The Unveiling

Part of being a published author, and going out in the world to sell books, is having a publicity photo. I’ve had several, none of which I’ve actually loved, but some that I’ve liked…sort of. The one I’m using currently was taken by a dear friend, Jared Hagen. A great photographer, whose wife joins me in this mad writing world. While some things have changed lately, I’m reluctant to change the photo I like so much. And there’s several reasons why…not the least of which is that I really don’t want to go through having my picture taken again.

Another set of reasons, much stronger than vanity, are at work here.  When I was seventeen, two things happened to me nearly simultaneously. Looking back now, I realize those events are a big part of why I’m here today, as a writer, hopefully of stories that touch a heart. I also find it interesting that both events happened in the library of my high school. I still adore libraries and books.

One day I picked up a book called A LANTERN IN HER HAND by Bess Streeter Aldrich.  That single book has influenced my desire to write as well as my entire philosophy on life.  I haven’t met many people who’ve read it, which is a bit disappointing. I’ve read it several times.

The main character in that book dreams of all the great thing she’ll do someday.  Dreams she never quite accomplishes.

That same year in school, my friend Debbie and I were studying in the library and she noticed that I had a white hair mixed in my long, brown hair. She laughed and thought it very strange. I didn’t. I wasn’t thrilled about it, but strange wasn’t a part of what I felt.

I pulled the offensive hair out and over the next few weeks, months, years I watched for more. I’d pull them as soon as they appeared. By the time I was in college, I’d discovered the different shades of Clairol Brown, and my college roommate, Robin helped erase all the evidence. Every six weeks. I met my husband a few years later. He’s never known me when I didn’t dye my hair. He’s never really commented or cared. My kids considered that a normal part of Mom.

Last month, I made a major life changing decision. I’ve known it’s inevitable and since that day back in high school, I knew I’d have to face it. It’s been a long time coming.

It’s not that I fear aging. I’ve always had a special relationship with the elderly. I’ve worked in Nursing Homes and Assisted Livings for over twenty years. I have a degree in gerontology and the aging process fascinates me.

No, my having white hair has nothing to do with time. Or age. It has to do with family.

My mother comes from a family where white hair is the norm, not the exception. They–we—don’t just gray early, we are white by the time we’re twenty five. My grandfather. My uncles. My mother. That branch of the family is known for the glorious, thick heads of white hair.

And for their evil.

I grew up knowing my grandfather, great-grandfather and uncle were not nice people. To my mother, to each other, to their community. Abuse was their norm. Theft was how they got ahead in the world. Not petty theft like robbing a bank…no my great-grandfather waited until bad times such as The Depression and would buy out their friends and family’s farms for just the taxes. They amassed a fortune. A fortune they miserly held onto until it was pried from their cold dead fingers by the attorneys. Their children suffered and lived in abject poverty until they dug the hole for the coffins.

My mother left home the instant she was old enough to escape. She always dyed her hair when I was a kid, a deep, dark black.  It was always very stark.  I wondered sometimes if she wasn’t trying to be someone or rather trying NOT to be someone.

That stray white hair in high school wasn’t a sign of aging…it was a glaring reminded that we can never escape who we are.  And it was a potentially painful reminder for my mother of the past she’d left behind.

I’m older now. My mother’s parents, aunts, uncles and now all but one of her siblings are gone. Oddly enough, the family members I knew and loved…were never cursed with the white hair.

So when I turned 50…and my hairdresser told me she couldn’t find a single hair with a drop of color…something clicked. I’d also mentioned that book, A LANTERN IN HER HAND in a conversation with my mother. And she actually bought me a copy for my birthday. I re-read it. It’s still a beautiful, bittersweet story. I still love it. It still gives me chills.

And I realized, that unlike that character, I had accomplished many of my dreams, like getting published and raising a family.

Now I have the book and the white hair. I’ve stripped out the color of thirty plus years from my hair but it still clings to the strands in pale golden blonde in places. The roots haven’t even hinted at color.

They never will, though I keep looking.

And so I’ve unveiled some pictures of my new haircolor to the world. I’m not sure I’ll ever get used to the difference.

But I do believe it’s time.  Perhaps long past time.  I am who I am.

Daffodils

I’ve done some re-thinking about my purpose for this blog. Originally, I started out with the idea of sharing how the weekly improv writing group that I attend operates. And that’s what I’ve done in the past. Now I’ve reached a point where the How-To has run out and, to be honest, a few of my fellow Improvites (yes, I just made up that word) have started to blog about the group and how it works. I almost feel as if I’ve reached a place of redundancy of myself and the other blogs. So, I stepped back and took a few breaths and thought about things.

What makes my blog different from anyone else’s isn’t this unique group, nor is it the practice of improv or stream-of-consciousness writing. No, the difference is how I, personally, take a prompt and turn it into something unique. I had hoped to eventually reach this point, where I share one of that week’s prompts, and show how I used it. So rather than wait for eventually, I’m going to just take that leap now.

If you’re interested in reading more blogs about our group, I encourage you to visit Rob Killam’s blog (nopennies.wordpress.com) or Grant McKenzie’s blog (improvwriter.wordpress.com). Both are wonderful writers who share my love of the improv group. Between all of us, I think you’ll be able to piece it together. And my past posts on the How-To will always remain available.

Judy was our “director” last night. She brought the prompts and managed to almost get us out of there on time. The third prompt was the one that did the most for me, though I don’t think the actual photo of some blue geometric designs made it into the piece. It did, however, inspire me to think about a particular recent event.

DAFFODILS

Last weekend I took my daughter to a meeting of a group called GRASP. It stands for Global and Regional Autism Spectrum Partnership, LLC. She is mildly–something–though at 26, a definitive diagnosis is doubtful.

But after the last group she was in failed, and I’ve watched her become more and more isolated, I’ve grown more desperate to find people and a place for her. My son found this group online and I signed both she and I up. I’ve enjoyed the online group, and we planned for her to attend this meeting.

It was at a woman’s house in downtown Denver. The woman has, she explained, processing difficulties and was very open and friendly. There were several other people already there. They were all friendly and inviting to my daughter.

She went, partially I know because she knew I was there, and that I’d be waiting outside. And she’s usually very friendly to anyone who is friendly to her.

I tried to be just as friendly, but my mom nerves were on edge. We’ve protected her all her life–I have trouble stepping back even now. But I need to.

So I said my goodbyes and went out to my car to read my book. My brain was on overload, so I didn’t read much.

Stepping into that woman’s house was just like stepping into my daughter’s room downstairs.  I knew that I was seeing what and who she could become in twenty years if I didn’t do something. It scared the heck out of me. Really scared me. I actually resisted the urge to go get her and drive straight home.

Instead, I let her stay and sat out in the car watching the downtown wildlife roam past my car for two hours.

About a dozen people attended. All my daughter’s age or older. All obviously just a bit different–and yet so familiar.

She came out eventually and was semi-smiling. Not that, ”I had a blast” smile, but an “Okay, I got that done and did fine” smile.

We talked as we drove through downtown to have lunch with my son and my sister. I listened to stories of people I’ll never really know. People she would like to see again. People like her. People who’s life experiences fill me with fear, for society doesn’t understand them.

And their road has been difficult just as my daughter’s has been and always will be. A world I can’t protect her from because someday I won’t be here.

My heart struggles–what to do? She most certainly doesn’t believe she’s anything like those people. She’s adamant about that.

And yet–

So the soul searching begins. Do I follow the “normal” path of this new world and encourage her to understand her situation? Or do I work harder with her to fit in better in the “normal” world.

A friend of mine asked if I couldn’t do both. I thought a lot about that and actually realized — no. Not because the world she is most like would be a problem. No, they are open and accept each others foibles. No, it’s the “normal” world that can and will cause her the most pain.

Driving up I-25, that dilemma occupied my mind and all through lunch I ignored it. All through the conversations and laughter, I pretended it wasn’t in my mind.

After we’d cleaned our plates and finished the last of the chips and salsa, it was time to head home.  We had one final errand to run after saying goodbye to the rest. My daughter and I headed over to my parent’s house. I had somethings to drop off and my mom had asked me to sign some books for one of her friends. They were gone camping, so we went into the empty house, into the kitchen that was as I always remembered it.

It felt like home. I felt as if I’d stepped back into a world so safe and warm. My daughter perked up too. i smiled as I looked at my mom’s daffodils in the back yard and all the things I take for granted there.

The rightness of that moment was exactly what I needed.

Most likely what she needed as she actually seemed to shift her whole body language.

Then I realized what the answer was.

I can’t always protect my daughter. I can’t “fix” her. I can’t change anything. but I can do exactly what my Mom has done for me.

I can give her a safe home base. I can give her a haven she will always have and where she can always return to when the world doesn’t accept or understand her.

When the world smacks her around, she can always know she can come home–to me.

And once I’m not there–maybe there will be daffodils–or amaryllis, or red toasters–that will bring all that back to her. For her.

Using Current Events

Last week at writing group, we did something we haven’t done in a long time. We went way over on time. Like half an hour. While that’s difficult for those of us who get up early the next day for work, it says a bit about the number of people attending, as well as the depth of what everyone’s writing. As the facilitator, it made me feel good that the prompts kept everyone writing.

When I’m making my prompts, I try to come up with something that’s more than just a suggestion. Because I really want to inspire people to dig a little deeper into their writing. Encourage them to think a little more while still sticking to the concept of stream of consciousness writing. It’s a fine line. A very fine line.

This past few weeks much of North America has been caught in a cold snap. A deep, dark, cold. Below zero here, as well a many other places across the country. Several people tweeted and posted on Facebook how it was a great time to stay home and write about their characters in a blizzard or such.

I wonder how many of those writers actually sat down and wrote that blizzard, cold-snap scene. It’d be interesting to know.

So when I was creating the prompts, I went with what, to me, was the obvious. Cold. I did a search for pictures of snow. I found piles of them…literally. Pictures of snow storms that were currently in the news with all the buried cars and snow plows. Artistic pictures of icicles, sunshine and clouds. There were snow carvings and people bundled up to their ears. It was a very complete collection of all things cold. Just looking at them made me shiver.

That’s a good thing.

So one of the prompts was to use one of these freezing cold pictures and not just use it to look at and come up with an idea from (though that certainly works) but to dig a little deeper. How does this picture, and the associated cold, make you or your character feel? Think about how it felt to walk from your office to your car today after work. Both emotionally and/or physically. That’s how you take a prompt and make it deeper, make it your own. I included that shivering I just mentioned in my piece. For me, the writer, it made the scene more realistic and hopefully for my readers that same realistic feel.

Another event occurring around the same time was the Super Bowl. I’m not a football fan, but my husband is, so it was an event at our house. Judging by the viewing audience, it was pretty popular around the country. Most of the group’s participants had at least a passing, if not involved, acquiantance with the game.

So I once again turned to my handy dandy search engine and hunted for football quotes. Now I wasn’t looking for quotes that were too specific to the game. That’s too narrow. i wanted something that could invoke a response even from someone who knew nothing about football. So the quotes about catches and runs and stats weren’t what I was looking for. Finally, I found two. One by Lou Holtz and one by John Madden. They were both more about the state of the world than the game of football. Both worked.

John Madden -
The road to Easy Street goes through the sewer

Lou Holtz -
If you don’t make a total commitment to whatever you’re doing, then you start looking to bail out the first time the boat starts leaking. It’s tough enough getting that boat to shore with everybody rowing, let alone when a guy stands up and starts putting his jacket on

They as well as the concept of football intrigued me. So here’s what I came up with.

I’m not a fan of football…not the game anyway. Just like every other woman in America I am aware of the value of the uniform…

In Jr. High I spent a lot of time watching football practice. Jim Wiseman after all was the quarterback and I had a huge crush on him. I didn’t learn a blessed thing about the game then, and didn’t really care.

My next connection with football was my senior year in high school when I played Powder Puff football. Do I look like a person you should put on the front line? Me neither, but there I was. It was fun, and by Monday morning after the game only my left arm was still purple. The right one had progressed to a lovely yellow/green shade of bruise. I still didn’t understand the game.

I had the good fortune to marry a man who didn’t play football…though he’s always been an avid fan of both Nebraska & Green Bay. He used to be much worse. I learned that Saturdays were college game days and I could do just about anything I wanted during football season, as long as it didn’t involve him.

So, to save my sanity I learned to sit and watch the game. Okay. Amend that. I learned how to read with the television on. I get some of my best reading done during a football game. No one bothers me then. It’s great.

Unless, of course, it’s the Super Bowl. Then we have to have a party and I have to provide food.

I still don’t understand football. Haven’t a clue what happens. And still don’t care.

When they say to write what you know, I don’t think they necessarily mean to write only what you’re an expert on. To me it indicates using your own experiences to color what you write. Mine it. Dig deep inside yourself and find what you do know about that particular situation. Because you usually know more than you think you do.

From the Writer’s Side

Some days do you wonder where you’re mind went? I wrote the notes for this blog awhile back and have been searching for them for days. I finally found them, so here’s the latest installment, just as I promised. What to do about the prompts from the writer’s side.

Not everyone in our group runs the group or provides prompts. There’s several reasons why, but we don’t ask. I think it goes back to our philosophy that this is a safe place to write. No critique–and that includes not critiquing other people and the lifestyle they bring with them.

Some people are natural leaders, so we accept those strengths and don’t question anyone else.

That said, the major distinction is that while the leaders facilitate and guide the prompts, they don’t guide us within our writing. That’s where we as writers have to take charge of our own work. If you want to have the freedom to create, you have to be responsible for your own creativity.

Let me explain with an example. The facilitator of the group brings three prompts each week. (We’ve tried to have multiple facilitators, but it’s just more work than it’s worth.) Sometimes the ideas they bring just don’t work for me. They are too fantasy or science fiction or historical.

Once the prompt was about traveling to a different planet. One of the women who was in the group at that time was writing historicals set in Scotland, with Robert the Bruce to be specific. The facilitator was sure he’d stumped her. Nope. She wrote about her characters traveling to a new place–yes, in Scotland–where they’d never been before. The people, the customs, the dress–everything was very different.

I think he was a bit disasapointed in his prompt, but quite impressed with her ingenuity.

Not every prompt will work for every participant. Some nights, none of them work for me. at those times, I can either get frustrated and stare at the screen/paper and have nothing. Or I can and do decide to take control.

What part of the prompt can I cut out and use? If it’s a quote, is there a word or two I can pull out and leave the content behind? Is it a picture of something I don’t find appealing, but can I take the concept of a painting, a photo, a picture and use that?

Can I just ignore the prompt? Yes!! We frequently do. Remember there’s no rules and besides what’s going to happen to you if you “color outside the lines?” Nothing. There’s no critique allowed, remember?

I’ll look around at the coffee shop, at the people, out the store windows. Does something out there strike my fancy? If it’s the second or third prompt, can I just pick up where I left off and keep going? That’s a popular technique for all of us, even if you like and can use the actual prompt.

If a piece/story is flowing, don’t stop just because someone else has an idea or the timer went off.

Once the prompt didn’t work for me at all and I couldn’t get any of the words even to work. No one’s fault, just where my brain was at at the moment. The store was quiet and little traffic or events were outside. I actually thought I’d fail to write something.

I looked over at Bonnie. She had that same desperate look in her eyes. “Give me a random word,” I whispered. She did. I gave her one in return. Was it perfect? No. Did it match at all what the prompt was? No. Did it get the juices going. Yes!!

And that’s the heart of it all.

Getting and keeping the juices flowing. Putting words down. No qualifiers. Yeah, it’s a bonus to get “good” words,but you can always clean it up later. You can’t do anything with nothing.

So, here’s a piece I modified as the prompts just did NOT work for me, but it didn’t really matter.

There is absolutely nothing that comes to mind with that sentence, of course the fact that I can and do write about nothing frequently is a good thing. I actually tried to do my own prompts last week to try and do the revisions for the Harlequin book. Ha. That was not real successful. It’s not nearly as much fun or successful to write in the vacuum that is my bedroom, but I have to admit it’s much more comfortable to sit on my bed, propped up with my pillows. Could you guys get a comfy pillow for me here? I’m sure the coffee shop will totally agree.

I did figure out, though that I can’t write the beginning revision scene until I’ve done all the rest. Took me all night to figure that out. Ahem. But now I’m going on to the other scenes in the chapters. The ones that are to go into the spots where the big gaping holes are that used to be the flashback scenes they asked for the first time around. Ah well, at least I know what’s supposed to go in there. Hopefully tonight I can get started on one of those scenes. They’re sort of formed in my head. My brain that has already had 3 cups of coffee today..ha and I just got another one. Oh this is going to be an interesting night. A very interesting night.

Oh goody there’s the buzzer. I’m done. Enough of this–

It isn’t perfect…but it’s SOMETHING.

Angel

Finding Prompts

Because our group is open to anyone and held in a public coffeeshop, we have a very diverse group of writers each week. Fiction and nonfiction, poetry and prose. Why, last week we had three people who write fantasy, one person who does psychological thrillers, several who write YA and children’s books, one poet and I write romance. We’ve all done bits and pieces of articles and op ed pieces and some just plain rants. As I said, a very diverse groups, both in people, as well as each night.

So the prompts that we, as the facilitators give, need to be fairly broad and open. That can be a challenge sometimes.

Finding ideas for prompts isn’t that difficult. They truly are everywhere. Writing magazines, like Writer’s Digest will even send you a prompt a day. http://www.writersdigest.com/WritingPrompts They also print them in the magazine each year. There are calendars with prompts on them and I love my book, The Pocket Muse by Monica Wood that one of my critique partners gave me last year for Christmas.

These are all really great places to start looking for prompts. But that’s just the beginning, especially when you’re looking for prompts for a group of people. Even if your group is all writing the same thing, their brains and imaginations are all different. Creating too narrow of a prompt can actually hinder the writer.

Let me give a couple examples. I read a prompt recently that suggested you write a magic spell. Then take those pieces of the spell and turn them into a poem.

That’s a great prompt for someone writing a fantasy or even a historical, but what about the contemporary? What about the children’s author? Nonfiction? So, while I like this idea, I’d take it apart and make it much simpler.

The prompt I came up with from this is: Create or recall a magic spell or curse. Write it down. How do you or your character feel about it? Similar. A poet could easily take it and create a poem, as the first prompt version suggested. A non-fiction writer could begin a piece on the history of curses and magic in America. A fantasy writer could write a spell that could be used as a piece of a witch’s spellbook in her story. The possibilities are endless. By opening it up, you gave the author control, instead of taking that control away.

Another great prompt is to completely remove words from the equation. Picures make some of the most useful prompts. Translating that picture, or a reaction to it is always successful. As a facilitator, you can group the pictures, or create a theme. Again, be careful as this can be limiting.

Once we did a grouping of clouds and weather. The other piece of the prompt was to “be” or “write from the point of view” of the weather or element. Fascinating. We get pictures from anywhere. Magazines. On line. Those pictures that end up on your camera on vacation that you don’t know what they are. Old photographs. Or specific sights you see, take the picture. My son and I were at a family event during the winter a couple years ago. We’d parked a couple blocks away and as we walked there, we saw a whole bunch of rose petals scattered on the curb and street. We snapped the picture and used that as the prompt for the whole group. Everyone can use the same picture, or all different. Either works.

Keep the prompts broad and open.

And keep the instructions simple. If you have to explain too much, it’s too complicated. Then everyone spends their time trying to figure out what to do instead of writing. J. had a great idea last week. we just didn’t get it. Basically she wanted us to divide a piece of paper into 3 parts. We’d put a letter in each box and them come up with a word that started with that letter. Then we’d have those three words to work with. It was a mess. No one divided the paper the same way. Then as we passed the paper around the table to add our word or letter, we all got confused.

It took more to explain than to do the writing.

That doesn’t mean scrap the idea. Just break it apart. Think simple. And you might actually come up with more than one prompt.

J. did one thing very right about that prompt, though. Early on, a friend gave me a great piece of advice about picking or creating prompts for the group. Involve everyone in each others work. It also helps when that reading part I talked about last time, comes around. If I put out a piece of an idea, I’m naturally curious about what they’ll do with it.

Once we managed to get over the instructions, several of us had put words on those divided up sheets. As everyone read, we were listening and enjoying what they wrote. Good writing and camaraderie. What a better way to create?

Hey, come back next week and I’ll go over how we view the prompts from the writer’s side. It’s different, too.

Reading Aloud

A few weeks ago, two gentlemen sat down at the tables reserved for our writing group. We greeted them, chatted and explained the “rules.” They both nodded and were very friendly. Neither had any paper with them. Or pen. Or computer.

Oh no, they said, “We’re just here to watch.” Several of us looked at each other, a bit perplexed. We didn’t get it and several people offered to loan them pens and paper. No. Still just here to watch.

Watch? Watch what? was the question of the night. People sitting at a table writing is about as eventful as watching paint dry. I love the people in the group, but even I wouldn’t enjoy watching them barely move. (Sorry, guys.)

Now, I’m not foolish enough to think that the other people in the coffee shop where we meet don’t listen to us. We read our work aloud, remember and when the coffee grinder goes off, we can read quite well over it. So sometimes the entire store can hear what we’re reading. I know that several people have been bystanders who joined us, and some are people who came to the store to simply observe and listen before deciding if they want to become a part of it. Those are all okay with us.

So, what’s the difference?

The difference is that seat at the table of participation.

Consistent participation is what makes this group work. While we don’t work on the same piece, we are all working together when we’re at the group. We stay within parameters of doing prompts and reading aloud but we’re all writing. And that proof, and the accountability that goes with it is in the reading aloud.

Because the most difficult part of being a writer, is putting and keeping your butt in the chair, your fingers to the pen or keyboard and writing! So watching isn’t a part of the deal.

Oddly enough, this has always been the most difficult of our “rules” to enforce. I have a dear friend, a multi published author who won’t come to group, though she wants to do the writing, because she refuses to read her stuff. It’s her choice. We didn’t make an exception for her, so we didn’t even consider it for our visitors. We went about our business and a few minutes into our first writing session, they got up and left. I remember looking across the table, watching a couple people look up, shrug and go back to their writing. The zone is there, and it sucked us right back in.

They did however, have an impact on the group. Whether consciously or subconsciously, several people that night wrote in defense of the group. Those two men actually served as an impromptu prompt. It was great.

As usual, there were three prompts that night. Too bad they didn’t stick around, maybe they’d have found their inspiration. I certainly wrote several good pieces.

And that brings me to what I’ve intended to do since starting this blog. To share my experiences, and to give those people who aren’t ready, willing or able to have a seat at the table the chance to benefit from the prompts. First I’ll share the prompts, then give an example of a piece I wrote there. Unfortunately, I’ll have to limit my sharing to the slice of life pieces I do, rather than the ones that involve my current work. Too much confusion in the copyright area, but hopefully these will offer enough example to get you started.  In this example, which prompt it goes with is pretty obvious.  That’s not always the case.  That’s okay.

The prompts that night were:
First – Five minutes – Life is like a box of chocolates…you never know what you’re going to get. So the prompt is, life is like…
Second – Ten minutes – The Power of Dreams
Final prompt – twelve minutes – Picture of autumn leaves arching over a dirt road. (Didn’t work, so I turned the picture over where I found the title “Ten Second Staircase.” Much better.

For the last two I wrote on my current project. The first however, got me started.  Here’s a taste.

No, no, no. life is NOTHING like a box of chocolates. That would indicate that life just sat there, waiting to be picked up and taken. No, life is more like a snow globe where some toddler got a hold of it and shook it until the people and props inside are totally obliterated

I have dreamed of being published for more years than I think I’ve been cognizant. So this whirlwind that I’m living in really is a dream come true. I just never planned on being quite this tired. I’m thinking that perhaps if this had happened when I’d originally planned it, and I was younger, it might be less daunting.

I’ve been interviewed, chatted at, photographed, called, emailed, IM’d and hopefully read this week. It’s wonderful. It’s exhausting…and to top it all off…my current book somehow clicked in my head. Joe came home and as we decorated the Christmas tree he helped me brainstorm the ending. He understands me entirely too well, which part of me is incredibly thankful for, and another part of me is quite shocked by.

Now to just survive my dreams and the holidays and get to the keyboard more often. Jace is suddenly not a very patient man. He wants his story told, and told now. Darned man.

Now it’s your turn.  Go ahead.  Write away.

~Angel

The Rules

Today my first Harlequin Super Romance, A MESSAGE FOR JULIA is released in stores and for download and order online. I say my first, because I hope this is just the beginning. I’m already working on what I hope will be the next book in a long line. And as I work on that book, I know that a big, big chunk of it will be written and created at the writing group. It seems only natural that I kick off the next stage of my publishing career with a post of more info on the group. I know it’s a godsend for me and hopefully others will find the same help.

For nearly eleven years we’ve been meeting and the time has gone so fast. Some weeks we have a half dozen people, others we’ve had twenty plus. It’s never predictable and definitely not controllable. But that’s part of the magic. The people I share this crazy journey with are nearly as fascinating as the prompts themselves.

Over that time, we’ve learned a few things, and tweaked the format a little. Basically, though it’s stayed pretty much the same. Some of what we’ve learned has developed into pseudo rules. although we tell people we really don’t have any rules. They are more like guidelines, or points to keep in mind.

The basic “rules” of our group are wonderfully simple.

1) We write. Anything we want. Fiction. Non-fiction. Poetry. Prose. Songs. Whatever we as the writer want to write at that moment. We do three prompts a night, provided by that week’s volunteer leader. One 5-minute warm up and two longer prompts, usually ten minutes and twelve minutes respectively.

2) We read. Aloud. What we created right there. It’s rough draft, of course, so no critique allowed. Positive reactions are encouraged but not required.

3) You get one pass on reading per year, but be warned that if you try to use it, we will harass you. If we’re all sticking our neck out–we’re ALL sticking our neck out.

4) And for our situation, in public, we don’t censor what you write, but request you not read aloud anything that would be offensive to the mother of a nearby three year old. Bleep is the preferred substitute. (And so far the most entertaining.)

Not everything we’ve learned has turned into a rule. Most are just skills we’ve added to our repertoire. For one, the best way to approach this is with the idea of stream of consciousness writing. The idea that you put your pen to the page, or your fingers to the keys and just write whatever comes to mind is paramount to the success of this type of writing.

Even if all you’re writing is “this is really bad and I don’t want to do it,” or “blah,blah,blah,” at least your hand is moving and your brain is grinding away. Something is happening. At some point your brain will click and the words will begin to flow. From where none of us fully understand, we just accept the fact that it does.

Another point to keep in mind is that you don’t have to take the prompt verbatum. There are times we put a sentence out there or a picture and the results are nothing related to the prompt. It just doesn’t work. So? Heck, take just one of the words and use it. “The” is a perfectly good word, you know. All’s fair in the world of creation.

That’s the basics. We stick to these and it works. The creativity is amazing. Some of us write short pieces while others work on pieces that will eventually connect into something longer, like a book. A big chunk of my manuscript of A MESSAGE FOR JULIA was written at Improv, as well as several other manuscripts I’m still working on.
It is where most of my quality writing occurs. Do I keep it all? No, much of it gets revised or edited. But that first spark of magic that becomes a story happens here, regularly, almost predictably.

So I hope you’ll return here to learn more about this group. Over time, I’ll share more about the concept of Improv writing, as well as introduce some of the people who make the group work. And to the many adventures we’ve experienced along the way. The names will be changed to protect the innocent…as well as the not-so-innocent. But I think you’ll get the idea.

~ Angel

And So It Begins

Several years ago, I was struggling with whether I should continue to pursue this stupid obsession I have for writing. For publishing. I’d been writing, critiquing, submitting and being rejected since early in my marriage and the struggle was nearly too much. Raising a family, working full time and finding productive time to create was well…a foolish ambition at best.

And because my husband had listened to me complain and dream for nearly all those years at that point, he laughed at me when I said I thought it was time to quit. Then after he realized I wasn’t laughing, and that I was really serious, he stared at me. Then, leaning back in his chair he looked at me and said, “Okay. I think your crazy, but if you’re really going to quit, I want you to do something for me.”

“What?” I stared back at him.

He tilted his head and said, “Give it one last ditch effort. Join that and if it doesn’t work, I won’t say another word. And neither will you. It’ll be done.”

The sign was one that had been posted near the coffee shop of my local bookstore. A new writing group was starting up.

Great, just what I needed. Another group to suck my energy and time. Oh well, I rationalized, if I wasn’t going to be writing anyway, which I did in all my spare time, so I had time to join it and have all my energy used up.

So I went. There were three people there that night. Wendy. Lene and Lene’s husband Roger. He was an artist but came to support her crazy idea of a writing group that actually created instead of sucked the energy out of people by trying to be an organization.

And so that night, we wrote. Not bylaws or plans for meetings. Not once did anyone pull out their day planner. No, Lene put strange words in a hat and we pulled them out and did what we were good at. We wrote. Then—god forbid—we read, aloud, to the world and everyone in the coffee shop who chose to listen, what we’d just written. Talk about your nightmares come to life.

But unlike the nightmares, no one frowned, or critiqued. They laughed, not AT me, but because one of the lines was funny—a line that was supposed to be funny.

I went home that night so full of energy, I barely slept. Ron smirked, laughed and slept soundly, a bit smug if you asked me.

That year I entered my work in Pikes Peak Writer’s Paul Gillette contest and actually won. I’d entered before, with mixed results. I also entered my manuscript in RWA’s Golden Heart contest. Just a short time after finding the group, I got a call from the judging committee that I was a finalist.

My writing seemed to come alive then. With both contests, I got exposure and appointments to pitch to editors and agents. The people of the writing group got caught up in my success and took that energy to nourish the group. We grew. We created prompts. We became more than a group of people getting together each week, we became a gathering of friends caught up in a magical world of creating. Camaraderie.

Time melted away, each Thursday arrived with anticipation and an amazing level of energy. We grew to sometimes twenty people each week.

Creativity became a switch I could flip on and off simply by walking through the doors of that coffee shop. I’d go there two or three times a week, able to channel the energy that seemed to haunt the coffee shop and wait for us to return each Thursday.

I wrote two entire books and partials of many others at that group and through my visits to the store. I’ve spoken at several conferences and groups, sharing the experiences, touting not only the magic of the group, but the support of the store.

Not once in those years has it occurred to me to quit, something my husband frequently laughs at me for. After the awards, my submissions gathered more than form rejections. Finally, Imajinn books bought my first book and then my second and an anthology that unfortunately was later cancelled. My confidence was growing.

Then something happened one night after I’d finished book two. I tried to find another story in the prompts each week. I tried to figure out if there was some secret in the coffee cup I drank from each week at group.

And then lightning struck…and something magical wafted in the air. I wrote a scene of seven men underground.

Authors often talk about their gift books. A book that seems to write itself. Characters that are so real they sit at the dinner table with you, sleep in the same room with you, and in my case, go to writing group week after week.

They just seemed to appear on the page. It was almost as if the prompts were created by the universe for me. For them. I think sometimes I just held my hands over the keys and it melted off my fingers and into the disk drive.

I sent that story off to my dream house. Harlequin. THE house of success. Paula Eykelhoff loved the idea. Loved it so much she asked for revisions. Four times. And so the Thursday group got more exposure to this story and characters. They listened again and again—and again.

They must have gotten sick of it. I know there were times I did.

But they never said that. Never even acted like they were sick of it, though I’m sure at times they were. Now as we all await the book’s publication, and they are all as anxious as I am, I want to try and capture the magic of my writing group.

I’d have never made it this far without the process that we immerse ourselves in each Thursday night. Improv. And so I’ve decided to try and share the magic with the world through this blog.

If you’re a writer who’s frustrated with all the work and struggle of getting published; if you’re a writer just starting out; if you’re a writer who isn’t interested in publication, just the process; even if you’re a writer who’s written dozens of books, I think you’ll find the Improv writing process helpful—and fascinating.

So won’t you join me? I’ll explain the process we use and recount stories from past groups as well as current happenings. I’ve always found that I learn from doing as much as being told, so you’ll be able to find prompts that you can use, prompts we’ve found success and fun with.

But beware, though, you might find it as addictive as I do and will spend the foreseeable future counting the minutes until the next session.

Welcome to my world, won’t you come in?

~Angel Smits