"Deliberate Practice" is More Than Just Practice

The idea of "deliberate practice" has been around for years, but it's become something of a buzzword lately. You've heard the drill: you need to put in 10,000 hours of work, or about 10 years of focussed practice, to achieve expertise in anything -- from writing poetry to throwing darts. Which is why your writing mentors are forever telling you to write, write, write. Because the more you write, the sooner you'll become a master of your craft, write? I mean, right?

Well, not exactly.
I've just finished an astonishing, hopeful book called The Genius in All of Us, by David Shenk. Shenk argues that we all have far more capacity than we give ourselves credit for; that through focussed application we can all become very, very good at what we dream of doing -- not only that, but we can, like the London cabbies he writes about -- actually grow our brains. The whole idea of "talent" is a red herring. People are not born with talent -- not Mozart and not Ted Williams. They became legends because they practiced really, really, really hard. But here's the real kicker:

Shenk says these arrows should actually
be pointing in the same direction

Turning Up the Tension

Last person to identify
this movie still is a rotten egg.

The annual Florida SCBWI conference in Miami has to be one of the best kid lit conferences in the country: witness the many writers who whizzed down last weekend from Canada and New York to attend. I spent an intense day Friday in a novel workshop with agent Marietta Zacker and Y/A author Dorian Cirrone; we covered a lot of ground -- from writing tag lines to penning the novel's climactic scene, so I'll share just a piece of what we talked about when it comes to ratcheting up tension in your novel and keeping it high.

This is one of Dorian Cirrone's tips; she had ten in all. Keep an eye out for Dorian as she makes the round of national conferences. She's a pleasure to spend a day with. Her book Dancing in Red Shoes Will Kill You is available from Harper Teen.

1. Ramp up your dialogue. 

If a Book Falls in the Forest...Lessons from The Book Thief.

I'm reading an astonishing YA novel, The Book Thief. Heard of it, by chance? I'm probably the last aspiring kid writer on the planet to read it, but I am flabbergasted by Zusak's use of language, his wit, his inventiveness, and his take-no-prisoners approach to historical fiction. Zusak must break every rule, contort every piece of advice, I've ever read or heard about writing for children, and it's brilliant. Just as inspiring is Zusak's contention in the video below that even if he knew, in advance, that not a single person would ever read his book, that it would never be published, that it would sink into obscurity, he still would have written it. In exactly that way.

Think Your Critique Partners Are Bad?

I'm stealing this from Giles Hash over at High Aspirations. It's too good not to share.

A Writing Joke from Hell

I'm not doing a real post today, because I'm planning to spend a full day on my new ms. Anyway, this joke seemed appropriate:


A writer died and was given the option of going to heaven or hell.
She decided to check out each place first. As the writer descended into the fiery pits, she saw row upon row of writers chained to their desks in a steaming sweatshop. As they worked, they were repeatedly whipped with thorny lashes.
"Oh my," said the writer. "Let me see heaven now."
A few moments later, as she ascended into heaven, she saw rows of writers, chained to their desks in a steaming sweatshop. As they worked, they, too, were whipped with thorny lashes.
"Wait a minute," said the writer. "This is just as bad as hell!"
"Oh no, it's not," replied an unseen voice. "Here, your work gets published."


Have a great weekend!

Do You Connect With Your Concept?

Rockin' Around the Plot Clock
I just spent an amazing weekend with a dozen other writers, holed up in a house in Mount Dora, Florida. We dedicated 48+ hours of workshop time to thinking about plot.

I did a pretty good job plotting my first novel by the seat of my pants (I went back in revision and created a detailed step sheet), but I never really felt like I "got" plot. No matter how many craft books I read on the subject, how to structure a novel for maximum impact (and I mean, I wanted it to kill) just wasn't gelling for me.

After this weekend, consider me gelled. I get how the plot points fit together now, and how they ought to resonate off each other. I merely had to spend some time with Joyce Sweeney and Jamie Morris's brilliantly simple Plot Clock. The Plot Clock features in most of the Sweeney/Morris Next Level Weekend Craft Intensives, and I can't recommend these workshops too highly).

Ann Patchett on the PRACTICE of Writing

Patchett: No getaway
from practice.

A nifty outfit called Byliner is publishing excellent original e-titles in miniature, and Ann Patchett's memoir, part writer's craft, part subtle encouragement, part autobiography is more than a bargain at $2.99 for the "Kindle single."

The Getaway Car: A Practical Memoir about Writing and Life weighs in at 195 KBs and is meant to be read in one sitting. But you'll want to spend many sittings with this little book, not least for the support Patchett offers aspiring writers, and the no-nonsense "get back on track, you nitwit" advice she dishes out. When you stray, she reminds us, remember: Good writing comes down to practice:


"It turns out that the distance from head to hand, from wafting butterfly to entemological specimen, is achieved through regular, disciplined practice. What begins as something like a dream will in fact stay a dream forever unless you have the tools and discipline to bring it out." 

and


"If you want to write, practice writing. Practice it for hours a day, not to come up with a story you can publish but because you long to learn to write well, because there is something that you alone can say. Write the story, learn from it, put it away, write another story. Think of a sink pipe filled with sticky sediment: the only way to get clean water is to force a small ocean through the tap. Most of us are full up with bad stories, boring stories, self-indulgent stories, searing works of unendurable melodrama. We must get them all out of our system...


You've heard the advice a thousand times, but maybe never as eloquently, as Patchett keeps circling back to it in widening gyres.

And now here's a funny story that happened to a blogging friend of mine, Joanna Marple, and a famous children's author, Kathleen Duey, only this week:

Writing the Second Novel: Three Things to Consider

I "started" novel number two this month, although I'm realizing that the verb "to start" is a slippery one. But I'm finding it useful to change up my process this time.

Here's what I'm doing differently:

1) I've got myself a new Scrivener program, which is going to make my research organize itself. Well, I hope so, anyway. Because novel number two is historical (Vietnam War), I'm going to have copious notes to keep track of. So far, I love Scrivener, which has all kinds of nifty gadgets for organizing characters, scenes, and locations, and umpteen methods of outlining. Anybody else out there in blog-land using it?

Interview With Author Louis K. Lowy

Lowy: Penning a mid-50s riff on flying
saucers and commie paranoia

If I’d been an agent pitching Louis K. Lowy’s novel Die Laughing, I might have called it Mad Men meets King of Comedy meets The Outer Limits. As Lowy notes in this interview, he spent a lot of time researching his 1956 setting for his first novel, and the period details—from the “burnt orange cigarette slacks” and black beret of his leading lady to his main character’s quest for TV fame (Sam E, a stand-up comic, is slated for “The Steve Allen Show” when things start to go downhill fast)--are exacting and very, very entertaining. Lowy’s work has appeared in, among others, Coral Living Magazine, New Plains Review, Ethereal Tales Magazine, Pushing Out the Boat, The MacGuffin Magazine, and The Chaffey Review. He’s been awarded a Florida Individual Artists Fellowship, and he lives in Miami Lakes.

Lowy will be participating in a panel sponsored by Writers' Network of South Florida

Author Publicity: Promoting Your Book

Yay You're Published! Now Comes the Hard Part


Wed. Sept 21, at 6:30pm

Broward County Main Library, 6th Floor, 100 S Andrews Ave.,


Fort Lauderdale, FL 


RSVP to: contact@writersnetworksofla.org

On Oct. 17 at 6:30 p.m., Lowy will be reading at

Park Road Books

4139 Park Rd., Charlotte, NC

(704) 525-9239

Questions for Louis K. Lowy:

Interview with Author Deborah Sharp

Celebrating Day 3 of Random Acts of Publicity 

Sharp: Training her lens on a disappearing Florida

Mystery writer Deborah Sharp is a former reporter for USA Today. She traded the sad stories of the news business for writing mysteries, set in a little-known rodeo-and-ranches slice of her native Florida. Her books are funny, with a Southern-fried edge: Think Stephanie Plum with a plate of BBQ and a couple of cousins named Bubba.

Deborah's “Mace Bauer Mysteries'’ debuted with Mama Does Time (Midnight Ink, 2008). To research her second, Mama Rides Shotgun (2009), she saddled up for a cross-Florida, six-day trail ride. Dressing up as a tacky bride was almost as grueling for 2010's Mama Gets Hitched. For her fourth book, Mama Sees Stars, Deborah plans several red-carpet soirees in honor of her title character's grab at Hollywood stardom. Trouble is, Mama's big closeup might just end in murder.

Deborah’s short fiction and essays have appeared nationally, and she's been interviewed on the "Today" show. She lives in Ft. Lauderdale with husband Kerry Sanders, a TV reporter. No kids. No pets. They had goldfish once. Turned out badly.

Visit Deborah at www.deborahsharp.com; or direct your lonely-heart and etiquette questions to Mama at ask-mama.blogspot.com. For a limited time you can download Mama Does Time for FREE by clicking here (if you have Kindle) or here (if you have a Nook). Lots of events this month and next: a couple of big galas to launch Mama Sees Stars in Delray and Fort Lauderdale, and Sharp will be speaking on a panel about marketing yourself as an author. Click here for the full schedule.

Questions for Deborah Sharp

An Interview with Author Donna Gephart

Celebrating Day 2 of Darcy Pattison's Random Acts of Publicity.

Gephart: Embracing her inner nerd.

I met Donna Gephart through a lucky accident: We were stuck in line for a bus at last year’s SCBWI-Florida conference. Which was my great good fortune, since she invited me to come to the monthly SCBWI critique group she co-hosts in Palm Beach Gardens (the group just celebrated its seventh anniversary). Donna has made her mark with gut-bustingly funny middle grade novels about smart, quirky kids; her newest book, Olivia Bean, Trivia Queen, about a girl determined to get on the TV quiz show Jeopardy!, comes out in March from Delacorte Press/Random House (pre-order it at Amazon and Barnes and Noble).  Her most recent novel, How to Survive Middle School, received a starred review from Kirkus and School Library Journal (click here for the singing hamster video).  Her first book, As If Being 12-3/4 Isn't Bad Enough, My Mother Is Running for President won the Sid Fleischman Humor Award. Visit Donna at http://www.donnagephart.com, where you'll also find out she makes a mean lemon square and apple cake.

Questions for Donna Gephart:

An Interview With Author Meg Medina

Launching Darcy Pattison's Random Acts of Publicity:

Meg, reading Tia Isa

I first met Meg Medina in the mid-'90s, when she was collaborating with dancer/choreographer Cherie Carson on a theatrical piece based on the life of her Cuban grandmother. Meg was a journalist for the now-defunct alt-weekly iCE in Palm Beach County; she also wrote grants for the Center for Creative Education. But for as long as I’ve known her, Meg has been passionately and creatively engaged with the Latino experience, and the joys and difficulties of navigating a bicultural heritage. I was bowled over when I found out she’d turned to writing fiction for children. And I was blown away by the beauty of her debut novel, Milagros: Girl From Away (Christy Ottaviano Books: An Imprint of Henry Holt Books for Young Readers).

Meg followed Milagros with a picture book, out this summer, Tia Isa Wants a Car (Candlewick Press, Spanish and paperback editions to follow in 2012). Her young adult novel, THE GIRL WHO COULD SILENCE THE WIND, is forthcoming from Candlewick in March of 2012. Although she still has family in South Florida, she now lives in Richmond, Virginia, with her husband and kids. She’s one of the smartest and most eloquent people I know.

I'm glad to launch Random Acts of Publicity with Meg, since September is also National Hispanic Heritage Month (see Meg's recipe for arroz con pollo, and her author's blog, here, and follow her on Twitter here. I've got a giveaway: a signed copy of Milagros goes to a randomly selected commenter on this post. I’ll contact the lucky winner at the end of the week about how to mail it to you.

Questions for Meg Medina

Ursula Nordstrom: Keeping the Channel Open

Mama Bear Nordstrom

Whenever I'm feeling sorry for myself, in a writerly sort of way,  I have a two-pronged approach to shaking myself out of it: 1) Reread the letters of Ursula Nordstrom, and 2) Pretend that she's writing them to me.

Nordstrom was the doyenne of kidlit--an assistant, then editor,  board member, VP, and finally semi-retired "consultant" to Harper Books for Boys and Girls from the late '30s until she died of ovarian cancer in 1988 -- she extricated children's literature from its vat of sugar-and-spice, dusted it off, and set it down firmly in the real world. Nordstrom had no fear of the dark side. She edited and championed E.B. White's Charlotte's Web (First line: "Where's Papa going with that ax?"); her letters to White about Garth Williams's spider illustrations are priceless. She discovered Maurice Sendak and gave him a real job (he was dressing windows at F.A.O. Schwartz), hiring him to illustrate Little Bear. Under her aegis dozens of authors won Newberys, National Book Awards, and Hans Christian Anderson Medals. If you haven't read her letters, Dear Genius, you must.