The Bluest Skies

When Booktrope offered me a publishing contract for Running Secrets last summer, I signed (of course) and celebrated. Then the work began. The first step was to form a publishing team. At Booktrope each book is produced by a team consisting of author, editor, designer, book manager/publicist and copy editor. For the past few months I’ve had the pleasure of working with a fabulous team of creative women: Pamela Hobart Carter, Loretta Matson, Katrina Randall, and Tiffany White.

I love the rich blue sky in this cover Loretta has created. It reminds me of the lyrics of the theme song from the 1960s sitcom Here Come the Brides: “The bluest skies you’ve ever seen are in Seattle.” Those of us who live in Seattle know those gorgeous blue skies mirrored in the sparkling waters of Elliott Bay. Of course, we also know the heavy gray of sky and water as well as the endless days when gray fog rises to meet gray clouds and rain drizzles for weeks on end. It's no surprise that suicide rates in the Pacific Northwest rank among the highest in the country. On one such gray winter day Chris Stevens, the protagonist in Running Secrets, attempts to end her own life. She fails. But will she try again?  

I glance up from my notebook as I write these words to see a trace of pale blue through the heavy clouds on the western horizon, the blue of hope, of promise. I remind myself to take pleasure in every moment of sunshine sneaking through Seattle's heavy gray of autumn and winter. If I’m at my desk at work, or doing laundry at home, or writing in a coffee shop, I should get outside at the first ray of sun and soak in the brilliant light because it may only last five minutes, maybe a half hour, never long enough. Too often I work through the rare sun breaks telling myself I’ll go out as soon as I'm finished and those brief moments of sunlight sparkling on the red and gold radiance of autumn, on the frigid waters of Elliott Bay, slip through my fingers.

In addition to being a hotbed of suicide, the Pacific Northwest also reports high rates of Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD). One treatment for SAD is exposure to light, preferably sunlight. Would sunlight have helped Chris Stevens’s struggle with depression? I know it improves my mood. I need sunlight, and I'm determined to drop whatever I'm doing, pull on my coat, and head outdoors to enjoy it knowing that the piles of student papers needing grades, the unfinished laundry, the new scene for the next novel will still be waiting for my return, but the Seattle sun waits for no one.

"What I Did on My Summer Vacation"

So here it is Friday of the first week of fall quarter. The equinox came and left, fall fell on Seattle, and I have yet to post this month. Here are a few highlights of my wonderful, glorious, busy summer (sounds a bit like something I might ask my students to write, doesn’t it?) ...

June 2013:    Second Beach and La Push Indian Reservation

Edith and I go way back. She was a young English language student from Switzerland. I was her young teacher. It was 1983. I’d just returned to Seattle after over a decade living in Hawaii and California, Venezuela and Mexico. She was only in Seattle for a few months before returning to Switzerland. Through the years, we lost touch as friends sometimes do. A few years ago I got a Facebook message: “Are you my Arleen?” I was, I am, I always will be. That’s my definition of friendship. In June, Edith returned to the Pacific Northwest for the first time in twenty years. I asked her where she’d like to go. “The sea,” she said. “Like all Swiss, I like the sea.” So we took a road trip and looped the Olympic peninsula. It was paradise.

July 2013:     Bruni's Snow Bowl Hut on Mt. Tahoma 

The first backpacking trip of the summer – short, steep and hot – was my friend Veronique’s annual birthday hike, complete with champagne and birthday cake. The tradition began a half dozen years ago. Veronique had never been backpacking and wanted to try it for her birthday. My husband, Tom, and I have both been backpacking since our teens. We planned a trip and Veronique was hooked. She’s spent her birthday backpacking ever since. This year a group of a dozen of us spent the night on Mt. Tahoma. Here you see my husband and me trudging upward.

July 2013:     Ike Kineswa State Park

A few years back, my friend, Barb, got me back into car camping – something I’d done eons ago as one of nine in an Army surplus tent with a fabulous center pole. This summer it was Lake Mayfield at Ike Kineswa State Park. Not the best choice we’ve ever made – too much noise, too few hikes. Great for kids with bikes, teens with ski boats, men with fishing poles. Not ideal for two women seeking solitude and hiking trails. Getting rained out the second day wasn’t a huge disappointment. It was here with Barb I received the publishing contract for my novel, Running Secrets (read all about it in Writing and Waiting). I would have danced around the campfire if there hadn’t been a burn ban. In the rain? A celebratory hug for the smart phone…

August 2013: No Name Lake

Really. It has no name. At least not on the green map. You know, those backpacker maps with all the trails and elevations marked. Tom and I were backpacking at Mirror Lake. We headed off on the PCT (that’s the Pacific Crest Trail – the one from Canada to Mexico Cheryl Strayed made famous in Wild – funny book, btw). I saw what looked to be an animal trail rising to the left off the PCT and thought we might get a view of Mirror Lake from the ridge, so we scrambled upward. That’s when the-bear-went-over-the-mountain syndrome got the better of me, and we kept going and going. The reward? Skinny dipping in No Name Lake. And no, not posting those photos (but yes, they exist). Here’s one of the lake. Sans naked bodies…

September 2013:      Shi Shi Beach and Makah Indian Reservation

Tom moaned his jealousy. Repeatedly. I’d been to the Pacific Coast with Edith. He had not. He wanted to hike the beach, sleep on the sand, poke around in tide pools. “Only three flat miles and mostly boardwalk,” he said. It wasn’t until later, when we were loading our packs – mine came in at a low 22 pounds – he figured he should mention the 150-foot drop to the beach at the end of that flat trail. “There’s a rope to hold onto,” he offered.

We woke misty-rainy wet the first morning, unsure whether to stay or go. But as we warmed ourselves with a morning fire and coffee, the sun rose over the hill behind us and the Pacific shimmered before us. We stayed to the reward of a glorious day, a breathtaking sunset, and the Milky Way.

Between the camping trips, boating, swimming, dog walks, bike rides and family visits, I did, in fact, work this summer. I finished Biking Uphill, Book Two of the Alki Trilogy, and read the entire manuscript aloud to Tom as we drove to Cape Disappointment and back again. Including on the ferry ride. I think Tom agreed to listen just so I’d go along! 

Running Secrets inches closer to publication each day. My Booktrope publishing team solidified in late August, and I couldn’t be more pleased with this group of fabulous women: Tiffany White, book manager, Katrina Randall, editor, Loretta Matson, designer, and Pamela Carter, proofreader. I hit the send button on the first round of edits last Sunday, the day before fall quarter classes began! And just this week, on a break between classes, I got my first glimpse of the cover design. No image here. Not yet. Maybe next month.

Writing and Waiting

My search for a publisher for my first novel began and I became obsessed about checking email. It became my last activity every evening and my first each morning. Truth be told, I should do nothing requiring active brain cells before my first cup of morning coffee.

There was an unknown name in my inbox on July 1. Thinking it spam, I almost deleted it. Something stopped me. I got out of bed, drank a cup of coffee, read the undeleted emails. That unknown name, Jesse James Freeman, was an offer to publish my first novel. I danced around the kitchen. I wanted to celebrate, but I was afraid to jinx my luck. It was an offer not a contract.

By July 31 with no contract in hand, I decided I needed a change of scene. My friend, Barb, and I left on our annual camping trip. I was determined to leave my worries behind. But I took my cell phone.

We arrived at the state park. We set up the tent, the camp chairs and the Coleman stove on the red checkered picnic table.

"I think I'll send a picture home," Barb said. "I want to show them what a great camper I am."

"I wonder if we've got service out here," I said.

I turned on my phone. Unable to resist, I opened email. A month had passed since I received the offer. Waiting comes with the territory.

You wait for a response to your arduously crafted query.

You wait for an acceptance.

You wait for a contract.

You wait to begin the edits hoping against hope that they will be minimal.

You wait for a cover design you love.

You wait for a release date. 

You wait to hold your baby in your hands.

And through it all you keep writing.

At the state park in front of the tent, I scanned my email messages. I hollered. I laughed. I was stunned silent. There it was: Kenneth Shear, Booktrope, a contract. I tried to open and read the document, but I have yet to master the skill of reading a tiny screen. It was enough to know I had received a contract.

I enjoyed the lake, the sunset, the beauty with greater intensity. A state wide burn ban, a rare August rain, and a very noisy campground sent us home early. I arrived to an empty house, my husband in Ohio visiting family. Barb and I unpacked, cooked the steaks intended for the camp fire, shared a toast to my contract. Then I was alone. I read the contract, complete the electronic signature, and hit send. I sat in a happy daze trying to let it sink in. Running Secrets will be published by Booktrope, a Seattle-based indie press known for its team publishing model (see Seattle Magazine).

Now I wait for my team, for the editing and design to begin, for a release date. I remind myself of the bumpy road to publication taken by my first book. I began writing The Thirty-Ninth Victim  in 2002 and signed a publishing contract in November 2004. Later I learned that my publisher had been bought out. In October 2006 I signed a new contract and the memoir was released in April 2008. Four years from contract to release. I tell myself to be patient. I tell myself that it won't take four years this time. 

Running Secrets is under contract!

It's a novel about family secrets, attempted suicide, and racial identity. A suicidal young woman and her Ethiopian home healthcare provider forge a friendship that bridges their differences. Together they learn that racial identity is a choice, self expression is a right, and family is a personal construct.

I don't remember when I started writing this novel. Sometime in 2005, I think. The Thirty-Ninth Victim was under contract (the first contract). I knew if I was really a writer, I'd keep writing. I knew that the hardest story I'd ever write was behind me. So I began a novel. A first draft, a lousy first draft, finished, I set it aside. I was distracted by the editing and eventual release of my memoir, by my family's reaction, by my mother's gradual descent into dementia.

When The Thirty-Ninth Victim came out, I received questions about my mother from readers who wanted to know more about this woman in the shadows. I too wanted to understand my mother. Sometime in 2008 or 2009 I returned to memoir to explore motherhood, but I was unwilling to let go of Gemi and Chris, the protagonists in Running Secrets. I started a second novel and soon knew I had a trilogy. I kept writing and was relieved that my submissions of the early draft of Running Secrets had been rejected. I pulled the manuscript out of the proverbial box at the back of the closet, dusted if off and rewrote it. And rewrote it again. And then again.

I began another round of queries. I am happy to say I did not need to follow Joyce Carol Oates's questionable advice nor did I meet my self-imposed target of one hundred queries (See Summer Plans 2013). Twenty one was the magic number. After eight years of writing and waiting, my first novel is under contract.

I hope to have Running Secrets out within five years of The Thirty-Ninth Victim, but five months is a tight schedule. I may have to settle for a six year gap between books, and as I wait (and edit) and wait (and edit), I will write. Because writing and waiting is what writers do.

The Colombian Coke Dealer’s 3-Legged Dresser

I never knew, will never know, if Felipe was guilty as accused or framed as he claimed. What I do know is that he was a friend at a time in my life when I was very short on friends. When we met, I still considered myself an ex-pat, was still married to a Mexican national, and though I was living and working back “home” in Seattle, I still had not made a definitive decision about the permanency of the move. But life has an odd way of turning us about.

I had landed a job in an English language school for internationals that encouraged teachers to participate in field trips and other social events. Being about the same age as my students, this was not only enjoyable but also filled a void in my life at a time when my husband had not yet made the move stateside and I knew almost no one in the city. As I was moving the few belongings I'd brought with me from Mexico City into an apartment near the school, I found a discarded sectional in the basement parking lot. After some serious scrubbing and lots of disinfectant spray, I had a faded velour sofa and was ready for my first class party.

I think my students felt sorry for me. Felipe’s first gift was a used hide-a-bed sofa. He insisted he was redecorating. He said it pained him to know his teacher was  sleeping on the floor. I tried to explain that I was a backpacker, that I’d spent a good number of years in Mexico and Venezuela sleeping on floors, that it was good for my back. He didn’t listen.

Felipe was a big man, a weight lifter. His second gift was the remaining months on a year-long health club membership. He wasn’t using it, he claimed. He didn’t like their weight room. Unaccustomed to Seattle winters, I was happy for the chance to exercise indoors.

Felipe’s third gift still stands in my bedroom. Frugal as I am, I’ve been unable to rid my life of a perfectly good 3-legged antique dresser. It’s a massive 5-drawer affair in dark mahogany with small brass medallions in the center of each wooden drawer pull, pillars on the front corners and heavy turned legs. By some feat of physics, it manages to stand solid despite a missing back leg. My husband and I joke that perhaps it wasn’t termites that ate the fourth leg, that perhaps the fourth leg was where the cocaine was hidden, that perhaps we should take off the other legs to check that they’re solid.

Thirty years have passed since that lonely young woman received three generous gifts. My first marriage ended, I made the decision to repatriate, I remarried, life went on. Last weekend my husband and I began a search for new bedroom furniture fearful that our old brass bed might soon collapse under the weight of our two hundred pound latex mattress.

“Are you sure you want to get rid of it?” He nodded toward the dresser.

“I’m tired of the old monster. It belonged to another life,” I said.

“I’m not sure how we'll get it out of here,” he said.

“Take the legs off?” I suggested.

“Might find enough in there to pay for the new furniture,” he said.

For thirty years I’ve stared at that dresser remembering Felipe’s generosity and wondering about his guilt or innocence. I know he was incarcerated. I don’t know how long he served. I don’t know where he is today. But I do know I will always remember his jovial laughter, his kind friendship and his 3-legged dresser.

Summer Plans 2013

Amy Tan filled Seattle's Benaroya Hall last Wednesday night. Svelte and glorious in a black dress and heels, she shared stories of her mother's fatalistic parenting advice with grace and humor. She didn't read from her latest novel, Valley of Amazement, scheduled for release later this year, but instead spoke of the deaths of her mother and her editor, both in 1999. Then she read a lengthy letter written in response to a new editor's request for a synopsis of this first novel manuscript she'd completed since the loss of the two women who shaped her writing world. In her letter she introduced herself, shared stories of her life and explained her reasons for writing. She said little about the novel other than a few closing sentences. As I listened, my mind floated to a dark place: I questioned how many editors would spend the time to read a letter of such length regardless how interesting and well-written without Amy Tan's name on the envelope. 

Later that evening I found a Facebook post in my inbox, an article attributed to Joyce Carol Oates published in The Onion. With over fifty novels and numerous other publications to her name, I was curious about Oates' advice to young writers. The title also intrigued me: If You Wish To Be A Writer, Have Sex With Someone Who Works In Publishing. In contrast to Tan's lengthy contemplative letter to land a publishing contract, Oates suggests fucking the editor. In fact, she suggests fucking any and all editors, fucking anyone with a connection to an editor, fucking anyone who might even have the ear of an editor. I laughed until my sides hurt. 

 

Now, as I reflect on these two approaches, weighing one against the other, I decide I'm the one who's fucked. I'm not famous and I'm too damn old to sleep my way into a publishing contract. So what's left? I ponder this question for endless hours, hours better spent saturating the indie market with that dreaded synopsis Amy Tan sidestepped. Determination, perseverance and seat time are the tools in my publishing arsenal. 

I promise myself I'll send out 100 queries. I decide I can stomach 100 rejections (or silences since many editors simply don't respond) before I turn to the world of self-publishing. That's not a slam against self-publishing - some of my best friends are self-published authors of wonderful works - I'm just not ready to take the leap. I enjoyed working with an indie press on my memoir and want a similar experience with my first novel. Of course there's also the agent and big five path to traditional publishing, the path taken by the likes of Amy Tan and Joyce Carol Oates, but they got in before the ground shifted under all of us. They were household names back when self-publishing was scorned as vanity press and e-books had yet to revolutionize the reading (and publishing) experience. Sans fame and youth, I'll keep my butt in the chair, my pen moving and wait for that 1 in 100 response. At least until the end of summer.    

MURDOCK TACKLES TAOS

I dislike reading manuscript PDFs on my laptop, especially if the manuscript is a good mystery and what I really want is to curl up and enjoy. Still, when writer, teacher and friend, Robert J. Ray, offered his latest Murdock mystery in pre-publication format, I was delighted.

Murdock Tackles Taos is Ray's sixth Murdock mystery. The first was Bloody Murdock, released in 1986. Matt Murdock moved to Seattle and Murdock Cracks Ice appeared in 1992. Ray says he writes slow. I say each new adventure is worth the wait. I've enjoyed every one of the Murdock mysteries and this is no exception. If you enjoy well-written mysteries, watch for Murdock Tackles Taos, scheduled for release by Seattle's own Camel Press next month. Learn more about Robert Ray's work at his blog, co-authored with Jack Remick.

Here's my review: 

Murdock Tackles Taos is an any-time summer read, a murder mystery fueled with action: a missing woman and a corpse, good guys and bad guys, love and sex, all flavored with evil I will not reveal. Also, Murdock Tackles Taos examines privilege and the extremes that mega-wealth can afford. When you can buy anything or anyone you want, what more is there? What games do humans play when the thrill is gone? When human life loses all meaning or value?

Through it all, Murdock makes me smile. He’s not a suave, sophisticated James Bond. He’s not a disheveled, bumbling Colombo either. He’s real. He’s kind. He’s somebody to share a good adventure with. Helene Steinbeck, retired town marshal turned successful author, is Murdock’s new sidekick and lover. She makes me just a tiny bit jealous. 

Robert Ray’s novel tossed me back and forth between the feel of a summer read and a study in human nature – either way Murdock Tackles Taos is a read you won’t want to miss.