Meet my new writing mascot

I went into Tuesday Morning to purchase a pair of ceramic birds that I saw a few days ago. Then I spied this warped cat. I had seen the same figurine in Hallmark, but this was one was 70% off retail. Whoo-hooo, discount tacky!

I decided she'd be my new mascot. Her name is Boxina (box EE nuh), because she's well... squarish. And she'll remind me to think outside the cat. Do you think she can scare away my inner critic? Oh wait, my inner critic will just fall over laughing looking at this thing. 

But she is sooooooooo me. 

Thoughts on Free Verse - finished

Although, free verse is "free" of the constraints of meter and rhyme, it cannot be free of poetic elements altogether. If it were, there'd be no sense in calling it verse. It would merely be prose in bits. Word kibble.

Okay ... I've heard of prose poems ... and I'm not sure what kind of critters those things are. I will be honest ... I can be rather persnickety about poetry. I fell in love with modern poetry in my college years. Maxine Kumin, e.e. cummings, and the lot. I still have my well worn, blue paperback, thick as a church cornerstone Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry around here somewhere. 

Verse novels are playgrounds for figurative language. Metaphors, similes, symbolic imagery, assonance, consonance, alliteration  --- it's like a fireworks store filled with literary devices. Boom! Sizzle! Flash! You can do so much more with so much less in a verse novel.

Verse can and should still have a sense of rhythm even when it does not follow a strict metrical pattern. Each word counts and should be carefully chosen. Line breaks also contribute to the rhythm. I usually make a line break where the speaker would naturally pause. Sometimes I may isolate words on a line for emphasis. Sometimes my line breaks are solely practical and done in a way to get the whole dang poem to fit on one page.

So, here concludes my brief sputterings on verse novels.  I suppose I should end with something profound or witty, but I have work to do.  For someone who resisted this genre for a long time, I have one out, one bubbling on the stove, and the recipe for a third on the table.

where i live by Eileen Spinelli

Used to be, most verse novels were angsty issue laden YA fare. Now, more and more verse novels for the younger set are cropping up.

This morning, I had the pleasure of reading where i live by Eileen Spinelli and illustrated by Matt Phelan.  The story is about Diana, her love of stars and poetry, her best friend, her sister, and a big change that causes poor Diana to start all over again. It's the stuff  middle childhood is made of, told in sweet free verse, accented with heartwarming sketches. This book may especially be comforting to children who are faced with a move due to a parent's job loss. When they see how Diana bounces back, they will know that they can to0.

Thoughts on Free Verse cont'd

Note: I don't write long blog posts because ... oh look at the cat ... I don't read long blog posts...   has it stopped snowing? ... because I have a touch of A.D.D. ... I think I'll make pancakes for breakfast.

Also, when I talk poetry I tend to talk about it in very simple layman's terms. I mean I CAN get into all the high falutin' artsy fartsy stuff, after all I'm a dagnab card carrying English major, but usually I just keep it well you know ... down to earth and slightly bizarre.

For me, it takes a LOT longer to write free verse than prose. It's not about the words you put in. It's about the words you leave out. Free verse is raw, concentrated, several pages contained in one verse of a hundred words or so. As in picture books, every word in a verse novel counts. Every word has to carry a lot of weight. Think of verse as sun-dried tomatoes, all that flavor, all that tangy bite shriveled down into something tiny that comes to life in your brain, the way the flavor of the tomato comes alive in your mouth.

More tomorrow. :)

Thoughts on Free Verse

There is more

to writing a verse novel

than making

wonky

line 

breaks.

                                         You

        can                      even                  have           fun

                  with                       your                tab

                                                 key

However,

if you take out all the extra line breaks and spaces

and all

you have

is an ordinary paragraph.

Then you do not have verse.

You

have 

creative

ty

pi

ng

skills.

More tomorrow.  :)

Life is a Roller Coaster

Life can change in an instant. So often we become comfortable or even bored with the way things are, and we expect them to stay that way day after day after day. And then in a split second, something's gone that leaves an aching empty spot, or something's gained that solves an enormous problem or fills a void. And that's what we have to do in our stories. Keep that roller coaster rolling. Our stories need those heart wrenching dips and quick free falls.

Writing For the Fun of It

Although we do have to be mindful of the business end of writing, I think it is important to not let go of the fun and joy of creating. It's hard. It's tough. It's darn right exasperating at times, but when the work is done - polished, threads cut, edges sanded, lumps smoothed - we can look back and marvel at this thing we have made, with help from Providence (God, the Almighty, the Universe, the voices in your head, whatever drives you.)

And that's what I aim to make this blog about. Having fun in the middle of the ups and downs of the business.

I also tend to be irreverent and sarcastic, so I'm just warning you before we get started.

It's 2009!

Happy New Year. If you add all the digits in 2009, you'll get 11, which is one of my favorite numbers. So that would mean luck, eh?

For the first time, I subbed a novel just at the close of 2008. It's a verse novel. I find I have an objection to the word "free" for some reason, and scattered verses in this book have calculated near rhymes and a definite rhythm. I think a better name for it would be squooshed novel. Because in verse, you take the equivalent of I don't know.. a huge chunk of chapter and squoosh it into about 100 words.  Of course squooshed does not sound flattering, so I suppose verse novel is much the better name for it.

Happy New Year to you all.