Sonja Foust, Romance Author

My sister and I could have been famous, but Karen Jo Shapiro beat us to it! She writes kids’ poems in the meter of famous poems. Check out her NPR interview to hear some. They’re cute.

But Joanna and I have been doing it for years. Well, ok, we weren’t necessarily aiming at children. My sister Joanna wrote a sad, sad story of Alby Tross and his final exams (with apologies to Samuel Taylor Coleridge).

I wrote a few of these in college, too. Here’s one:

THE DIFFERENT INDIFFERENT (apologies to John Donne)

I can love both wheat and white;
That which the oven melts, and that served slightly chilled;
That which needs provolone, and that with pickles dilled;
That which is deep fat fried, or which is lite;
That with tuna, and that with meat;
That which delights with peppers’ heat,
And that which has honeyéd mustard sweet;
Sandwiches many, I will gladly eat.

Will no other food content me?
Will it not serve to eat a burger, or whatever?
Or have I so, on bread and meat, become fixated ever?
Or doth a fear of foods so new torment me?
Oh, sandwiches are good, I know.
I eat them because it is so.
Rob me, and bind me up, and be my foe,
But do not take my sandwiches from me,
Or make me eat each new food that you do see.

Subway heard me sigh this song,
And by marketing scheme, big moola, it swore
If I would write it down, and then make the poém a whore
To sell, commercialled, to the fast-food throng.
I said, “Hell yes!  Some four or three
Or even two hundred will be
Enough to ’stablish a bargain with me.”
I did not tell them that mere sandwich whole,
Or even a half sandwich would have bought my soul.

And here’s another one I found, although I think I have close to 20 of these scattered around in different places…

The Lady Whines a Lot (apologies to Alfred, Lord Tennyson)

Buried in the pillows lies
A tired student, about to cry.
She memorized 100 lines
(Or will have, when the hour is by)
For stupid, stupid English class.
And up and down her hall-mates go
Gazing blankly, walking slow
While exams do suck and blow
And they all feel like ass.

Um… Maybe we could write one aimed at college students instead of kids. Think there would be a market for that?

I’ve read a lot of books on writing in the past five years or so. Some I’ve read and never thought of again, and some I’ve internalized into my process. Today I want to give you a list of the 4 writing books that I think are the best of the bunch.

Here’s a little caveat though, or maybe a hard lesson I learned and one you won’t have to, because I’m warning you: There are no rules in writing. Wait, let me amend that. There are rules (lots and lots and lots of them), but that doesn’t mean you have to follow them. The most important thing about writing is to find your process, and that takes time, and practice, and you won’t find your process by copying someone else’s process. So when you’re reading books on writing, observe, learn, and throw out all the stuff that doesn’t work or make sense for you.

Ok, end of warning. On to the books.

1. Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life by Anne Lamott
Most of the time, How To Write books are either reeeeally touchy feely, or completely technical. I get annoyed with books like that because writing is a combination of both. So I wasn’t convinced I’d much care for this book, which leans toward the touchy feely. I was NOT expecting to find touchy-feely with a hint of tough love.

I enjoyed it very much. Lamott manages to inspire without fist-pumping theatrics or lies about the publishing business. Instead, she offers humorous, straight-forward, sometimes tough-love advice aimed at helping you get over yourself and get on to your writing. If you’re in a rut, do yourself a favor and pick up this book. It helped me immensely.

2. On Writing by Stephen King
Part memoir, part writing instruction, this is a great read. The memoir part made me go out and buy some of Stephen King’s books, even though I’m really not much of a horror fan.

The section I was really interested in, though, was the writing section. Stephen King offers a lot of good advice, but you have to be warned that it’s advice on how he writes. See the above caveat. Stephen King writes, as we say, by the seat of his pants. If you are not a pantser, you never will be. I am not a pantser, but I did try the exercises in the book, and it was a good way for me to expand my thinking and loosen up a bit.

3. Telling Lies for Fun & Profit by Lawrence Block
This was one of the first writing books I read, and is still one of my favorites. All good advice and worth a read, though most of it was fairly intuitive. Still, it really helps to have those intuitive things put into words sometimes, especially for me. Block is entertaining to read, even if you don’t learn anything earth-shattering. But I think you’ll learn something, too.

4. No Plot? No Problem!: A Low-Stress, High-Velocity Guide to Writing a Novel in 30 Days by Chris Baty (of NaNoWriMo fame)
Most definitely the resource of all resources for NaNoWriMo. Get yourself a copy before November!

Even if you’re not a huge NaNoWriMo dork like I am, I think you can still get something out of this book. A lot of times, we as writers take ourselves too seriously, and Chris Baty won’t let us do it! He gives lots of writers’ block busting techniques and ways to churn out that first draft fast, fast, fast. After all, that’s the point of NaNoWriMo.

***

There, that should keep you guys busy for a while! So how about you? What’s your favorite writing book?

I love music, and I’m not too picky about what kind, either. And every now and then, a song comes along that gives me chills! Here are some of my current favs:

Halo by Beyonce– I love that part when she sings “halo” and she starts way down low with lots of vibrato and then just magically jumps to this great, ringing high note.

Come on Get Higher by Matt Nathanson– Just a nice song, with a great structure to it.

I Will Always Love You by Whitney Houston– Pretty much all of Whitney’s songs give me chills, but this one is by far my favorite. It’s about the only real “classic” on this list, just because it feels so timeless.

No Air by Jordin Sparks (and Chris Brown, blah)– I love the intensity in Jordin’s vocals!

Angel Standing By by Jewel– I hadn’t heard this one until I watched Return to Me. Love it. It’s gorgeous. Give it a listen! (Return to Me was really good, too. Best kept secret movie, maybe.)

So how about you? What songs make you so happy you get goosebumps?

(And, yeah, I’m still using Amazon Associate links. So sue me.)

I’m living the dream, people. I am a writer. I receive a regular check because people  pay for what I wrote.

I think, though, that a lot of people have a different idea of what “being a writer” involves. Maybe it’s that we all sit around all day in our pajamas alternately eating bonbons and shoving our cats off the keyboard. Oh, and we wear pink boas while we’re doing all that. We rarely go out in public, but when we do, people stop us in the street and ask us to sign our latest and greatest work for them, and we obligingly do, even if it will make us late for this posh and fabulous dinner party our publisher is throwing just for us.

I gotta say, it’s not really like that.

Most of us have a day job. If you’re looking for a Get Rich Quick scheme, I promise that writing is not what you want to be doing. I get a check once a quarter. It’s enough to let me claim I write for money, but it is not enough to live on, even for, like, a week.

I don’t eat bonbons while I’m writing. I’d get chocolate on the keyboard.

I do not own a pink boa.

I do not own a cat. (Well, no one really owns a cat, I guess, cats being the way they are. But there is not a cat in my household.)

I do sometimes write in my pajamas, but not very often, because it makes my husband look at me and go, “You’re not even dressed yet?” (Yeah, some people just don’t get that writing in your pajamas is considered glamorous. I dunno.)

Publishers (at least most of them) do not throw parties for their authors, although book parties and author parties seem to be in all movies involving authors. Weird.

Authors write for months, or even years, and then send their book around to be roundly rejected before finally finding the right publisher. When they do sell, most don’t make much in the way of money, and many keep their day jobs. It’s hard work, and not really all that glamorous.

But, you know what? We wouldn’t trade it for the world!

Ok, I promise this is my last soap-boxy post on the whole Amazon mess. If you have, in fact, decided to boycott Amazon.com or would just like to support your local independent bookseller, I present to you a list of independent booksellers in the Raleigh/Durham area. Enjoy!

ABDebs Books & Gifts
Knightdale, NC
We sell books, but our specialty is service.

Books at Stonehenge
Raleigh, NC
A general independent bookstore

Chapel Hill Comics
Chapel Hill, NC
Proudly independent, locally-owned bookstore which specializes in comics and graphic novels.

Falls River Books
Raleigh, NC
Deals in fine and used books.

The Know Book Store
Durham, NC
Peruse the shelves and find old and new books on African-American history, religion and children’s books, all interspersed with knickknacks like African masks and wooden figurines.

Quail Ridge Books & Music
Raleigh, NC
Fine literature for adults and children, with a special focus on the South.

Reader’s Corner, Inc.
Raleigh, NC
We are a general purpose broadband bookstore. Everything from bodice rippers to nuclear physics. The proceeds go to NPR, the best educational bargain in the USA.

The Regulator Bookshop
Durham, NC
Our goal is to share the wisdom, ideas, and stories that books contain. Making a profit here is a means to this end, not an end itself.

And, for those of you not in the Raleigh/Durham area, try the Top 19 Independent Booksellers in the U.S.A.

Did I miss anyone? Who’s your favorite independent bookseller?

Related articles by Zemanta

• Independent Bookstores Become Self-Aware (edrants.com)
• Unchained success (boston.com)