Yenta

I am a collector. I collect interesting things. I don't collect knick-knacks or bobbles or commemorative plates and coins. I do collect books but that is righteous and hardly considered a collection - more like a beginning library. Anyway, what I collect is information. This usually take the form of business cards and take-out menus.

In a recent "The Kill Zone" blog, James Scott Bell posted about discoverability. It's an interesting look at being successful as a writer. In a nut shell it talks about how writing is hard, marketing is easy, and discoverability is our of our hands. And he's right. To be successful at whatever we want to do we have to be discovered. We can shout as loudly as we can from the tallest mountain we can climb about how great we are or how great our product is, but until someone listens and buys what we're selling, it means nothing.

What I've found during my lifetime is that getting your needs fulfilled is hard if you don't know where to look. It used to be that if you needed a plumber you let your fingers do the walking and checked the yellow pages. Now you can go online and search for ratings, or comments on Angie's List (provided you don't mind paying for a subscription AND they have a site in your area). I have found that the BEST way to get a reputable plumber or electrician or a recommendation for a good restaurant is by word of mouth. What businesses, and really all of us, need is not more marketing, they need networking - matchmaking.

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Wherever I've lived I've paid attention to what people say, collect business cards and other tidbits that are of interest. It helps that I'll talk to anyone about anything. (It also helps if you live in an area where people actually are willing to share information.) That way if I overhear someone needing a plumber, I can pipe up and suggest one. Need an electrician? I have one of those too. A clock repair man? Yup. Need trees removed? I have a recommendation. For a business, a good reputation and recommendations are the key to survival if not growth.

It's that way with regular people too. Sometimes we just need to be matched with the right church, parent group, or whatever. So, if someone offers you a business card or suggests something, pay attention and give it a try. You may be surprised to find that the best match isn't made by the biggest marketing budget. Listen to the Yenta.

In Search Of Pizza

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Friday night is Pizza Night at the Rhoden household. There are 52 Fridays in a year so the quality of pizza is vital. I grew up in the northeast so I know quality pizza. We had Steve's Pizza, and Balzanos. We won't even talk about the pizza you could get in Providence on "Garlic Mountain" or in Boston, and of course, New York. My husband grew up in Maryland so he knows crab cakes. That being the case, the responsibility of finding a really good pizza falls on my shoulders. I haven't lived in the northeast since I was 17 when I went away to college so the task of finding pizza in the south that can compare has been a long journey.

I'm not disparaging southern cooks. Southern food is fabulous in its own right. I mean really, who doesn't love chicken and dumplings, or fried chicken? Pizza requires the right touch and the right water to make the right crust. Fortunately, I lived in Florida and saw the great in flux of Yankees of the 1980s and 90s. With the Yankees came pizza.

One of the best pizzas that came to our little town is Scorpio's Pizza. The pizza is fantastic and their other offerings are equally wonderful. If you make it to Deltona, FL for any reason, you must have one of their pizzas. I was very happy to introduce my husband to real pizza and he loved it! Scorpios Pizza established our "pizza scale" in our quest for a good pizza. I'm happy to see that they've been successful and have two locations now.

We have settled here in Georgia and our pursuit for pizza continues. We prefer to try the mom & pop run pizza places for good food, and cozy atmosphere. We like it when we can get to know the people there and they know us (yes, like Cheers, "where everyone knows your name"). We thought we had found that place and for the last 3 years we have been patronizing the same location every Friday night (well, most Friday nights). Little Man was still in an infant carrier when we found the place. He grew up there. and for the first two years it was great. The people knew us by name. They knew our order without needing to take it. We tipped well. Little Man had his first bite of garlic bread there. He had his first taste of pizza there. When he started talking, he knew their names. Last year our place changed ownership. The food is still good but the atmosphere has changed and all the people we knew left.

So, with a heavy heart, we have begun our search for a really good pizza and a really good atmosphere. Last week we tried a place and loved the pizza. The atmosphere wasn't bad either but it was a bigger place and not necessarily "cozy." The pizza ranked 7 on the Scorpio's scale and the atmosphere placed a 5 or 6. This Friday we will try another place to see how they rate.

In my novel, which yes, I'm still revising, Walter Martin has a regular place where he is known. What do you look for in a "regular" place to go? Good food? Good atmosphere? Friendliness? Let me know some of your stories.

Too Much Or Too Little And How Do You Know?

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So, I like to cook. It is a creative outlet for me although I admit to falling down on this a bit recently. Toddlers don't really like to experiment with food and I don't like cooking separate meals all the time so we've been eating like children lately. Or ordering out so someone else can cook separate meals. But, when I do cook, I enjoy it because I can combine and layer flavors and textures making something pleasing to the palette. Or, as my husband says, "Mmmmm! This is good! You can make this again."

I like knitting too because I can combine knits with purls to add texture and patterns. Throw in different color yarns and make stripes. Make cables too and Celtic knots. My goal is to learn Nordic patterns (yikes!). I know what you're thinking. You live in the south, you don't need sweaters and mittens. No, but I have family up there. Besides, an Irish sweater or Nordic sweater just plain looks cool.

Needlepoint and embroidery is fun for me too. Same reasons - different color yarns, different materials (wool or floss), different stitches. All yield different textures and patterns.

As you all know, I have also been editing and revising my novel. There was a horrible error that was caught by one of my beta readers. Terrible, but no big deal really (now that the twitching has stopped). I'll just move some chapters around and alter a few things. The important thing is that it was caught and can be corrected! Yay!

But the one thing that has me scratching my head is more about editing than revising. I have had some readers say they like certain things, and others say they don't like it. I've read blogs and editing resources that say don't do this, but then in just about every book I've read or am currently reading, it's there.

I'm not talking about too many or redundant adverbs. He shouted loudly. Duh, how else do you shout? I'm not talking about asides - he thought to himself. Well, who else do you think to? I'm not talking about weird physical things (although I've seen this in many professionally published books) - her eyes followed him down the street. No, her gaze, stare, glance can follow, but not her eyes.

I'm talking about what's called "stage direction." You know, telling what the character is doing. I get that we don't need to know that the character opened the refrigerator door, reached in, pulled out a beer and opened it. He lifted it to his mouth and drank deep gulps, downing the beverage in a matter of seconds. Simply saying he downed a beer may be enough. I agree, that that much detail is too much. But, I've had some readers say they like to know what the character is doing (downing the beer) and others say, cut it all out. Which is right?

I can't "taste" it to see if there is too much salt or "feel" it for too loose or tight stitches. When do you know what to cut and what to keep? If I cut too much, will the story now be a little stiff? If I don't cut enough, will it be trite? I guess I'll just have to make that decision on my own.

Revision *twitch*

Well, after the second edit of my novel (I'm still calling it Murder at the Primrose Inn), I sent it out to a number of betas. One came back with preliminary thoughts, two had partial thoughts, my Dad says he has "nits to pick with me" once he's finished reading it. One beta received it just the other day so I don't expect to hear back from him for a few days at least. Anyway, my friend Allison used to work in forensics and she told me that I had a serious problem with the discovery of my victim's cause of death. *gasp* So, now what?

Revision. Or re-envision. Rearrange. Re-research. Yes, it's time to correct the GLARING error by rearranging some of the events in the story. No big deal really. *twitch* That and I need to play up the sub-plot a little more and build tighter tension. Okay. *twitch* All of which can be done with the story I have simply by revising. (yeah, right, simple)

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Building blocks. Right now I have a big pile of blocks that are good colors, sizes and shapes. I've managed to stack them into what is some sort of structure, but it teeters. My goal is to rearrange the stack into a towering castle. It's like the movie Premonition, all out of order. Put it in the correct order and it will make more sense. *twitch*

I'm okay, *twitch* really. It's my first novel and I didn't expect to get it perfect right off the bat. I didn't expect to get it right the second round of edits or even the third without having to do revisions. The important thing is that it will eventually be right and good! And I am grateful for all of these people who are helping me to get it that way. *twitch*

Editing and Revising

Last week after a one month hiatus, I started editing and revising the adolescent scribbling I call my novel. A couple of evil fiends friends offered to be fresh eyes and they have made a number of harsh suggestions that I'm sure will make my novel better.

Two things have surprised me. First, how taking a break from my novel could change my perspective. Now that I'm not living in wrapped up in the storyline or held captive captivated by the characters on a daily basis, I can be more objective. This is good because I can look at the evil criticisms suggestions that were made without taking them personally. More than likely, the critiques are things I'd have seen too.

Second, just how impossible difficult editing and revising can be. You have to look for punctuation, grammar and spelling. Then there's continuity, repetition, gaps, cliche, awkwardness, wordsmithing, triteness, imagery, etc. Somethings will get cut and condensed, others will get expanded and explored. The hard part is knowing what makes the story better.

I hope the shredding editing of my novel won't take as long as writing it did. I'd like to get this over and done with finished as soon as it's ready. In the meantime, I have started my second novel. The working title is Untitled.

I Don't Sit at the Cool Table

Growing up we moved around a lot. We finally settled in a small town when I was in 4th grade. Seems early enough to settle in but it was one of those small towns where unless your parents were born there, and you were born there, then you just didn't quite fit in. It doesn't matter to an adult because adults have other concerns that take precedence to fitting in. To a kid, however, it can be consuming.

As a result of being an "outsider," I didn't get to sit at the cool table in school. I did have lots of friends that ranged across the strata of high school society. I had band friends (even though the extent of musical ability is to recognize that music is playing), geek friends (even though I wasn't quite as smart as they were), motor head friends (mostly because my brother was a motor head and they had awesome muscle cars), derelict friends (even though I had ambitions) and even a jock or two (mostly males needing the answers to Mr. Sullivan's English Lit. test). The cool kids, especially the cool girls, excluded me.

Life went on and I went to college, got married, got divorced, had success in several career paths, made a lot of good friends, owned my own home, bought several cars, got married again, moved around a bit, had a baby, yada, yada, blah, blah, blah. In all that time, not being a cool girl didn't bother me or matter. Oddly, the social media phenomenon of Facebook has reconnected some of us as friends as adults.

Still, there lingers that background insecurity of not being quite good enough to be cool. This insecurity resurfaced the other day at my son's school when the cool moms were gathered in the parking lot. These are the moms with the coordinating jewelry and make-up. Their workout shoes match their cashmere hoodies and the piping on their yoga pants. They gather in the parking lot near their Escalades/Suburbans/Expeditions to arrange a Zumba/hot-yoga/pilates/mani-pedi/coffee get together. Our children are friends, but I am not cool enough. At least that's what it felt like when their conversation stopped until I'd passed by them.

Truth is, I've got a good 10 - 15 years on these gals and I don't fall into their generation. And even if I were to be invited to the Zumba/hot-yoga/pilates/mani-pedi/coffee get together I'd probably turn it down. Really? Zumba, hot-yoga, pilates? I can't do that anymore! I'm, um, over thirty-five! I'm not the mani-pedi type either. Coffee? Maybe. As long as it's not organic or low fat. Besides, my muscle car could put their SUV in the dust. Wanna have some real fun ladies? Let's hit the time track!

I know that these sub-surface insecurities have in some way driven me down certain paths or caused me to put I extra effort to try to be an over-achiever. That's not a bad thing. I have to wonder what childhood situations may have affected my characters' personalities and given them an underlying impetus to their actions as the adults I write about. Should I include a FULL biography, to include childhood, as part of their back stories? Does it matter in the end? And all of my characters are cool, even if I'm not.

Family

 

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Yesterday was my birthday. I'm not shy about my age so I'll tell you up front I am over thirty-five. I took the day "off" meaning I only did laundry, straightened the house once, made a crock pot dinner and watched the Little Man. I did have chocolate cake with chocolate frosting and a red frosting rose on it as has been my tradition since I was five. Well, I experimented with ice cream cake in my teens, but I returned to my senses as an adult. For my birthday I received a few cards and a number of Facebook greetings. The best gift, however came from my husband and son. Little Man sang Happy Birthday to me. The first chorus he substituted his name for Mama but corrected it in the subsequent five verses. We even sang it as our bedtime song. My gift was two plaster stars. One with pretty colored glass tiles and stones pressed into it and the other one is painted multiple colors with the word Mama spelled out in glitter. To me, they are the most beautiful things I've ever seen. The real gift is not the stars but having watched Hubby and Little Man together for the past few days. They went shopping on Sunday together, then they worked together in the garage for days. I could hear the giggles and laughter and that was wonderful.

So, of course, I start thinking about birthdays past and family. One of the many, many, many projects I'm working on is the family tree. Not just my side, but my husband's side as well since this is something I want to pass down to Little Man. I don't want to just find names and dates of people. I want photos, if I can get them and stories if I can find people still alive that remember things. And memories from my siblings too. And maps to show the family's migration across this country. I want a family orchard, not just a tree. I am the middle child of three. My brother has two children. Someday my son and my brother's sons will have families of their own too. So, because I'm weird, I start thinking not just about the ancestors that have been but also about the descendent to come. What will I leave them?

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I have lived over thirty-five years and in that time I have learned that family is important. There are different kinds of family though. There's the blood-kin as my mother would say. Then there is the adopted family. My sister-in-law was adopted but her parents and her brother (also adopted) were a family just the same. Certainly, my husband's family is now my family and my family is now my husband's family. And then there's what I call extended family. These are the people who mean a lot to you - best friends you think of as a sister or brother, mentors that are like an aunt or uncle or even a parent. I consider myself fortunate because I have many of such people in my life. These all belong in the orchard.

So, because I did take the day "off" leaving me lots of time to just think, I started thinking about how my family orchard is really my back story, or at least part of it. So my characters must also have a family orchard. It may, or may not, play into the storyline of my novel but it could add to their personality, idiosyncrasies, hobbies, neuroses and psychoses. Perhaps, when it comes time to edit and revise and I need to deepen my characters, I might want to look into their family orchards. I feel bad because right now, I don't know when Walter's birthday is. Maybe he should share mine.

Technology

I'm a reasonably intelligent person, however, dealing with Technology can leave me frustrated, short-tempered and near tears mired in insecurity and emotional abandonment. Yes, Technology has left me behind. I call it Technology because along with Earth, Fire, Wind and Water, it has become the fifth element.

I grew up in an age of rotary phones and televisions you had to manually change the channels on (that means turn the knob). I learned to type on a typewriter! Not even an electric one!! Microwave ovens didn't come out until I was in middle school. Our first "remote control" had a looooong cord that went from the controller to the VCR. The VCR was the size of a small car which was okay because the TV was a gigantic piece of furniture. We got our first computer when I was in high school. It actually used floppy discs. The big floppy ones! And you had to type in C:\\ as an opening statement. That's right, DOS! *gasp*

I was excited in 1988 to purchase my first home that was pre-wired for phones and cable in every room! And they were phone outlets - you plugged the phone cord in yourself! WOW! In 1995 I purchased my first microwave when my toaster oven died. And in 1998 I made the BIG leap. My father bought me a computer (the floppy discs were the hard 3" ones then) and I got my first cell phone! Let's just say that both devices were large. The "technology" to use these things was not very challenging either. It took very little time or emotional involvement to deal with them. Now the computers and phones are smaller and they are merging. There is something unholy about it.

This weekend I got my first "smart" phone. I was amazed at how deftly the young man with the tight jeans, man scarf and faux-hawk could caress the phone and manipulate it -  bringing up different screens, flip them around, open something new, go back and return it to the home page. I was lost and just wanted to play peek-a-boo with my toddler. Personally, I don't care what anyone under the age of 35 says, Technology is not simple or intuitive. It is mocking and manipulative. And I'm pretty sure it is male. I say this because my husband and two-year-old son have no problem with it.

An excerpt from this weekend:

Me: (angry) This @$!?&*% phone is broken. It froze.

Husband: What happened?

Me: (whining) I was trying to set up this app. I got to this page and pressed "next" but nothing happened.

Husband: Hmmm. Did you go back?

Me: It won't let me.

Husband: What are you doing now?

Me: (near tears) Pressing "next" again.

Husband: Why? It didn't work the first time.

Me: (having a nervous breakdown) Maybe it didn't understand. Maybe it didn't hear me. Maybe if I keep pressing the &*%$@?! button, it will finally work!

Long story short, it works now. I can answer the phone and send text messages on it and that's good for me right now.

Since we are updating our fixer-upper house, we are also updating the electrical things like outlets and switches. While we were putting these things in the cart, my husband starts to look at the complicated electrical things for the office we will be working on at some point. These things had USB ports, AV inputs and other outlets I've never SEEN before. So what's next? A "smart" house? Cars that drive themselves? Soylent Green?

My main character, Walter, is also not technologically savvy. He, like me, prefers to use the computer and phone as the tools they are and not as a way of life (head down, ear buds in, unconscious to the rest of the world). However, times are changing and Technology is here to stay (and manipulate us, and alter our world view). Since I am not up-to-date on these things, this is where I have to do research when characters show up who are technically skilled. So, if you see me in a puddle of tears, notebook open, pen in hand, standing in front of the Geek Squad counter being stared at by a young man with a man scarf and faux-hawk, I'm just doing research.

What's For Dinner

As the mom of the house, I get asked daily "What's for dinner?" On the surface this does not seem like a complicated question and many times the answer is right there ready to go. Other times it is more difficult to answer. Dinner requires planning and if I haven't planned ahead, then I can't answer that question easily.

Cooking dinner requires ingredients and time. Ingredients require shopping. Shopping requires work. As the cheapest, sorry, frugal, person on the face of the planet I shop the sales and then I check to make sure I have a coupon for what's on sale. I shop at multiple stores. This one has "buy on get on free," this one accepts competitor's coupons, this one give you gas points and a discount at the gas pump. And yes, I do get a thrill of having coupons for "buy one get one free" stuff and a really big thrill when I can stack a store coupon with a manufacturer's coupon. And if I can do that with "buy on get one free" I'm in a total happy place! Squeee! I know, I'm a freak.

 As I was saying, dinner takes all sorts of planning. Once I know what ingredients are on sale, then I can begin menu planning. I can make meatloaf, or turkey tetrazzini, or chicken and rice. And I have to consider that meals need to stretch for leftovers (if I can get the Little Man to eat leftovers) and lunches for my husband to take to work. "Honey? Are you traveling this week? Or do you have customers visiting that you'll take to lunch?" I ask. "I don't know yet. I don't think so. I'll let you know. What's for dinner?" he replies. I remind you, I'm the planner and he is more spontaneous.

Then there is the time element. Sometimes I don't have time to do my due diligence with the weekly sales ads. Perhaps we've been working on a project in our fixer-upper house, or I'm busy knitting scarves for church, or Little Man is in full-swing terrible two's. Whatever the reason, sometimes dinner is scavenged out of the freezer and pantry. Tonight we are having hot dogs with macaroni and beef gravy! Or some such interesting concoction. And other times, dinner is take out from whatever restaurant is closest and has curbside service (a wonderful invention).

Writing is like dinner. To have a story you want to tell is easy but to have all the ingredients and time to write it down takes planning. And even with planning, sometimes things get in the way. Sometimes you are able to make your outline, plan your back stories, list your tensions, and block out your chapters. Sometimes you are scavenging and just writing by the seat of your pants. Other times there is no writing and it is just a day to read. Ironically, I write mostly by the seat of my pants and do my structuring and continuity during revisions. I do know my characters' back stories and list my tensions. Where the back story is revealed and when the tensions happen is entirely up to the flow.  Hmmm, I'm a spontaneous writer! But tonight we are having meatloaf.

Research - Who knew?

Okay, I'm a freak. I LOVE doing research. No, I'm not being sarcastic, I'm serious. I love learning new things. But not everything is easily researched on the Internet or library and I find I need to ask specific questions to knowledgeable people to get the answers I seek.

Let me remind you that I'm writing a murder mystery (actually, I'm writing two of them but I'm soooo close to finishing my first one, that I've put the other one down for a few months). Anyway, some of my questions are mundane about investigation jurisdiction. Others are questions about medical examinations. My favorite questions are the ones about methods of killing.

Now you can type into Google your question and you'll get LOTS of "helpful" sites to go to that may or may not answer your question completely. The paranoid part of me knows that by typing in a method of murder (I won't tell you because you'll have to read my book) I get a little cookie put on my computer and my information is sent directly to the agency that watches people who ask macabre questions (which explains the dark car parked in front of my house).

But what these sites do have is usually a "contact us" button. So, yes, I click it and send my email. "Hello. My name is LeeAnn Rhoden and I'm a writer. I am working on my first novel involving blah, blah, blah..." And yes, I send the email (after spell checking). Then I wait eagerly and hopefully for a response. Meanwhile I know that as soon as I load Little Man into the car to run to the grocery store, a team of people wearing dark suits come into my house and plant bugs and monitoring devices to keep tabs on me.

Surprisingly, I do receive responses! And even more surprising is how NICE these people are to take time out of their day to answer creepy, morbid questions from a still unpublished writer. I could understand their willingness to reply if I was Steven King or Tom Clancy, but I'm just little old me! I guess after their surveillance teams came back with an all clear (It's cool. You can answer her questions, she just a suburban housewife) then they felt free to send me the information I needed.

Even more impressive is all of them, without fail, have encouraged me to continue my writing and wished me success. I have saved all of the responses I've received. Mainly because I still need the information for editing, but also because I want to make sure each one of these kind professionals gets an appropriate thank you notation in my book. And I can't imagine why these professionals aren't writing their own novels with all the cool stuff they know.

That's all I have for today. I have to go back to writing now that I have information, after I sweep for bugs!