How Writing is Like Breaking the Law...and Making the Law

A couple of recent events caused me to reflect on writing and laws. I'm not talking about the laws of writing—the kind that established writers caution about not breaking unless you know what you're doing. I'm talking about the legal kind you get in trouble for breaking (and making).

The two events both occurred this past Christmas Eve in which I spent time with my niece and nephews while their father was at home on his roof—with a chain saw and a tree that he felt was getting in the way of his giant inflatable Santa—and their mother was holding the ladder.

My oldest nephew, who's out of college and starting his own business, asked me why I gave up a career with pay for writing stories with, you know, nothing in return. It was nice to be asked. For me, the answer was simple. "I write because I can't not do it."

His sister is more like me, but she's determined to make herself stick with a course of studies that will provide a secure career. Me, bad aunt, suggested it was better to follow her passion even it meant that she would "only" be happy, but not financially secure. Good thing their parents weren't there.

The way this relates to the law is that it was their father who taught me how to break it, literally. I was fourteen at the time and he was nineteen. We were living in the middle of nowhere on an island (and that's all you need to know for now). He found some abandoned buildings up the road and was curious about what was behind one of the locked doors. He kept kicking and kicking the door, but it wouldn't budge. Then, voila! He figured out the secret.

"You have to kick all the way through," he told me, "like you know you're going to succeed."

 Me—when I lived on an island that shall not be named

Writing is like a locked door that I can't just pound on here and there. I have to give it everything I've got in order for it to fall into place. Not only that, but it takes going outside the parameters of what is acceptable and responsible. At some point, it's important to stop caring about the right thing to do and break down the door like I know it will give way. It's different for everyone, but this is how it is for me.

The other thing that triggered my thinking about laws and writing was later in the evening when my nephew found a picture of me at a bill signing. He wanted to know why I was in a picture with the old governor and the new one (when she was Attorney General for the state). I told him it was the signing of an anti-bullying bill—years ago, when it wasn't at all easy to be against bullying. The bill had taken the prime sponsor many years to push through a lot of resistance.

It made me realize how writing is a lot like creating laws:

• If it's really good, it will take years to succeed.
• There will always be people who don't like what you come up with. 
• They may even not like you. A lot.
• You will have to create something that does not exist, in an environment that does not want it to survive.
• You need the right people to agree with your idea. 
• The more people who agree, however, the worse your idea probably is. Best to try something else.
• In the end, the most you may get is a pen and your dignity.
• You will do it again. 

Now, as I'm celebrating the completion of my thesis—a collection of flash fiction for middle graders called FLASH FRIGHTS: TINY TALES OF CREEP—I have a little law breaking and law making to thank for giving me the strength to get this far.

Bill signing for Anti-Bullying Law

(That's me in the back row—toward the left—heh)

Is You Is or Is You Isn't?

There are many qualities that separate really great writers from the rest of the pack—some of them reside entirely in the realm of art and some in craft—but I'm currently of the mind that there's nothing that tests the mettle of a writer more than the ability to write a novel in present tense without being noticed.

Case in point: Jennifer L. Holm's TURTLE IN PARADISE.

First of all, I don't think I've read anything of hers that I haven't fallen in love with. Her stories are fully entertaining and magnificently well-told; but more than anything, she's got that ineffable quality of voice that makes her work sing.

When it comes to TURTLE, it's Holm's technique that I think elevates the narrative even further. Her narrator (Turtle) tells the story in the present tense without that excruciating tendency to walk the reader through each movement, as in: "I look out the window; I walk to the door; I turn the handle." I aye aye.

This sort of point-by-point present tense approach can become so mechanical, it hurts to read. The only place I've ever seen a need for this might be in creating scenes in which each action places the character in peril, and we don't know what the outcome will be. HUNGER GAMES works well in present tense because it helps build the suspense (although I may be the only one who wanted Katniss and Peeta to die).

Otherwise, I prefer the distance of time to allow a little past tense reflection, even if the story is being told the next day. Most people aren't that brilliant in the moment, and they don't think about the position of their bodies unless they're in physical distress. Yes, dear narrator, you've had to move your body parts from point A to B. Unless your telling is so mangled, the reader can make the leap from lying in bed to lunging at the intruder (and be better off for it). I don't think, "I'm going to the door to open it." I think, "Whoever is pounding down my door is gonna be sorry real soon—" Readers can make the leap between cause and effect, and they should be trusted to do so.

Holm's TURTLE shows us how present tense can work with an expert hand guiding it. She starts off right away with this gem for the opening:

Everyone thinks children are sweet at Necco Wafers, but I've lived long enough to know the truth: kids are rotten. The only difference between grown-ups and kids is that grown-ups go to jail for murder. Kids get away with it."

The story is told in first-person present tense with sprinkles of past tense reflection that Holm seamlessly blends together, putting the reader in the immediate experience of the narrator (Turtle) while also filling in the background a little at a time, just the way a person might think about herself. Even though the "I do" this's and that's are unavoidable, she does not rely on them to crank the story forward.

Aside from her narrative skill, Holm simply writes a compelling, entertaining novel with depth. But if she had handled the present tense any differently, it would have turned her fluid storytelling to wood.

So, as I read TURTLE IN PARADISE, I'm thinking...wouldn't it be nice to write like that?

Review: Saraswati's Way

SARASWATI'S WAY
by Monika Schroder
Frances Foster Books | Farrar Straus Giroux (November 2010)
Ages 10-14

Some books remind me of movies that come out right around the end of the year, just in time to be fresh in the minds of Academy Award voters. I'm talking about the quiet movies, the ones with substance and staying power. Like their visual counterparts, these books earn their way through the emotional landscape--no manufactured sentimentality or cheap scenes that break down at the end of the day.

SARASWATI'S WAY, by Monika Schroder, is one of those books. Set in current day India, it has all the components of a heartrending plot: a boy has a dream to go to a good school, but he needs a tutor in order to compete for a scholarship, his family is poor and his father dies, forcing the boy to grapple with modern day indentured slavery from which he escapes, only to end up in the slums of Dehli where his dream slips farther and farther away; and yet, Schroder keenly shies away from milking the reader's emotions with the editorial narration of a superior outsider.

This isn't a "multicultural" book that helps to educate readers about other ways of life. It's a human and humane novel that levels the playing field for all readers.

Schroder deftly crafts a story that tells itself honestly and without frills. This is simply how life is. People die. Others are cruel. Circumstances turn good children into drug addicts, dealers and thieves. However, no one and no thing can steal or stifle a dream when it's as powerful as that of twelve-year old Akash.

He has a genius for numbers and patterns, and a real chance for a better life if only he can find the money to pay for a tutor, but Akash's real gift is his personal integrity and internal compass. Through the lens of a somewhat distant third person narration, Schroder brings us inside the mind of a boy struggling to understand why the gods—Ganesha, remover of obstacles, and Saraswati, wisdom and knowledge—are ignoring his pleas.

Thankfully, Schroder allows Akash to make mistakes—one of which leads to a big loss—and she does not ignore the realities of lecherous men who prey on boys, corrupt authorities, and the prevalence of poverty and crime. I'm not sure how she does it, though, but none of the seaminess is gratuitous. Like the storytelling itself, it's there to serve and not detract.

My only wish is that the resolution had taken longer to reach and been a bit less tidy. Even so, I was left wanting to follow Akash to the next chapter in his life. This is one book I would love to see a sequel to.

For a little taste of SARASWATI'S WAY, check out the book trailer:




Source: copy provided by author