Musing Among Valley Vineyards

Creative Distancing
By Kelly Pollard



My husband and I have been taking our young sons (those tiny dots on the trail above) on short hikes around the foothills of our town. The first time I hiked Brushy Peak and looked down into the valley where our home hides among cloisters of sycamore trees and vineyards, I looked at my life in a whole new way. Viewed from above, our hometown was nothing like the suburban sprawl and everyday monotony that I lose my hours to. It was beautiful, art worthy.

Then, in the same time period, I approached my young adult manuscript as if from afar...or from the creative distance of many months since I sent it out on a round of submissions.

Oh, what a difference a bit of perspective makes on my creative life...



Unfortunately, rereading my novel did not rouse the same awe I felt for my hometown. The first fifty pages were as I remembered them. How many times had I workshopped them with my critique group or reread them before sending them out to potential agents? Too many to count.

Then, I read the rest of the manuscript. Many of the scenes were rushed. Characters barely sketched and the setting almost nonexistent. How did I think the book was ready to send out? There were even the little typos that slipped past my radar through the many drafts I worked through. As I read through the stack of paper, I constantly asked myself: how could I have believed this was ready? Would it be wildly inappropriate to beg the agents who have had my manuscript for a chance to resend before they even give me an answer? In some ways, I've had to sit on my hands in order not to shoot off some passionate emails.

What is so crazy about this experience of distance and time since working over the manuscript, was just how much I missed in drafts six through eight. When does it stop? How long are we writers expected to allow our drafts to simmer on the backburner? I'm going on close to four years working on this book. So here I find myself working on my last revision...again.


Kelly Pollard is a freelance writer and aspiring young adult novelist. Her two sons give her plenty of material to write about over at her blog. She is also the Newsletter Editor of the California Writers Club, Tri-Valley branch.
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Musings Among Valley Vineyards

Creativity and The Question of Audience

By Kelly Pollard

As an aspiring young adult novelist, I have been following the break out success of Stephenie Meyer since her Twilight series propelled her to an almost cult-like popularity with teen and adult readers. Though vampires and paranormal romance has never been something I've been interested in, I'm more interested in the workings of how a book or series rises about the hundreds of thousands of books pumped out by publishing companies this year.

Her final book, Breaking Dawn, was released earlier this month. Passionate fans gathered for midnight release parties across the country,with fans wearing costumes and t-shirts declaring their loyalty to Bella's two love interests. The books sold over 800,000 copies opening day....and then, backlash almost as fast as readers could plow through the 700 plus pages.

Being a struggling writer and living only on my husband's steady income, I vowed to wait for Breaking Dawn to be available at our library. Over fifty eager readers with the same idea as me managed to put in requests ahead of my own. After seeing the mysterious looking book on a display at the store for a reasonable hardcover rate, I buckled. I just couldn't help myself.

I just finished Meyer's 'last' book in the series yesterday. I admit to pure bafflement at some of her plot twists and how she wraps up the underlying vampire-werewolf-mortal conflict in the very end. But I had no idea how passionate some of Meyer's 'fans' have gotten on the internet, especially on the Amazon comment boards. I read an article by Publisher's Weekly highlighting the fierce movement of readers demanding their money back from Meyer's publisher Little, Brown claiming that the book was over-hyped, poorly edited and plotted and that the author was somehow rushed to pump out a book before she could decide the way the story should end.

As a writer, I totally sympathize with Ms. Meyer. She allows her fans inside her writing and home life on her website, she weaves together stories she is passionate about. Then a small group of fans comes together and tries to take it away from her. Though I won't claim the last book of her hit series was up to par with the other books, I will say that she had me turning the pages long into the midnight hours this past week. And isn't that why we buy books? And why I want to sell them too, without fear of backlash?

Kelly Pollard is a freelance writer and aspiring young adult novelist, actively searching for an agent for her first novel BLUSH about one teen's journey through a swirl of rumors posted on a social networking website about her. Kelly has written for local newspapers and parenting magazines and is the proud mother of two energetic sons.

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Musings Among Valley Vineyards

Wishing and Writing
By Kelly Pollard

I just finished Noelle Oxenhandler's new memoir "The Wishing Year: A House, A Man, My Soul-A Memoir of Fulfilled Desire". An award winning writer that has graced the pages of O Magazine, The New Yorker and Vogue, Oxenhandler wrestles with her skeptical demons by daring to dream big for herself. In a general sense, yes, she got everything she wished for and more than she could have imagined. I closed the book last night with a hopeful warmth coarsing through my blood. And I fell asleep with various wishes spinning in my head.

Much care and thought must go into the art of wishing. This past June, I thought my wish was to be accepted into the acclaimed Squaw Community of Writers Fiction Workshop. For weeks, I worked with my critique group to polish the first 5,000 words of my YA manuscript Blush. I visualized myself driving up to the gorgeous Sierras with copies of my writing in tow, to meet with such literary heroes as Anne Lamott and Amy Tan. I dared to dream. My writing partner Julie dared to dream the same thing.

And by the acts of fate, the opinions of the judges who open those heavy doors into their top-notch, creative world, I discovered I had been waitlisted. Not an outright rejection, though I couldn't help suspecting that they assured every applicant denied entry that they too were on the waitlist. A few days later, my writing friend Julie found out she was in.

I'm proud and excited for her and just read her first blog post about life at the beginning of the week-long conference, free of children and family and household obligations. Oh, what a luxury to spend a focused week on the art of spinning stories. In some ways, I admit the envy makes my green eyes several shades greener. But, I also applied to Squaw without a plan on how to pay the chunk of money required to attend. I applied with a manuscript I am done workshopping. I had plans to bring my newer manuscript to workshop, which had no way of being polished enough to present to such high-caliber writers and workshop leaders. So in all, the wish was misdirected. Perhaps my real wish was for that vast landscape of escape to a place where I could focus on my art without answering to daily life. Perhaps I haven't gone deep enough within myself to discover what I truly wish in order to throw the intention out there.

And no matter my feeling of envy that swarm to my surface when I share in Julie's enthusiasm in joining this group of amazing creators, I will still follow along with her journey while tapping my own keyboard and creating something worthy of wishing for.

Kelly Pollard is a freelance writer and aspiring novelist living in the San Francisco Bay Area. Her work appears frequently in Bay Area Parent and she is hoping to sell her first young adult novel, BLUSH, very very soon. Read more!

Musings Among Valley Vineyards

Messy Beginnings
By Kelly Pollard

After endless months of rewriting and fine-tuning my young adult novel BLUSH to prepare it for agent submissions, I find myself back to square one: forging a new journey with a new set of characters, different time period (hello 1971!) and a fresh, emotional landscape. It's a messy, murky idea for a story and the only thing that keeps me tethered to some semblance of structure is a fire-orange workbook titled Book in A Month.


I am guilty of spending more time reading about the craft of writing than actually practicing the tidbits I'm learning. It kind of reminds me of those months of new motherhood I spent pouring over any self-help parenting book instead of just parenting. So I vowed to stop losing myself in books that tell me how to do a certain something, instead striking out and actually doing.

Well, I broke my self imposed ban on these handy self-help books during a browsing session at my local bookstore after a caffeinated rant with my writer friend about our mutual blocks on our projects.

My block played out as follows:

Kernal of an idea planted over ten years ago when I lost a friend as a result of his bipolar depression and four suicide attempts and one attempt that did the job.

Sat to write a story about what happens to those left behind after losing someone in a horrific, violent fashion. But couldn't do it, so started another story which took me through almost three years of drafting, rewriting, critiquing and submitting.

This summer, picked up that story kernal once again and began to write.

Executed an extremely schizophrenic relationship with the would-be novel's point of view.

First person, past tense, one narrator.

Then three separate narrators in varying combinations of first and third person viewpoints.

You name the combination and I wrote it. And stopped. Then opened a new file on the computer for yet another draft.

That day in the bookstore, a flashy orange workbook caught my eye in the writing reference section. Victoria Lynn Schmidt's Book in a Month found it's way into my arms and has been my gentle friend these past two weeks. With a set deadline, I charged through pages, finally settling on the viewpoint that works with the plot. Two weeks of falling in love with my characters and the surprises they have thrown my way. Schmidt has been my invisible teacher, holding my hand every day and guiding me through pointed worksheets about character motivations, plot snapshots and my own personal reason for writing this book. And this is an intensely personal book for me, no matter that the beings that inhabit it are pure fiction.

It won't be done in a month, but possibly the first draft will be punched into my laptop by the time my oldest starts kindergarten at the end of August.

As of today, I'm on Day 12 and up to page 67 in the new manuscript.

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MUSINGS AMONG VALLEY VINEYARDS

Seeking Clarity in a Tangled World

By Kelly Pollard

Rising Above Rejection Depression

How is it that writers, who are often the most sensitive types, must build the thickest skins?

For the last year, I’ve crafted, tweaked, reworked and slanted queries to send to literary agents in hopes of selling my first young adult novel. I count myself lucky when a response actually appears in my email inbox; many agents are too busy to even respond. They tell eager writers that if they don’t respond within three months, than just assume rejection. And out of the rejections I have received, I’d say half of them were encouraging, if you could label any kind of rejection of something you’ve toiled over for the past three years as encouraging.

“I loved your writing style, but the story didn’t capture me right away.” Agent A.

“Although the story is intriguing, I feel it is overwritten, but I’m sure another agent will feel otherwise.” Agent B.

These short notes fill a folder of my yahoo account and gather as proof that I have been building up layer upon layer of that thick skin in order to survive and either send out another batch of queries or dive headfirst into the next manuscript.

Being a writer, I need to write. The business letters and concise synapses shove the muse from my office and I often wonder if I’ll realize the moment has come when I should print out the manuscript and file it away as that first manuscript that may never see the light a day. Maybe BLUSH is destined to be my organic lesson in the art of skin thickening and book plotting.

BLUSH queries still float about the publishing world. And since the last ‘nice’ rejection, I have tiptoed into the next project and compartmentalized the completed book to a tiny pocket of my brain. The water is warm from where I compose this first draft that haloes out from my center with infinite possibilities and another batch of writerly dreams. As I sit to compose a new chapter, I don’t think about query letters and agent blogs with faint clues as to if they have picked up my partial or full manuscript for a brief scan. I’m lost in my new story and floating on its dreamy waters.


Kelly Pollard is a freelance writer and aspiring novelist working on her second young adult novel while navigating the world of literary agents and publishing houses with her first novel "Blush", about a teen living with a cyberbully posting rumors about her on a social networking website. Kelly is also mother of two energetic boys under five who lives in the Livermore Wine Valley. Find more of Kelly at www.twoboysintwoyears.blogspot.com. Reach her at kelpollard@sbcglobal.net. Read more!