In case anyone out there has been holding on to a stand-alone fantasy novel that they’d love to submit to us, I wanted to point out that our submission guidelines have been updated. I have a particular interest in a new original high fantasy for upper middle grades, either as a stand-alone or a series proposal.
Check it out.

I’m flipping back and forth on TV between a documentary called Planet Twelve: The Secret Life of 12-Year-Olds which isn’t showing me any new secrets but is funny to watch all the same, and the beginning of The Return of the Musketeers, the opening scene of which begins with a closeup of a hand drawing a sword slowly and dramatically, only to pan out to a man straddling the rafters of a 1649 French pub, apparently drunk.
All the while, my cat knocks over boxes in the other room, and I think he’s going to kill himself one of these days.
But back to the drama of being twelve. The documentary is actually a good introduction to the social hierarchies of twelve-year-olds, laying it out in concise vignettes of what it’s like to be popular, a jock, normal, slightly lower than normal, and on through to the bottom rung. For anyone who lived through junior high, you’ll probably cringe to watch it but nod all the same.
I haven’t gotten beyond the first scene of the Musketeers movie, because I had to pause it to rescue the cat (I heart DVR/T
ivo/whatever you call it). But the opening scene hasn’t impressed me so far. I think my radar for openings has really fine-tuned since my first days as a slush reader. If I’m not hooked right away, I’m bored. However, hooks for me in movies are different than I might expect of books–see: my passion for the BBC production of Persuasion, for which I think I’ve only met five people in the world who love it as much as I. Anyone else who has seen it tells me it was too boring to get through. I doubt in a book I’d be as hooked by men rowing an admiral to his ship to say the war is over or a middle-aged baronet being told he must retrench. I think it’s the Chopin soundtrack that does it, really.
That’s what I *should* be watching right now. I’ve just inspired myself.

It fascinates me how much the editing process intertwines with the writing process. I like to write a little myself, and it’s clear to me that my talents run most clearly to the editing end of the process. I’m fine with that–it better be, if that’s how I make my living! When I write, It’s very hard for me to turn the editor off. I can look at someone else’s plot and say that this part needs to be moved here, and that we need to lead more with such-and-such, and that we ought to streamline the pacing here… but it’s much harder for me to do that with my own work.
I suppose the main reason for this is that I spend so little time on writing my own fiction (though I’ve spent years writing nonfiction for jobs and school–newspapers, a trade magazine, grad school). I’ve been working on the same book since my last year of undergrad, about six years ago. I wrote a novella version of it for a class in grad school, which was a major milestone for me, but something still was missing about the plot. Back in November during Nanowrimo, I finally hit upon an idea to make it something beyond a generic high fantasy
retelling of a fairy tale. But of course immediately upon hitting my stride, I got computer problems *and* a lymph/sinus virus that knocked me out for months (culminating in sinus surgery). It was all I could do to get myself to work, so the writing had to be put off. (Reason #325 why I will never be a career writer: too many other things getting in the way that are more important to me, such as my job–which I love far more than my own writing. No excuses. Just reality. And that’s okay–but if someone reading this is an aspiring writer, hopefully this illustrates in the reverse how writing needs to be near at top of your list of career aspirations. For me, I find an equal choice between writing in my own time and doing the dishes or watching Lost.)
So I like to think I know how it feels when writers give me excuses for such-and-such happening–I really do!–and I really admire those for whom writing is their number one job priority. Juggling writing with other responsibilities that can sap your creativity really is a tough job.
I think that’s helped me, actually, to be a better editor. I understand that writers do hit blocks, and can be there for them. When an author hits a block, I can be the resource they need for coaching, a second pair of eyes to see mistakes and continuity problems, another creative mind to spark new directions–and even when my suggested direction isn’t t
he exact answer, I might help the author spark a new idea and see places that don’t work quite right for the reader.
I’m thinking of these things in tandem because I just sent off comments to an author for a book that really thrills me, and planned on spending some time this afternoon tinkering with my own story for a while. I was thinking about how good this author’s writing is, and how much I’d love to be able to write like that. But that even if I never finish my own book, it wouldn’t matter–because I’m able to be a part of creating books that I love, no matter whether I write them myself or not.
I’m sure you’ve heard the saying that editors are just frustrated writers (much like the saying that most lawyers are frustrated writers). I’d say yes and no, which probably contradicts my opening sentence that writing and editing are so intertwined. The writer part of me is both distinct from and completely intertwined with the editor part of me. I love telling stories, and I love reading stories, and when a story inspires me as this particular fairy tale has, I really want to tell a new story that incorporates it and makes it my own. The editor part of me just loves good stories and wants to help them be told better. It’s almost like having a dual personality when I write for myself–which one will be dominant today when I’m trying to write?–but then the editor/literary critic completely
takes over when I’m working. But deep down, the writer is reading the same stuff the editor reads, and saying, “Wow, they’re good.”

When it’s published, that is. I’m just finishing up an edit on the first book in a new dark historical series for teen girls that comes out next year. I can’t tell you much more than that, except to say that it’s *good*. I love my job. I get to read fun books for a living. I highly recommend it.

In answer to . It’s been growing this last year, and hopefully will grow more this summer if I get to go to ALA.

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I’ve only been to one country outside the U.S., and that’s Scotland–well, count the whole U.K., I suppose, given my layovers in the Manchester airport, but I never did leave the airport, so it doesn’t really count. I live in Washington–hello, I need to go to Vancouver or something, get myself using that passport more often.

Forwarded to me by a friend at work. It does seem to be at least a stereotypical line between different kinds of writers. I can’t say, though, that I’ve ever heard a writer talk about the agony–more, the hard work of it. Writing is definitely hard work, as much as any other job. But he does make his point in a very entertaining way.

Okay, let me say this once and get it off my chest and never mention it again. I have had it with writers who talk about how painful and harrowing and exhausting and ALMOST IMPOSSIBLE it is for them to put words on paper and how they pace a hole in the carpet, anguish writ large on their marshmallow faces, and feel lucky to have written an entire sentence or two by the end of the day….

Continues here:
http://prairiehome.publicradio.org/features/deskofgk/2005/old_scout/

My cats have been chasing each other around the house this morning, I suppose filled with spring fever. Well, they do this every day, so really I should just mark it down to them still being kittens, even though both of them look nearly grown. They’ve also recently discovered the fireplace, which to them must be a really cool cave to explore or something. Now that I’ve made it off-limits, it’s even more intriguing. This is such a badly designed apartment in so many ways–the flu is horizontal for quite a ways, and large enough for a cat to fit in, especially a curious one like Tildrum or Mogget. Mogget is a tuxedo cat with little white socks on his paws–normally. Now, his white parts are almost as dark as his black parts, covered in soot that won’t wash off. I’ve tried twist-tying the chain closed (my last apartment had glass in front of the chain, so it was easily kept off-limits), but they seem to still be finding a way in when I’m at work. I come home at night to little sooty paw marks all over everything.
It’s a beautiful, sunny day outside, but I feel like staying in. I’m supposed to be at church in 15 minutes, actually, but I have a feeling I won’t find parking because it’s a conference today. I should have left an hour ago just to get there in time to park.
I’m working on reading Scott Westerfeld’s latest installment in the Midnighters series, Blue Noon. Halfway through. I love the concept of this series, and it’s told in a satisfying way. Next on the list–at least from the library pile of books–is Uglies, by the same author. Of course, there’s also the even larger pile of books I’ve been meaning to get to on my own bookshelf. Ever since I became an editor full time, I’ve had ADD when it comes to reading other books. It’s not that they’re not good books–it’s that when I come home, if I have reading to do for work, I should be doing that, and if I don’t, I’d rather rest my eyes and do something non-readerly. I’m getting past it, though, slowly.

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