seduced by the written word

Last time I was in Savannah I visited Folklorico on Bull Street. Folklorico inspired the shop in my manuscript, All Things Unusual, and I can’t resist going inside. So after a morning walk through Forsyth Park I ducked under the orange awning to discover their latest treasures.

On this visit I was charmed by the Hindu Goddess Saraswati, the Goddess of learning, knowledge, and the creative power of Brahma:

After leaving Savannah, as we sped down the highway on our roadtrip, The Goddess had a safe spot in the backseat. When we were looking for cowgirl boots in Austin, Texas, The Goddess came along:

And every night when we wheeled our suitcases into the latest hotel we would bring The Goddess into the room. If the car got stolen, so be it, as long as The Goddess remained with us.

Sara means ‘essence’ and swa means ‘self’ in Sanskrit. It feels right having the essense of the self looking over me as I write.

Today was meant to be a writing day. A day dedicated to moving my manuscript forward. But as I was lying in bed, just thinking about getting up, voices floated up from the dock outside our window. The voices were saying that today was the annual floating homes tour. It’s a day when tourists with cameras arrive to wander the docks and tour houseboats while local artists sell their work and speakers amplify music that drifts down the docks and dances over the water. Somehow The Big Day had snuck up on me.

Okay, now I’m going to sound like Scrooge, but honestly, if you aren’t a tourist, it’s the kind of day that makes you just want to leave home until it’s over. So we went into the City and queued up in front of Brenda’s www.frenchsoulfood.com/ on Polk for some cafe au lait, beignets (plain and crawfish) and catfish Benedict. Yes, I was missing New Orleans.  And, yes, the food was worth the wait.

Appetites sated, we moved to the Embarcadero and the Ferry Building www.ferrybuildingmarketplace.com/

Where we sampled and bought cheese from Cowgirl Creamery www.cowgirlcreamery.com …..

Strolled through the Farmer’s Market in search of the perfect pluot….

And returned home as the last tourists were boarding their bus. Just in time to sit down at the keyboard and write.

Who knew I’d run into Janet Evanovich www.evanovich.com in the Newark airport bookstore at 4:00 in the morning back when I posted Evanovich Fever a few weeks back? Certainly not me.

This is the book I’ve been waiting for, the one I’ll be reading by flashlight under the covers in the nights ahead……or maybe I’ll just download it onto my ereader like a normal person would.

When the Trenton exit loomed ahead it was tempting to take it just in case I might see a Lula look-alike in the berg, but Bill stuck with the New Jersey turnpike until we reached the Jersey shore and I’m glad of it:

What was I doing in this gorgeous spot? I’d tagged along for a weekend reunion of Bill’s, Billy’s, childhood friends from Scranton, Pennsylvania, home of Dunder Mifflin http://www.dundermifflin.com/ 

Nancy Dempsey’s beautiful home on the Jersey Shore was the perfect retreat for this group of wiseguys. What a bunch of warmhearted, wisecracking, painfully funny, Irish Catholic storytellers. Almost made me wish I’d gone to school with them….but then again, that would mean they’d know all the skeletons in my closet, too.

In my quest for all things Evanovich, I had the opportunity to eat that well-known New Jersey delicacy:  TastyKakes. 

Sometimes it seems life couldn’t possibly get any better.

I promise not to write about every truck stop along highway 10 between Savannah and Sausalito during my recent road trip. But I will say this about New Orleans….I happened to be there during the fifth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina and it was very wet.

Because I’ve read all of Anne Rice’s vampire and witch novels, www.annerice.com/ the Garden District holds a special fascination for me. According to my tour guide, this is where she wrote those books prior to moving to La Jolla:

Yes, the photograph is blurry. I took it during a downpour (notice the person in the yard wearing a blue rain slicker).  The tour guide also took me to a nearby cemetery:

where I found myself ankle-deep in mud and rain water. I know, you’re feeling jealous right about now, but that’s life.

My favorite part of the visit was eating beignets and drinking cafe au lait in the French Quarter at Cafe Du Monde www.cafedumonde.com/

Months ago, for no apparent reason, I blogged about where I go in San Francisco when I’m craving beignets. Yes, I am driven by certain, shall we say….sweet addictions. So I’m sure you won’t be surprised to learn that the beignets and cafe au lait at Cafe Du Monde were so inspirational I envisioned a scene I will be writing this week. Who needs a muse? Just pass the beignets, please.

But some take longer than others. That’s stop-and-go traffic on highway 101 along the California coast somewhere near Santa Barbara:

After nine days of driving, Hannah and I limped home to Sausalito. Our route began in Savannah and we stopped along the way in New Orleans, San Antonio, Austin, El Paso, Palm Springs and San Jacinto. We listened to Elizabeth Gilbert’s audio of Eat, Pray, Love www.elizabethgilbert.com/eatpraylove.htm  and made our own pilgrimage to In-N-Out Burger once we crossed the border into Southern California. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s go back to where our story began: Savannah, GA…….

This was my first trip to the historic  district in August and the cicadas in Forsyth Park were deafening. And although Savannahians have warned me away from summers in the historic district I loved every minute of it — feeling my hair frizz within seconds of walking outside is like a science experiment, right?

Time was spent researching sites for my work-in-progress; I had to see what the light was like late at night on a certain corner on Bull Street, out in the Starland District, where a murder occurs. It was just as spooky as I had imagined it as I wrote the scene back on our houseboat in Sausalito.

My first morning in town I got together with my friend Harriet www.savannahsites.com/ at Gallery Espresso. Here’s my favorite view of Chippewa Square taken through the window where we sat:

Harriet and I commiserated about this and that over iced coffee, moved one Square over for lunch, and then we walked over to E. Shaver Booksellers on Madison Square where she recommended Mary K. Andrews book, Savannah Blues, www.marykayandrews.com/ After long days of driving I enjoyed carrying Savannah with me through its pages and finished the novel at my parent’s house in San Jacinto, which was perfect timing, since that was our last stop before home.

On one of my walks I met Alice and Candy in Twiggs of Savannah, www.twiggsofsavannah.com/ as they prepared to move the needlepoint shop to 2 Liberty Street. There were so many fun choices I was overwhelmed. We had a friendly chat, and when I mentioned I was beginning to house hunt, they directed me to a darling home on Liberty Street:

If  it is still for sale on my next visit I’ll have to take a serious look. But there was no time on this trip because early the next morning Hannah and I hit the road for New Orleans.

In a few hours I’ll fly to Savannah and stay across the street from Forsyth Park:

I’ll catch up with friends and check facts for my latest manuscript.

Then, Hannah and I hit the road. We’ll visit New Orleans in hopes the Vampire Lestat is home, Austin’s music scene, and then…….the  road will stretch before us for MILES……. until we reach San Francisco and home…….

Many writers prefer writing the first draft and dislike the revision process. I’m the opposite. For me, the first draft is fraught with blank spots where I sit and stare at the screen and try to figure out what comes next. Hate that part. My happiest writing comes after I’ve laid down the bare bones and thoughts begin to spark and connect.

I made progress today but it was slow and I’m feeling grumpy about it. So let me tell you about what I just finished reading….

Sizzling Sixteen by Janet Evanovich www.evanovich.com/

 The first Evanovich I read was, Plum Spooky. It was a random read, number 18 in her Stephanie Plum series, so it was out of sequence. I didn’t know what to expect, and from page one I couldn’t believe what I was reading. It was a crazy, wild ride with a chimpanzee in the backseat.

Even so, you might wonder why would I go back, start from the beginning, and read all twenty Stephanie Plum books? They do have a predictability about them: Ranger and Morelli will vie for Stephanie’s body, Lula’s going to be eating, or talking about eating, and popping out of her ‘ho clothes, together they’re going to lose their skips and Stephanie will end up wearing garbage, there will be chimpanzees and alligators and Stephanie’s car will explode, and Grandma Mazur will cause a scene at the mortuary…

….wait, get Janet Evanovich on the phone, I’ve written the outline for number seventeen.

Knowing all the above, why do I count down the months in anticipation of her latest release? Because Janet Evanovich writes the snappiest, funniest, laugh-out-loud-and-wake-everyone-in-the-house dialogue. She makes Trenton, New Jersey a destination point. Guaranteed. I’m crazy about her characters and I love what they have to say. Even now. Reaching the final page is sad because the ride has come to an end. But wait….

Wicked Appetite, a Diesel novel will be released September 14, 2010. Just a few more weeks of anticipation before we can dig in.

One of the things I enjoy about writing a novel is the research. Yes, it is fiction and I am making most of it up, but at some point, something arises in the plot, or with a character, and making it up just isn’t good enough. This week I reached that point in my work-in-progress and today I had my first interview to discover the nuances of my main character’s job.

The first interview I ever conducted took place as a journalism student back when I was a freshman at Eisenhower High School. You may assume I was a journalism student because of my longstanding love of writing, but as I recall, I was a journalism student so I could schedule interviews with cute boys on the swim team.   In retrospect, it was very entrepreneurial of me. Of course, after I interviewed Roy Cencirullo, I was forced to follow-up and actually write about water polo.

Thankfully, those Byzantine days are behind me. Today, I interviewed Ilza Lewis over a slice of tres leche cake from Sweet Things Bakery in Tiburon. My goal? To help bring authenticity to a scene.

What?! You think I may have had ulterior motives? Perhaps I wanted to get closer to the rugala as it was being pulled, fresh from the oven? Yeah, that too.

Ilza gave me the inside scoop on what it’s like to open a bakery while it’s dark outside and the rest of us are snuggled into the sheets. And in case you were wondering, yes, it still smells sweet from the previous day’s baking when you walk into the kitchen at 3:30 in the morning. Because I’m a baked goods addict, I had to pursue this: “So the kitchen smells sweet. Sweet, like what?” I asked.

“It smells like cake,” Ilza said.

“Like cake?” I reflected, not willing to let the moment go.

“Yes, like caramelized sugar.”

Oh boy. Now we’re talking. 

Ilza was generous with her time and knowledge, but I’m not sharing more with you today; the rest goes straight into the manuscript.

Now that I have a literary agent, Jill Grosjean, working to sell my manuscript, All Things Unusual, my writing hours are consumed with working on the latest manuscript. But reading is such a passion; I always find time for it. Here’s the book I just finished:

I’ve read every Jack Reacher book Lee Child has written http://www.leechild.com  I’ve also seen him at a book signing at Book Passage www.bookpassage.com  The line between fan and groupie probably blurs after reading all fourteen of his books. Why are these books so good?

No one writes vengeance better than Lee Child, and no one embodies it better than his main character, Jack Reacher.

Here’s what I’ve discovered when it’s after midnight and I’ve glanced at the clock and decided that I’ll read just one more chapter: vengeance can be quite satisfying. There are no calories involved, it will keep you up past your bedtime, and it will be good for you. Trust me on this.  

As a reader, I love all the Reacher books because they’re page turners. You can’t put them down. As soon as I finish the final page I hand the book to Bill and say, “You’ve got to read this.” Usually, our literary tastes do not align, but on this we agree: there’s nothing better than vicariously being alone in the dark on the road with Reacher as he sets out for justice. You know that when the moment of reckoning arrives there will be no turning back. It’s going to be good.   

Because I love to write, I’m also reading for technique. And reading Lee Child is a lesson in relentless tension and pacing. Of course, like all lessons, it comes down to execution. Sure, anyone can admire and deconstruct his work, but there’s only one Lee Child. And if you haven’t had the pleasure of reading him, you really should do something about that. Just saying.

If you’ve read Stephenie Meyer’s page turner, Twilight, you’re familiar with Forks, Washington, www.stepheniemeyer.com/twilight_forks.html   

Often, I feel like I live in Forks, because, baby, it’s cold outside. Not to mention damp. Here’s what it looked like from our dock, yesterday:

And that’s during the daytime. I was dressed warm, down to my Uggs, and I still needed to turn on the heater. So, if you are in a spot where you can:

Hear a screen door slam behind you,

Feel the grass between your toes,

Watch the kids play in the sprinklers,

Complain about the heat as you pour a cool glass of lemonade or sweet tea,

Barbeque in shorts and a t-shirt,

I’m not envious – I’m flat-out jealous.

The upside, and yes, I’m really having to search for one, is its good weather to stay inside and write. Arrrrggh.

The other upside is I’m planning a trip to Savannah in late August. My completed manuscript, All Things Unusual, is set in Savannah, but my work in progress begins there, as well. I’ll arrive just in time to appreciate the historic district during a Southern summer. That’s right, I can’t wait to have sweat drip off the tip of my nose.