Oh Canada and Wilderness and the Insecure Writers Support Group meeting

As I write this it is July 1st or Canada Day as we call it here in uh...Canada. So I'm going to post early this week. Because I secretly love Canada Day. I am not sure why - it really wasn't a big deal when we were kids. Probably because we had just gotten free from school and it just blended into that general bliss. I don't want to be too jingoistic but I do love our country. And mostly I love it for the countryness of it. The thing is we aren't so populated as our neighbours to the south and certainly not as populated as European countries or well anywhere I don't think. We have a lot of big vistas, rolling hills, mountains - for yes we too have the Rockies only our part of that range is quite a bit more rugged. I can say that with complete conviction having lived in the mountains on both sides of the border. The Canadian Rockies really rock. And the prairies are truly waves of gold and the north is awesome in the original meaning. I have lived in these provinces - Alberta, Manitoba, Ontario, Nova Scotia, British Columbia and Labrador (now called Newfoundland & Labrador but that is just silly - I didn't live in Newfoundland).  So coast to coast to coast (Labrador being on the Labrador Sea). I have been to many National Parks and many Provincial Parks. If you ask me a favourite wild place in Canada I will not answer you - it depends on what I'm looking for. I love all of Nova Scotia - it's variety and beauty from stunning Peggy's Cove (near where I live) to the highlands of Cape Breton. Being the daughter of Manitobans I completely think the prairies are fantastic - the big sky, the space! I feel so at home in the countryside of the Ottawa Valley in Ontario, the stone farmhouses and jumbly fields. The foothills in Alberta (where I was born) bring out my inner cowgirl and British Columbia is so wildly beautiful with its towering trees, mountains and the Pacific Ocean lapping at its edges. Labrador is a different beast altogether - tundra, rivers, it's crazy beauty in winter, its quiet powerful presence at all times.

I love the art inspired by this wildness, Emily Carr, the Group of Seven, Maude Lewis, Tom Thompson. As a budding landscape painter I am thrilled in just the attempt to bring the beauty I see to others. The land of Labrador inspired my first novel The Crooked Knife which focused on some of the ecocide that is happening in that part of the world.

                                    Into the forest by Emily Carr

                          mine - coming into Canmore, Alberta

Today, had it not been pouring with rain, the fella and I were going to take out the canoe he's been rebuilding all winter for its maiden voyage. We were just going to cross the road and go in from our lovely neighbours beach. We wanted to do it today because it is the anniversary of our second date when we went canoeing in Prospect Bay, 22 years ago. We don't mind a rainy day though. Last year we had terrible forest fires and we are happy to see the small brooks rise up again in our part of paradise. 

So happy birthday to this land - which of course was already here in 1867 when Confederation occurred. If we can remember why this is a countryside worth preserving, that held peoples both First Nation and Inuit that are worth honouring, well then that would be truly wonderful. 

And now for something not completely different...

The monthly meeting of the Insecure Writers Support Group is now in session.

Purpose: To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds!

The awesome co-hosts for the July 3 posting of the IWSG are JS Pailly, Rebecca Douglass, Pat Garcia, Louise-Fundy Blue, and Natalie Aguirre!

In keeping with my theme of landscape I am happy to post an article I wrote for Kate Juniper's  site  Juniper Editing & Creative in which I wrote a piece on writing and place.

Place as Character

Whether I’m writing a novel, a memoir, a poem, or a play, the very first thing I do is situate the story in a time and place, metaphorically giving the reader some ground to stand on. To me place is so much more than a location’s physical features: it holds a unique and particular culture, right down to the mannerisms of its inhabitants. Place is in the way an Inuk lifts his eyebrows for yes and scrunches them down for no. It is the slump in the shoulders of a group of old men looking out as they watch the ice on the bay breaking up in March when it shouldn’t break up until May. It is how one neighbourhood has persnickety front gardens and another is strewn with the corpses of trucks and piles of garbage next to front doors.

In most of what I’ve written, the place is a character in its own right, and so it needs the full treatment I would give to any other person inhabiting my story. What is the place’s history? How do its people treat it? What challenges does it face, and how does it respond? What story does it want, or even need, told?

The latest works I’ve been writing—mystery novels, poems, and essays—are all located in Labrador: a place my partner’s family came from and that he knows very well. We lived there for five years, during which time I grew to love and despair of the place in equal measure. It can be a very challenging environment—long cold winters, isolated communities, and a history of being misunderstood and pillaged for its natural resources. It is wild and beautiful and frightening. It intrigued me and infuriated me. Writing it into my work was a way that I could begin to come to understand it, or at the very least understand its impact on me.

Because I treat my location as yet another character, I look at what I imagine the place wants, just as I do my protagonists, my villains, and anyone else inhabiting the world I’m creating. Peggy’s Cove, Nova Scotia, where I set an early mystery, seemed to want to be respected for its wild and dangerous side, instead of always being reduced to the single note of its view. Annapolis Royal, also in Nova Scotia, has an old and curious history that demanded I allow for a certain atmospheric quality given to it by its long history as a habitat. Where both Labrador and Peggy’s Cove are primarily their physical environment – the land and ocean itself, Annapolis Royal must include the buildings, the imprint of the humans who lived on that spot over the centuries.

Labrador struggles with being dismissed as the land God gave to Cain, a description of Labrador by explorer Jacques Cartier. He was alluding to Genesis 4, in which Cain, having killed his brother, is condemned to till land that is barren. Labrador is at once dismissed by outsiders as being an inhospitable place, unfriendly, and plundered by the same for its natural resources. Meanwhile, the people who live there—the Innu, Inuit and settler communities—try their best to protect it from large-scale exploitation.

Place, in my mind, is the very best way to evoke atmosphere, and is also so effective as a means to evoke emotion. Within a place are many locations: frightening (a dark wood on a moonless night); transcendent (a wild beach below the Northern Lights); comforting (a roaring fire, a chair, a lamp within a home the protagonist loves). It can help the reader understand a character by what they can ‘see’ of their surroundings (do they live like an ascetic monk, or a bohemian collector of oddities?) and how they respond to their surroundings.

Most importantly, setting the story in a tangible place that evokes the senses embodies the reading experience: it transports your reader to that different world, where they can sink into the story entirely, feeling safe enough to get lost. And I believe most readers would tell you being lost in a story is the very best place to be.

June is here!

It is another meeting of the Insecure Writers Support Group. We meet the first Wednesday of every month. 

 Purpose: To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds!

June 5 question - In this constantly evolving industry, what kind of offering/service do you think the IWSG should consider offering to members?

Geesh! I don't know. I like what the IWSG already offers - in particular the ongoing sharing and encouraging and the safe haven for all of us. I'm becoming more and more allergic to improvement. Casting a wider net may mean you catch more fish, but it could just as easily mean you spend all winter knotting a huge net and finding a bigger boat to haul it out to the fishing grounds and all for very little benefit. I'm becoming an essentialist. To quote the website of Greg McKeown, writer of Essentialism - The Disciplined Pursuit of Less

"By applying a more selective criteria for what is essential, the pursuit of less allows us to regain control of our own choices so we can channel our time, energy and effort into making the highest possible contribution toward the goals and activities that matter."

Or as my daddio, Major General Mo Morrison, would opine "if it ain't broke don't fix it." 

So that's my two cents. Well two cents from Greg and two from Mo. That's their four cents!

Now onto other things. Yesterday (which was really more than a week ago as I have to write this early due to this and that) I called the publisher of my novel. On the phone. Weird right? I'd had over five months of emailing him, waiting a century or two to hear back and then trying again, all in the hopes of getting the rights to my novel returned to me. Guess he's a busy guy. Anyway I was desperate to have this done so I can jump into the joy and bliss of querying the second in the series. Which I couldn't do with him holding onto the rights. So he answered the phone (!! right?) and agreed immediately to my last offer. Now I'm waiting for the email he promised. I will then be free. A gay divorcee! 

Yesterday I got my garden in. Calloo Callay. today it is raining not just cats and dogs but rhinoceroses and hippopotami. Yes it is. Hope my poor little innocent bedding plants make it through or that'll be like I spilled a bottle of the most expensive Scotch. Maybe the plants are a bit cheaper but not if you include labour. 

I love that it is raining however. It has been desperate dry here and you may recall (probably don't why would you?) that last year at this time we had dreadful and very frightening fires that went on and on. Then a flood. 

Ah well.

I'll be away for a few days doing a Buddhist program so am getting this out early.

And by the way I do a weekly essay on Substack called Dispatches. If you are interested, it is completely free and it is just me rambling on. 

 

 

May Day

May 1st!  Happy May Day! But who has encroached on this wondrous day that celebrates spring in all its craziness? What - it's a day to reflect on the plight of the worker? Aw fudge. I don't wanna. Don't get me wrong - I'm a union girl down to my toes. Why when my first child was born over 54 years ago, I went into labour at 9 am and delivered at 5. But I want to celebrate mayflowers (so sweet, so elusive, so fragrant) and hope that the merlins come back to have their next batch of kids here again, and get my peas in again (durn birds ate the first bunch I put in). I want to make a flower crown and lie about in the grass dreaming of swimming. Here's the version of May Day that I want: (Wikepedia naturally)

May Day is a European festival of ancient origins marking the beginning of summer, usually celebrated on 1 May, around halfway between the spring equinox and summer solstice.^] Festivities may also be held the night before, known as May Eve. Traditions often include gathering wildflowers and green branches, weaving floral garlands, crowning a May Queen (sometimes with a male companion), and setting up a Maypole, May Tree or May Bush, around which people dance. Bonfires are also part of the festival in some regions. Regional varieties and related traditions include Walpurgis Night in central and northern Europe, the Gaelic festival Beltane, the Welsh festival Calan Mai, and May devotions to the Blessed Virgin Mary. Europe,  It has also been associated with the ancient Roman festival Floralia.

Besides we already have a day for the worker in Canada - it is Labour Day and it happens the first Monday in September. Proper thing.

Of course today also marks the monthly celebration of the insecure writer, as does the first Wednesday in every month. Go to this spot to sign up or find other writers banging on about their insecurities. Insecure Writers Support Group

Purpose: To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds!

Posting: The first Wednesday of every month is officially Insecure Writer’s Support Group day. 

Let’s rock the neurotic writing world!

Our Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and hashtag is #IWSG.

The awesome co-hosts for the May 1 posting of the IWSG are Victoria Marie Lees, Kim Lajevardi, Nancy Gideon, and Cathrina Constantine!

May 1 question - How do you deal with distractions when you are writing? Do they derail you?

May 1 answer: Well duh, yes, distractions aren't distractions if they don't derail you.  How do I deal with them when I'm writing? I entertain them for awhile. I let them take me away on clouds of inconsequentiality and then when they are distracted themselves I smack them and send them packing! Positively everything is distracting to me when I am trying to focus. And I meditate every day so I'm well aware that all distractions begin and end in my own head space. And no, it isn't true that knowing a problem is half a problem solved. But being so well used to them I can give you my list of ways to derail my distractions before they completely take over.

1. Have a list of things I really want to finish every day. It shouldn't be a huge list - just two or three things to do with writing projects such as get one query out, or write 2000 words in wip or research microscopic black holes for book on Shag Harbour incident.

2. Give myself a time limit on distractions. For example : allow myself half an hour to watch youtube on how to train my dog to do the cha cha. Or tell myself that after working steadily for an hour and a half I can go to the kitchen and start a batch of cookies.

3. Instead of focusing on the distractions or distract myself by worrying about the distractions, I try and focus on what is going well. I climb the mountain of possibility instead of falling over the cliff of despair. I reward myself often (just with little things but still) knowing that I'm the kind of work horse that responds better to the carrot than the stick.

4. Remind myself that if I'm being particularly distracted it is usually because I'm afraid for some reason of going forward with writing. Then I spend a bit of time sleuthing out my apprehension. That usually works a treat.

Okay - back to work I go. I have one more post to write and a query to make.

So Happy May Day everyone! I'm going to go pick mayflowers and loll about in the grass.

Naïve no more

 It is the April meeting of the Insecure Writer's Support Group. Link here to sign up for this beacon of hope in a sea of turbulent storms (hmmm...think I've just joined the purple prose posse.)

Purpose: To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds!

Hello fellow writers, today I want to talk about something different than my usual. I'm not afraid of appearing foolish and/or weak. I fully embrace my foolish weak self. I have not been through the fire because either I'm still in it or? I do feel safe in your company, but I wonder if you are safe in mine? Nah, just kidding. I do want to talk about a form of safety however. It is something that has arisen in my writing life - a feeling of vulnerability and how it arose. It is hard to be both 72 years old and to recognize that one is still naïve in the ways of the world - at least in the ways of the publishing world. 

It is an old story I believe. Bedazzled by being chosen I didn't fully examine my new partner in this business. For it is a business - this being an author. It is very interesting to me (in a horrifying way) that like my early romantic choices I didn't fall prey to evil or dastardly types, but just one that was inept, lackadaisical, and didn't remotely put my interests first, or even eleventh. And I did not examine my contract properly for escape clauses. I did have a lawyer look it over but we both neglected to notice that there was no mention of rights reversal in the language, or at least not one that included me. 

So - in the barest terms I can write it - I wrote a book that is in the same series as the book published (trying not to use any names here). The publisher of the first book declined to even look at it, reporting that the first one hadn't sold well enough. The first one sold well beyond what most debut books sell, but who am I to argue. I didn't like being rebuffed but the bloom was well off that rose anyway, and I looked forward to finding a publisher that would be more attentive. All the books sold were because of my hard work by the way. Trouble is that a publisher won't be interested in a series when the initial book is held (imprisoned?) by another publisher. Okay. I did some research and sent off a request to have my rights returned to me in full. I heard nothing, which was the modus operando, so I wrote again. Finally I received a reply only not really. The publisher said that they had a number of my books in their warehouse and wouldn't be able to sell them if they reversed my rights. I did a little digging and I'll get to that in a minute - but this turns out not to be true. They can't print anymore but they can sell remaining stock. I was willing to take some of them from the publisher but not the bulk because why would I?  I was paid no advance - I was never warned that they didn't think sales were good and it was the publisher who was wanting in the marketing business not me. I replied with these details and mentioned that in all the back and forth the publisher had not once responded to my question. The words rights reversal where never written by the publisher. They were, in my opinion, trying to monetize my departure. This is, I hasten to say, not illegal but it sure is unethical. What they are in effect saying is that they don't want to publish future books, but no one else will be able to either. It's been, as of when this will be published, three weeks since my last request. I'm being held hostage by a humbug. 

Why am I telling you this dumb story? Because some of you will be like me - madly sending out queries and being thrilled if one comes up good. And here is my advice - go to the site Writer Beware and read everything they've got on what should be in your contract, especially in terms of rights reversal. Victoria Strauss was invaluable in helping me parse what was happening. I felt  gaslit and she shone the light of truth on what was happening. She responded to my cry for help in two days. 

As to what I'm going to do next - I am not sure. I think I will forgo more emails and send a registered letter, and I may stop being coy about who is doing what on social media, but I'm hoping I don't have to do that. It makes me wonder about the writing associations I belong to - the ones I pay membership fees to. Where is their help for this sort of thing? I'm going to start asking more questions and quit being so dewy-eyed. Now keep in mind I'm in Canada so some things are different, but not many. One thing that is different is that small publishers here get pretty nice sized grants from the government to publish books. Not sure if that is the case in the much bigger market of the US but it pays to know these things.

Hope you are all well and enjoying some kind of spring (or fall) weather! We're heading to Cuba for two weeks a week from today for a much needed vacation.

Carrying On

I now call this meeting of the Insecure Writers' Support Group of Prospect, Nova Scotia to order!

I'll do roll call.

Is Jan the writer here?

    Here!

Is Jan the author here?

    'sound of crickets'

Okay then, is Jan the procrastinator here?

    Yes, I'm here. (mumbles something under her breath)

Is Jan the diehard romantic here?

    Yes, I'm here in my writing jacket with leather on the elbows and a pipe and a tumbler full of scotch.

Oh, I didn't realize that Jan the diehard romantic was a guy.

    Well...sometimes. Today I'm fashioned on Hemingway. Yesterday I was a starving artist in a garret in Paris. I was wearing a wispy gown and drinking absinthe.

Alright, moving on. Is Jan the business person here?

    voice of Jan the writer - "she is out trying to find Jan the author."

Of course she is. Finally, is Jan the householder here?

    Yes, but I can't stay long. I'm still trying to finish the decluttering in the writing studio, but Jan the painter is making that nearly impossible. Also, we have folks coming for dinner.

Okay. We have a quorum. First thing on the agenda is that Jan the author hasn't heard back from the publisher and can't give Jan the writer the go ahead to collaborate on the new query package. Who will contact Jan the A. and get her to write another blasted email?

    voice of Jan the diehard romantic "I will. I'll fill her mind with thoughts about what fun she'll have when her next book is published - that week or two when everything is rosy."

    voice of Jan the procrastinator, "I don't think she should bug the publisher just yet. Maybe after Easter would be better. Or Monday next, Monday is a good day to begin things."

    voice of Jan the business woman who has just come in the room, "No! It has to be done today. I couldn't find Jan the author anywhere. Think she's on a bender. I'll write it."

So do we have a motion?

    all speak up, "don't be crazy! If Jan the business woman says she'll do it, she'll do it."

Jan in charge looks abashed,  - Okay, next order of business. Jan the writer, I've heard that you aren't keeping up with your writing schedule? How can we help you?

    Voice of Jan the writer "You can tell Jan the householder to quit inviting people to dinner. And why do things need to be so clean?" (laughter all round) And Jan the painter needs to remember where she is in the pecking order."

    Voice of Jan the householder "You know darn well that every time you come to some plot point you can't figure out that you call on me to insist on cleaning the fridge or doing our taxes so lay off!"

Kafuffle breaks out,  "Order! Order!"

    Voice of Jan the writer "I think this meeting is over! I have a piece to write for the Insecure Writers' Support Group and then I'm working on edits in Butter & Snow so get lost."

I now call the March meeting of Jan's Insecure Writers' Support Group Prospect Division over.