly had an entire scene about a woman, Brenda, going through a deep depression during the Christmas season while her husband was deployed. The entire scene unfolded in my head and demanded to be written.

Keep in mind, I was still researching the Vernal Temple and fully expecting to write novel about that, although no story was really popping out at me yet. Finding one was sure taking a long time (I had a few elements floating around my brain, but nothing really solid yet), but I wasn't in panic mode. The story would come, I figured. It always does.

But Brenda's scene itched to be written. It wasn't the beginning of a story. If anything, it belonged somewhere in the middle of a book. But I sat down and wrote it.

Since I'd recently submitted Tower, I had nothing else to read at our weekly critique group meetings, so I brought that scene.

In no uncertain terms, they told me, "You have to write this book."

On one hand, I was flattered. But on the other . . . what about the whole temple series thing? Well, maybe I could do both.

I kept researching Vernal and writing this deployment book on the side. I ended up with five different women whose lives come together when their husbands are deployed together. Each has her own stage of life, her own weaknesses and trials. The story went into their friendships and support of one another. The result was something unlike anything I'd written before, something that not only shows a glimpse of deployment but also what real female friendships are about.

But when it was more than half done, I still had no story about Vernal.

It was late spring when my trusty editor Kirk told me that first of all, Tower was accepted for publication. (Yay!) But then he said the committee was asking me to do something else after that . . . something not temple-related. They thought maybe the temple series idea had run its course now that I'd done all four of the old Utah temples.

I was taken aback, because I'd had plans for Mesa, Alberta, Hawaii, Nauvoo . . . but okay, I'll put the Vernal book on the shelf and let it gather dust.

But then Kirk asked if I had any ideas for writing something else.

And I had to smile. Because not only did I have an idea, I almost had another book ready. Something that sort of spilled out of me.

I told him about the deployment manuscript. It's not a romance, I told him. It's not a historical. It's "women's fiction." And it's not remotely like anything I've done before. But I love it.

Kirk thought the idea was great and very timely and asked how quickly I could get it to him.

I bit my lip and wondered just how fast I could get it to him.

I made a leap. "By Halloween?"

On Inspiration

I've chronicled how some of my characters and stories "show up" in my head fully formed. Several readers have found that interesting. 

Let's debunk a myth right now: For me, such "inspiration" does not drop from the sky out of nowhere, even if that's how it appears in the moment.

In every case, there's been a lot of work done beforehand. I've done weeks of research. I've come across kernels of ideas or facts that might work well in a story. I dwell on those for days, trying come up with ways to use them in a plot. I might run across a news story or read something in a book that sparks an idea. I think about types of story lines and characters. As best I can, I immerse myself in the location the book will take place to get to know its "personality."

All of this is effort, which is entirely in my head, is major part of my creative process at work. 

It helps me uncover dozens of puzzle pieces that then float around. I have to sort through the pieces: which ones belong in the book I'm going to write and which ones don't? I have to look at what's left (often I don't sort them perfectly and have to resort) and then figure out how they fit together into a cohesive picture.

There's a lot of thinking involved, a lot of turning off the car radio and letting my brain ponder as I drive. A lot of daydreaming while I'm making dinner or folding laundry. A lot of jotting down random notes that only I would understand the meaning of.

Then, and only then, while I'm in another one of those moments where I can ponder and still do some brainless activity (like drying my hair) do I have those magical moments where two or three of those puzzle pieces snap together in one quick moment, and I see the vision of what the full picture just might look like. 

One bit of irony is that the harder I try to chase the inspiration, the more it eludes me. I have to let it percolate mentally, reaching out with tendrils, coaxing it with whispers to come out of the corner and reveal itself.

Sometimes the process takes longer than others, and that's when I start to panic. What if there isn't a story hiding in the shadows this time? What if I can never coax this one out?

But that's usually the point where the idea, unbeknownst to me, is already maturing somewhere in my head. That's when the puzzle pieces are drawing near one another, getting ready to click together into a new character, a line of dialogue, or a specific scene.

I imagine some writers do have magical moments of inspiration that come out of nowhere, but mine always arrive as the reward for lots of ground work.

A section of Stephen King's On Writing describes writing as uncovering a fossil, uncovering what's already there. I can relate to that. The longer I think and work, the more of the dirt is brushed away. At some point, the bones of the story will be exposed for the first time--but not without all that dirt clearing first.

That's how I work, anyway. I'm sure there are as many ways as there are writers.

Writing Journey: Part XV

Part I Part II Part III Part IV Part V
Part VI Part VII Part VIII Part IX
Part X Part XI Part XII Part XIII Part XIV

Many times over the years while doing events for my temple novels, I'd have people excited about one book or another specifically because of the temple it features. Maybe their daughter attended Utah State in Logan, or the reader was married in St. George or their parents were married in Salt Lake. 

But I frequently got one  question: What about Manti? 

Turns out that Manti is one of the most popular temples. More people seem to have a personal connection with it than to the others.

"It's next," I said every time.

But yeah . . . no pressure on writing a book about that one. 

As I'd done with three prior temples, I spent time seeking out sources about the Manti Temple and the founding of the city. I found a couple of books and two master's theses, all with great information.

But I ran into a couple of problems. 

First, most of the information I found was either about the founding of the city or about later improvements to the temple. Sure, there was stuff about the groundbreaking and fundraising and whatnot, but I wanted meaty information about the construction itself.

Second, I wanted the book to be set in the 1880s when the temple was well underway. But after reading about the settlement of Manti, I also wanted significant story elements from that era. Those two didn't really fit, because a twenty-something main character in the 1880s wouldn't have been born when Manti was settled.

Hmm.

I spent weeks sort of freaking out because I had no characters and no plot. I half wished I was doing another Shakespeare retelling as I had with Spires, because at least then I'd have a skeleton of a story to go by.

One day, right about the time I was going to panic, I was blow drying my hair (which in and of itself is pretty rare; I'm an air-dry girl). Hair drying is one of those brainless activities like vacuuming and going on a walk during which, I believe, your creative side can work without you always knowing it.

With my hair half dry, a line of dialogue popped into my head. "It's Tab, not Tabby. I am not a cat!"

I grinned into the mirror.

It was as if Tabitha had walked onto my mental stage. I knew who she was. I knew her past. I knew her personality. I knew about her son. I knew some of the challenges ahead of her.

I didn't know a lot about what her story would become once she returned to Manti. I had yet to meet Samuel or Jeremiah or Mantia, for starters, although I did know about the newspaper. 

Most importantly, I knew I had a story, and I couldn't wait to get to the computer to pound out what I'd found and discover more of it.

Only I had yet another minor problem: Easter was in less than a week. I had to sew my three daughters Easter dresses. It was either disappoint my girls, who were counting on me keeping up the tradition, or bottle up the creative energy and let it sit on a shelf for a week.

The dresses won out. But after Easter, you couldn't tear me from the keyboard.

Temple Trivia: Logan

Of all my temple books, House on the Hill tells more about its temple than any other. The Logan Temple is almost another character, it's such a big part of the story. Even though there are more stories in that book, plenty more aren't in it. Here are two of my favorites.

Carpeting the Temple
The original plan was to purchase factory-made carpet. 1,516 yards were purchased, but that wasn't nearly enough. Worse, the order had pretty much depleted the supply available. What to do?

Superintendent Charles O. Card asked the committee for permission to use handmade carpets. As soon as it was granted, stake Relief Societies were called on to band together to make the carpets.

The women donated rags, which were torn into strips at rag-tearing sessions. The strips were then sewn together by color and rolled into balls. The balls were taken to a weaving machine, which created long strips of cloth. They then sewed the strips together carefully so the carpet wouldn't twist or bulge.

As they were sewn together, the carpets were stretched across a room, tied to doorknobs on either side, to help keep them square. Some wards had to work together on pieces for the larger rooms to make sure the pattern remained consistent.

In spite of how hard they worked, the women weren't able to complete quite all of the carpet on time. The last of it was delivered to the temple on Tuesday, May 20, three days after the dedication. The carpet was installed all that night, with the last bit being laid at 8:00 AM, barely in time for ordinance work to begin that day.

In all, the Relief Society sisters made 2,144 yards of carpet, about two-thirds of the total 3,660 yards in the temple. The homemade carpet remained until 1925, when it was replaced by store-made carpet, with the exception of one bit, which hung on in one of the towers until 1959. When it was removed, that last section was cut into pieces, which were given to officiators and others. Presumably, one piece is still in the temple office.

The Hay Baler
One of the saddest stories in the construction is something I wanted to tell in the book, but I couldn't find a natural way to fit it into the plot. Since I refuse to throw in irrelevant history just for history's sake, I reluctantly left it out. So I'm going to tell it here instead.

Since the construction era was well before things like gas-powered cranes and other motorized vehicles, much of the power came from animals like horses and mules who hauled stone, pulled ropes on pulleys to raise stone blocks, and the like. (I do tell about Old Jim the donkey in the book. Fun story there.)

As a result of the animal labor, they had a temple stable where the work animals were fed and housed. For many families, their donations for the temple consisted of hay for the animals. To keep the hay in good condition and to be able to distribute it easier, they needed a baler.

Nolan P. Olsen describes it as being, "15 feet high, consisting of a large wooden enclosure, with a hole through which the hay was pitched. A large flat rock was rigged up so it could be hoisted up high by horse power, and when it was tripped it would fall into the enclosure and mash the hay flat."

The 300-500 pound bale would be tied up with ropes or wire and then stacked for later use.

One day the rope got stuck, and they couldn't trip the rock to make it fall. The workers couldn't get the rope to loosen or the stone to budge. At that point, a young man of 13 years, John Hincks, put his head inside the baler to peer up in hopes of seeing what the problem was.

Of course, that's the moment the rock tripped on its own. It came down and crushed his head, killing him.

The death of John Hincks was the first connected to the construction of the Logan Temple, but while it wasn't anywhere near the last, to me, it's one of the most tragic because he was so young.

As his grave marker said, he was "Like a flower in bud just bursting into view."


Today's tour stops:
Is It Just Me? (Featuring the Lunar Temple and a new face for me!)
Heather Justesen

Temple Trivia: Salt Lake

Below: Me next to an Salt Lake Temple Earth Stone. Those puppies are huge!

(Taken roughly where Claude went after the dance his last night in the city, at least in my funky writer brain that has no grip on reality and thinks it really happened.)


One of my favorite pieces of trivia about the Salt Lake Temple is that Brigham Young originally wanted to build it out of . . . adobe.

Seriously. He even lobbied in general conference for it. He argued that adobe would outlast stone. (Wha-ha?)

When I first read that, I was confused. How in the world could he have assumed that the magnificent structure he saw in vision was made out of dried mud? Of course it was gray granite!

At first sandstone won out. It was relatively lightweight and close to the Temple Block. Work moved right along until, due to Johnston's Army, they buried the foundation to protect it and fled the city. As many people know, once the foundation was uncovered some years later, it was cracked and had to be replaced.

That is when the gray granite we know and love was chosen for the stone. Spires of Stone goes into some of the difficulties in transporting the stone and how long it took to bring ONE stone to the temple compared to the sandstone (4 days round trip for one stone versus a couple of stones per day with sandstone). The work basically came to a standstill.

More on the transportation problem in a minute.

So the temple was going to be built out of gray granite after all. But I still couldn't figure out why Brigham Young had ever thought it should have been adobe. He'd seen the temple in vision! Couldn't he tell?

Then I came across a quote from a captain in Johnston's Army, describing what Salt Lake City looked like as they marched through. Many of the homes and other buildings were made from adobe.

Which he described as looking like cut, gray stone.

Eureka!

My opinion is that Brigham Young thought what he saw in vision was the same substance he saw around him all day long. Adobe is what he was familiar with, and it makes sense to me that his mind would have gone there first instead of assuming the grand, gray building was made of granite (which probably wouldn't have even occurred to him).

Back to the stone-hauling issue: So eventually they determined to use the granite up Little Cottonwood Canyon. But as I said, it was seriously heavy and far away.

Leaders tried to come up with all kinds of solutions to the transportation problem, because at the rate they were going, it probably would have taken a century or more to build instead of 40 years. My favorite (because it's just so out there) was building a canal from Big Cottonwood Creek and floating the stones to the Temple Block.

They basically built the canal (quite a feat, considering all the ravines and obstacles it had to get through). It was twenty feet wide at the base, gradually widening at the top, and was four feet deep.

But it didn't work; it wouldn't hold water. W. C. A. Smoot said the soil across an area in Parley's Canyon was loam, which acted like a sieve for the water. It drained about as fast as it came in.

You kind of need water for a canal to work. So the canal idea was abandoned.

They tried a wooden railroad, but it didn't work, either. Wasn't strong enough. They eventually halted work at the quarry and built a commercial railroad that could take dozens of stones to the Temple Block in a day. And that is when the work finally picked up.

In the end, it was a good thing that the Salt Lake Temple took four decades to complete. By the 1893, science and technology had improved to the point where the temple had better heating, hygiene, lighting, plumbing, and more than it possibly could have had even a decade before.

This temple—by far the largest ever built even yet—would serve the people better (and safer) than it could have otherwise. It could immediately handle more people and reach its potential, whereas before it would have been too big to manage such a feat.

I think the Lord knew that.

Today's tour stops:
Dunhaven Place (In which Tower of Strength becomes Tower of Terror.)
Temporary? Insanity