Fiction

Writing is about surprising yourself … I don’t just mean the reader here;  I mean the writer, too.  You should be on a journey yourself when you are writing and, hopefully, you will end up in a new place. - Arabella Hicks in The Fiction Class

There are so many things I have to do, need to do, love to do and want to do that in any given chunk of time, some will be neglected.   I have a tendency to want to do everything every day, sometimes leaving me feeling frustrated instead of fulfilled.   For example, classical music has been missing from my musical diet, so this week, I started sitting downstairs in my recliner on my writing nights so that I can use the stereo.    About a year ago, I moved my CDs from my office to the stereo cabinet, piling them randomly on an available shelf, a filing system that is awful for finding a particular piece but good for surprises.    Last week I found Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, and Mendelssohn’s Piano Concertos 1 and 2 … all old friends who pleased me as they always have in spite how long I’ve ignored them.

This week I also ended an unintended hiatus from reading fiction.   Even when I’m not reading, I accumulate books, usually trade paperbacks, from Border’s 2 for 1 shelves or those seductive bargain shelves outside the front door.   These new friends have waited patiently in my night stand for their turn to touch my life.    Monday evening, I retrieved The Fiction Class by Susan Breen and by the time my head hit the pillow at midnight, I was hooked.     Arabella Hicks, the main character, is an unpublished writer struggling to reach the students in her weekly fiction class while dealing with her difficult mother, who is in a nearby nursing home. When she discovers her mother wants to be a writer and begins to give her the class exercises, teacher, class, and Mom learn about writing together … and about how the honesty of the writing process opens hearts.   It was funny and touching and reminded me of my years in a fiction writing program at Cal State Fullerton.

Reading The Fiction Class, I realized that I not only do I miss reading fiction, I miss writing it.    I miss the pocket notebook of ideas and beginning to write, seeing if the idea develops into a story line.   I miss inventing characters who sometimes take on a life of their own, driving the story in directions I didn’t intend, almost as if they have free will.   Writing my Morning Pages today, an idea even turned up.   A man performs a small miracle in his middle years, a healing of an injured pet for a child he doesn’t even know.   Throughout his otherwise ordinary life, he’s tried to heal again without success, but he becomes increasingly desperate as his wife slips into Alzheimer’s disease.   Great possibilities, right?

Then I remember what my writing teacher, Patricia McFall, said in class (I paraphrase):  Everybody has ideas.   Writing is more about persistence and revision.  Like Arabella, I’ve ended up with 300 pages on my hard drive and felt the heartbreak of knowing the novel I worked on for two years isn’t what I want it to be.    I remember rejection letters and was reminded by a post on Susan Breen’s blog*, about seven years, of the commitment it takes to go from idea to publication.  And I’m not sure I’m up to all that.    But maybe it’s worth dragging out a few old manuscripts and seeing what happens.  After all, I’ve got nothing else to do.

* I’ve added Susan Breen’s blog, bloomers, to my Blog Roll.   It is definitely worth a look if you are  interested in the writing and publication process … or just in some interesting posts by someone who published her first novel at fifty after raising four children.

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Tags: feeling older, fiction, perspectives, writing and blogging

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