Tag: A Closer Look Meme

I can thank (?) Tristi for tagging me on this um . . . delightful . . . meme. :)

Here we go:

1) My kitchen sink

Amazingly enough, when I went around taking these pictures, the sink was empty. Shocker. It obviously could use a good scrubbing, but hey, no complaints. Having it this clean isn't the norm.

2) The inside of my fridge:

Like Josi, I'm a milk snob. My kids are so used to the natural, hormone-free stuff that they will not drink the store-bought gunk if we run out before milk day. Good thing we only go through about 2 gallons a week. I love the stainless steel, even if it gets covered with kiddie fingerprints a bit too easily.

3) My favorite shoes:


I'm not much of a shoe person, really, but I've the most extraordinary luck at D.I. Seriously, it's scary the things I've found there. I got all three of these pairs there, for somewhere around four bucks a pop. How lucky am I?! I KNOW! I adore the black ankle boots on the bottom right and wear them a ton at author events. The other two pairs are way cute, but you really need the right outfit to pull them off, so I don't wear them that often.

4) My closet:

I've never had such a great closet before, not in the two apartments, small house, and then townhouse we lived in before. It's a walk-in, and this is my side of it. Not the most organized, but hey, it's got room, and I love it.

5) The laundry pile:

Not too bad today. The basket on the right is even empty. Be impressed.

6) What my kids are doing right now and

7) My favorite room:

Actually, this is my second favorite room, because my new office just earned the "favorite" title. But I'm not posting that here; it deserves its own post! So here's our great room, somewhat cluttered, right before dinner. This is the thing that sold me on this floor plan in the first place: it's big, it's roomy, and there's lots of gathering space for the family. And I got my dream cupboards. Aren't they gorgeous?! The kids are at the table waiting for me to stop snapping pictures so they can eat already.

The blinds are all closed, because when they're open, there's too much glare for a picture. There's a stray "Happy Birthday" balloon at the top of the cupboards. Ignore that. But take a look at the left side. See that rocking chair (yeah, the thing with the skee-wampus cushion)? That's the same rocking chair I was rocked in as a baby, and I rocked all of mine in it too.

8) My most recent purchase:

I'm assuming this doesn't mean shampoo and apples at the grocery store. This is the runner rug in my new office. (I promise, I promise. More pictures forthcoming in their own post!) I think the rug is bea-u-ti-ful. And it was even on sale. Boo-yah.


9) My fantasy vacation:
I actually have two. In college, I wanted, oh so bad, to go on BYU's London semester abroad. But alas, I didn't get to walk where the Brontes walked or see the Globe Theater or any of that stuff.

The other is (no surprise to my long-time readers) a trip through LM Montgomery-land, including her homes in Norval, Leaskdale, and Toronto where she did most of her writing. (This is the Leaskdale manse where she lived for several years.)


10) Self-portrait:


Scary. I have no words.

As for the tagging:

Don, because I haven't seen a guy do this one yet.

And Jenna, because I want to see her pictures.

Farworld Book Winner

As promised, today I get to give away an Advance Reader Copy of J. Scott Savage's Farworld: Water Keep, which is coming out in September.

A moment ago, I printed out all the names of the commenters on the last post, folded them up, and threw them in a bowl. My girls fought over who got to pick the name out, but eventually peace reigned, and we have a winner:

Congratulations to PIANOPLAYER!

Hope you enjoy it!

Be sure to e-mail me your mailing address (annette at annettelyon dot com) right away so I can pass it along to the powers that be. (If I don't hear from you by Wednesday, I'll draw another name.)

Now for a couple of random things:

1) Children have a way of making everything new again. On the Fourth of July evening as we lit fireworks with some cousins, I sat in a chair like the old person I'm feeling like. My youngest came up beside me and leaned in, gazing at the fountain of sparks. "Oh, Mommy," she said. "It's beautiful." And she was right. I've seen street fireworks so many times (and usually spend the time worrying because hubby and his brothers are pyros--their definition of a "good" firework is one that is nothing but ashes when you're done with it, so they pimp out the ones from the store). It took my little girl pointing out a simple beauty for me to notice it.

2) I'm trying to decide whether to work on my WIP right now or be lazy and watch my NetFlix DVD that's been sitting around the house for WAY too long. I'm a bit achy and tired today, so the movie (an old classic that I haven't watched in ages) is sounding really good about now. I'll probably watch it, even if I end up folding laundry while I do it to assuage any guilt for not getting anything else done.

3) Coming soon: The "A Closer Look" Meme that Tristi tagged me for. I have all the pictures now but haven't gotten them onto the computer yet. Scary meme.

What You Don't Know: J. Scott Savage

My first contact with J. Scott Savage was when I was the chapter president of the Utah Valley Chapter of the League of Utah Writers. I found his contact information in the back of his first book and e-mailed, asking him to speak at the January meeting. He agreed.

A few weeks before the meeting, he came to our critique group's annual Christmas dinner as our newest member, and that's when I first met him. (At Brick Oven. How could I ever forget? Yum . . . .)

That was six and a half years ago, if I'm doing the math right. (I was expecting #4 then, and it was right before my first book was accepted. Yep.) He was a bit of a turkey when it came time for him to speak. I sent a confirmation e-mail to him, and he replied with something snarky like, "What? Was that THIS week? I totally forgot. . . . Just kidding."

I knew right then that he was a goofball, or, er, a riot to get to know.

It's been great having him in the same critique group (especially as the first male, someone to tell us when our male characters were acting, um, less than manly).

Today I get to have fun mentioning his latest publishing achievement, his upcoming book, Farworld: Water Keep, the first in a young adult fantasy series. The book will be on shelves in September, a mere two months away.

Since I agreed to be part of his cool blog tour before I hopped aboard the Whitney Committee and could no longer review 2008 books or publicly mention my opinion of them, I'll keep mum on what I think of the book itself.

Never fear; there are plenty of places you can learn about the book, as his blog tour is going for two months and is quite extensive. You'll be able to find great question-and-answer sessions, reviews of Farworld, and more all over the blogosphere.

However . . . since I can't review the book, I thought I'd have some fun. So . . . this may be the only place you get to find out about the real J. Scott. Here are six little-known facts I've learned about him in the six and a half years I've known him. I picked six because it's a fun number and not too big. I could have gone with twenty-six and had plenty to say. I've got a lot of dirt, but I decided not to mention the . . . oh, wait. :D

1) He enjoys being an anomaly.
For example, he finds it great fun to be the only bass in the room singing, "As Sisters in Zion" at Relief Society Literacy nights.

2) He's observant.
At last year's critique group Christmas dinner, he gave one member a miniature (toy) vacuum that actually sucked . . . that plugs into the computer. I think he knows we women ("The Ladies of Wednesday Night," as he so lovingly refers to us) do a balancing act between housewife and writer.

3) His biological clock is seriously messed up.
The poor man travels so much, my head spins. More than once as we're getting RSVP e-mails about meeting, he'll send a last-minute message along the lines of, "I was supposed to be flying in to SLC tonight, but there was an emergency in [Georgia, Las Vegas, LA, fill in the blank] so I'm headed there right now. Sorry; I won't make it tonight." Forget his biological clock; I bet that half the time even he doesn't know what time zone he's in.

4) Disneyland has played a part in his writing.
On a couple of counts. First, he once wrote a scene as an exercise of how to take a normal, happy situation and make it scary and creepy . . . using the "It's a Small World" ride. (Last time I rode it, my girls loved it, but I kept waiting for doll arms to reach up out of the water and kill me. Yeah. Thanks, dude.)

Second, since his sweet wife, Jen, adores the park, his family goes there a lot. On something like their third trip of the year, he once spent the day at Disneyland, writing, while his family played.

Talk about a writer's happiest place on Earth . . .

5) He feeds his friends.
Or maybe it's Jen who does it. Regardless, whenever he hosts critique group, there will be chips and salsa on the table. A good thing, too, because I often skip dinner as I race out the door. Therefore, most of the chips and salsa end up being eaten by me. Yeah, I know. Oink. (Oops. I think I just revealed more about me than I did about him.)

6) He gives the dreaded, "It's great . . . just two things," critiques.
Those two things are often something like, "I totally didn't buy the premise of the scene" or "The main character's motivation for doing any of this fell flat" or "It's just boring." Dang it all if he isn't right 95% of the time, but fixing his "two things" requires hours and hours.

(And he complains because I write all over his manuscripts. Sure I do, but adding commas and deleting adverbs doesn't take nearly as long as rewriting an entire scene . . .)


There you have it; six things I bet many people don't know about J. Scott Savage. But here's one more you may have figured out: He's a great friend who is willing to help out any way he can. That's something rare and valuable. I consider myself lucky to be one of the Ladies of Wednesday night.

Now for the (other) fun part: One of my blog readers will get an Advance Reader Copy of Farworld: Water!

To enter the drawing, simply make a comment on this post by midnight (MDT) on Sunday, July 6, 2008. I'll put all the names into a hat and have a small child draw the winner. I'll announce the winner here the next day, on Monday, July 7.

If the winner doesn't don't contact me with their mailing address within two days, we'll draw another name. Good luck!

Eagles Don't Make the Man

This has been an odd week for the family. Not only have we been working like mad on my daughter's new room, but she's been gone for all of it at summer camp. (We wanted to surprise her with the finished product. SO worth it! Pictures forthcoming.) She returned this afternoon and was thrilled.

For two and a half hours, the family was together again. We had a nice dinner, and then her brother left for a Scout hike and camp-out. It's like my family is fractured, and I have a feeling that the older (and more independent!) they get, the worse it's going to be.

But on to the point:

As I packed up my son's frame pack with the necessities, I was thrown back to the days when I went on Uintah hikes. I come from a family of campers. As in wilderness, roughing it, actual camping campers. None of this wimpy, drive-up-to-the-site-and-break-out-the-cooler stuff. Puh-leese.

My ward was the same. Every summer, the Young Women went on a week-long trip, leaving Monday morning for the High Uintahs, hiking every day to a new camp site, and coming home Saturday. Those were, quite literally, some of the most molding experiences of my adolescence. Some day I'll wax philosophical about the kinds of things I learned in the Uintahs, especially from our devoted leader, Brother T, but for now, I can't help but share a laugh.

Shortly after high school graduation, I went on a Uintah trip with some friends, along with an adult brother and father (neither mine) for supervision purposes. The group was mixed boys and girls, and I believe every male there was an Eagle Scout.

Hence, I assumed they knew what they were doing.

My first clue to the contrary was the fact that they were packing in at least half a dozen two-liter bottles of ice.

Two major problems with that.

First, do you have any idea how heavy ice is? There's a reason you're not supposed to try to carry more than twenty-five percent of your body weight. Duh.

Second, the Uintahs are covered with fresh springs. If you find a lake (and it's almost hard not to), you can find at least one, and likely several, springs running into it. Sure, you still boil the water to make it safe. You wouldn't drink it straight from the stream. But you sure as heck don't pack in your water when it's right there for the taking.

On the hiking portion, at every break, they'd take off their packs to rest. Okay, first off, that's a total waste of time (getting those things on and off is a bit of a pain). And provided you packed your trail mix in an outer pocket, you can either reach it yourself or have someone else get it for you without having to take off the whole pack.

But another (rather big) problem is that trying to put on a heavy pack while standing on a steep slope can throw your balance off and have you rolling down the mountain like an Oompa-Loompa. You just don't do it.

Then again, what do I know? I'm a girl. A non-scouter.

Then we reached the camp site. The Eagle Scouts got all dude-like and pushed us girls aside to let us observe their masculinity. They went in search of locations to set up the tents. I spotted several great spots, but none seemed satisfactory to them. In short order, they whipped out their camping shovels and began digging rocks out of the ground to make the site level.

In the Uintahs. Which is, by definition, a mountain with lots of angles. Where rocks practically grow on trees. You're trying to dig out all the rocks? Are you kidding me? Didn't you bring a foam pad to put your sleeping bag on? If you had, that would cushion the rocks, because I promise, you won't be getting any ground completely level out here without a bulldozer.

Meals were the biggest joke of all. They brought out heavy pans. (Again, um . . . is it any wonder big brother's hips and back were about to break? His pack must have weight ninety pounds!) They pulled out—and I only wish I were making this up—canned food. Why not pack gold bullion into your pack while you're at it? Might as well if you don't care about weight in a situation where every single ounce matters.

It was all I could do to keep myself upright and stop myself from crying out, "Anyone heard of Cup o' Soup? Ramen? Hot cocoa packets? Anything dehydrated? Freeze-dried? Lightweight?"

I almost looked around for the candid cameras hiding in the pine trees.

The trees had something else in store, though, because after dinner, the men decided we had to hoist all the packs into the pine trees, using ropes, to protect against the bears. I'm sure bears exist in the Uintahs, but I haven't seen any. And even if they do hang around camping areas, don't they, um, climb trees?

I shouldn't have been surprised when they pulled out canned peaches, actual eggs in their shells, and Spam for breakfast. Oh, golly. I had to bite my lips together into a tight line to keep myself from laughing hysterically.

All these years later (and we're approaching the two-decade mark), I still giggle when I think about that trip. They thought they were so darn cool, but in reality, they made the trip so much harder for themselves than they needed to. (I think there's a metaphor for life in that.)

To say I wasn't impressed with their Eagle Scout prowess would be an understatement.

So it was with great pleasure that I remembered my dad's classic know-how (Eagle, schmeagle; I have no idea if Dad earned his, although he probably did, but he knew what he was doing) on what to bring, how to pack it, and what not to put in the pack.

I even had my son stand on the home scale and weigh himself with and without the pack like we used to on the back porch to be sure it didn't weigh too much. We got it a few pounds under twenty-five percent. Perfect.

Scout leaders have the best of intentions, and I have no reason to believe that ours are the kind that lug Spam and ice into the mountains, but if my son's going to grow up to be a real camper—a real manly man—he'll benefit from Grandpa's tutelage.

So Dad, I can't wait until you're home again and we can take my two oldest on a real Uintah camping trip now that they're old enough for it. I'm counting down the days.

The Office

Not the show. MINE.

The back story: We moved into this house four years ago. (We moved to this CITY almost five years ago. That year in the stupid, cramped apartment is a nightmare best forgotten . . .)

When we picked out this floor plan, one of the main floor bedrooms was identified as my future office. Yippee!!! I couldn't wait! But I had to; see, we still had a little person in a crib. While the other kids were old enough to sleep in the basement (with a monitor so paranoid Mommy could hear them sleep), the littlest one used that future office as her bedroom until she was a big enough little girl to venture downstairs for the night.

So what would end up, someday, being my oldest daughter's bedroom has been my office for the last four years. It was odd recently thinking about all the work I've done in that "temporary" space: I wrote a good chunk of House on the Hill in it (although I began it in our previous house and did some work on it in that stupid, stupid apartment). I did all the edits and proofs of it in that office.

At the Journey's End and Spires of Stone were born there as well, aside from the jaunts I took with drafting on my Neo elsewhere. I remember one all-nighter I pulled with a Spires rewrite deadline down there. Oy. What a memory.

Drafting Tower of Strength (to be released in April, if you're keeping track). I remember times of writer's block and when the flow just came. I remember creating this blog. Researching and revising. Coordinating meeting with my critique group. E-mailing with the LDStorymakers. Getting good publishing news and bad publishing news. Of planning this spring's writing conference.

Man, so many memories.

And yet, in a lot of ways, I detested that office. It was relatively dark, being a basement room. And although it had a decent-sized window, the sun came through it at just the right angle to blind me, so I generally had the blinds drawn. I felt like I was in a freaking cave half the time.

I never decorated it (or really organized it, for that matter), because it was "temporary."

I never thought that would mean four years.

But the littlest one is downstairs now. All three girls are squeezed, sardine-style, into the same room during the renovation and switch. My (real!) office has been painted. It's got a gorgeous walnut floor and built-in bookshelves that hubby made himself. The trim is to die for (and I'm a teeny bit proud that I did the caulking myself . . . if you knew how much tools and I dislike one another, you'd be very, very impressed).

I've got a great rug (actually, a two: a rug and a runner). My desks are moved upstairs. My computer is hooked up. Moving my books and files took the better part of a week. (And dejunking the old office was a bit shocking . . . holy cow, HOW did I manage to collect so much GARBAGE?!) The most recent addition was Honey hanging up the door yesterday.

I still have to put up pictures and organize a couple of last things.

In the meantime, now that I've moved out of the basement, we're working on what will be my oldest daughter's new room. One wall needs another coat of paint, and then we have to touch-up the trim a bit, but then we're moving her in. It will be happy day in the Lyon house when that happens.

I'll be posting pictures soon, not only because finishing up these projects has totally usurped my summer so far and I want something to show for it, but because I'm so dang thrilled to have the office of my dreams. In a weird way, I feel more like a "real" writer now. Plus, it's also nice that I'm a bit for accessible to the kids and even to the front door.

(Before, even though I was ten feet from the door . . . but in the basement, if someone rang the doorbell, I'd have to dash across the basement, take the stairs two at a time, and I might still miss the person. Now I can meander slowly and get there in seconds!)

Hubby has been taking pictures of the entire process, so you'll get to see before, during, and after shots. (Can you tell I'm giddy?!)

I can't wait to experience the memories that this office will hold for me. What plots and characters will be born here? I can't wait to find out.

As Brillig would say, the place is frickin' brackin' awesome!

In It Together

Last night at critique group, some of the commentary about my WIP got me thinking about my characters. I noticed something about them that struck me as interesting.

(A caveat: All of them are real to me, so you'll have to pardon the fact that I'm going to talk about them like real people.)

These five women, as different as they are, have one big thing in common. It's not just the one big situation they're in together. It's something else, too.

And, sadly, it's something that a lot of us women share: we compare ourselves to one another.

In general, we come up short in the comparison. She's smarter, prettier, skinnier, is a better mom/wife/housekeeper, and so on.

Or maybe we're judging in the other direction, being harsher on the other person to make ourselves feel better, like the woman who told me once, when I had a toddler and a baby, that I had no idea what stress was like, because she had four kids, and I only had two.

When we compare, we're judging—another person and ourselves.

That can't be healthy. I know that it certainly isn't for the ladies in my book. They range in age from twenty to fifty-five. One is a newly wed. The other four have children. One is an empty-nester. One's a nurse. They are all now dealing with the same difficult situation, yet each responds to it differently. And they're all judging and comparing.

In addition to the one common burden, each woman has her own additional struggle to face, something she keeps back from the others, because of course they wouldn't understand, or they'd judge her, or they'd think it was silly, or they wouldn't be able to relate.

She thinks.

The the truth is, if they could all take off their social masks and get real, they'd discover that while their individual trials are different, that all of these women are very, very human. They're all under pressure. They're all imperfect. They're all barely keeping their heads above water.

What a comfort such a revelation would be to them.

Somehow I don't think my characters are alone in this. I think we all put up barriers, put on a face for the rest of the world, and then compare ourselves with everyone else's pretend faces.

So now I have to wonder . . . what would happen if we all dropped those social masks? What if we let one another know, really know our insecurities, fears, and weaknesses?

I imagine that at first it would be terrifying. But eventually, I think it would be liberating. I imagine we'd actually judge one another less because we'd have more compassion and understanding. I imagine we'd be able to find strength and support among other women because we'd rally around one another instead of worrying about what each other thinks. We'd stop pretending.

I hope the five women I'm writing about can learn to trust one another like that. They'll need one another's support to get through what they're facing. But they'll have to learn to let down those barriers first.

Maybe I can learn a thing or two along with them.

Dilemma

I am known for my intense opinions as well as my tendency to voice those opinions. Loudly. It's taken me a lifetime to learn when to keep my big mouth shut, when to speak up, and more importantly, how to speak up in a diplomatic way that doesn't end up with those involved hating my guts.

Actually, I'm still trying to learn that one. I'm still caught far too often with my foot lodged securely in my mouth.

Which is why I'm in a dilemma today.

There is an aspiring writer I know. This person has been taken under the wing of another writer in a mentor-like situation. All well and good. But some of the advice flowing from teacher to pupil is, in my never-quiet opinion, waaaaaaaay off track.

I can argue the reasons with intensity and prove my point. I drafted a short, polite (I think!) e-mail to the pupil letting them know my concern. But I haven't sent it. Probably won't.

See, it's none of my business.

It's not. It's not. It's not. I have to keep telling myself that. I've been watching this for months now, and not saying something is killing me.

But if I speak up, I'll make the teacher person look bad. I'd likely get both people mad at me, which would be . . . uncomfortable for several very big reasons. I'd end up in a nasty situation of my own making.

And yet . . . I know full well that I'm watching a train wreck in the making. If this person follows the instructions they've been given, they'll end up wasting months (if not years) of time and work in their efforts to be published.

The two facts are tearing me in two directions.

I can either put my nose into someone else's business because they're heading into a ditch (and open a giant can of squishy, angry worms I could never close again) or stay out of it (and keep the peace, but know full well that I had a chance to prevent someone from failure).

Yikes. What to do? I want to hit "send" on that e-mail. Real bad. But I think I'd better delete it.

It's none of my business. It's none of my business. It's none of my business . . .

Searching for the Right Cup

To the few male readers I have, a warning: You probably don't want to keep reading this one. The ladies, most likely, already know what I'm going to be talking about, and they likely agree with me.

Right, ladies? Right.

Okay, then.



About a year and a half ago, I went on a shopping mission. It wasn't a fun shopping trip (you know, that kind that's full of, "Oh, look. Cute shoes!"). It was the absolute worst kind of shopping. And no, I don't mean for swimsuits, because as miserable as that is, one suit will generally do the trick for years, so it's not something that bears repeating very often, and frankly, during the process, your middle section (the area with stretch marks and bread dough) is covered.

Bra shopping, however, must be done a bit more frequently. And it's a hideous, hideous experience. You'd think that all the sizes would actually mean something, that the shape and style wouldn't matter all that much.

You'd be wrong.

This time, I had put off the dreaded trip too many times, to the point that my current supports were flimsy and really . . . . well, not doing the job, shall we say. I finally gave in and dragged my toddler—and a feeling of impending doom—to the store.

I wandered the aisles, looking for sizes and shapes that I thought would work best. With about ten different bras in hand, I went to the dressing room, jaw clenched, eyes narrowed, much like facing a lion in its den.

The first bra one was a definite no-go. I tried the second. Same thing. Frustrated (but not surprised), I went for the third. Meanwhile my little girl was getting bored. She began belting the alphabet at the top of her lungs.

After getting her to shush (and nearly swearing because bra #4 didn't work either), I tried on yet another and another, and another. Each one had its problems, which I'll leave up to your imagination, because you women know what I'm talking about, don't you?

Thought so.

None of the ones in the stack came even close to doing the job. I got dressed, and we trucked back out to look for more.

I spent time investigating the displays, managed to gather another armload of potentials, and dove back into the dressing room. This time my daughter noticed feet on the other side of the divider and decided it would be neat to crawl underneath and say hello to the other women on either side of us.

With one arm in a strap and one out, I quickly grabbed her and pulled her back into the booth, trying to explain why there are times we aren't friendly and go out of our way to say hello to people.

In the end (after some two or three hours), I managed to find a bra that worked. I wanted to sing! In such cases, you buy multiples, because you never know when you'll find another one just like it. But there wasn't another of that style in my size. But since I also know that you can tweak sizes just a bit (increase the band size and the cup is a bit smaller, or vice versa), I got another one in the same style and a slightly different size. It would have to do.

Turns out that after wearing either of those bras for about an hour, the result is the "quad effect." I won't describe it further, but again, I'm sure the ladies know what I mean. It's been a frustrating experience. I don't know what I could have done to know this beforehand except for wearing them and staring at the mirror in the dressing room for an hour.

A couple of months after this bra-shopping expedition, I began taking a particularly nasty medication that didn't address the reason I was taking it and instead caused my brain to fall out of my head. Another side effect was making me nauseated all the time. As a result, I lost a bunch of weight. Remember this post?

At the time, I had lots of people wishing they could take the same pills and lose some weight. Yeah, right. And feel as if you're in your first trimester but you're not making a baby? And not even chocolate sounds good? And you're moody and can't think or focus, to the point that not only can you not write, but you're unable to add 6 + 4 without the aid of your fingers? (You think I'm kidding.) It was a miserable period.

So after about three months, my doctor and I decided it would be best to go off the medication. (Very good decision, by the way. Yes, the weight came back when I actually ate food again, but I'm a much happier person.)

But I had lost weight everywhere. So I bemoaned in the doctor's office, "I just bought new bras. I'm going to have to go buy some new ones."

Assuming he knew my concern, he said, "Oh, don't worry. When you go off the medication, you'll get your full size back."

Who cared if I lost a cup size or so? I just couldn't face racks and racks of brassieres and the accompanying trauma that comes with bringing them to the dressing room.

Save me now!

In the end, I just waited for the weight to come back so I wouldn't have to go on another 3-hour torture quest.

But the time has come again. I really need to face the dragon, as the "quad effect" is becoming a real problem.

This time, I'm leaving everyone home and facing the misery alone. To calm the trauma afterward, I'll be treating myself to some chocolate. It's the least I can do for myself.

I've Been Hagged

My local library has a lot of fun throwing parties for families. They do at least two every year, and they're quite the productions.

For years they had a Harry Potter party each summer around Harry's birthday. (Last year's in celebration of the final book was mucho cool. Totally blew me away.)

And there's the an annual princess ball, which they always connect to a neat theme (this year it was Chinese new year).

Kids often dress up for these things, and there's always a ton of fun activities connected with the theme. Families come in swarms. It's a big deal.

This year the fantasy party focused on a new series. Yesterday, the library turned into Fablehaven. The lengths to which they went for the celebration were stunning. Among the features of the night:

• A decorated archway marking the entrance to Fablehaven.


• A search for different fairies as well as Olluch and the Gatekeeper's keys


• Human Foosball (based on Kendra and the Sphinx playing the game)


• Chickens to feed (kids got to guess which one was Grandma)


• Nymphs shooting kids with water guns


• Hags handing out curses (Things like, "Every time someone says your name, yell out a pizza topping." Curses could only be broken by a fairy kiss . . . Hershey's kisses handed out by one of several cute high-school girls dressed up).


• Fairy crafts


• "Magic" milk provided by Meadow Gold (and their giant, inflatable cow as Viola)


• Seeds to plant your own fairy garden


• Fablehaven posters awarded to a handful of attendees


• A magical well with creatures inside (condensed sponges that turned into animals in water)


• and more

The big draw of the night was the author of the NY Times bestselling series, Brandon Mull, showing up to talk and then sign books for an insanely long line.

As in the past, I was once again roped into helping with a library party, and this time I got to be one of the hags running around, doling out curses. (As soon as some kids realized that chocolate lifted the curse, they kept coming back for more curses. I had to put a limit on how many times I'd curse the same kid.)

I struggled at first on what to wear, but finally put together something I thought worked okay. You can't see all the glory in this picture (the huge rusted earrings, the thick gray witch stockings, the torn and ragged shirt, the moles, the blackened teeth). But as I trotted out to my kids to get opinions, they all shrieked.

I guess it did the trick:

A lot of people showed up in costume (mostly preschooler girls as fairies), and my family came to enjoy the evening as well.

When Brandon himself arrived and mulled around, I thought I should go say hello, because while we're not exactly close friends, we had met before when we sat at the same table at the Whitney Awards dinner in March. And I don't know about him, but fellow writers are always a happy sight for me.

But I don't think he recognized me. I mentioned my name. Nothing. That we were at the same Whitney table (WHEN YOU WON. REMEMBER THAT NIGHT?!). Nothing seemed to turn on a light bulb. I think he was stuck staring at the black teeth and icky eyebrows. He just smiled and nodded.

It was all I could do to not tell him that while I think Fablehaven is a really great series, that no, I'm not a weird fanatic woman who dressed up like a hag just for his party like most of the six-year-old fairies running around had. I was there working as a vol-un-teer.

And I'm a fellow writer. We have a ton of mutual friends. Oh, and I was a Whitney finalist too. That night, I presented one of the awards. Ring a bell? Rob Wells mentioned during the ceremony that I came up with the name of the award?

Hmm. How about: I was the only one at your table who didn't take home a trophy?

Never mind. Next time I'll be sure to talk to a fellow writer (NY Times bestseller or otherwise) when I'm, oh, not sporting two gigantic moles on my face.

But hey, I got my daughter's book signed. Before the actual book signing. So there. :D

It's Brillig the Frog!

By some twist of fate, I ended up guest-blogging on TWO blogs on the very same day.

Today come visit me at Twas Brillig

and

at Six LDS Writers and a Frog!

My Funky Reading Habits

I’ve gotten better about not always finishing books that I start, which is a very good thing. Feeling compelled to finish a book I don’t like has been a bit of a curse for me—a curse I’ve had hanging over my head since high school.

Case in point: One year in English we were running out of time to read a novel before the end of term. Miss Drummond (whom I idolize; it’s because of her I’m a grammar fascista) summarized something like ten chapters and then told us to skip ahead.

I COULDN’T DO IT. I had to read the whole thing, which necessitated a few long nights of extra homework so I wouldn’t fall behind the rest of the—sane—class.

I know. I’m a sad, sad person.

Part of my obsession with finishing books is getting personal "credit" for them, because for many, many years, I’ve kept a running tally of the books I read. If I don’t finish a book, I can’t very well put it on my list of books I’ve "read" for the year, now can I?

Well, for 2008, I decided to make a sub-list: "Partially-read Titles." I cannot tell you how liberating that list has been. So far I’ve added half a dozen books to it in just the first five months of 2008. That is UNHEARD of for me.

Yippee! What freedom!

My other reading habits are still a bit odd, and I’m the first to admit it. The other day my husband noticed me swapping between various books and teased me about leaving four—yes, FOUR—books on the couch, all with bookmarks in them.

"Exactly how many books are you reading right now?" he asked.

"Oh, not that many," I assured him, with a dismissive wave of my hand. And then I began counting.

I always have at least one book in my purse or in the car. Ya never know when you’ll have time to read in a waiting room, lobby, or whatever. A car book is a MUST. That’s one.

There’s the one I’m reading to the kids at bedtime. That’s two.

The novel hubby and I read together before bed. That’s three.

The book I read a page or two of each night as I brush my teeth. That’s four.

And the classic I’m slowly working my way through (it’s not one you can sit down and absorb hundreds of pages of in a sitting, but I do love it). Five.

The library book I need to get through because it’s due in a couple of days. Six.

And don’t forget the one that #2 and I started awhile back and haven’t gotten around to finishing. Seven.

And the audio book I’m listening to via iPod. Eight.

The non-fiction book I pick up when I have a few spare minutes. Nine.

Not to mention two writing books I’ve cracked open a bit here and there but haven’t really committed to reading. I don’t think I should count those, though. Not until I have actual bookmarks in them.

I did have two books I was going through for research, but that project is on a backburner, so I'm not finishing them right now.

(No, I don’t have a book in the bathroom. At least, not right now. I have read plenty of books that way in the past, though. For now, that’s where I do my magazine reading. Of course.)

I have a stack of other books waiting for me on my dresser. I have two big cardboard boxes stuffed with books that I’m "storing" for my parents while they’re away. (In reality, Mom let me raid her bookshelves before she packed them up prior to their latest mission. She’s got some of the coolest books ever.) Then there’s the huge list of books I plan to read that grows faster than I take away from it.

Hubby asked if keeping all the stories and writing styles straight isn’t a bit difficult. I hadn’t really thought about it, but I suppose it is a bit odd to flip between Victorian literature, Fantasy, Non-fiction, LDS literature—and a couple of other genres—in the course twenty-four hours.

Or maybe I just have a short attention span.

Hey, look! What’s that over there?

This Is NOT a Review

I'm in the middle of an LDS novel that I think is really, really good.

I recently finished another one that I enjoyed a lot.

My daughter recently read a YA book by an LDS writer and is dying for me to read it too. I will soon.

And my husband and I have plans to read aloud a book by yet another LDS writer, whose books we've enjoyed in the past.

All four of these books are by talented people, and I wouldn't be at all surprised if all of them ended up as Whitney finalists for 2008.

But I'm not telling you the names of the books or who wrote them. There's a reason for that.

Now, as many people know, I'm hyper-opinionated. I won't just tell you if I liked or disliked something. Instead, I'm liable to go on a rant about the virtues (or lack thereof) of a particular work. I get passionate about these things. I debate. I foam at the mouth.

That kind of thing.

But this year . . . you won't be hearing any of it from me. At all. Or, at least about fiction written by Latter-day Saints. (Movies and fiction by other writers are all fair game. I may have to get loud and ranty about those just to compensate.)

See, I was thinking about posting review about the one I'm reading as soon as I finish it, but then I remembered: I can't.

The reason is that I have the privilege of serving on the Whitney Awards committee for 2008. I get to read a ton of novels by LDS writers this year and judge in two categories as well as help select the novels that will be up for Best Novel and Best Novel by a New Author.

That's the terrific part about being on the committee. (For those wondering, I'm willing and able to be part of the committee because my next novel, Tower of Strength, won't be released until 2009.)

Keeping my opinions to myself might just be torturous for someone with as big a mouth as I have. On the other hand, I will get to voice them with the other committee members. That's some consolation. (Poor souls have no idea what they're in for.)

I encourage readers to nominate books they think are deserving of a Whitney and to tell others to do the same. Broadcast the news far and wide! The program is there to recognize quality fiction produced by LDS writers and to help the entire cannon improve and grow. The only way to do that is to get the best books nominated, and that takes the readers.

Visit the Whitney site at the link above to submit a book for consideration. Don't assume your favorite is a shoo-in. You never know.

In the meantime, I'll be tying my tongue into a knot.

David vs. David

I don't think I've ever, ever, blogged about American Idol, even though my hubby and I have watched it religiously from the very first year. (Thank you, TiVo. That's how we do it: back when we had toddlers and babies under foot, we'd get them to bed and then have some time alone with Simon and company.)

However, I'm writing about it today because the final performance night yesterday got me riled up. That and I won't be able to watch the results live tonight, so I'm giving fair warning: if anyone spills the beans, I'll hunt them down. Don't tell me.

But I think I already know who will win. If pure talent were to take it, it would be David Cook. (Two of my girls spent a good hour last night voting for him repeatedly.) But I'm betting it'll be the other David instead, because Cook's got a couple of big things going against him:

1) He lacks the "he's so cute!" preteen girl vote,
2) he didn't play to his strengths last night, and
3) cutie-pie Archuleta did.

Sure, during the rest of the competition, shake things up, take risks. But on the FINALE? Play to your strengths, man! Cook's a rocker. He's got an awesome edge. Did he show any of that last night? No.

While I really enjoyed all three of Cook's performances (I was jammin' out to his rendition of a U2 classic), Archuleta hit the stage to win it. He saw the night for what it was: not just another week of the show, but his last and final chance to show off his strengths and get the votes.

Every one of Cook's songs would have done him well on any other week of the competition. The guy's dang talented and never once ended up in the bottom three, but on finale night, that's not enough; you have to be unbeatable. THE BEST. And he could have been the best last night. He HAS been the best before. But not last night.

Ah, well. I was hoping a rocker would win it finally. (Both Bo Bice and Chris Daughtry really deserved to go farther than they did.) Even when (Okay, okay, IF. We don't know yet) Archuleta takes the title, Cook will have a fantastic career ahead of him. I just wish he could also lay claim to the win, because over the last several months, he's proven that he's the greater talent.

He just didn't show that last night, more's the pity.

That said, Go Archuleta! He's a great kid, and I'm glad his childhood dream is coming true. I'd be far more upset if someone else from the show were in his shoes, someone whom I didn't think deserved it.

I must say that dang, time flies. The idea that little Davy grew up watching American Idol is a bit freaky.

I'm not old . . . I'm not old . . . I'm not old . . .

UPDATE: In a twist of fate, I ended up staying home and watching the finale with the entire family (except for #4, who opted to stay downstairs with The Little Mermaid and a bowl of popcorn to herself).

YIPPEEEE!!!! Cook WON!

Even though we were watching it live, we didn't know who won the moment it was announced. See, the finale always runs overtime, and our TiVo was set to record from 7 pm to 9 pm. We knew it'd go over, so when the warning dinged that it was going to change channels to record something else at 9:00, we just told it to cancel the recording and stay on Fox.

But here's the thing: The TiVo technically stopped recording at 9:00 and then continued recording on the same channel, so right as Ryan said, "The winner of American Idol 2008 is David . . . " we got a 3-second blip of blackness and silence. The whole family screamed and jumped and gasped. We had to watch the crowd's reaction, trying to figure out who won. (The timing, people! Sheesh! NO other 3-second moment could have been worse.)

Since both Davids handled it with such grace, you couldn't even tell the winner from their faces at first.

Anyway, I was . . . AM (obviously) thrilled. Go Cook!

High Praise

This is yet another post about my literary hero, L M Montgomery. (I should start a new label for these . . . hmm. I'll label this post that way. At some point I'll go back and label the old ones!)

As I've mentioned before, I'm reading the fifth and final volume of her journals. I'm going through the book very slowly, just a couple of pages a day, usually right before bed. It's fascinating and educational all at once. And sad.

She spent her last years very depressed. Where I'm at right now, she's visiting her beloved Prince Edward Island for probably the last time and mourning the fact that all her childhood haunts were going to be soon desecrated by being turned into a national park. (I'm not sure I'd have the heart to visit those spots now . . . it would almost be a slap in her face to be one more of the hordes of tourists she dreaded.)

At this point she was also rereading a lot of her old work and commenting on some of it. Some of it felt as if she were reading someone else's work, since it had been so long since she'd written it, decades in some cases. She mentioned a couple of short stories that made her wistful--she thought they were some of the best work she'd ever done, but didn't think she could write like that anymore. She'd "lost" something. I don't think she meant in skill, but in perspective and outlook on the world and life.

One thing I thought fascinating is that she determined that she thought Rilla of Ingleside was her best novel, and thought that her weakest book was Windy Poplars. I've thought the exact same thing ever since I read them the first time. Rilla is her best. Poplars . . . meh. It's entertaining, but it's not stellar. Taking the #2 slot would have to be The Blue Castle, followed by the Emily trilogy.

At this point in her life, she was writing Jane of Lantern Hill and had yet to publish Anne of Ingleside, which were her last two books. I enjoyed both of those much more than Poplars. Eventually I might post about some of the ways certain events in her life impacted the storylines of those last two books, particularly one thread in Ingleside.

So here I am reading my icon's journals and planning to pick up another one of her books soon, which I do every year, and I receive an e-mail just last night.

It's the kind of thing I would have only dreamed of back in the eighth grade when I had my nose tucked inside an L M Montgomery book at all times and had delusions of grandeur of becoming like her.

The e-mail was from my dear friend (and hugely talented member of my critique group), Lu Ann, who teaches junior high English and has for some three decades. She was also named as Utah's Best of State K-12 educator of 2008.

Her 9th grade honors English students recently took a test in her class. One question asked them to use a book they had read for their lit. circle (I imagine that's like an in-class book group where they discuss books) and compare it to another book they'd read during the school year.

For her lit. circle book, one student chose Anne of Green Gables. (My kind of girl, obviously.)

The book she compared Anne to?

House on the Hill.

If you're looking for me, I'll be on Cloud 9.

"She did a pretty good job of it, too," according to Lu Ann. And now I'm part of her test!

To repeat: I have been compared to L M Montgomery.

I might be able to die happy now.

Googling Together

Why is the sky blue?

How can a whole tree come from a seed?

Where does rain come from?

Those are normal questions young children ask. They are also questions I can readily answer. Apparently, I don't have normal children—which, to be honest, is rather fun. I never know what my youngest will come up with.

She's asked me all kinds of odd things that I never would have thought to wonder about myself, like the etymology of various words (okay, so she didn't use "etymology," but that was the gist). I often don't know why we call something what we do, but it's great to say, "Let's find out when we get home," and then to boot up my trusty OED on CD and read about it.

She's wondered why the Earth is round when it's flat when you look at it. She's tried to figure out why water stays on the ground instead of flying off into space. (I'm not sure why she doesn't ask the same question about people. Apparently water is different?) I managed to field that one with a basic lesson on gravity.

Just the other day, she came up with her latest original query:

What do snails eat?

That one stumped me at first. What DO snails eat? Do they even have mouths? If folklore is to believed, salt will kill snails. And of course the French eat them. But I'd never given a moment's thought to what snails dine on.

I told her we'd go online soon and find out together, so yesterday she climbed on my lap by my computer, and we Googled her question.

Turns out that my guess was pretty close: they eat live and decaying plants. But they also eat other, more obscure things, like algae.

I almost closed the window, when she touched my mouse hand to stop me.

"Where do snails live?"

The site we were on answered that question, too. She insisted we read the entire web page, which told how long snails live, how big they grow, who are their predators, how they protect themselves, and all kinds of other fun things. (I didn't read her the part about how snails are hermaphrodites. That's a can of worms that would take a lot of explanation.)

At the bottom was a diagram of a snail's insides. We had to look at that, too. The mouth. The eyes (which are on the ends of their tentacles), the foot, the radula, and so on.

Then she posed her next question, asked with all the seriousness her little face could muster:

Where do snails go poop and pee?

If she were a boy, she'd have asked the question and giggled hysterically. And then maybe farted or burped for good measure. But no. She was genuinely curious. She wanted to know.

I had to study the diagram a bit closer. "Ah. There. Right there," I told her, pointing at "anus."

She tracked the process. "So here's the mouth. The food goes to the stomach, and then it comes out there. Right by the place the slime comes out." She was quite pleased with herself. A moment later she hopped off my lap, satisfied.

I love how curious she is about the world. It makes me wonder what her next question will be about. And then I start asking questions about new and exciting things that pique my curiosity. I look them up for myself. For all I know, I'll use some of my Googled questions in my writing some day.

A preschooler is a wonderful thing.

Snails? Not so much.

Chatting with Tristi

I first met Tristi Pinkston four or five years ago after I joined the LDStorymakers e-mail group. Since then, she's become a great friend and has been there to help me out more than once. But I love Tristi for another reason too, and that's because we both write historical fiction.

Her book Nothing to Regret is likely the most original perspective I've ever read about World War II, and I love the fact that she's got a new book out, Season of Sacrifice. Like her other books, it's a novel, but this time the story is based closely on her ancestors who were a big part of the Hole in the Rock expedition.

Several other bloggers have reviewed Season of Sacrifice already. I recommend you read some of those posts. This one is very much worth your time. So is this one. But this one is my favorite post I've found on it so far.

Today I get to host Tristi on her blog tour, so instead of posting another review of the book (okay, here's my review: It's great. BUY it!), I thought it would be fun to pick her brain a bit in an interview, one historical novelist to another.

Her answers are downright delightful. (My favorite: "I'm essentially one big walking quirk.") Read on to get to know Tristi and her book:


I know you did a lot of research for Season of Sacrifice by reading your ancestors' journals. What other research did you do?
My main sources were Incredible Journey by Lee Reay, At All Hazards by Brenton Yorgason, and Hole in the Rock by David E. Miller. At All Hazards is historical fiction (I'm sorry to say, Yorgason got a few things wrong), and the other two are nonfiction. Each of these books was tremendously helpful and they're listed in the back of my book as recommended reading.

Was it a challenge putting words into their mouths—and then hoping it's what they would have said?
It was a little challenging, but not as much as one might think. I already knew how they felt about things from reading their journals, so I just used their same vernacular and put their feelings into dialogue. Additionally, I truly feel their spirits were near to me as I wrote. I sensed, many times, the direction I should go.

Name at least one thing found during your research that you would have loved to include in the book but didn't for one reason or another.
Well, I don't know if I would have loved to include it, but Sarah's boyfriend from Wales actually followed her over here. He was in New York, working to earn passage to come out to Utah for her, when she wrote him and told him she no longer had feelings for him. I decided to leave that out—it seemed kind of mean. Not that she should have married him just because he came for her, but I didn't want the reader to feel that she'd led him on in any way, because she didn't. She had no idea how her life would change as she came to know the Gospel.

Without any spoilers, what is your favorite scene from the book?
All of my favorite scenes revolve around the intense faith these pioneers showed. I love the scene where Ben takes the wagon down the Hole for the first time to test it out. I also love the scenes toward the end as the tensions reach fevered pitch about polygamy. I really feel those passages contain some of my best writing ever, besides being testimonies of the incredible obedience of these faithful Saints.

Which character do you personally relate to most?
Sarah. I don't necessarily relate to her in a way where I feel we have a lot in common, but rather, I feel a connection to her. She's my great-great-grandmother, and we share the same blood.

What was the hardest scene to write?
There were two scenes that were very difficult for me to write. The first was the retelling of Stanford Smith's descent down the Hole. His wife, Arabella, tied herself to the wagon to try to keep it from going down too fast, and she incurred a serious injury, which she later recovered from. What made this story so touching was the faith of their children, who were left at the top while their parents took the wagon down. The oldest child told her parents that she had just waited there with God until they came back. My heart was wrenched out of me as I wrote that scene.

The other difficult passage was the one where Sarah decides to marry Ben. I've never been a fan of polygamy, and so for me to authentically write her change of heart was immensely difficult. I pretty much came to a standstill as I figured it out. What I finally realized was not that Sarah was converted to polygamy, but that she was converted to the Lord and wanted to be obedient at all costs. Once I made that clarification in my own mind, I was able to move forward.

Since the basic plot line was predetermined by actual events, how did you go about writing the book? (What was your basic method of attack? Did you outline the whole thing, write the new sections first or last, etc.?)
In so many ways, this book wrote itself. I read the family history documents I have, I read the books I mentioned above, and I took scads of notes. Then I sat down and just started to write. I began at the beginning and wrote through to the end, only going back to add depth and detail. This is completely out of the norm for me—usually it takes me months to come up with the finished product.

What is your typical writing schedule?
Typically, I answer my e-mails and check my favorite blogs first thing in the morning. I can't function if I don't do that; it's a weird mental hang-up I have. Throughout the day, I'll sneak to the computer as I'm able and maybe edit a little, answer e-mails, and the like. Then at night, I sit down around nine or ten and get to work. I check my mail again and then I write my blogs for Families.com (I'm a media reviewer, movie reviewer, and I also blog on topics of interest to the LDS people).

After that's done, then I pull up my work in progress. I'll stay up until two or three in the morning, writing. Sometimes if there's a scene that's just dying to be written, I'll manage to squeeze it in during the day, but my children are still young and I homeschool, so I don't have large chunks of time during the day.

Do you have any writer's "quirks" that help you get into the flow?
I'm essentially one big walking quirk. But to be more specific, I can't have music playing. It distracts me. I also have to check my mail. If I think someone may have written to me, and they're waiting for an answer, I can't work. I like to have a glass of ice water next to me (I'm an ice eater) and I also have some Vicks Vaporub sitting here (keeps my brain awake) and some lip balm (yes, my own brand) I also find that taking long showers or baths really helps get me in the creative mood—I'll often come out of the bathroom with whole scenes ready to go.

What has been the biggest surprise for you about the publishing industry?
The biggest negative surprise is that huge lines of people don't queue up to see you when you have a book signing. I used to envision doing a signing at the mall and having the whole hallway congested because there were so many people eager to meet me. Yes, I also did have the fond idea of all the guys who flirted with me, but never asked me out, coming to the mall, seeing me, and feeling so sorry that they never confessed their love to me. None of that ever happened.

The biggest positive surprise has been all the friends I've made. I truly feel so blessed for the interaction I have with other writers, with aspiring authors, and with those in the publishing industry. My life is rich because of the friends I now have—good, true friends I can turn to for anything. Of which you are one, Annette!

Aw, thanks, lady! :) Right back at ya. If you could give your younger writer self any advice, what would it be?
You know what, I would tell myself to get an ergonomic keyboard years before I did. The only problem with that is, they weren't invented back when I started typing. I would love to have saved myself all the pain I went through as a girl and young teenager. Rampant carpal tunnel, folks. I'm now using an ergo keyboard and take flax seed and vitamin B complex every day, and I feel great.

Any other advice . . . I'd tell myself to be a little less cocky. I went through a period of time where I thought I could do no wrong. Guess what—I can. And often. I know that now.

What's up next?
There's a lot still up in the air for me right now. I've got some contemporary mysteries that are just for fun—two completed and one in the "thinking about it" stage. I have a Vietnam-era novel I'm really proud of, as well as another family history-inspired novel set during the Depression. As far as what to write next, I've got about twenty books outlined and it's all a matter of time.

Me again. To purchase Season of Sacrifice, click here. Seriously. Click there. Now.

A Tale of Two Wrists

About four weeks ago, #2 was climbing around some stuff in the basement (a no-no) and fell about four feet onto her arm. She came to me crying and holding her wrist. We iced it and gave her some Tylenol for bedtime.

After school the next day, she was in more pain, and the wrist was swollen. Okay, then, off to the doctor's office. We took her to an urgent care facility, where a nurse practitioner, a doctor, and a radiologist all took one look at her arm and declared that it looked and "acted" broken. To their surprise, they couldn't see a fracture on the x-ray. They made up a custom, fiberglass splint for her and said to come back in a week to get another x-ray.

Not 48 hours later, #3 was out roller-blading, took a turn too sharp, and landed, yep, on her wrist. A neighbor helped her back into the house, and she arrived, howling with pain. We decided not to wait 24 hours like we had with her sister, so off again I trotted to Urgent Care.

The exact same nurse practitioner was working. Since my girls have bright red hair, they're easily remembered. She looked at us and cocked her head. "Weren't you just here a couple of days ago?"

I grinned sheepishly. "Uh, yeah," I said and was tempted to add, "But I really am a fit parent."

Up to that point, we had never had so much as stitches with any of our four kids, and suddenly in a couple of days we had two wrist injuries?

We got #3 x-rayed, and this time the fracture was clear. Even my untrained eye could see it on the film. The good news was that it was a "green stick" fracture, which apparently is the best kind to get because they heal fast. (News to me.)

She was told to return in a few days to be casted when the swelling had gone down. We had to return anyway in a few days for #2 to be checked again, so I made an appointment for both girls on the same day. #3 would be casted, and #2 would be x-rayed again (and possibly casted).

Once again, the x-ray was inconclusive for #2. She got a removable Velcro-like splint to wear for another week or so (a radiologist was going to compare the two sets and give an opinion), and her sister came home with a bright blue cast.

Eventually we got word that #2 didn't have a fracture, although a clear diagnosis wasn't ever given beyond, "Hmm. Maybe she sprained it." The pain has finally gone away for her, though.

And today #3 gets her cast off. Then she'll have to go back to practicing piano. Poor thing.

Below is a picture of their arms. At first glance, it almost looks like it's one person with two injured arms, because #2 hurt her left arm, while #3 hurt her right.



They say things come in threes. So far, we've had two, and it appears we got through the craziness without a third shoe dropping.

KNOCK ON WOOD.

My First Kill

I think I was fourteen at the time. I’d gone with my mother to the BYU bookstore, where she agreed to buy me a binder for my writing. It was a rosy pink with “Brigham Young University” in silver on the spine. The binder still sits on a shelf in my office.

Once home, I eagerly filled it with notebook paper, then plopped onto the living room couch and began scribbling.

I had no concrete story idea; I was just in the mood to write. I began with an image and went with it: a little girl walking through a meadow where her imaginary friends lived. I’m sure the idea was a direct result of the fact that at the time, I constantly poured over the work of L. M. Montgomery.

In the brief story, the girl greets the fairies and other mythical creatures and bemoans how she has no other friends. The other children mock and tease her. She feels welcome only there with her magical companions. As I wrote, I discovered that the girl also has a serious illness and rarely gets to go out to her meadow.

She lies on the ground, hidden from sight by the flowers above and around her. Then she closes her eyes and whispers, “My dears, I’ve come to join you.”

And dies.

A perfectly melodramatic story for a teen to write. But overdone as the two-page ditty was, the ending hit me with a bolt of lightning. I closed the binder and stared at it, feeling not a little shaky.

A little girl was dead, and I had killed her.

It didn’t matter that she was fictional, that she hadn’t ever really inhabited this world, experienced life, or had a family to mourn her passing (I worried about her poor mother—would she be able find her daughter under all those flowers?). In those few minutes I’d lived with her on the page, she had been real to me.

The sensation was odd—a creative rush combined with the sensation of intense guilt almost nauseating in its strength. The little dead girl seemed to haunt me for days afterward. I’m sorry, I wanted to say. I didn’t mean to kill you. I didn’t know you’d die. It took a week or two to get over the guilt.

Then I had my first dip into research. I had to figure out what she’d died from, so I cracked open one of my mother’s many reference books and read up on various fatal illnesses that could strike children. For reasons I don’t recall, I settled on aplastic anemia, a disease I knew nothing about save for a brief description written in tiny text. The fact that a child minutes away from death wouldn’t be in a position to frolic in a meadow was pretty much irrelevant to me.

Since then, I’ve killed many fictional people, but I’ve reached the point where I no longer take responsibility for their deaths. I grieve when they die; they’re my friends, in a way. But it’s not my fault. Sometimes characters, just like people, die.

About a year ago, after reading At the Journey’s End, a man in my neighborhood came to me and said, “What is your problem with death?”

Confused, I asked, “What do you mean?”

“By the end of the first chapter, three people are dead.”

At first I was taken aback. THREE? No way. I thought back. One person dies in the prologue. One in the first chapter. Oh, wait. Two. Yep. That makes three. But both deaths in chapter one were real historical figures. I didn’t kill them. They really died on that day in history; I just told about it.

As if that made it so much better.

So I thought back to my other books. Lost without You has a mother already dead before the book begins, which is pretty much what the plot revolves around. Plus a little girl’s kitten dies. Oh, and a man dies in the girl's presence. Almost forgot that one. At the Water’s Edge has two deaths. And House on the Hill? Several pretty major deaths, plus a dog.

Wow, I thought. I do have some kind of fascination with killing people off.

The best response I could come up with for my neighbor was, “Rest assured, no one dies in my next book.” I paused to double-check, thinking through Spires of Stone just to be sure—did anyone—or anything—die in it? Even a cat or dog? A mouse? Nope. No one dies. Phew.

However . . . I can’t say the same for my upcoming Tower of Strength. Sorry. It does have two deaths, plus one more in the back story that we don’t see. My obsession with the end of life is apparently quite healthy.

But I’m innocent! I swear, I didn’t kill anyone in that book. It’s not my fault, and I won’t feel guilty over it.

Okay, so I still cried writing about them.

Goodness, we writers are certainly an odd lot . . .

Coming Spring 2009 . . .

It's official!

My next book, titled Tower of Strength, has been accepted for publication and will be released next spring.

My fourth temple-related book, it's set in 1884 Manti, a few years before the temple there was complete. Much of the story centers around events (both real and fictional) that took place in and around the city's Temple Hill.

I love the title they picked; Tower of Strength can refer to both the temple (the towers are under construction during the story) as well as the heroine. Tabitha really is a tower of strength, and that plays a huge role in the story.

This book has been an interesting ride. I loved uncovering the story and characters. I struggled with some of the research. I laughed. I cried.

And in the end, I'm excited for my readers to meet Tabitha Chadwick and get to know her for the strong woman she is . . . even if they have to wait almost a year before meeting her!

Orcs Don't Go Bump in the Night

When he was about eight, my son went to see The Two Towers with his dad. Some people thought we were completely nuts to let a child so young see it. He'd surely get nightmares, they said. It was way too intense for a third grader. But we knew our son.

Some time before, we'd gotten The Fellowship of the Ring on DVD. As I left for a commitment that night, my husband started watching it. I was a bit concerned about the scariness level for the kids, but he promised that he'd turn it off if our son showed any signs of anxiety. The girls weren't interested anyway, so they wouldn't be watching.

When I returned that night, I discovered that not only had my little guy not been terrified by the Orcs (creatures that quite frankly freaked me out in the theater), but that he had watched the movie on his feet, jumping off the couch and pretending to slash Orcs right along with Aragon. I should have known; ever since he could hold anything relatively narrow and long, he'd been pretending to sword fight. The drive must be on the Y chromosome or something.

(Toy store store employees were horrified when we tried buying him a toy sword. What kind of psycho parents were we?! I'm sorry, but a hollow, plastic light saber doesn't do as much damage as a metal butter knife.)

He loved the movie. What about nightmares? None. At all.

A few weeks later, our 3-year-old daughter got a Disney Nintendo game starring Mickey Mouse. The game, intended for preschoolers, had cheery music a cute graphics. Typical Disney. The player was to go through the magical world and gather up the pieces of a broken mirror and put it back together again, because a ghost had broken it. That's about as much as I remember about it. All of the kids played the game, including our son as he helped his younger sisters figure it out.

Within days, he began having regular nightmares . . . about the Disney ghost in his closet.

Somehow the animated ghost terrified him and seemed real, whereas the bloodied Orcs remained firmly in his fantasy imagination. Go figure.

He wasn't allowed to play the Mickey Mouse game anymore, but he was allowed to see The Two Towers. Again, no nightmares.

The only person who got a start was my husband, who, on the way home from the theater, heard our son whisper from the backseat in a perfect imitation: "My precious . . ." who then laughed his head off when Dad jumped.

Attack on the Grammar Fascista

My family is out to get me.

It began a few weeks ago when #2 left the piano bench during her practice time and sought me out in the kitchen.

“This song is so easy,” she said. “Can I play it less times?”

Twitch.

Before I could answer, I had to clear my throat and get my face under control. Then I launched into a speech about count nouns versus non-count nouns and therefore the proper usage of less and fewer.

“It drives me crazy,” I told her. “Commercials mess them up all the time. It’s not less calories. You can count calories, so it’s fewer calories. It’s not like time or flour, which you refer to in general quantities—less time, less flour. So it should be fewer calories. Fewer, people! Fewer!”

#2 just looked at me. “So . . . can I play it less times, then?”

Twitch.

(For any other grammar fascistas out there, I don’t hold to the antiquated school of thought that one must use “may” in requests such as these instead of "can." I’m not a savage.)

The song really was easy. Normally the kids are required to run through all songs five times each, but I decided to be flexible. “Fine,” I said. “You can play it three times today . . . if you ask me again using fewer. Say, 'fewer times.'”

She grinned. “Awesome, Mom. Thanks! Can I play it fewer times?”

“Yes,” I said, glad to have bestowed such a great grammar lesson upon my offspring.

As I turned away, she shot out, “Less times!” Giggling hysterically, she bolted into the living room.

“FEWER times!” I yelled after her.

“LESS times,” she called back, still laughing.

That exchange has since snowballed into the family finding glee at torturing me. They’ve always known that Mom’s a bit of a nut when it comes to grammar and usage, but they’ve never used it against me.

I don’t even know how the conversation got started the other night at dinner. All I know is that suddenly everyone was thinking up horrid grammar mistakes and hurling them across the table just to see the vein in my forehead pulse.

My husband even got into the game. Knowing one of my all-time pet peeves, he found ways to inject imply and infer into every conversation for the next few hours. He purposely (and rather brilliantly, I might add) used them wrong every single time.

That night, by the time I had on my pajamas, I was on the verge of calling for a strait jacket.

“Stop, stop!” I wanted to cry out. “Oh, the humanity!”

But after a good night’s sleep, something wonderful dawned on me. If my family knows enough to use incorrect grammar just to tease me . . . they also know the correct grammar because I’ve taught it to them.

Bwaahahahahaaaaaa!

I win.


Note: Thanks to Luisa, the Ultimate Grammar Fascista (one of the highest forms of praise I am capable of), for the use of her banner.

2, 3, Cha-Cha-Cha

My partner on the university summer ballroom team almost didn’t ask me out.

We’d spent every morning for a good chunk of the summer dancing together. I’d gone out once with another guy on the team—a boy that, while nice enough, didn’t exactly impress when he went on about how desperate he was to get married.

Over the course of the summer, my partner and I became great friends, and yeah, we flirted a bit. But I kept talking about how I was going to serve a mission, and he took me seriously on that.

I don’t remember the first time I saw him, but I do remember the first impression I had of him. It was early in the summer before we had assigned partners and instead the guys rotated between the girls every few minutes. He was my last partner of the day, and I remember thinking, Wow, this guy can really lead, and we work well together. We both finagled things so we’d end up assigned together, and we had a ball all summer long.

During that time, the film Strictly Ballroom came to theaters. I thought it would be a great excuse to hang out—ballroom is what we did, right? It wouldn’t necessarily be a date . . . I was going on a mission, remember. And I insisted that I didn’t like him like him, although when my friends asked about him, I had a hard time sticking to the story . . . . and not blushing.

He and I made plans to see Strictly Ballroom, but then it left the theater before we had the chance. Here was this guy who wasn’t afraid of a smart girl with a scholarship (big points in my book), who could quote Shakespeare for crying out loud, and who had the warmest chocolate-brown eyes ever, and my one excuse for seeing him off the dance floor had fallen through.

Dang. Now what?

Fortunately, he decided that we should still see a movie, so we went to Sleepless in Seattle. Best first date ever. No awkwardness at all. We already had inside jokes and plenty to talk about. It did take him awhile to stop looking for me four inches taller than I really was, because he was used to my silver Latin-heels-enhanced height. That first date turned into many more.

He proposed on my birthday, and the following spring, we were married. It’s been fourteen years now, and each has been better than the last. Today we work together better than we did in our fancy dancing shoes and costumes.

Happy anniversary to my life-long dance partner.

I love you more!

Seeking My Plot

Most successful writers I know have no dearth of story ideas. The majority tend to have so many ideas that they often have to sort through them to decide which book to write first.

There was a time when that described me, too. I had plot ideas swimming in my head all the time, and I have several unpublished manuscripts to attest to that. I worked on them before and shortly after the time that I wrote House on the Hill.

For years I had felt compelled to write something about the Logan temple. I'd had a love of Cache Valley and the temple there for a long time and knew that there was a story I had to write about it. At the time, I had no plans for sticking with the historical fiction genre or for writing more books about temples.

In fact, the next book I wrote was a murder mystery, a sort of sequel for Lost without You, my first book, that takes place ten years later when the daughter, Angela, is a high school senior. I had a ball writing that one (it was totally awesome when my cop brother didn't guess the bad guy).

And then House on the Hill sold. Really well. And readers were suddenly clamoring for more. That's when I got a call from my publisher that boiled down to, "Hey, let's do more of that."

When I went back to the drawing board, I realized that I really loved doing historical fiction. In a lot of ways, writing it came more naturally than some of my other, contemporary, work had. The problem was that my writing mind had left the historical arena. I had that murder mystery plus two other contemporary novels I was working on.

The question loomed large: What should I write next that would be historical?

I decided pretty quickly to write a follow-up to House on the Hill, because the number one question I was getting from readers was, "What happens to Abe?"

Well, I'll find out, I thought.

When talking it out with my husband, he suggested writing about another temple. And then doing a whole series of temple books. I loved the idea and jumped all over it.

That was a few years ago. Now I've got three temple books in print, a fourth written and awaiting acceptance, and a fifth in the research phase. It's great, and I'm loving the experience. I've learned so much Church history, things we don't generally hear about, and I've come to appreciate and respect the early Saints so much more.

The trick, though, is that I no longer have the luxury of thinking about plots ahead of time. I have no inkling of what storyline my temple books will have until I start digging into the research.

How in the world could I decide what would happen in At the Journey's End until after I read up on the types of events that really occurred on the Honeymoon Trail? I couldn't.

For me, the location and its history become a secondary character to the book, the backdrop to the main story. I still maintain that I don't want the history to become the point of any of my books. The history is and always will be the backdrop for the plot and characters. The stage, if you will. You won't find a history textbook, with gobs of things that are "good for you" shoved down your throat. Ick.

The bottom line for me is I can't come up with a viable storyline until I know what constitutes the stage: what was going on in a particular area at a certain period in time, what the "personality" of the place was.

I thought I was an anomaly in my method, but in the most recent Writer's Digest, I came across a quote in an interview with Sara Gruen, author of the best-selling novel Water for Elephants. I don't have any delusions about being the next Sara Gruen, but something she said made me think that maybe I'm not entirely loopy for working the way I do. Talking about her latest book, she said:

"I didn't think about story until I'd done a fair amount of research into the backdrops, but then it was clear."

Yes! I wanted to shout from the rooftops. That's how it is for me, too! Someone else writes this way!

Maddie from At the Journey's End popped into my head fully formed after about two weeks of research. Tabitha from my upcoming Manti book trotted "on stage" one day with her name, a great line of dialogue, and her back story after I'd been reading up on Manti for several weeks (and starting to worry that I'd never have story to tell about it).

This is the point I'm at right now. For drafting purposes, it's getting a bit late in the year for me to not have a story in mind if I hope to turn in a manuscript by the end of the year, like I usually do. There's a bit of pressure growing, that same bit of worry I've felt before.

You've been reading about that place off and on for weeks now, it says. You have no story. It won't come this time. Who are you kidding?

As much as I talk myself out of the worries, the calendar ticks away one day at a time, and I do get a bit anxious. But then yesterday I was (yes!) smacked in the face with my heroine's first name. I don't know who she is yet; I'll have to spend some time getting acquainted with her and her family. I do know she has a brother she's very close to who will play a big part. Beyond that, it's very sketchy.

But it's coming.

This morning I opened up one of my research books that I've been putting off, and I read thirty pages. It's a sign that I'm getting stoked again. The characters will show up when they're ready, and the story will, too.

I can't wait to meet them.

Indoctrinating the Younguns

My mother did it for me over twenty years ago, and I'm doing it to my kids, with no apologies.

When I was around 10, and lasting for several years thereafter, Mom made a point of renting videos as a means to creating culturally-literate children. The great part was that in addition to getting a great education, we also had a ball seeing terrific classic films together.

Now when I run across fellow Gen-Xers who haven't seen these gems, I have to remind myself that not everyone had such a great learning experience from their parents in their early teens.

I plan to show my kids all the same great shows Mom shared with me, but at this point, my kids are still a little too young to appreciate the likes of Lawrence of Arabia, Casablanca, or The Philadelphia Story. Ditto with some of the Hitchcock greats (my personal favorites: Charade and Wait until Dark). My son might be able to sit through something along the lines of The Dirty Dozen, being as there's a lot of guns and fighting in it. And I've toyed with showing them Some Like It Hot, since that's downright hysterical. Even the youngest might be able to get some of it.

But until they're mature enough to appreciate the older greats (with a few exceptions, like Mary Poppins and Chitty, Chitty, Bang-Bang), I'm indoctrinating them with the classics from my youth. We've gone with The Private Eyes, an 80s film starring the inimitable Tim Conway and Don Knotts. A few of the others they've watched include blockbusters like E.T., Big, Newsies, and most recently, Footloose.

(Side note on that one: I've known forever that Footloose was filmed in Utah, but now that I'm an adult—and am far more familiar with Utah County than I used to be—it was a ball watching it and recognizing actual locations. It was also fun to see one of "our" missionaries from the time my parents presided over the mission in Finland. He was an extra in the movie before he served. I had to jump off the couch, rewind the DVD, and point out Elder Sperry to the kids. We caught sight of him two or three times.)

Next up is Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure, which I saw over and over again at the Movies 8 dollar theater with my good buddies, twins Denise and Melinda. We saw a lot of movies together that year. (We also smuggled pounds and pounds of penny candy from ShopKo into the theater. Good times.)

Movies on my to-be-watched list: Ghostbusters, Girls Just Want to Have Fun, and The Muppets Take Manhattan. I regularly come up with more to add. That way I can make sure my kids get a taste of the cultural icons I grew up with.

One great thing about all this is that we're having a ton of fun watching these movies together. Each brings back all kinds of great memories for me.

Another benefit: The kids are starting to "get" references in TV shows and movies that refer to things they recently saw because I showed it to them. They're also understanding better why Mom and Dad laugh at parts of the Shrek trilogy and other movies that they don't grasp: Oh! Those lines are references to other shows! It's like a light bulb going off in their heads.

Just the other day, my daughter was home sick. We ended up snuggling on the couch together as we caught an episode of Leave It to Beaver. I didn't expect her to watch the whole thing, but my culturally-literate side kicked in, and I insisted she watch a few minutes of it. That way when she heard mentions of "The Beav" or "June Cleaver" on other shows, she'd know what it meant.

Lo and behold, that very night while watching a DVD, we heard a reference to Leave It to Beaver. She was a bit tickled to be the only kid in the family who had a reference for the line.

So thanks, Mom, for yet one more thing!

I'm Getting There . . .

I've made some progress on my catch-up list from last time:

• Get a way overdue and much-needed hair cut. Hasn't happened yet. I'm thinking maybe Monday or Tuesday.
• Cut the kids' hair. It's on today's "Saturday is a special day" list. This way they'll look less like homeless waifs when we walk into church tomorrow.
• Bake a decent dinner. It's happened once so far, thanks to the crock pot. (I made homemade rolls to go with the beef stew. That counts, right?) But we've had a few unexpected issues that have thrown a wrench into having a great dinner, like an emergency trip to the doctor for DD10's possibly broken arm.
• Do the laundry. It's now caught up to a reasonable level of completeness. The mountain is gone, and everyone has stuff to wear again. We're back to maintenance mode.
• Go grocery shopping. Done. Of course, there were a few things I forgot to put on the list, but I DID go. We now have clean clothes AND food.
• Clean a few toilets. That's on one of the kids' chore lists for today. So I'm getting it done, even if I'm not the one doing it.
• Make the bed every day. Done. Except that I haven't made it yet today. But I will. I swear.
• Get dressed before noon. Managed it every day this week except Friday, but I had good reasons. Really, I did. And today I was showered and dressed WAY before noon. Impressed? Should be.
• Go to the library. Done. I even put a book on reserve that I have a sneaking suspicion will be a Whitney finalist this year. See, I'm trying to read up as much as I can NOW to avoid having a wild attempt to madly dash through 25 books in a few weeks like I did this year.
• Mop. As with the toilets, one of the kids gets to do that today.
• Sleep. Somewhat happening. Critique group tends to throw a wrench into that once a week, but I've gotten close to 8 hours most nights. And today . . . I got to sleep in. Hubby even got up and closed the bedroom door so the kiddies wouldn't bug me. Felt GOOOD. And naps? Nope. No naps. But I didn't really expect to slip one in, either.
• Run miscellaneous errands. Hasn't happened yet. Soon, for sure.

But next week I also need to make time to have some fun with the kids. It's Spring Break, after all. One of their friends is on a big trip to California right now, and when she asked my daughter where we were going for Spring Break, she replied, "Nowhere, really. Well, we're going to the dentist."

(Cringe.) It's true. The kids really do have their 6-month appointments during Spring Break. Long story, but I couldn't avoid it. I'll have to make it up to them somehow. We'll come up with something really fun to do during the break. At least once.

And finally, I may be the last blogger on the planet to jump on board, but for those three people who haven't heard about J. Scott Savage's upcoming fantasy series, Farworld, listen up. The first book, Water Keep, will be out in a few months, and as part of the ramp-up for that time, he's planning a giant blog tour. I get to host him this summer, and one reader from my blog will get a signed Advanced Reader Copy of Water Keep.

To learn more about the series (or to host Scott as part of his tour), click here.