Pandemic Narrative Part 15/Big Block of Cheese Day

If you don’t know the Big Block of Cheese Day reference, then you haven’t watched enough episodes of “The West Wing.” Quick description: There are some posts here on the blog when I have different things on my mind at once, so instead of deciding on one as a topic, I put together some shorter posts inside one longer one. I’m also tagging this as part of the overall pandemic narrative as well, since each topic is somehow related to Covid-19 and its aftermath. Because what isn’t these days?

THE ACTUAL PANDEMIC NARRATIVE PART

There are more than 9 million Covid-19 cases in the United States. By the time you read this, there will probably be 230,000 deaths. Our President is a liar, and anyone who believes him when he says we’re turning the corner and the military will be able to delivery 70 bajillion doses of the vaccine in time for Thanksgiving leftovers is too naive for words.

Since the last time I updated the narrative, Covid caught up with my family and knocked back one of my blood relatives pretty damned hard. He’s doing a lot better now, thank God, and hopefully will be done with all of it much sooner than later. It was maddening when he was in the thick of struggling with it, and all my family could do was wait and see what happened. The last I heard was he was hoping to return to work in a couple days. Fingers crossed he does, and that’s the end of it for him.

Minnesota is on fire. We’re currently experiencing thousands of new cases daily, which of course means more hospital beds are occupied, and tragically more people are dying. None of this seems to have any impact on the people who have succumbed to their Pandemic Fatigue or their Covid Anger, or the cultists who still feel this is a hoax and “refuse to live in fear.” Anyone out there walking around feeling emboldened by the armor of their ignorance who wants to blather on about how Covid is a hoax? Acting with caution and living in fear are very different. I hope things aren’t going to catch up with you and show you how seriously you should have taken this. Sadly, I think that will inevitably be the case with some. I just hope getting to watch your kid take a few hikes during his senior year of high school football will have been worth it.

SHIFTING LEARNING MODELS DURING THE PANDEMIC AGE

The state and the school districts have said since back in the summer that it was likely the learning models being implemented would change throughout the school year, depending on the spread or containment of the virus. Four weeks ago, our district was considering returning the hybrid students to a full-time model. Two weeks ago, they saw that couldn’t happen. Two weeks after that, or now, they’re arranging for the secondary students to begin a full distance learning model while the elementary students remain in a hybrid. Elementary could potentially change to distance learning as well, provided the Covid data being monitored locally ever necessitates such a change. 

Predictably, there are many people and families who agree with more careful learning models, as well as many who feel the amount of implemented caution is too extreme. Somehow (45) this has been bastardized into being a political issue. This is leading to a lot of raging comment threads on social media, many of which assign teachers as the most identifiable face of the school system and freely bash away at them (us) as if they’re (we’re) the ones making these decisions, instead of the elected officials and district administrators following the science. It’s really unfortunate that our community is struggling so much to come together at a time like this to and support each other through the unprecedented challenges we’re all experiencing. I would like to suggest to anyone who may someday invent a time machine that your best move would be to travel back to Harvard around the turn of the century, and convince Mark Zuckerberg’s girlfriend not to dump him. Then maybe social media will never have a pathway of coming into being, and everyone in the world will be happier and get along better for it. 

NANOWRIMO 2020, OR RAGING AGAINST THE EMPTY

I’m just going to say it: I’m coming off a bad week. Why was it bad? I wish I knew. There was no starting point when things went from their standard neutral to bad, but it sure happened. There wasn’t a lot of smiling or laughing going on, at least outside of the time I was with my students. Sleep was more of an interruption in the darkness than an escape, when it even came. Emotions ebb and flow, however. Yesterday was net positive, and today feels nice and normal. Bad days come, sometimes stretches of them, but they also balance out. Plus there are things people can do to fight back the negative. Those things are probably different for each of us, and I feel like I have a basic understanding of what a few of my things are. One of them is definitely reading a good book. Here’s the one I picked: 

It took one book for Justin Cronin to become one of my favorite authors. I met him at a book signing in 2012 for his novel THE TWELVE, which is the second novel in the trilogy that started with THE PASSAGE, a horror novel that, coincidentally, began as a story about a pandemic that started with a bat and decimated the population. As he signed my book, I mentioned I was a teacher hoping to be an author someday. He said he’d started out the same way, which of course I already knew.

Four years later when CITY OF MIRRORS came out, I was back for another book signing, but this time with a different story to share. Instead of buying my copy of the book at the signing, I brought my own, which my agent had given me as a birthday present a few weeks earlier after she somehow managed to score a copy of it before it had even been released. You might think that shouldn’t be any great trick for someone in the publishing industry, but for a high profile book like this was at the time, it was no small feat. I was absolutely blown away. When it was my turn in the book signing line, I told Cronin how things had changed for me since his last signing. He shook my hand, congratulated me, and asked what I was working on. Then he wrote this with his signature.

I know that reading a good book does something to my brain, like flipping a switch that primes it to narrate. I recently decided to participate in National Novel Writing Month again this year, so it seemed like a good opportunity to start reading a good long book and tap into that priming action. I picked CITY OF MIRRORS because he’s a really good writer, I’ve only read it one time, it contains a section that I would argue is one of the best love stories ever committed to paper, and above all it’s a horror story, which is what I’m going to be trying to write next month. I’m putting aside the middle grade work for a shot at adult fiction, and specifically horror. I’ve been looking for a good horror story to tell for a while now. When I started writing for real in college I wrote horror almost exclusively, but I still haven’t done it as a full-length novel, at least in adult fiction. I’ve had a number of conversations with my agent over the past year about taking on a project like this, and decided I had to go forward with it after she gave the concept her blessing.

I can’t say I’m really excited about it, though. I’m very excited about the story, but not so much diving into another round of writing a whole damn book in a month. First of all, it won’t be a whole book: Nanowrimo only requires 50,000 words in 30 days, and my draft should be aiming for something closer to 80,000-90,000 before editing, which would be really taxing to do in 30 days. I still win if I hit the 50k mark, and I will win at this because I won’t allow myself not to, but I’m okay with finishing the rest of the story in December.

See, I realized earlier this month that I feel better when I’m creating something. I finished revising a middle grade novel a few weeks ago, and noticed that the darkest part of October started soon after I was done with that, and continued to get more pronounced the longer I sat on the sidelines. Writing lesson plans helped, believe it or not, because there’s a certain amount of creativity that goes into that. Everyone has their own ways of proactively fighting whatever depression or anxiety they might be experiencing during these crazy pandemic days. I think my fight has to do with reading and writing, between keeping my head occupied, filling me with whatever collection of hormones are dumped into my system when the reading ignites that narrative response, and the feeling that follows the achievement that comes from writing something that brings me a sense of accomplishment. I don’t know if it’s necessarily a good thing that I seem to need that so much, but it’s probably good that I recognize it. 

Okay. That’s enough for now. Since I can’t start working on the new book until tomorrow, I’m going to go do some reading instead.

May 31: Pandemic Summer

I’ve started past summers by covering my refrigerator door in a colorful array of sticky notes, creating a massive list of goals, hobbies, and adventures meant to fill my summer break with experiences and accomplishments. This summer I’m leaving it blank. 

This coming Friday would be Track and Field Day at my school. In a lot of ways, that day is the emotional starting point for the end of the school year. However, because of the coronavirus and distance learning, our Track and Field Day is virtual this year. No sweaty day out in the sun. No kids dumping out their water bottles on each other. No Tug of War, or Fifth Grade All-Stars competition, or dunk tank, or subsequent happy hour which I probably would have gone to this year.

The beginning of summer break is a wonderful time, the launch pad of so much possibility, and so many things to do. Go see a movie in the middle of the afternoon, if you want. Meet up with a few friends for lunch somewhere you usually wouldn’t go and catch up. Enjoy the open time without any immediate responsibility, or at least less of it.

This year though, I don’t know how much it will even feel like a break, at least for me. I haven’t seen my students in nearly three months, and I won’t see them as a group ever again. I’m sure it will feel like summer, with the pounding afternoon sun and the humid air and the occasional storm rolling through. So summer, sure. But a break from what? My work day for the third trimester has meant sitting in front of my computer screen each day, which is what a good chunk of each day will be like as I work (and yeah, it really is WORK) to write one new manuscript and revise another. That was always going to happen. Anything I would have had on the Sticky Note To Do List would have been distractions around it.

But this year, what’s going to happen in the outside world? For the second time in 2020, the world has gone through remarkable change for the worst almost overnight just this past week. George Floyd was killed not even a week ago, and not for the first time we’re finding so much of our lives affected by the actions of one violent ex-cop. Tragically there’s no way everything that followed that won’t lead to a second wave of COVID-19 by July, and my guess is that by then one community demanding justice and another wanting to go up North every weekend won’t eagerly welcome another shelter-in-place order.

So in my little world, there are a lot of things that either I really can’t, or shouldn’t, do, as well as things that would be pointless. There won’t be the traditional countdown to the first day back to school in the fall, because there’s really no telling what the fall will look like. There won’t be any boiling afternoons spent in a dark movie theater to retreat from the excessive heat and the storm watches, because even if the theaters were open there aren’t exactly any movies out for them to show. There won’t be afternoons or evenings, or sometimes even mornings, wandering the aisles of Cub or Target for an hour, only to arrive at the check-out with a cartful of things I don't really need. Live music is pretty much dead at the moment, so the one concert I was excited about attending has been postponed for at least a year, to say nothing of how there wasn’t even a Summer Concert Series at the MN Zoo amphitheater announced. I didn’t even bother trying to pick an Official Driving With the Windows Rolled Down Album of the Summer, both because friggin’ 2020 doesn’t deserve one and because the last time I filled my gas tank was mid-March and it isn’t even half empty yet.

On top of all this — no State Fair. Maybe at least on the Fourth of July I can try to watch the fireworks from that show near my house …maybe they’ll allow that with social distancing…at least on the fourth I can watch the Hot Dog eating con…nope, that’s getting shut down for sure.

I don’t know. I mean, I fully expect the Second Wave to hit like a tsunami, but maybe before it does I’m being too cautious. A lot of people are getting sick, but a lot aren’t. NO, that’s the kind of magical thinking that ends up with people in the ICU. I’m not taking any risks I don’t have to, and if that means more time in the designated pick up spots in the Target parking lot instead of in the store, so be it. I’m walking around with an underlying condition or two here. I’m not taking any risks I absolutely don’t have to. 

Besides, there are still a lot of things I can do. There are dozens of books to read in my house, along with the two of my own I’ll be working on. In fact, I’m halfway through the new Stephen King right now and have an older John Sandford mystery I still haven’t read on deck. I’ve got miles and miles of summer dog walks ahead of me, along with sunny afternoons we’ll spend in our chairs on the patio. There are all of those shows on Netflix people talk about, and I’ll probably take the final technology dive into Disney+ at some point, to anesthetize myself with Marvel movies. I’m also taking on the summer project of catching up on classic movies I’ve never seen; I think “From Here to Eternity” is actually recording as I sit here and write this. I have a well-worn copy of Fallout: New Vegas at the ready for any night I can’t fall asleep, now that I don’t have to worry so much about waking up to “go to work” anymore. And as far as shopping? I can get pretty much whatever I need delivered to my house. To paraphrase one of my students from an assignment they wrote about living through a pandemic, there’s a difference between the things you want and the things you need.

Whatever happens, the summer of 2020 promises to be both quiet (personally) and dramatic (publicly). Let’s just hope there’s still a world left out there when it’s time to start school again in the fall. 

Pandemic Narrative, Part 1

I’m writing this in the minutes following the government declaring a national emergency in regards to the spread of COVID-19. So far this event has progressed at such a frightening rate, it occurred to me today that it might be a good idea to document the things that are happening to keep track of the pace. Of course, since this is my blog, much of what I write about here will be filtered through my own point of view. Not all of us will have the same experience as all of this rolls out. All I can offer is my own perspective.

Since I’ve done a lot of Lists of 10 here on the blog before, I think that might be a good format to follow for this as well — 10 points of what is either happening in the world in the moment or what I’m doing in my best efforts to cope and survive. 

So, here are 10 observations or comments, in no particular order: 

*To start off…I’ve been walking the face of this godforsaken planet for a wee bit longer than half a century now, and I’ve never seen anything like what is going on with this pandemic, and the worst part of it all is how it’s only getting started here. No wait, the worst thing might be that all the toilet paper and hand sanitizer and disinfectant wipes are sold out across the land. (I’m starting to think toilet paper might become currency when the virus apocalypse really kicks in.) No, hold on: The worst part of it is how our government is being operated by an incompetent collection of clown-shoes-wearing bumbles when we need experts in charge more than ever.

*A few weeks ago, I had won a pair of VIP tickets to see the Lumineers at Xcel Energy Center. I was excited because I really like the band, and have yet to take in a VIP experience of any sort. I even worked on growing out my beard for a few weeks, so it would be scraggly enough to have proof I was the fan of a band who played the kind of music Mumford and Sons would have if they’d grown up on the western plains or the Rocky Mountains instead of the UK. I’d hoped the virus spread would be slower and it would make sense to take the chance at going, but it didn’t work out. I was ready to give up my tickets right when I found out the concert had been postponed until September. Yay! Now I just need to stay alive until September. And I can get rid of the beard, which frankly is probably a trap for virus-tainted droplets anyway.

*On the subject of getting rid of the beard: The whole idea of not touching my face, which is proving a challenge, makes the simple act of washing my face feel like a spa day. Not that I know much about what a spa day would feel like, because what am I, Ryan Gosling? But face washing has never felt as luxurious as it does when you’re trying so hard not to touch it during the rest of the day.

*I started spring break today, officially. I have a doctor’s appointment this week — which was set pre-pandemic — and other than that I have no legitimate reason to leave my home. I mean, I’ll go outside to walk the dog and get the mail, but to go to a movie or a store, or meet someone for lunch? I may not go anywhere until I have to return to school at the end of break. Unless….

*Yesterday, Gov. Tim Walz declared a statewide peacetime emergency. He did not, however, close the schools. About ten states have, but we aren’t one of them…yet. It’s my hope that by the time my spring break ends, he’ll wise up and rectify this. You see, I know what it’s like in a school. It isn’t, “Oh, it’s just a bunch of kids and they aren’t the ones getting sick.” It’s the parents who come through. It’s ALL OF THE ADULTS who work there, many of whom travel from building to building, sometimes during the same day. And as for those kids, even if they aren’t typically getting sick, they’re very effective carriers. Generally, I like to think my immune system is pretty robust; for example, I’ve only had about one week worth of colds in the past two and a half years. But this new virus is a big unknown, and I’d rather not try taking it on. As strong as my immune system might be, I spend my day with coughers and wipers and scratchers and pickers. I’ve been coughed on in such close proximity I’ve been able to taste them. I know how bad the disease vector of the public school is first hand, so I know how much potential difference it could make to get it off the game board for a few weeks. Because social distancing? In a classroom? No. It’s not possible. 

*There is more food in my house right now than there probably ever has been during my entire adult life. I usually shop a week at a time, which can leave my kitchen not unlike Tyler Durden’s by the end of the week. I am fully stocked now though, and I plan to ration. Not down to anything ridiculous like three Cheez-Its per hour, but a whole lot less snacking and a whole lot more of respecting serving sizes. I could even wind up dropping some weight because of this, which would give me a nice self-esteem boost to enjoy for the three weeks I’d have until the virus kills me off. Until then, I’m fully prepared to settle in and let my introverted superpowers carry me through as far as they can. 

*I’m filling time by watching TV, which is becoming a trigger. I often have news on as background noise, but there’s nothing about that right now that isn’t scary. Even normal TV is scary though, when you see people touch their faces, or shake hands, or hug, or high five, or fist bump, or sneeze, or cough, or wipe their nose, or not wash their hands long enough…I’m sure you get the picture. I also plan on reading a lot, which will be easy since I have a formidable To Be Read pile. This is a part of it (full-disclosure: I’ve already read about 25% of these, but just don’t have anywhere else to keep them).

*I’m also going to use the time to get some writing done. I’ve got one book I’m starting and another I’m preparing to revise. I have to say some state-mandated weeks off from school would help quite a bit with getting things done for the other job.

*I’m honestly torn between wanting to keep myself as hyper-informed about what’s happening as I can so I know what we’re all up against, and wanting to just watch The Office and rock out to old Styx albums to pretend the world is still a normal place. It makes me wonder what it will be like afterward, however long it takes us to achieve afterward, when we’ll be able to put all of our previous concerns into a new perspective. 

*Today I plan on dusting off the Xbox and starting an open world game I’ve never played before but have had lying around for the longest time. An open world game is one where you just kind of wander around through the expansive setting of the game, interacting with different characters, completing missions and quests, and just living your game life. 

I’m pretty sure there won’t be any scary viruses in there.

Day 19: Book of Hours

One of my favorite things about summer break is having time to read. I still need to find a book to kick off my reading binge, but there's another one I really want to finish off first. The problem is I've been reading this book for at least a year and a half now.

It's not that it's long. In fact, it comes in at just around 450 pages. There have been a few paperback novels I've read in a day when I've had the time. If I take a trip somewhere, I usually go out of my way to find a book to bring, and I usually have the time to finish it before returning home.

This book is just really, really dull.

I won't say what it is or who wrote it; as I writer who hopes to someday be in a position when I have to be concerned about other people being hypercritical of my work, I just don't think that would be a cool move. I will say the author is very successful, and the book is in the vein of something like The DaVinci Code. The main character is something of a historian who backs into a longstanding governmental conspiracy and is soon way over his head. Most of the chapters are only a few pages long, which seems to be structured to propel the reader forward. My problem is that I'm so unengaged with all that's going on I can't seem to read more than ten or twenty pages in a sitting.

This book has gone for months at a time, sitting on a table untouched and waiting to be revived. I have the hardest time abandoning books completely, and can only think of maybe ten times I've ever done it. It becomes a quest after awhile, even if I don't enjoy the book. That's what this one has become.

If I get to a place where I just don't want to read it anymore, I've started trying to figure out why that is. What is it, specifically, about that book that I find so numbing or bothersome, or even repellant? There have to be good lessons there in that kind of analysis. Here are a few things I've figured out about this one:

1. The main character isn't interesting. He doesn't really have any agency in the story. He's more like a pinball, bouncing his way through the story and only reacting to things as they happen to him. There were early attempts at a backstory, but they just didn't catch my interest. Plus I read that part more than a year ago, so I don't remember much about them. Which is also a statement.

2. He's "in love" with an old middle school crush who came back into his life through the events of the story. The author isn't giving me enough about her to make me share the crush the way I think I'm supposed to.

3. The short chapter thing doesn't always work. Yeah, sometimes there are mini-cliffhangers I want to see resolved, but there are too many times he's not giving a scene enough time to breathe.

4. He keeps telling me about why this conspiracy is such a big deal, and yet I don't really feel it. He hasn't shown why, other than having a lot of characters with a variety of loyalties chase around the greater Washington, D.C. area after each other.

I think I have about 100 pages left. In a perfect world, I'll be ready to start a new book on June 9th. It'll probably be some John Sandford crime story, which is how I've started many a summer in the past. He's not perfect, but at least he's entertaining. And I always finish his books.

Please Don't Screw Up A Wrinkle in Time

Dear Hollywood,

“A Wrinkle in Time” was the book that defined my childhood. There is no book in all of literature I have reread more; I would conservatively put the number at more than twenty times.

This was the book that introduced me to science fiction, real hard-core science fiction that took advantage of actual science. It was the book that pushed me beyond reading about Henry Huggins and the Hardy boys in 3rd grade, and got me to borrow something from the school library other than the popular collection of Peanuts cartoons or the enormous book of D’Aulaires’ Greek Myths. Encountering this book and the first Star Wars movie within a year of each other was probably the most formative pair of experiences I had in becoming a writer. My almost nine-year-old brain stood no chance.

This was the book that inspired another author, decades later, to write her own science-based science fiction story, which became one of the most popular books I’ve ever read to a class. Because this other book, “When You Reach Me,” referenced “A Wrinkle in Time” so heavily, the students demanded I read it as a follow-up, and I was all too happy to oblige them.

I’m not saying its perfect, but even its imperfections are things I’ve come to love, because they are such important parts of the book. (For example, I never bought Calvin caring so much about displaying proper manners in a moment of crisis that he would have had the presence of mind to yell, “Tesser, sir!”) 

The teaser trailer for “A Wrinkle in Time” went online yesterday. I watched it, hoping to spot the filmmaker’s visualizations of important characters and scenes and settings from the book. 

I was dismayed by the sight of so many palm trees.

Never in my life did I ever think of Mrs. Whatsit looking anything like Reese Witherspoon.

I understand giving big stars screen time, but Mr. Murry, although serving as the catalyst for the entire story, was a minor character at best. Why was Chris Pine featured in half of the trailer?

Is Oprah’s Mrs. Which pep talk speech to Meg happening when she delivers her alone to Camazotz? Because Mrs. Which is supposed to be INTANGIBLE. And don’t get me started on the voice. 

Why was there so much running and screaming? The book was an adventure, but one based more on philosophy and science than action. Was that sandstorm looking thing destroying the forest supposed to be The Black Thing? Because…no. Just, no. The Black Thing was more presence than present. 

Why are the kids bouncing red balls in unison in a cul-de-sac?

Why are Meg and Calvin basically the same height?

What about all those weird planets? Am I just having a hard time reconciling those images with what I’ve seen in my head for the last forty years, or have has the visionary director gone that far off book?

And on top of it all: A spooky cover of a crappy Eurythmics song was the best match you could find for the teaser soundtrack?

Please, please don’t screw this up. It would break my heart to have to skip this, but I’ll do that before I let any multi-million dollar attempt at creative reinvention ruin the book for me.

View the trailer, and cross your fingers

Stephen King, Justin Cronin, and the Rush of Causing Nightmares

I’m preparing a new manuscript these days. I have the idea gestating in my head almost constantly, and I’m frequently digging my phone out of my pocket to record any ideas that come at me sideways before they get away. The story has pretty much come together now, and isn’t that different from the original idea that came to me nearly fully-formed a few months ago. It’s another ghost story, but a departure from The Ghost of Lake Emily. That one was tense and atmospheric in a classic ghost story sense. This one works on a different scale. 

Back in high school when I started writing, I dealt almost exclusively in horror. It wasn’t planned, but those were just the ideas I got the most excited about. One of the first short stories I ever wrote was about two friends driving around in the country at night, messing with the headlights and accidentally hitting someone. They found the body impaled on a tree stump, which was bad enough, but then that body pulled itself off the stump and slowly stalked after them when they panicked and ran away.

This was how my brain worked at seventeen years old.

I was neck-deep in my Stephen King paperback phase back then, and almost all of the stories I wrote had some kind of horror element. I watched scary movies to enjoy the juicy gore, not even caring if they were cartoonishly silly. I was a hardcore fan of the genre for a good long time. And yes, I said “was.” I don’t think of myself as a horror fan anymore. I’m still a Stephen King fan because I feel his writing transcends the genre so I’d read him anyway. However, I don’t seek out and consume all things horror like I used to. Something about the vicarious thrill of experiencing characters in fear for their lives and getting killed changed for me when I was at my sister’s bedside the moment she died.

That doesn’t mean I’ve abandoned it all, though. Horror isn’t just about death. It’s about confronting fear and fighting to survive, and the relief that comes with finally conquering the things that plague you. There are a lot of good stories to tell inside of those elements.

When I discovered Justin Cronin’s writing several years ago, the first book of his I found was absolutely horror, but written with such art and skill that I would have read it regardless of the story. The biggest take away I had from reading him, which reflected back to why I had read so much Stephen King way back when, was that it was possible to write a story that was scary without it having be just a scary story. And on the subject of the esteemed Mr. Cronin, I can’t tell you how awesome the leftover shadow of my inner teenager thought it was to discover an author Stephen King had widely praised, then receive the last book in that author’s bestselling trilogy as a birthday present from my literary agent before the book had even been released, and then have that author sign the book congratulating me on finding an agent and asking what I was working on. Like a colleague would. Life’s rich pageant, I guess.

So, back to this new project. Even though it’s going intentionally scary (and funny, by the way), it’s still a children’s book, though one I expect will be testing some boundaries. I’m at the stage in the work where I can get excited about how it’s coming together, like finding ways to translate some of my deepest fears into a character just to see how they’ll react. Or to consider the possibilities of what could happen to the story if I kill off a character who is only about eleven or twelve. Or to think of exactly how far I’ll be able to push my characters before they’d reach the breaking point that would force (or allow) them to do the sorts of things that normally they’d never consider doing.

As this story has built up, I’ve wondered a little about what it would mean if this new book and The Ghost of Lake Emily both found publication homes, and both found even modest success. Would I find myself early in my writing career getting pegged as a horror writer, much like I had aspired to be in my teenage short story days? I don’t know if that would necessarily bother me, as long as I was allowed my moments to step outside of the genre and work with other stories as well. I know my leftover teenage shadow would think it was awesome.

I figure as long as “writer” was somewhere in that label, my adult self would probably be okay with it, too.

Drums, Books, and Fighting Back the Burn Out

Sometimes it’s hard to know exactly how you feel. 

It wasn’t long ago I was convinced that after twenty-five years of teaching, I had entered a stage of almost full-fledged burn out. It wasn't a happy thing to admit, but it was hard to ignore. The school year has brought a variety of challenges, just like every other year, but the challenges right in front of you at the time always seem like the biggest ones. This year has the added effect of my feeling even a little lonely while at school, which is something that has never really happened before. The grades I work with are clustered in one end of one hallway, which means that almost my entire school day is contained to about one fifth of our building. I’m very lucky that I get along and work well with the few other people in that end of the hall, but from the way my schedule is set up and from the lack of proximity, several people I’ve come to think of as friends aren’t a part of my life this year. It’s isolating, and when you’re out of the loop with what’s going on in the school it’s easy to feel like the world is moving on in a lot of ways without you. 

Being one of the most experienced people in the school can compound this. You can feel a gradual transition happening, to a new generation of teachers or new philosophies finding prominence. You know as that continues that eventually your place in it will start to phase out, and you’ll be seen more as a leftover from an era people can’t relate to anymore. 

Teaching can be an incredibly frustrating job. There are a lot of little things that pick at you and wear you out, and as soon as you resolve them there’s always another crop of things to deal with waiting to take their place. That’s just frustration though, and regardless of what anyone ever does in their life, frustration will eventually be a part of it. Burn out is different. It’s bigger. I’ve seen it happen to others, and I know I don’t want it to happen to me. I think burn out is signaled by when you start going through the motions of doing the work and have removed all the emotion from it — not because you’re trying to maintain a professional perspective in a job that can be demanding, but because everything has become routine and requirement. 

Carrying that feeling with you every day, even small amounts of it, takes a toll on your psyche. At least it has on mine. If I have my phone in my pocket during the day, I’ll check it as soon as I can when I feel an email notification buzz through, just in case it’s my agent letting me know she’s heard back from one of her editor submissions, and we need to start talking about an offer. Then I’ll know my writing career is about to start, and that could mean a possible chance to make an exit from teaching a few years earlier than originally planned. It’s not something I wake up banking on every day, but there’s always that sliver of hope.

Something interesting happened recently though, and it has me pretty convinced that I’m not burning out just yet. I might be tired sometimes, or a little discouraged. I am very much looking forward to beginning my writing career. But I know I haven’t been driven to the point where I’ve stopped caring about what I do at school. 

I started reading some things about a middle grade book called I AM DRUMS by author Mike Grosso, which was released just last year. I was intrigued enough by what I read to order it online. The idea hooked me because I grew up as a drummer myself. I started playing in band in 5th grade and continued through high school. I was a tappy kid the whole way through, listening to my Walkman cassette player on the morning school bus and playing along with the drum parts on my thighs, looking for an escape from my hour-long ride. Drumming is still a small part of my life now, well into adulthood. Most summers there will be a time I get together with my cousins and all of their guitars and basses and keyboards and microphones, and we’ll play late into the night. I have a small electronic drumset in my home office, positioned so I can spin my desk chair around 180 degrees when I need a mental break from writing (or if a good song comes on), and I’ll have the drum set right there waiting for me to play it. I’m still interested in drumming enough that one of the other books that came in the same online order as I AM DRUMS was an autobiography by Kenny Aronoff, a well-known rock drummer I’d been a fan of for decades.

When my online order arrived, I AM DRUMS was the first book I cracked open. I read it in a weekend. It was great fun for me to find a book that connected so well with a lifelong interest, and described so many experiences I could relate to. But that wasn’t the best part. The best part was knowing that when I finished reading it, I was going to be able to put that book in the hands of a kid who would love it.

I have a boy in my 4th grade class who talks about drums all the time, and how badly he wants to play them someday. He’s always hammering out a beat with his hands or fingers, sometimes on his legs, sometimes (to a noisier effect) on top of his desk. When his reading teacher asked him to write a poem, he wrote about drums and the sound they make. When his class performed for a younger class during music, he made sure he had the chance to accompany the singing on a drum, which he proudly carried through the hallways before and after the performance. The music teacher even commented to me on how well he had played.

Like I said, I read I AM DRUMS over a weekend, even if that meant waking up early on the day back to school to quickly finish it, so I could bring it in as soon as possible. Even though there were issues ahead of me to deal with that day, the same kind of issues that I could so easily blow out of proportion and use to convince myself that I was finally burning out from teaching, I was practically bouncing around the house with excitement while I got ready, knowing that was the day I would get to introduce this kid to what could easily end up being one of his favorite books. 

Cut to a few hours later. The arrival bell rings, and, of course, it turns out he’s absent that day. 

But he was back the following day. After I told him I found a book I was pretty sure he was going to like, I set it on his desk. He picked it up, read the title out loud, saw the squiggly illustrations on the cover, and made this nonverbal, almost animal-like noise of excitement. He repeated the title to himself a few times, flipping to the back cover, examining the dust jacket. “It’s about a kid in middle school, and the thing she wants more than anything else in life is to play the drums,” I told him. His smile slowly grew wider and wider. Throughout the rest of the day, I saw the book open on his desk during any moment long enough for him to finish even one more paragraph. The day after that we had a conversation when I got to prove to him that paradiddles are a real thing.

I feel it’s safe to say, and I’m happy to unequivocally know this now, if I can still get this excited about introducing a student to a book, and then reveling in the satisfaction after watching how attached they become to it, I absolutely still care a lot about what I do.

Clearly the burn out isn’t encroaching as quickly as I thought it was.

Day 29: Ten Things I'm Looking Forward to About Summer

Memorial Day weekend has become widely recognized as the unofficial start of summer. I only kind of agree with this. On one hand, I’m not going to consider it truly summer until I reach that first morning when I wake up knowing I don’t have to go to school to teach anyone or pack anything. On the other hand, any days at school that follow Memorial Day have a very different feel to them since summer break is tantalizingly close.

Each summer break is different from the ones before it, but there are always a few things about the season that are at least similar. I don’t yet know what moments or events will eventually come to define whatever this summer break will be, but I do know there are going to be some things about it that I’ll enjoy, because I do every year. Here’s a list of ten of those things that have me looking forward to finishing off the last two weeks of the school year. As always, in no particular order:

1. Catching up on television
My Netflix account has been all but dormant these past several months, and I know I’m going to more than make up for it when it comes to summer binge-watching. I also have a number of series saved on my DVR that I never found the time to watch during the school year, and I’m seriously thinking about doing a “West Wing” series re-watch this summer as well. And all of this is to say nothing of another summer of “Big Brother,” my summertime guilty pleasure (and I do feel guilty about enjoying it), starting up in a few weeks.

2. Family events
Just as I spend a lot of time with friends during the school year, I always seem to spend more time with my family during the summer. This year we’ve got a high school graduation, two weddings, and the annual trip to the Turtle Lake fair coming up. Plus there’s still the Cousin Movie Night I want to see happen (Paul, we need to get started on the logistics for that!).

3. Home improvements
There are always some jobs around the house that could stand being done, and summer is a perfect time to take care of them. I’m not talking about major construction or anything like that, but more things like organizing, cleaning, or small bits of decorating. I like having a home where I feel comfortable and relaxed, and I don’t mind setting aside some of my summer to put in the time and thought it takes to make it that way. 

4. Games
Yes, I play video games (as you probably do as well, even if you want to call them 'apps' on your phone), and yes, I own an Xbox One. I don’t have the stamina to spend marathon amounts of time playing anymore, but when I find a game (or two) that really captures my imagination, gaming can be a great way to fill a lazy afternoon or a sleepless night.

5. Writing time
In summer, I don’t have to schedule in the time to write. I can just do it. I can plan, prewrite, write, revise, edit, proofread, and work on different projects at the same time if I want. If I ever catch a wave of flow state, I can just ride it out as long as I want without having to worry about other commitments. It’s wonderful, and one of the reasons I would happily leaving teaching behind if the opportunity ever came together. Since I can think of at least three different projects I’ll have going, I’m planning on this year being a very productive summer. 

6. Afternoon movies
Maybe it’s an introvert thing, but I think the absolute best time to see a movie in the theater is to go on a hot summer afternoon. You don’t have to worry about crowds, or lines, or some knucklehead five rows ahead of you playing Candy Crush, or the people who sat in the seats right behind you even though the theater was only half full talking through the whole stinkin’ movie. If you time things right you can even get the whole place to yourself, and then pretend you’re a billionaire watching a private screening in the full-size movie theater you built in your basement. If anyone wants to tag along sometime and see how great it can be, let's talk!

7. Reading time
What’s a summer reading list without the time to enjoy it? Every year I have at least one day when I set aside everything else and just read. It’s beyond amazing. And even though I already have a fairly extensive reading list, you can bet there will be at least a trip or two to Barnes and Noble in my future. 

8. Working on the fridge
This will only be my second year of having a refrigerator door covered with colorful Post-It Notes making up a to-do list of summertime adventures. I love the feeling of accomplishment that comes with checking items off a list, and I learned last year that having the visual prompt of ideas and the motivation of being able to take them down are great ways to keep my days occupied. 

9. The procrastination checklist
I’ll admit I procrastinate. It’s not a chronic thing, but if I have a job in front of me that I really don’t want to do, it’s too easy to find different ways to spend my time. After awhile though, those boring-to-unpleasant tasks start to hang over your head. Summer is a great time to take care of at least some of them, which not only gets the stupid job out of the way but also provides a little dopamine charge for the reward of finally getting it over with. Achievement unlocked!!

10. Naps
Maybe not every day, but several times a week. Most are pretty short, but the beauty is they don’t have to be.

So that’s part of my list. How about you? What are your favorite things about summer, whether you get eleven weeks off from your job or not?

Day 25: Another Big Block of Cheese

They did this thing on "The West Wing," at least early in the show's run, when they'd have occasional episodes about something called "Big Block of Cheese Day." Long story short, it was a chance for smaller interest groups to get an audience with someone on the White House senior staff. I've done a few Big Block of Cheese posts in the past when I've had ideas bouncing around that probably didn't have enough behind them to develop into an entire independent post, or, more likely, I was too lazy to take the time to do that. Since this is May and I'm looking to fill space, here are a few of the things on my mind these days.

*I've had a few discussions with a number of teachers in the past few days about how structuring the school year calendar to something closer to year-round school with manageable breaks built in would be an effective way to prevent the summer slide, when kids forget so much of what they learned the year before. Our school calendar follows an agrarian schedule that is completely outdated in the 21st century, and yet I'm glad we have it. I do like having a nice chunk of time off during the summer. However, even though my students are personally important to me so many get cranked up with attitude and less-than-desirable behavior this time of the year, because they're feeling the same school year fatigue I am. This usually makes it much easier to say goodbye on the last day. I'm sure they'd agree.

*I think I have at least the first wave of my summer reading list figured out and stacked on my piano bench. Of course there will be other books I buy during the summer that I'll add, but I've got a pretty good idea now of at least where I'm going to start. Last summer was a disappointing one as far as how much reading I got done so I'm making a point of taking advantage of that time this year. I have to say though, some of these books are pretty long. It looks a little daunting now, but I'm ready to take it on. 

*Our media guy Reed hit me up with another head-scratcher of a question not too many days ago. The only reason I'm not using it as an independent post is because I'm so close to the end of May, and, to be honest, my stamina for coming up with a new topic every day and writing coherent thoughts about it is nearly running on fumes. Think about this one, though: If you consider every relationship you have, friends, family, colleagues, whatever -- each person you bring into your life has some reason for being there. Your relationship evolved out of an interest you shared, or fulfilled a need that you provided each other in some way. If you thought of all the people you have in your life, could you identify the connective threads that bind you to all of them?

*I've always watched television news, and I tend to follow it more closely during a political season leading up to a major election. I really don't know if I can this year. I'm just so sick of looking at Trump, much less viewing the lowbrow political performance art he's been displaying for nearly a year. I'm not even so sure I can put up with local news as much anymore. Not because of the Trump factor, but more because I'm questioning how necessary it is on a daily basis. Sure, if something big happens it's a good way to get information. But so much of it, even in a metro area that size of Minneapolis/St. Paul, has become more about community interests and presenting the anchors and reporters as engaging and accessible personalities. 

*It's an unfortunate thing for me to admit, but I have yet to narrow down what will be my favorite album to listen to while driving with the windows down this summer. That title has often gone to a live album (they seem to lend themselves to driving, somehow) and something with a good straightforward, energetic rock sound, but without being too intense. I'm open to suggestions if anyone has favorites to mention.

*I think I have officially crossed over into the end of the school year slide. Not that I'm giving up on teaching anything of value or plan on sleepwalking through my final 11 instructional days, but we're now close enough to the end that I can see everything left that I need to do roughly mapped out in front of me, and the light at the end of the tunnel is that much brighter because of it. I think I can speak for most teachers by saying that reaching that point in the year is pretty nice. 

*On the subject of planning out my summer, I've got some good ideas for Post-It Noting up my fridge. Right now I'm just collecting ideas though, and I won't officially even display my summer experiences to-do list until I drive away from school for the last time this year late in the afternoon on June 13. And honestly I'm even seriously considering posting at least select items online, almost as an unofficial open invitation for anyone who would like to join in with any of my adventures...though I can almost guarantee it would be a stretch to call any of them that. 

*I'm curious: Do people not use Facebook that much anymore, or have a lot of people just gradually morphed into lurkers who sign in to read other posts, or memes, or videos, or whatever? I only ask because I've noticed, even in just the past few months, that a lot of people on my friend list don't seem to be as active online as they once were. I assume that means they're just off doing different things and the Facebook shine has worn off for them. Either that, or they're slowly blocking and ignoring me into oblivion...and after I've clogged up the news feed with daily blog posts for nearly a month now, can you blame them?

*Anybody want to make a Dairy Queen run this weekend? I might be up for it....

Day 24: Worlds Collide, Part 2: The Young Authors Conference

Young Author’s Conference

I was a chaperone for a field trip today as my school sent a group of kids to the Young Authors Conference. I’ve chaperoned this one a number of times over the years, and it’s become a favorite. The first time I went my writing was little more than a hobby, though one that still fired off some occasional “author someday” writing dreams. Mary Granpre, the illustrator of the Harry Potter books, appeared as a keynote speaker. I was a little starstruck to be in the same building as so many real authors. I’d even heard of several of them. 

The second year I went felt a little different. I had gone through NaNoWriMo twice by then and had two complete manuscript drafts to my name. Some of the kids who came along that year had even read one of both. I was on pins and needles a bit since one of those manuscripts had earned a full request from an agent during the time window we were there, so everything about my author life speculation was heightened. Nothing came of that request because the manuscript wasn’t ready, the time wasn’t right, and I had yet to cross paths with the right agent. 

My third conference happened just a month after the right agent and I found each other. I wandered through the conference that year with dreams that felt slightly more tangible, now seeing all of the authors there as people who could potentially see me as a peer in the not too distant future. I tracked down an author I knew who was presenting, David LaRochelle. He had a lot of history with my school and we had crossed paths over the years because of that, so he knew about my writing and had always been supportive. It felt great to tell him the news of my representation, since he knew exactly how big of a mountain I had climbed to even be able to make that claim. The keynote speaker that year was Geoff Herbach, who had a great speech and put on a great session. I tweeted him afterward to tell him how much I enjoyed his presentation, and later that same day he followed me. A real author, with published books and everything, following me on Twitter! it was so cool. 

This year, my fourth trip to the conference, things were quite a bit different. First of all, a little over a week ago my plan was to go to the conference, live up a day with the kids chosen to participate (because they’re writers so of course they’re good and smart and interesting) and then go straight to Barnes and Noble to buy Justin Cronin’s  new book The City of Mirrors, which was released today. That plan was torpedoed in the best of all possible ways last week when a box showed up on my front step with an early birthday present from my agent inside — a pre-release copy of The City of Mirrors. I nearly passed out.

I still had the conference to look forward to today, though. I walked around in my Watership Down t-shirt, because what else are you going to wear to a young author’s conference? It was a good conversation starter a few times when people enthusiastically recognized the listed names of “Fiver and Hazel and Blackberry and Bigwig.” (I still think Hazel should’ve been listed first, but, you know, different topic.)

The first session I went to was one of my highlights of the day: Magical Realism presented by Abby Cooper. Her debut middle grade novel Sticks and Stones will be released this coming July. We’ve known each other on Twitter for some time, but like most of the people in the Twitterverse, we had never met in person before. I told her in advance I was chaperoning that day and would be sure to come to her session. Since one of my students had a ticket to see her in the morning, I tagged along. The presentation was great, and her past teaching experience was clearly working for her. I had the chance to talk to her briefly afterward, and it felt great to make a new real-world connection to someone in the writing community. On my way out, I grabbed a couple of the bookmarks she had set out for attendees — one for her upcoming book, and another for My 7th Grade Life in Tights by Brooks Benjamin. Brooks and I both write for the "Middle Grade Minded" blog (check it out here if you want to see how awesome we all are) so I know him though that, and his book is currently perched atop my summer reading pile, just waiting for me to finish reading The City of Mirrors.

I had another session after that, then our group went outside for lunch on a nice patch of the campus grounds with a comfortable sun/shade mix where we were entertained by the same calypso band that has played the conference every year I’ve been there. After lunch we went into a book fair sponsored by The Red Balloon, one of the big-time bookstores in the Cities that specializes in books for children. I browsed with a few specific books in mind I was hoping to see, and ready to pounce at anything that even looked halfway interesting. I saw a good-sized section of Geoff Herbach’s books, and since I really liked the other two of his I’ve read (plus he did follow me on Twitter and all) I picked up his newest one, Anything You Want. As I went further down the table, I recognized a stack of copies of The Honest Truth by Dan Gemeinhart, another Middle Grade Minded contributor. Without hesitating, I shot my arm across the table and grabbed the one on the top, startling a girl who had been standing nearby and studying at the cover. She looked at me, then looked at the stack again, then looked back at me with an expression of “Really? It’s that good?” I smiled and nodded, so she picked it up, read the back, and added it to the pile she was carrying.

We had one session left before leaving, but I was shut out of the one I wanted since the room was practically full when I got there. I was totally fine with this, since I had a paper bag under my arm with three new books I could read. 

The day turned out to be another typically great experience at the Young Author’s Conference, but the thing I kept reflecting on throughout the day was how I spent most of my time there feeling like I had a foot in two separate worlds. I was primarily there as a representative from Teacher World, and spent most of my time inside of that sphere. I wore the stick-on name tag, I was recognized by the others teachers as a chaperone, I was escorting kids around and helping out others I didn’t even know who seemed confused or lost, because that’s what teachers do at events like this. 

But throughout the day I kept encountering these reminders that, even though Teacher World is the bigger part of my life right now, Author World is noticeably catching up. Never was this more apparent than the bus ride home. I was talking to one of my students, the girl who had been at Abby’s morning session with me. She hadn’t volunteered her ideas during the session (magical realism, in case that slipped your mind) so I asked what she wrote about, and this conversation happened:

“I wrote about that thing you did that one time, with the lunchbox.”

“What thing I did that one time with the lunchbox?”

“You know, when someone forgot their lunchbox, and you wrote that thing on the board. I wrote about the stuff people forget at school when they go home, and then all the stuff has a party at night but the custodian finds out.”

“You should’ve raised your hand! She would have thought that was so cool!”

She pauses and looks at me, somewhat suspiciously. “Why were you talking to her after?”

“Well, we kind of know each other.”

“Kind of?”

“We’ve known each other through Twitter for quite awhile, but this was the first time we’ve met in real life. So we talked a little bit.”

She paused again.

“Wait: You’re saying…that you know…Abby Cooper?!”

Now a few others who had seen Abby’s sessions overheard this and began to chime in: “You KNOW her? / How do you know her? / We went to her thing after lunch! / She was really fun! / She gave us these bookmarks! / She was so pretty! / I want to read her book when it comes out!”

It hit me right then, sitting in the back of a school bus full of middle graders mostly making animal and robot noises while we slowly trudged through pre-rush hour traffic: The way my girls were fangirling all over Abby wasn’t so drastically different from the low-grade starstruck fascination I’d felt during my first time I’d chaperoning the conference. Then I wondered: How would that aspiring writer version of me from years back feel about where I am now, and what my day at the 2016 conference had been like? 

He'd probably be pretty darn excited to know that my present was going to be a part of his future. Then he’d probably say, “Okay, yeah, it’s great that took the time to process all of this and that you still have the blog going after all these years. But seriously dude, if you have all of this happening now, you must have some REAL writing business to deal with. Shouldn’t you go take care of that, so you can get us to that last step already?”

And he’d be right.

Day 23: Worlds Collide, and Right in My House

Shorter post tonight. Remember a few days back, when I posted this?

Day 13: The Book Club of Destiny


Tonight is the night of that very book club meeting. I'm mostly excited, but a tiny bit anxious. This is mostly a positive anxious, though. It will certainly be a fun to have these people over to my house to talk about my book. As I'm sure I've mentioned a few times before, in my earlier days as a writer getting people to agree to read something I wrote usually involved a lot of hopeful groveling. Not tonight, though. These people were excited to read it, and so far have had very nice things to say, and I get to be there and listen to them roll through a list of discussion questions about it! All good things!

But, there's a world collision on the horizon, probably, as long as all the technology works the way it's supposed to. Which, speaking from the perspective of someone who has experienced a lot of presentation snafus happening during staff development sessions, I'll feel better about it when I know it's happening and it worked. Once book club came together with the novelty of having the author involved with the discussion, I thought, "Why stop there? Why not see if how possible it would be to also get the agent to make a cameo appearance as well?" 

Long story short, the plans are in place right now for book club to connect with Carrie tonight through cell phone and Bluetooth technology, which I'm very excited about, but this does introduce an unusual collision of Writer World and School World for me. I'm not expecting it to be anything but great, but having those two worlds not just existing side by side like they usually do, and actually overlap for a short time? It's newish territory for me, so it could feel a little weird.

Not that that's a bad thing, though. In fact, with any luck, the day won't be too far in the future where there's more overlap than independence between the two worlds.

Might as well start getting used to it now....

Day 13: The Book Club of Destiny

I've never been a member of a book club before. I think that's probably due to a combination of the people around me never really getting one off the ground, as well as my off-the-charts introverted nature (a quality which I was uncomfortably reminded today is so very real). I have nothing against book clubs. I think they could be very interesting in the right circumstances. I'll admit though the idea of sitting around and talking about a book sounds equal parts intriguing and terrifying: Intriguing because with the right group of people it could be a great bit of stimulating social interaction, and terrifying because the last experiences I had that involved discussing a book with a group of people flash me back to the one year I spent as an English major in college, and had the same collection of self-aggrandizing pseudo-intellectual porto-hipsters rotating through each of my literature classes, and almost to the person they were convinced that each of the novels we were assigned read could somehow be thematically linked to sexual frustration. 

However, I'd expect the discussion to take on a dramatically different tone than this in a book club populated by elementary school teachers. Especially if they were going to be discussing a book written for a middle grade audience. And double especially if the author was someone they all worked with.

If you've put those pieces together correctly, you've figured out that, yes, the book club from the school where I work has decided to take on one of my manuscripts for their next discussion, and 100% happy truth that it was completely unprompted by me. Back when I was doing my class read aloud of "The Ghost of Lake Emily" and posting progress updates along the way on Facebook, it got some people interested in reading it. Of course I was more than willing to send around enough PDF files for everyone who was interested.

The meeting takes place two Mondays from now. Based on some incidental check-in reports I've gotten at school, a few people have already finished reading it and some others have at least started. Response has been good so far, which is encouraging, but I'm very curious to find out what it will feel like to sit there in the room with all of these people -- I think the total right now is somewhere in the range of 10 to 13 (excluding the one who felt using her Beyoncé tickets for that same night was a bigger deal). 

It's one thing to talk to someone one-on-one about your book and get feedback and stand there trying to keep your insecurities from taking over your vital organs while you hope really hard that they liked it. I expect it's going to be a whole different experience to listen to a group of incredibly intelligent people I know and respect while they talk and ask questions about the book I've poured so much of myself into. I'm going into this experience optimistically curious, but I really don't think I can predict what it will feel like. 

However, since two Mondays is not that far off anymore, I'm going to put further posting aside for tonight and try to get a head start on Stage 1 of the housecleaning that needs to take place before that night. Yes, not only will the book club meeting be about my work, but I'll be hosting it that night as well. 

I can only hope my hospitality will influence opinions in the best of all possible ways.

The Donadio & Olson Young Adult Book Club

Ever since my name first appeared on the author’s page of the Donadio & Olson web site (the literary agency that represents me), I’ve been curious about exactly how the place works. Who all is in the office on any given day? How many of those people would know my name if I ever walked in and introduced myself? What are the dozens of things they have to get done while there? What does the place even look like?...those kinds of things, the little curious fill-in-the-blanks details. I’d catch partial glimpses of the office in occasional social media photos, and pick up interesting tidbits now and again while talking to my agent Carrie, and of course I had all the information offered up on the rest of the web site. I had the smallest of location tags to go on since the mailing address was slightly familiar from the few times I’ve needed to use it, but beyond that I had no possible frame of reference; frankly, the very idea of New York City is so foreign to me it might as well be some exaggerated version of a science fiction metropolis serving as a hub of interplanetary travel, especially from the perspective of someone planted on the edge of the Minneapolis suburbs.

However, internet searching and blind speculation was only ever going to reveal so much. And the more I thought about it, what better way is there to get to know a literary agency than by reading some of the books the place is responsible for?

I began making it a point to catch up on a number of those books. Obviously I was most curious about the ones my own agent, Carrie Howland, helped usher into the world. (I’m including her last name here in case someone running an internet search while researching agents finds this post in their results; maybe they’ll find some helpful information!) When you’re a writer and you’re querying agents, one of the most common bits of advice out there is to familiarize yourself with what agents have represented in the past so you can judge whether or not they’d be a good fit for your work. Since Carrie found me through a pitch contest, I had to go through something of a reverse approach to this, to see if I could piece together how I wound up on her list. I faithfully bought and read copies of the books by her other authors as they were released, which, as it turned out, wasn’t always super-encouraging: I was working on my own revisions as I read the other clients and would often think, “What? These people aren’t just writers, they’re ARTISTS, and I’m totally sitting here in flyover country at the little kid table and I am so woefully out of my league and HOW DID THIS HAPPEN?! Was she suffering from a crippling migraine or something like that on the day she agreed to take me on?” I looped back to that brand of insecurity more than once.

Of course I got over it, mostly by reminding myself that while it was obviously true I could never write the books those other people had written, they likely couldn’t have done what I was doing, either; different perspectives, and personal expressions, and individual voices, and a variety of life experiences and stories to tell, and all that. So, I just let my idealized image of these people traveling around on their book tours, and smiling at every person who showed up at their signings, and being effortlessly engaging during at readings or interviews or conferences sit there in my head while I worked onward. 

Along the way, social networking let me get to know a lot of these other writers. Some were eagerly/patiently anticipating the upcoming releases of their books, and I vicariously latched onto them to closely follow their progress, hoping to pick up some sense of what it could be like if/when I found myself in a similar position someday (I know, I’m hedging here, but despite the unwavering confidence I have in Carrie, I refuse to jinx anything). 

In the space of about three months this past winter, three of the books I’d been following were released almost one after the other, and of course I went and bought them all. As of this week I’ve finally finished reading all three, and now I’d like to tell you a little bit about each one and my experiences with them. Maybe you’ll recognize something here that sounds interesting to you, or possibly for someone else you know, and you’ll decide to pick any of them up for yourself. For the record, these would all be categorized as young adult, which, admittedly, is not a demographic I will ever be confused for. Teen angst? Love stories? Not usually the highways I travel. But these books, from Melissa, and Isabel, and Liza! The simple fact that Carrie had decided to represent them out of the so many other options she had was more than enough endorsement for me.

Whether or not I get strange looks when I take pictures of the books I'm buying totally depends on the cashier. 

Arrows, by Melissa Gorzelanczyk
To start, I’m proud to say I know Melissa well enough that I could list some of her favorite bands for you, and also I spelled her last name right on the first try without looking it up (not to mention I could pronounce it for you as well). Arrows was the first of the three I read. Melissa was one of the first of Carrie’s clients to congratulate me when I joined the agency, so she was one of my initial gateways into the writing world. She’d gotten her book deal just months earlier, so I’d been waiting for a good long time to get a look at her work.

Arrows is so much of a love story that the cover art is a heart-shaped balloon pierced by an arrow. It’s a teenage love story at its core, but also a combination of greek mythology and teen pregnancy, taking place inside the worlds of high school, competitive dance, and Mount Olympus. As I read my way into this story of a Cupid trying to repair a mistake made that changes the trajectory of a promising young dancer’s life, I’m thinking, “high school…check, love story…check, swooning…check, dance…check, mysterious new boy in town…check.…” and then out of nowhere BOOM, somehow I was halfway done without even realizing how much I’d read, and I was thinking, “Oh, come on!! I know, I get it, magical arrows and all, but how can Karma not see how wrong that complete chump of a boyfriend is for her?!” I got pulled into such a quick read that I finished it in two sittings, the second of which was an afternoon marathon that seeped so deeply into my subconscious I actually dreamt about the characters that night. 

Bookishly Ever After, by Isabel Bandeira
After finishing Melissa’s book, I went into this one more open minded when it came to reading about teenage romance. Isabel was another writer who had things coming together with her book just as I arrived on the Donadio list, so I got to witness online moments like her trying to decide on author photos and promotional bookmarks, which, from my perspective, were checklist items almost too awesome to imagine.

Right away I saw this book would revolve around something I didn’t know anything about: Book Boyfriends. I didn’t know that was even a thing until a year or two ago, but the main character here was all about that because she was always reading, and was mentally bouncing between a guy at school she had a crush on, and the guy at school her best friend was steering her toward, and the romantic leads in the books she read. She had a fairly normal high school life even though she was constantly reading, and tended to see her world how her favorite book characters would, which sometimes got her into awkward moments but also bolstered her up to do things that may have been going against her more shy nature, particularly when the guys at school were involved. Isabel wrote parallel passages from the books her main character Phoebe was reading, to demonstrate how Phoebe would use ideas from her favorite books to guide some of her decisions; I asked Isabel once how thoroughly she had worked out the fictional books Phoebe was reading. She said she had fairly extensive outlines for each. Which I thought was awesome. 

By the time I was maybe a hundred pages in, I was thinking, “These kids seem to have a decent and relatively comfortable high school existence going on. Not the worst life to have, I guess, but outside of this girl who reads a lot, I don’t have anyone to relate to. How do I connect to this?” And after awhile it came to me: I had no connection to it, not really. But that turned out to be my hook, to take this book as a window into a world that otherwise I wouldn’t have known anything about (and probably isn't so different from the world my nephews live in right now). From there the whole thing became something like permitted eavesdropping as I followed all of the things these kids did in their lives, and how they interacted with each other, and what was important to them. From that perspective it just got more and more fascinating to witness.

Hello?, by Liza Wiemer
This one tells the story of how the lives of a group of teenagers intersect due to a phone call that may not have been as random as it first seemed, and proved to be a catalyst for many things that followed. The hook here is how the narration is shared between five characters, with the same events unfolding and told through their varied perspectives. Beyond having each character narrate in a particular voice, two of them even go into different formats as one recounts the events as part of a screenplay she is writing, and another interprets them through poetry. Each character experiences some kind of change as secrets (some even kept from themselves) come to light as the invisible strings binding the five kids bring them closer together. It reminded me a lot of a book called Among Friends I'd been assigned to read in my MA program, in the way the characters traded off narration duties throughout the story. I had some long reads in this one as well, and, as I told Liza once on Twitter while I was reading, I discovered that Bob Mould’s music (his new album “Patch the Sky” in particular) served as a good soundtrack for the book. It’s tricky enough to write a story with one of the characters narrating in the first person, but to do that with five people at once, and to do it with five different voices so distinctly written that you never forget which character is telling the story? Not an easy feat to pull off, and she did it really well.

Now that I’ve finished the set, I almost feel like I just read one really long book instead of three moderately long ones. In the time it took to finish my YA trifecta, another of Carrie’s clients had a release date show up, which now means Kaitlyn Greenidge’s now-acclaimed bit of literary fiction “We Love You, Charlie Freeman” will soon be added to my summer reading queue. I’ve got some other books to get to before that, but now that I’m done with Arrows, Bookishly Ever After, and Hello? I feel I have an even better idea about what draws Carrie to a project than I did before. First off, I think it’s fair to say her interests are pretty diverse. For this I’m eternally thankful, since the two manuscripts she and I are working with are about as different as two middle grade stories could be, and she still really likes them both. Additionally, I’d say what pulls her in about the books she wants to represent is ultimately the writing. Every one of the books she’s sold that I’ve read, of course including these most recent three, have been the kind that can occasionally pull you out of the story because you just have to take a moment and appreciate how skillfully the writing was crafted.

For my part, it’s humbling to think I was even considered to be included on a list with any of these writers. As solitary of an endeavor as writing can frequently be, these books stand as testimony to how I find myself in some extremely good company. If anything, knowing what the other writers at Donadio & Olson, and especially the ones on Team Howland, are capable of producing only pushes me to try even harder.

Day 28: The Shark Curtain and Beyond

Just a few days ago I finished reading a book called The Shark Curtain. The author’s name is Chris Scofield, and it’s her debut novel. Full disclosure: It’s entirely possible I never would have found it if not for the happy fact that Chris and I are both represented by the same agent -- Carrie Howland of Donadio & Olson (I may have mentioned her once or twice.)

As one might expect, I’ve become very interested in what kinds of books the agency (and Carrie specifically) represents. I’ll admit, I still have moments of feeling like I snuck into this whole writing world through a back door someone forgot to close all the way, or showed up at the party after finding someone else’s invitation on a sidewalk. Throughout this time it’s been fascinating to learn and experience so many new things, including having any kind of connection, no matter how tenuous, to a published book.

The Shark Curtain is told from the perspective of a girl named Lily Asher as she’s growing up through her teenage years during the 1960s. Lily’s life is occasionally complicated by both the dynamics of her family and her own internal conflicts, which frequently have a way of spilling out and affecting the world around her. I know that’s a vague description but I don’t want to give too much away, especially since there are so many layers to Lily as a character that I think would be best discovered by reading the book, and I highly recommend people do just that. As soon as I finished reading it, I walked around the house in a sort of book hangover, knowing there wasn’t any more story for me to read, but not quite being ready for it to end and not quite sure what I was supposed to do with myself next after exiting the book and re-entering my own world. Hopefully you're familiar with that feeling, because it means you’ve been reading the kinds of books that can take over your life.

Right after finishing Chris’s book, I started in on the manuscript of another one of Carrie’s clients, Rachel Simon, after she and I had been catching up on Facebook one night and got to talking about our manuscripts and decided to trade. It’s pretty common for writers to connect with other writers, and usually discuss or share their work. But for me at least, the experience of reading a published book, or one on its way there, and being able to express any ideas about it with the author is new enough to be an exciting novelty.

A good-sized cluster of us writers represented by Carrie have found each other online and have formed a nice, happy little socially-networked group (Team Howland shout out!). I had the chance to connect with Chris while I was reading her book. We’ve had some nice exchanges, and I can say she’s now responsible for about 80% of the movies currently listed in my Netflix queue (I almost don’t dare give her recommendations in return since she obviously has better taste than I do). For most of my life I've tended to narrowly identify an author with their writing instead of acknowledging the obvious truth that writing is a lot of made-up storytelling and can have very little to do with the person telling it. I feel I've gotten a few glimpses about why Chris was the perfect person to write The Shark Curtain, but now being on the writer side myself, I've appreciated getting to know her and the other Team Howland members as people, beyond what they write about.

I’ve always seen writing as a solitary endeavor. The first full-length manuscript I wrote to completion was mostly done between the hours of 12:00 and 3:00 AM during a summer break that saw my usual sleeping patterns shot to hell. I would take stabs at the research involved in querying agents, and occasionally would be lucky enough to encounter other writers who could relate to what I was trying to accomplish. All these years later, it's nice to find myself becoming more comfortable with the larger world of writing and the people who are a part of it.

As I write this, there's a HUGE publishing event taking place in New York -- BookExpo America. Some of the people I've mentioned here are attending and getting to meet people in the industry, and making new connections, and spending time surrounded by books and writing and all kinds of people who bring these things into the world. It's easy to feel slightly out of the loop being a thousand miles away from all of that, but then I'll remember that things might not always be that way, and maybe the time will come when it's my book leaving people stumbling through a reading hangover. Until then, it's great fun being able to see others experience that from a front row seat.