I'm Afraid (Repost)

If you're writing, querying, or in that in-between stage in the writing journey, I wanted to repost this old blog post for you. I wrote this a little over half a year before getting my book deal. Doubt and fear and frustration are normal. Rejection sucks. But if I had quit before even starting queries, I wouldn't have a finished copy of Bookishly to hold. It's okay to be afraid, but keep working and dreaming, too.

I'm Afraid

I'm an optimist, a Pollyanna, Anne of Green Gables-loving (well, Emily of New Moon is my favorite but she's not as positive, so let's just roll with the Anne thing, okay?,) twirl-y skirt-wearing glitter addict who sees the glass not only half full, but that it's full of teal glitter.

I'm not saying I don't have bad days or lose my energy sometimes. But, in general, I see life as this short journey and we can't waste it looking for the dirt and shadows when there's so much joy and sunshine around us. This past week, though, I had a few 3 a.m. moments that so many of you pulled me through, like little text and twitter rays of sunshine (cue quote I've put on this blog before:)

"...she knew that there would be days when she would feel desparingly that she could not write and that it was of no use to try; days when the editorial phrase 'not necessarily a reflection on its merits,' would get on her nerves to such an extent that she would feel like imitating Marie Bashkirtseff and hurling the taunting, ticking, remorseless sitting room clock out the window; days when everything she'd done or would try to do would slump-- become mediocre and despicable; days when she would be tempted to bitter disbelief in her fundamental conviction that there was as much truth in the poetry of life as in the prose; days when the echo of that 'random word' of the gods, for which she so avidly listened, would only seem to taunt her with its suggestions of unattainable perfection and loveliness beyond the reach of mortal ear or pen." -L. M. Montgomery, Emily's Quest

I wanted to post this in the beginning of the query stage before waves of rejections start rolling in, because I still believe very firmly in what I wrote in my product development post. I'm not afraid of rejection, but I'm so, so, so afraid that I'm deluding myself into thinking I can write well enough to even try. I'm afraid of being like those dancers in the audition episodes of So You Think You Can Dance who are not awful, but nowhere near good enough to compete with the good dancers. The ones who probably are in the Intermediate-Advanced classes in their little dance schools, but would only qualify for Advanced Beginner in the NYC schools (This, I know from my years of taking class in suburbia and Broadway Dance Center.) They're unable to see that they'll never be as good as the people who do make it on the show.

Worse, I'm afraid that I might be equivalent of one of the delusional awful dancers.

I'm afraid of dreaming about yet one more thing and having that hope crushed--I have enough of that in my non-writing life as it is. (note: here was where I wrote stuff about family, being single, career... but it became rather depressing, so *delete*)

In a little bit, I'll be back to sunshine and rainbows, but I needed to write out this fear. Because, honestly, I'm terrified.

What are you afraid of?

#LoveInBooks: 7 YA Authors Sending Love

Hi all!

Today is the first day of a multi-author Valentine's Day special: #LoveInBooks. Seven of us have teamed up to share quotes from our books containing the word "love" from now through Valentine's Day. Here's the first quote for BOOKISHLY EVER AFTER:

Grand Prize Giveaway

To spread even more love, each of us is giving away a finished copy of our books and swag. You can enter the giveaway below. Entries are accepted daily through Feb. 12th. The winner will be announced on Monday, Feb. 15. USA only.

Participating books and authors (alphabetically, by book):

1. ARROWS by Melissa Gorzelanczyk / Follow Melissa on Twitter
2. ASSASSIN'S HEART by Sarah Ahiers / Follow Sarah on Twitter
3. BOOKISHLY EVER AFTER by ISABEL BANDEIRA / Follow Isabel on Twitter
4. CURIO by Evangeline Denmark / Follow Evangeline on Twitter
5. THE MYSTERY OF HOLLOW PLACES by Rebecca Podos / Follow Rebecca on Twitter
6. SWORD AND VERSE by Kathy MacMillan / Follow Kathy on Twitter
7. THIS IS WHERE IT ENDS by Marieke Nijkamp / Follow Marieke on Twitter

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Remembering How to Write

This summer has been... a summer. And the hardest part of it has been my inability to write--some for emotional reasons, some because of logistics (travel and cat sitting and basically being the responsible big sister stuff,) and some because of exhaustion because of the logistics stuff.

And then, I was SO AFRAID I forgot how to write. It reminds me a little bit of how scared I get every time I step on the ice, before my body realizes it knows what it's doing and I remember how much I LOVE skating. Sometimes, the only thing that keeps me going back to the rink is that I have standing lessons, or that I need to practice, or just remembering that I need exercise. Thinking of writing after a long period of not feels just like that, like I'm so afraid I'm going to fall and break something.

But, then, I wrote a little yesterday morning, and it reminded me so much of the relief I felt when I wrote this post, quoting from Emily's Quest:

It Feels So Good To Write...

... after a few days where I couldn't:

"MAY 15, 19--


"This has been a lyric spring day--and a miracle has happened. It happened at dawn--when I was leaning out of my window, listening to a little, whispering, tricksy wind o' morning blowing out of Lofty John's bush. Suddenly--the flash came--again--after these long months of absence--my old, inexpressible glimpse of eternity. And all at once I knew I could write. I rushed to my desk and seized my pen. All the hours of early morning I wrote; and when I heard Cousin Jimmy going downstairs I flung down my pen and bowed my head over my desk in utter thankfulness that I could work again.
...

(click through to see the rest of the quote)

"But the work for which we are fitted--which we feel we are sent into the world to do--what a blessing it is and what fullness of joy it holds. I felt this to-day as the old fever burned in my finger-tips and my pen once more seemed a friend." L.M. Montgomery, Emily's Quest

It's nice to have my old friend back. So, so nice.

The Stone Girl Blog Tour: Mini Interview and Guest Post

I'd like to welcome Alyssa Sheinmel to my blog today and I'm really happy to share her book with you. Y'all know that I rarely (uhm... okay, really rarely) review books on here. When I do talk about books on this blog, it's because I really enjoyed them.

You'll see in a minute why I think this book should be a part of your library.

The Book:

Sethie Weiss is hungry, a mean, angry kind of hunger that feels like a piece of glass in her belly. She’s managed to get down to 111 pounds and knows that with a little more hard work—a few more meals skipped, a few more snacks vomited away—she can force the number on the scale even lower. She will work on her body the same way she worked to get her perfect grades, to finish her college applications early, to get her first kiss from Shaw, the boy she loves, the boy who isn’t quite her boyfriend.

Sethie will not allow herself one slip, not one bad day, not one break in concentration. Her body is there for her to work on when everything and everyone else—her best friend, her schoolwork, and Shaw—are gone. From critically acclaimed writer Alyssa B. Sheinmel comes an unflinching and unparalleled portrayal of one girl’s withdrawal, until she is sinking like a stone into her own illness, her own loneliness—her own self.
 (from Alyssa's website. You can read an excerpt and find out more about the book by clicking on this sentence!)

  







The Review: (Well, the part of this post where I gush about how much I liked this book)

When I was first approached by Random House to be a part of this tour... I'll be honest, I wasn't sure. Wintergirls was tough enough to read-- did I want to dive in to another book about body image and eating disorders so soon after all of the discussions I had been having with friends on and offline about my vlog post?

But then I opened Alyssa's book, read her foreword... and burst into tears. This was the book for girls like me and like many of my friends. Girls who didn't quite fit the mold when it came to textbook definitions of anorexia or bulemia. I won't write any spoilers, but there is a scene in the beginning of the book between Sethie and her friend Janey that gave me chills because one of my own friends had the same experience. Sethie is real and relateable and her story was hard to put down.

The (Mini) Interview: (Where Alyssa answers my LOOOONG questions)

1. When I received the book and read your introduction, I actually cried because you finally gave a voice to those of us who skirted the edge of the eating disorder cliff. There's so much stigma in society about body image and disordered eating as a "first world problem" and I have trouble talking about my experiences because I wasn't one of "those girls" who "really" had an eating disorder. Were there points while writing The Stone Girl where you had doubts about your story? Were these times when you thought about stopping?

Well first of all, thank you.  I wrote this book for many reasons, but one of them is certainly that I felt that there was a part of the story that is rarely, if ever, told; the girls who skate on the precipice of eating disorders – not quite sick, but certainly not well either.

And to answer your questions – Yes!  Repeatedly as I wrote the novel I doubted the story.  I wondered whether there was anything left to say about eating disorders that hadn’t been said already, and by people much more qualified than I am.  I wondered if anyone would care about Sethie’s story; the girl who skips or vomits only some of her meals, who doesn’t drop down to eighty pounds, who isn’t admitted to an eating-disorders clinic.  I stopped writing the book repeatedly, but something always kept me coming back.  Finally, I decided that I would write the book, but maybe I wouldn’t share it; maybe it was something I was writing for me, this eating disorders book that I just had to get out of my system.  But once I’d finished a draft, much to my surprise, I did want to share it.  And – also to my surprise – people seemed to believe in Sethie’s story.

 

2. The friends who opened up to me about their own experiences with body image issues and eating disorders/disordered eating have mentioned the amazing things in their lives that they wouldn't have experienced if they had continued down that path. For me, it's been skating and eating my way through a few countries. What are one or two things in your life that you have been able to enjoy because you were able to move past the need to be ultra-thin?

Oh my goodness, where do I start?  Of course, with the obvious – food.  The funny thing is, despite everything else, I’ve always been kind of an enormous foodie.  Going to new restaurants, taking trips just to try new restaurants in other cities, are some of my favorite things to do.  Thanksgiving is my single favorite day of the year, not least because it is an entire national holiday that completely revolves around a meal.  And being able to do those things I enjoy so much without the fear or guilt about food hovering over me is certainly something I would have missed out on had I not let go of my body-obsession.

 

But there is so much more, of course.  I don’t know exactly when or how I gave up my body-obsession, but I do know this: my life became infinitely better once body-obsession wasn’t a part of it.  I became better at my job, I made better friends, I began practicing yoga, I started dating the boy I would later marry, I got my wonderful, sweet, funny dog.  I can’t tell you exactly how it happened – Did I finally get to have these good things because I let go of my body-obsession and was able to concentrate on more important things?  Or was I able to let go of my body-obsession because my life was newly filled with these good things?  Or was it simply that these good things demanded the energy I used to spend on my body-obsession?  I honestly don’t know; what I do know is that the things I wanted most shifted.  There was a time when the thing I wanted most in the world was to be thinner.  Now, of course, I still have days when I feel fat, days when I wish I could change something about my body or myself.  But those thoughts are relatively fleeting.  Now, there are just so many other things that I want more.

The Guest Post:

A few weeks ago, I was sick – some kind of stomach bug or food poisoning.  I was out of town, and spent my vacation miserably holed up in my hotel room.  I pretty much couldn’t eat anything.  And here’s the thing – it was oddly familiar, walking into the market of the hotel, seeing foods that I loved and wanted to eat, and having to remind myself, No, you can’t eat those things.  It was a bizarre kind of flashback to the way that I used to live.  It only lasted a few days, but suddenly food was the stuff of longing, the stuff of bargaining, the stuff of promises.  What a strange thing, after all this time, to find myself promising that if I just made it through one more day of being “good” I could have whatever I wanted later.  Rationalizing that I could have one bite of the donuts from my favorite restaurant, but only one, even though I was hungry enough for two, or three, or four.  It made me sad for the girl I used to be, the one who spent so much of her energy thinking about food, feeling guilty about food, fearing food.  I was relieved when the vacation was over and I recovered, relieved when I could go back to normal.  I was so uncomfortable living like that for just a few days; I can’t imagine how I spent a few years that way.

Of course, even when my body-obsession was at its worst, I didn’t live like that every single day.  Sometimes, food was a source of joy or pleasure or simply nourishment, as it should be.  Sometimes, I could go weeks without trying to skip a meal, months without vomiting.  I never even dropped down to an unhealthy weight. 

Your questions got me thinking; with the publication of The Stone Girl fewer than two weeks away, I’ve been talking so much about the book, and about eating disorders lately.  I’ve written and spoken about my personal experiences with food and body-obsession quite a bit over the past few months, more than I had in years, more perhaps than I ever had.  I wrote this book thinking about those of us who – as you beautifully said – “skirted the edge of the eating disorder cliff,” and even now, I find that I check myself when I’m writing about my own life; I’ll delete the words eating disorder, anorexic or bulimic and replace them with the words body-obsession.  Even now, sometimes I still don’t believe I deserve to call whatever it was that I had an eating disorder. 

I don’t remember the last time I made myself throw up, the last meal I skipped in an effort to drop a few pounds.  It’s been, I think, fewer than ten years, but more than seven or eight.  I may still dance around the semantics of it, but this much is true: I was sick then, and I am better now.



A 3am At 6am

This was my Sunday morning tweet (soooo long that I had to go through tweetlonger):

"I was up until 6am reading @jodimeadows ' Incarnate, to get through the masquerade scene. And then I lay in bed, wondering how I could POSSIBLY ever write anything when books like this and Die For Me and Dearly, Departed and so many others are so amazing beyond belief. I feel like Ana with music(esp Dossam's music...) and how she doesn't feel good enough around so much genius! #LeSigh"

Three a.m.s, those bleak, hellish moments of self-doubt, are a part of life.  Especially if you want to be a writer because so much of what you do hinges on the opinion of others...  There's nothing like laying in bed in the middle of the night after a long day of writer's block or empty inboxes, knowing:

"...she knew that there would be days when she would feel desparingly that she could not write and that it was of no use to try; days when the editorial phrase 'not necessarily a reflection on its merits,' would get on her nerves to such an extent that she would feel like imitating Marie Bashkirtseff and hurling the taunting, ticking, remorseless sitting room clock out the window; days when everything she'd done or would try to do would slump-- become mediocre and despicable; days when she would be tempted to bitter disbelief in her fundamental conviction that there was as much truth in the poetry of life as in the prose; days when the echo of that 'random word' of the gods, for which she so avidly listened, would only seem to taunt her with its suggestions of unattainable perfection and loveliness beyond the reach of mortal ear or pen." -L. M. Montgomery, Emily's Quest

And what else could send me over the edge of the great self-doubt pit but something incredibly beautiful, like this:

"He played my notes again, but instead of stopping after, he played the most amazing thing my ears had ever heard. Like waves on a lakeshore, and wind through trees. There were lightning strikes, thunder, and pattering rain. Heat and anger, and honey sweetness.

I'd never heard this music before. There seemed no room to breathe around my swollen heart as the music grew, made me ache inside.

It went on forever, and not long enough. Then my four notes came again, slow like before. I struggled to breathe as the sound echoed against my thoughts. And quiet blanketed the parlor." - Jodi Meadows, Incarnate

*swoon*

I love prose.  I love words and how they can magically string together to capture thoughts and feelings and pictures.  At the SCBWI roundtables, I just kept getting lost in the music of some of the 500 words samples that my fellow roundtable-ites were reading aloud (and I think everyone was starting to get tired of my "Oooooh, I LOVED this one line of yours.  SOOO PRETTY!" over and over again with the different reads.) 

Now, combine the ladies at the roundtables with some of my favorite authors.  All of these women write beautifully about topics ranging from history to revolutions and imprisonment.  They talk about love and death and life.  The paranormal in their stories (where applicable) have fantastic and creative premises.

Me, I write about cute boys and magic.  And sometimes cute magical boys. 

Yeah.

I could feel my heart breaking (in a good way) over the sentences in Incarnate.  Until I Die had me squealing in delight over Amy Plum's storyline and how her descriptions had become even more beautiful since her first book.  Dearly, Departed made me want to keep reading the book forever.  Those books were written by amazing authors.  And at that hour, I felt like a poseur, trying to break into the same profession.

"I could feel the tension in his arms and chest, trying to hold me, trying not to break me. I wanted to say something, reassure him that I trusted him, but if I spoke, the moment might shatter."- Jodi Meadows, Incarnate

But the sun always comes up in the morning, pushing back those cobwebs of fear. Doubt doesn't do too well in the daytime. (Not to mention, Jodi, Amy, and Lia have sequels a 'comin. They may break my heart, but I love them anyway.)

I  always have to remind myself that everyone's been there.  Everyone has had their own personal three a.m.s (or six a.m.s) filled with questioning and maybe even a tinge of despair.  I'm not going to write like Jodi Meadows or Amy Plum or Lia Habel or LM Montgomery-- I'm going to write like me.  I can't change who I am as a writer, I can only learn and grow.  And even if I never publish, I still have these MSs that are all mine, my babies filled with castles and sugar sand and cute magical boys.  Life is too short not to try and breathe life into these stories.

Thank you, authors and editors and agents for making me question myself while still inspiring me.  You are the reason why I stay up all night for just. one. more. chapter.

That same morning, I had a burst of creativity and productivity on my MG WIP (no cute boys, but plenty of magic!) Autumn and TRC seem to love my self-doubt!

Bloggy people-- how do you get past your 3ams?

If I Had A Time Machine...

Another Friday Five from the people at Paper Hangover:

What are the FIVE novels you wish you had written?

When I first saw this question, I immediately thought of the books that had inspired me as a child and as a teen.  These are the books on my shelves with broken spines held together with tape and glue, pages threatening to fall out.  I've loved these books to death and still re-read them to this day.

1.  Emily of New Moon (Lucy Maud Montgomery)

From the EoNM Anime

When I was ten years old, a distant family member gave me a box set of the Emily series.  I had never read L.M. Montgomery's books before (even Anne), so these books were my first introduction to the magic of Prince Edward Island and Montgomery's beautiful prose. 

Inside of these books was a ten year old girl like me-- someone who loved reading and wanted nothing more in the world than to be a writer.  Emily understood what it was like to have the thrill of words rush through you and, oh, God, her "Flash"... Montgomery gave description and voice to that magical moment of seeing something so amazing and beautiful just beyond our physical world.  I've seen and felt that, myself.

I lived with Emily through her 3ams of doubt, her rejections (haven't we all had that moment of disappointment when that first childish poem isn't published?), her growth as a writer, and finally, the publication of her first, wonderful book.

This book inspired me and still inspires me to keep striving, to keep trying to climb that "Alpine Path."  If I ever do get even near the top of that path, I'll partly have L.M. Montgomery to thank.

2. Blubber, Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret, & Deenie

This is the cover of the copy currently on my shelves

Been a tween and teen can be incredibly difficult.  You deal with bullies, body image issues, figuring out your faith and the "who" of who you are.  Judy Blume is like the incredibly cool aunt who completely understands you and hands you these books as manuals through your teen years.  I have her to thank for not panicking about some of our more stressful "rites of passage" and some of us ladies in the office still talk about Deenie when we have a discussion on non-operative scoliosis treatments (bracing, for example) and the effects on teen girls.  I want teens to read my books and feel like I've given them a little bit of a voice, too.  Maybe I won't be as cool as informative as Ms. Blume, but I want to be someone who supports and inspires them.


3. Emma (Jane Austen)

Emma is so sweet and clueless

And a genius adaptation

I love Jane Austen.  I especially love her snark and digs at the society of her time, something that doesn't always show itself to a first-time reader of her books.  Emma, to me, is the epitome of Austen's wonderful snarkishness (is that a word?)

Plus, it inspired possibly one of the best adaptations of a book-to-modern culture movies EVER:


I don't know about you, but I think Ms. Austen would have completely and totally approved of Amy Heckerling's adaptation.  *Hides from the literature snobs and Austen fanatics who start chasing after me with torches and knives*





4.  The Mists of Avalon (Marion Zimmer Bradley)

MZB was one of the first women and feminist pioneers of Sci-Fi/Fantasy, paving the way for generations of writers.  I loved her Darkover books as a teen, but The Mists of Avalon was, by far, my favorite of all of her books.  Hearing the story from the traditional villain's side (Morgan le Fay, Arthur's half-sister) and watching her weave together a new version of the Arthurian legends still resonates with me and even affects my own thought process while writing.

Her novel, The Firebrand, is also high on my list of all-time favorites.







5.  Dracula (Bram Stoker)

Confession: I kind-of went through a vampire phase in high school.  The Fictional Dead Boy post touched on that a bit.  My vampires, however, did not sparkle.  Mine had that dangerous, sinister edge to them that many current vamp incarnations are, well, lacking.  And, during that phase, I stumbled on to the granddaddy of all vampire tales.

oooooooooohhhhhh... Classic cover without fangs!!!

Stoker's prose is beautiful (I'm a sucker for prose!), his descriptions so vivid that I get hungry when I read about Harker's meals in the first few chapters and my stomach churns when I read about Renfield's meals in later chapters.  I feel so sorry for beautiful Lucy, and I am brave Mina.  Everything that this book does, from drawing me into the action to making me feel a *little* bit sorry for the villain, is exactly what a book should do.  Stoker was a genius-- I hope that I can someday write a fraction as well as he did.


Those are my top five "wish I wrotes"-- what are yours?

A Letter from a New Jerseyan

A rant:

I was reading a book by one of my recent favorite authors (and a NYT bestseller, at that), when I came across a passage in the book where the main character and her friend--in the span of two lines-- insulted New Jersey.

Again.

And I nearly threw the book across the gym. (I didn't, of course, because it's a BOOK and books are precious, precious things... but I did think about it.)

In that moment, the idea for this post was born.

Dear Authors (and Publishers),

I am from New Jersey.  I love being from New Jersey.  I am one of your readers and contribute to your income.

Remember that NJ is the most densely populated and second wealthiest per capita state in the US.  (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_population_density , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_income )  We. Buy. Books. Too.

Can you please be a little bit more original and quit bashing on a percentage of your readers?

I understand that we've traditionally been an easy target.  I'm not QUITE sure why, but people seem to love to hate us.  Stereotypes about our state seem to abound.  (psst... most of the cast of the Jersey shore-- esp the most obnoxious ones?  Not from NJ-- source: http://www.mtv.com/shows/jersey_shore/season_4/cast.jhtml )

BUT, remember:

• That accent that people love to imitate?  I really don't know many people from NJ who actually sound like that.  I'm REALLY tired of people saying that I don't sound like I'm from New Jersey.  We don't all sound like "The Nanny."
• Every time people from most other states bash us... they're actually smacking NJ after benefiting from our money. "New Jersey has the highest disparity of any state in the United States between what it gives to the federal government and what it receives. In fiscal year 2005, New Jersey taxpayers gave the federal government $77 billion, while only receiving $55 billion. This difference is higher than any other state and means that for every $1 New Jersey taxpayers send to Washington, the state only receives $0.61 in return. This calculation is applied correctly after making the federal government deficit neutral, as sometimes the federal government spends more than it receives. As of 2005^[update], New Jersey has never been above 48th in rank for per capita federal spending (with a rank of 50th for the majority of that time) since 1982, while being second or third in per capita federal taxes paid to Washington." (source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Jersey
• Most of our state is wooded and farmland.  We're known for our cranberries, blueberries, tomatoes, and peaches.  We have beautiful forests and beaches, from the rolling hills of Warren and Sussex counties to Appalacian trail to our Pinelands and our very (well known) shore.
• We don't all have big hair or have a taste for gaudy clothing
• And, no, we're not all in the mob.

So, the next time that you feel like bashing our state... please don't. Because it's not nice, it's not funny, and frankly, it's getting old.

Sincerely,
Issy, a proud South Jersey girl

PS: I'll write another post soon showcasing some of the really beautiful places that I love in my home state

A beautful November day in the NJ Pine Barrens (this picture was taken less than 1/2 mile from my home)