On the top of my computer armoire is a stack of writing books. One of my favorites is Stephen King’s On Writing. It’s part memoir, part “toolkit,” as King calls it. The horror master reveals his tricks of the trade, and talks about how the love of writing gripped him as a child.
But my favorite anecdote in this beautifully-written book?
It’s the story of how King began the book Carrie. He was dead broke, married with a few kids, and working as a schoolteacher. He wrote in every spare second, like a lot of us do. The idea for his novel about a teenager girl who had the power of telekinesis came to him, and he typed up a few pages – before realizing they were awful. In frustration, he crumpled them up and threw them in his overflowing trash can.
Later his wife, Tabitha, spotted the pages. She brushed off the cigarette ash, smoothed them out, and began to read. Then she handed them back to King. “You’ve got something here,” she told him. “I really think you do.”
Carrie launched King’s career and proved that wives really do know best. Er, I mean that before trashing a work in progress, it’s always a good idea for a writer to get a second set of eyeballs on the page.
In my second novel, Skipping a Beat, my main character, Julia Dunhill, sees bits of her life in scenes from the world’s great operas. One is Cavalleria Rusticana. The backstory to the tale of tenor Turiddu and his love Lola is just as fascinating for me as the actual opera. Composer Pietro Mascagni was a dirt-poor piano teacher when he wrote it for an opera competition, hoping a win would reverse his fortunes. Like so many artists, he was incredibly self-critical, and he ended up despairing of his work. But his wife believed in him, and she secretly mailed it to the judges (again the wife!) He won, and just like that, in the snap of a finger, his life turned around.
The moral is clear: Don’t trash your work. Set is aside. Re-read it another day, or better yet, ask Stephen King’s wife to read it for you. Sure, the work might belong in the trash can. But you also might be sitting on something pretty spectacular.
July 27th, 2010
| Posted by Sarah Pekkanen | 2010 Debs
| 9 Comments
I’m a dog person. Don’t get me wrong – I love cats, too. And monkeys and hamsters, birds and even lizards.
But maybe because I grew up in a house full of pugs, dogs have a special place in my heart. We had four of them, and they pretty much regarded themselves – and were treated – like our less articulate siblings. They slept in our beds, cuddled on our laps while we watched TV, and even stole food off our plates (yes, we violated every single dog-rearing principle the experts warn us not to).
Recently, the hysterically funny author Wade Rouse asked me to contribute an essay to his upcoming anthology, I’m Not The Biggest Bitch In This Relationship. It is, as you’ve hopefully guessed, a collection of essays by writers who adore dogs (My husband just tried to make a joke, but I elbowed him in the solar plexis).
At first I thought I’d write about my black lab, Bella, who shares my author photo. But Bella is too mellow to create good material: she likes every dog she meets, she befriends cats, she loves to ride in cars, and she happily sleeps on a big cushion on the floor right next to my bed. Bella, though one of the sweetest creatures on the planet, isn’t quirky enough to sustain a 2,500 word essay.
But the pugs. Ah, the pugs could fill the whole freaking book. Though some proceeds of Wade’s anthology will go to the Humane Society, writing my part was actually a gift to myself. I was flooded with memories of my childhood, and grew alternately giddy and weepy as I recalled the pugs’ antics. Like the time Delilah stole the giant Hershey bar my brother won at a Halloween party and buried it under my father’s pillow (sometime around midnight, he went to plump up his pillow and discovered his body heat had melted the chocolate, all over his sheets). Or the time my polite, refined future sister-in-law visited our house for the first time and watched, stunned into silence, as a pug walked under a coffee table and our iguana strolled out the other side (“What kind of coffee table was that?” she asked years later). Or the day my mother phoned me at college to tell me she had to call the vet to come to our house to put McDuff – our final, ailing pug – to sleep.
It’s impossible for me to imagine what my childhood would have been like without pets. And just today, my son asked if we could get a cat, or possibly a hamster. I’m pretty sure he’s going to have an easy time wearing me down on this issue. I know pets are messy, a big responsibility, and expensive. Yet none of that comes close to the importance of the love I’ve gotten from them through the years.
Please keep an eye out for Wade’s anthology, to be published in 2011!
July 20th, 2010
| Posted by Sarah Pekkanen | 2010 Debs
| 10 Comments
The 2010 Debs were almost contenders. Household names. We came so close to hitting the cover of People magazine, sitting down for an intimate chat with Oprah, and being forced to open extra bank accounts to cash all of our checks.
Except for a wee misunderstanding.
Here’s how it played out: Last November, I received an email that sent me into a tizzy involving medicinal gulps of wine, frantic phone calls, and fleeting thoughts about the possibility of minor plastic surgery. Below is the email I sent to my fellow Debs describing the incident.
Okay, I’ve been screaming with laughter all night. I got an unsolicited email a few hours ago from someone who said she was a TV producer and wanted to do a reality show on us Debs. I freaked out, called Alicia, we both Googled the woman and I learn she has won 2 emmys and worked with Ellen DeGeneres and Simon Cowell. Holy crap! She’s big-time!
My husband comes home and I shout, “Do you want to be on a reality show with me?”
He responds calmly, “Why not?” (I was hoping for a more impressed reaction).
I throw the baby at my husband, pour a glass of wine, perfect my pitch and call the producer back.
I’m 2 minutes into my spiel of why we would make a killer reality show — “There’s Maria – she’s sexy and fun and a big radio personality! And Alicia is an incredible self-taught musician and is married to another author! Emily lives in England and has a big two-book deal and homeschools her kids! Joelle has this incredible life – she’s married to a photographer and she’s so into sustainable living! And I write my books at Chuck E. Cheese while my kids whine for tokens!”
Producer woman cuts in – “Whoa. Wait a minute. I think my wires got crossed here. I’m trying to do a show on debutantes.”
Me: “Like with the gloves?’
Producer woman: “Yes.”
Me: “Oh.”
Producer woman:
Me:
Sounds of producer woman trying to get off the phone as fast as possible.
Man, we were so close to stardom!!!! It gets funnier and funnier the more I think about it. As Alicia says, who in their right minds would think a TV show about writers would be riveting?
July 13th, 2010
| Posted by Sarah Pekkanen | 2010 Debs
| 9 Comments
Fireworks are kind of like books.
You want to grab attention from the very first moment, with an explosive sound and dazzle of color, or a gripping opening line. You’re telling your audience that the show is on – and it’s going to be a doozy. But you can’t shoot off all your fireworks at once, leaving people feeling shortchanged. You need to establish a rhythm – a burst of excitement followed by a quick pause so folks can catch their breath. But even during the quiet moments, the audience knows not to avert its eyes, because they might miss something.
And the most important part? The finale. Viewers (or readers) should be rapt and sighing, fully satisfied and entertained.
I’m gearing up to start writing my third book, now that my second one, SKIPPING A BEAT, is into copy-editing. I’m going to tape a little note to my computer that says, “Fireworks” to remind myself to bring them to as many pages as possible…
July 6th, 2010
| Posted by Sarah Pekkanen | 2010 Debs
| 8 Comments
About a month before The Opposite of Me came out, I booked a signing at the big Barnes & Noble in my hometown of Bethesda, Maryland. The lovely folks at the bookstore followed up with a long email to my publicist, asking all sorts of questions. Did I prefer to sign with a pen or a sharpie? Which page of my book would I be signing? Would I like to have a bookstore representative write down the the names of the folks waiting in line so I wouldn’t misspell someone’s name?
I’d long dreamed of autographing my book, but I’d never thought about the mechanics of the process. Since then, I’ve collected stories of what other authors do. One signs on the last page of his books, just to be different. Most scrawl their signatures on the crowded page that lists the book’s title and the name of the author and the publisher’s information. For me, it felt right to sign on the page that just lists my title – because I like to have the extra space to include a little note along with my signature.
If I know the person receiving my novel, I’ll write something personal – an expression of gratitude for their friendship and support, or maybe a few words that will conjure a happy memory. If I’m signing stock, or inscribing a book as a gift, I’ll usually write “Happy reading!” along with a few x’s and o’s and my name. It turns out I do prefer sharpies, but I’m just as happy signing with any other kind of pen.
And you know what? Each and every time I sign a book, I’m just as excited as I was the first time.
June 29th, 2010
| Posted by Sarah Pekkanen | 2010 Debs
| 9 Comments
My father is one of the funniest people I’ve ever met. He loves to laugh at himself, which is a rare and admirable trait. He’s quick with a quip, he spontaneously comes up with silly poems that rhyme with my sons’ names, and he’s a terrific writer (seven non-fiction books – one of which was made into a CBS Sunday Night movie and got him an appearance on Oprah, and countless magazine articles, including two that won him National Magazine Awards). He’s an incredibly kind, sentimental man who loves his family and adores my Mom (he still calls her “my bride” after 47 years of marriage). One of the things I’ll always be grateful to him for is that he taught me so much about writing – and he’s still my first and best editor.
Here is a story Dad loves to tell about raising us kids:
Once, in the grocery store, my father was struggling to put my younger brother Ben into the seat in the front of the cart. Ben kept stiffening his legs, causing my Dad to practically do contortions to try to wedge Ben’s chubby little legs into the right holes. Suddenly, my older brother shouted, “Lock your legs, Ben!” Ben obeyed, at which point my older brother and I – knowing my father was immobilized – promptly pulled down my father’s pants. He laughed about it then, and gets absolutely hysterical recalling the story today.
But Dad can get mad, too. Once my older brother and some of his teen-aged friends hopped the fence at our neighborhood swimming pool for a midnight dip. One of the pool board members lived nearby and saw them – and called the police. Dad was so furious that this guy – who’d been a referee at many of our swim meets and shared pot-luck with us – had tried to get the kids in serious trouble for a teen-aged prank that he refused to speak to him for twenty years. Twenty! The moral is, don’t mess with Dad’s kids. Even though Dad is now friendlier to that guy, I’m pretty sure he’d still put a “kick me” sign on his back, given the chance.
Happy belated Father’s Day, Dad! I love you very much.
June 22nd, 2010
| Posted by Sarah Pekkanen | 2010 Debs
| 11 Comments
Deb Sarah is thrilled that one of her favorite authors, Emily Giffin, just told People.com that The Opposite of Me is one of her picks for the best beach reads of the summer!
Congrats to Erika Lynn and Mary (Bookfan), who have won advance reading copies of Simply From Scratch. (Winners were generated via random.org). Thank you very much to all who participated in the giveaway contest on Wednesday.
And in other Simply From Scratch news, Thorndike Press, the world’s leading publisher of large print books, acquired rights! The large print version will come out August 5.
Click here for graduate Deb Eve Brown-Waite’s book trailer about First Comes Love, Then Comes Malaria, now available in paperback!
June 20th, 2010
| Posted by Sarah Pekkanen | 2010 Debs
| 6 Comments
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