As I’ve noted several times already in this space, Robertson Davies is one of my literary heroes. His novels were among the first to show me that literary prose, compelling stories, and deeply developed characters could coexist with a heaping helping of humour. John Irving also helped enlighten me on that score. That Robertson Davies and I appear together on the list of Leacock Medal Winners (he in 1955, for Leaven of Malice) still sends a tremor through me when I think of it. In December 1995, shortly after his death, my wife and I attended Robertson Davies’ memorial service in Convocation Hall at the University of Toronto. It was the first time I’d ever laid eyes on Douglas Gibson, Davies’ longtime editor, and miraculously, now mine. Last night, some 14 years later, my wife and I attended Robertson Davies: The Peeled I at the wonderful Hart House Theatre, just across the quadrangle from Convocation Hall. It was a one man show featuring Reed Needles as RD. He bears a striking resemblance to the great writer. We thoroughly enjoyed the play. It only runs for a couple days, so if you’re a Davies fan and are anywhere near Toronto, check it out.
Here’s the photo of Robertson Davies that hangs in our third floor library, supervising my writing. Whenever I hit a dry spell or am struggling with a sentence, I look up at this photo for inspiration. Then I get back at it…
Quill & Quire has assembled on its blog some quotations from several authors capturing a selection of writing rules. Not sure how I made the list but Q&Q is clearly excerpting the Canada Also Reads piece the finalists were asked to submit last week for the National Post’s Afterword blog. I’m delighted to be there amidst some wonderful writers and their sage advice.
Taking a cue from the Guardian’s Rules for Writers series in the U.K., Brad Frenette, at the National Post and its Afterword blog, asked the authors of the eight shortlisted books for Canada Also Reads to submit their own fiction writing rules. My contribution, hastily considered and created to meet the National Post’s deadline, appeared on the Afterword blog this morning. Who am I to be cooking up writing rules anyway. But I always try to do what I’m told.
So, here are my ten rules, such as they are:
Very few rules apply to all writers. Every writer is different, so only observe these rules if they happen to work for you. If they don’t, make up your own rules to break.
Create a quiet, comfortable space for writing. Then, write there often. If that’s too regimented, carry a notebook and try writing wherever you find yourself, whether it’s Starbucks or the JiffyLube when your car is up on the hoist. As well, write in stretches of at least four hours so that you can get into a groove and not feel rushed or forced by the clock. If you don’t have four hours anywhere in your life, try writing in short snippets and see if that works.
I’m an “outliner” so I favour investing the time up front to map out a story in considerable detail. For writers with a fulltime job and not enough spare time for writing (like me!), I find you can maximize efficiency if you know what happens and where you’re going in each chapter. If that doesn’t work, try starting with a blank page and follow where your story leads you. This seems to work for many writers, though it’s a foreign concept to me.
Read. I don’t know many great writers who aren’t also great readers. Although I do know lots of readers who aren’t writers. What was my point again? Oh yes. Reading is professional development for writers. In other careers, people go to conferences and take courses. Writers read. (Having said that, I’ve spoken at a few writers conferences and will be teaching a course in the fall, so what do I know?)
Worry less about finding an agent or publisher, and more about your manuscript. (I know, I know, easy for me to say.) But most agents will tell you it’s really all about writing. Landing an agent and/or publisher will be easier if your manuscript is as good as it can be.
When your manuscript is finished, for the first time, let it sit for a couple of weeks before you return to it. Time inflicts distance and perspective, which almost always inform and aid editing.
Read your writing aloud. You’d be surprised how often I rearrange a sentence or choose a different word after hearing my writing, rather just looking at it. It was one of the benefits of podcasting my first novel before it was ever a book.
Print out your manuscript-in-progress once in a while. It’s easier to read it, and the growing stack of paper provides a sense of progress and satisfaction that can help you through the home stretch.
Visualize the scenes you’re writing as if you’re a movie director. This will add realism to your words, and help you decide what to describe and what not to. If it helps, go ahead and cast major stars as the main characters so you can see them in your mind.
I know this seems like a drag and may appear to contradict Rule #5 above, but when your book is written, commit as much effort to promoting your book as you did to writing it. Build an audience by using the online tools to which we all now have ready access, like podcasting and blogging. Offer to do readings at libraries and book clubs. Enter your book in competitions and awards. Sit on panels. Get out there, even if it’s uncomfortable. Publishers like it when you do this because you sell more books. And, you get better at it with practice. You might even come to enjoy it. I know I have.
Last year, I did a reading at a public library in Toronto’s Beach community. When it was over, a young woman approached to have her book signed and to ask some writing-related questions. Our conversation carried on out onto the street after the event, and I got to know Evadne Macedo, aspiring novelist and all-round lovely person. Evadne is a lawyer, and works by day at the Ontario Human Rights Commission. But she’s also a writer. I read sections of an early draft of her first novel shortly after we met, and saw real promise in those pages. I loved the voice, matter-a-fact tone, and the quirky sense of humour. Well, in the intervening months, Evadne has been hard at work on her manuscript, while starting other writing projects as well, including a second novel, and a writing blog. I’m just now returning to her first novel manuscript, The 29th Day, now that she’s happier with it (or as happy as writers can ever truly be with the state of their manuscript!). I’m looking forward to reading it and offering whatever help I can as she ventures into the publishing waters.
My editor, Doug Gibson, dropped by yesterday morning with the final version of the manuscript for The High Road. He’d wanted me to see and approve a couple of dozen or so added commas and other punctuation changes to put the book to bed. It took me less than an hour last night to walk through the entire manuscript, searching for Doug’s modest pencil edits. So it’s really done now. Well, you think it’s finally done, but it’s never really done until it’s sitting on a bookstore shelf. But the final manuscript is now handed over to one of McClelland & Stewart’s skilled copy editors. As Doug describes it, it’s the copy editor’s job to make Doug and me look like idiots by discovering many errors in syntax, grammar, spelling, and continuity that neither Doug nor I caught the first 47 times we’d reviewed the manuscript. And rest assured, additional minor edits will arise as we wend our way towards publication. That’s just how this works. But, it feels good to have reached this stage, and before our deadline too. The manuscript isn’t contractually due to M&S until January 11th.
This copy editing phase apparently should not take too long. Then they’ll format and lay out the book block, as it’s called. This is how the inside of the book will look when it’s finally published. We’ll then print out several copies on 8.5 x 11 inch paper and send them around to literary luminaries who might read it and pass favourable judgement on the novel. Ultimately, we’re looking for endorsements that can be quoted in publicity materials, and even on the book itself. Finally, they’ll move into cover design. Doug Gibson’s idea is that The High Road should look like a companion novel to TBLP. So there will almost certainly be graphic and thematic elements from TBLP’s cover that will be found in the cover design for its sequel. I find the publishing process to be endlessly fascinating, so I’m looking forward to what comes next. Still, we’re at least eight months away from the release of The High Road. That’s just how long it all takes. Sigh.
This has all gotten me thinking about what may come next. So I spent this past Friday mapping out novel #3. (And that’s what it’s called at this stage, Novel #3.) It’s not part of the Angus canon, but is something new. I’m enjoying plotting the story, but it still needs more time just steeping in my head before I’m ready to start the formal outlining and chapter notes, let alone the actual writing. Strange not to have Angus in my head, but I’m sure he’ll return…
On Thursday night, I took my younger son to the beautiful Canon Theatre to see a rare public appearance by the prolific Stephen King. (Check out the brief clip someone has loaded up to YouTube.) He was interviewed on stage by David Cronenberg, acclaimed Canadian film director who brought King’s The Dead Zone to the big screen back in 1983. The place was just packed. Ben and I trekked to our seats in the very back row of the uppermost balcony. We were so far away from the stage that I worried about not having our passports with us. More 2,200 King fans filled the theatre, and they were not disappointed.
I’ve only read one of Kings’s fictional works, The Stand. I liked it when I chewed through it in 1979 but I’m not really set up for horror and apocalypse. But I recently read his wonderful memoir called On Writing. I learned of the book from hearing many other writers sing its praises on various author podcasts. I loved it, and found it inspiring.
After George Stroumboulopoulos introduced him, King seemed startled by the enormous crowd. The first words out of his mouth as he stood at centre stage and gaped at the audience, were “Holy Shit!” He claimed it was the largest audience he’d ever addressed at a book event. King started by reading from his new novel, Under the Dome. Then David Cronenberg joined him in easy chairs for an on stage discussion of King’s work and their experiences together. I enjoyed the event and tweeted a few times about it.
Last weekend, I finished polishing the manuscript of The High Road, the sequel to TBLP. It felt very good to close the document and send it off to my agent Beverley Slopen. My wonderful editor/publisher Douglas Gibson at McClelland & Stewart still has to read the second half of the novel and I’m sure he’ll have some edits and suggestions as he did on the first half. So the process is not yet complete, but we’re getting closer. Provided he has no major issues with how the story unfolds, (and I suppose he might), we’re really in the home stretch now.
Believe it or not, I was actually jotting down notes today for my third novel. I think I’ll be taking a break from Angus and Daniel for the next book. An idea is steeping and fermenting in my head. It needs to rattle around for a while yet but there’s something there. Thinking, thinking, thinking…
Last Sunday I snuck away from regular family weekend activities to see John Irving at the International Festival of Authors (IFOA) here in Toronto. Regular readers of this blog (both of you) may recall that John Irving has been an inspiration to me. The emotional impact of his writing and the laughs along the way make him one of my literary heroes. A Prayer for Owen Meany, quite possibly my all time favourite novel, restored my interest in fiction back in the late 80s, and I’ve never looked back. Needless to say, seeing him in person, along with hundreds of other fans as part of the IFOA, was a thrill.
He talked about this writing process, including his immutable first step of writing the last sentence of his novel first, before anything else. It was fascinating to hear him talk about how it all comes together. He then read from his new novel, Last Night inTwisted River. One thing I’ve learned in the last year, as I’ve read with other authors at a variety of festivals and readings, is that not all authors can read. There is an art to reading well, not to mention a smidgen of theatre. It is a performance of sorts. John Irving had the room spellbound. I can’t imagine anyone listening to him read and then walking by the book table without snagging one on the way out.
Finally, he was interviewed by Seamus O’Regan, one of our TV morning show hosts, before the floor was opened for questions. It was a memorable event for me. I’m about to start Last Night in Twisted River, said to be his most autobiographical novel to date.
I’m really happy to report that over the weekend, I finished the draft manuscript for The High Road. Yep, the process that began last December when I started to create the outline for the TBLP sequel, has now, some 10 months later, crossed another major threshold. I must confess, after such a long process of outlining and writing, it felt amazing to key in the words “The End” after putting Chapter 20 to bed.
Writing my second novel has reaffirmed my faith in the writing process I seem to have adopted, or stumbled into. I was looking back through this blog and noted that I finished my first pass at Chapter 1 on February 17th. I could not have written 100,000 words in less than eight months of evenings and weekends without leaning heavily on the outline I’d already spent about two months preparing. When writing, I have two Word documents on the screen at the same time. My outline is on the right hand side and my manuscript is on the left. I just follow the outline and write, page by page, chapter by chapter. There was still room for spontaneous creativity as I was writing. There were several additions to the story that weren’t in the original outline, but the major plot points have all been preserved. It felt like the process worked well, though I admit I have little to which to compare it.
Though the manuscript is now essentially complete, there’s still work to do. I’m now returning to the beginning of the novel to begin editing and polishing. I actually do quite a bit of editing as I write, so at this stage, I’d say the manuscript is probably the equivalent of a third draft. My plan (and my editor’s too) is to hand over the edited and polished manuscript by the end of October. There will almost certainly be some additional tweaking and, of course, proof-reading after that, but the heavy lifting (I think and hope) is done.
I’ve told my editor/publisher Douglas Gibson that I’ll have the completed manuscript to him by October 31st. So I thought it was time for another update. (Anything to distract me from actually finishing the book!)
I’m actually quite far along now and feeling good. It seems to go faster when the finish line is in sight. There are 20 chapters in The High Road, and I’ve just started to write Chapter 18. Yes, only two and a half chapters to go and I’m done. Well, not so fast. Actually, when I finish Chapter 20, I’ll then go back to the beginning and take another pass through it all to edit and polish. But I’ll make my Halloween deadline. Doug has already reviewed the first 60,000 words or so and has made some suggestions that I’ll incorporate. Mercifully, there are only minor edits to make and he’s quite pleased with what he’s seen so far. So I’m breathing again.
Usually, if we’re not too busy on weekends, I can write a first draft of an entire 5,000 word chapter from Friday night to Sunday evening. And it almost always happens on weekends when I can carve out several hours at a time to write. I don’t seem to be able to get much writing done during the week after a long day at the office. So thanks to my very indulgent and understanding family, I able to sequester myself in our third floor library for long stretches on Saturdays and Sundays. I’ll report in again when Chapter 20 is in the books (as it were).
Welcome to terryfallis.com where award-winning novelist Terry Fallis blogs about his writing life and podcasts his first novel, The Best Laid Plans, winner of the 2008 Stephen Leacock Award for Humour.
