Reading Through a Writer’s Eyes and Thoughts on Marissa Meyer's Winter

An interesting phenomenon when you spend a great deal of time editing and revising is that you start noticing mistakes. In everything. Especially in books of bestselling writers, because, let’s face it, everyone has a different opinion on art, and what one person likes isn’t necessarily what another person likes. I’ve heard other writers and editors complain about it. The inability to turn it off long enough to enjoy the story.

It’s true, to an extent. This year, I’ve really pushed to improve myself as a writer. I’ve advanced in ways I wouldn’t have imagined in January. I’ve critiqued and revised, even started a new series. I also made a goal to read 52 books this year.

This week, I read Winter, the final book in the Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer. If you haven’t picked up the books, I highly recommend them. I found them last year and blasted through Cinder and Scarlet. Then I had to wait for Cress to come out. I thought that was torture, but then I had to wait for Winter.

I’m a huge fan of Marissa Meyer. I love her writing style, her characters, and her story. I also love the fact that she’s a NaNoWriMo author. Both Cinder and Scarlet were written during NaNoWriMo. If that’s not motivation, I don’t know what is.

While I’m working on my current novel, I’ve also been thinking about revision. I’m not a stranger to revision, out of the five novels I’ve written, I’ve probably done an average of 3-5 revisions on each. But as I work on the Orange WIP, I realize that maybe I’m not doing it as effectively as I could. As I researched revision, I found Marissa Meyer’s blog, and she gave an incredibly helpful and detailed summary of how she revises.

One of the things that popped out to me was that in her first revision, she asks what she can do to make things worse for the character. How she can make it less easy.

Knowing that, I read Winter with new eyes. There were moments when I could almost see her going through, thinking, nope, this is too easy. Time to make them suffer.

And suffer they did.

But because I still had my ‘writing goggles’ on while reading, I was able to pick up on those small details that I might not have noticed otherwise. I loved the book, and I was depressed when it was over. But I have a feeling that I’ll be going back to those books over and over again, probably with my kids as well. And when I start revisions, I will be taking Ms. Meyer’s process in mind, making things as physically and mentally difficult as I possibly can for my characters. 

Plot, Character and Setting

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been gearing up for NaNoWriMo. Every year, I try and do something a little bit different, something to push me to try something new.

Last year, I wrote my first modern day novel with no fantasy, just actual family relations and dealing with the disease of Alzheimer’s. It was a learning experience I wouldn’t trade for anything. To see what I learned from that novel, check out the link here.

This year, when I started thinking about NaNoWriMo, back in April, I didn’t quite have a story in mind. I used Camp NaNoWriMo to create characters, hoping that at some point, one of them would jump out to me and ask me to write their story. Fortunately, even though it was a frustrating month (possibly because I don’t like spending a lot of time with strangers), I did have two characters whose stories started to meld together.

Last month, I started plotting out the story. It was exciting, the more I plotted, the more I learned about the story. It’s the closest I’ve come to pantsing. I’m not actually writing, but I’m letting the story flow out. The more I wrote, the more I learned about the world, about the situations the characters were in, about the setting. Unfortunately, I kept hitting walls. Moments when I didn’t know where the story was going.

This week, I put aside plotting and character development. I started working on the setting. Getting to know the world my characters were living in. I had to determine how different organizations work, both of my characters are deeply involved in their own systems, and apparently, the plot wouldn’t move forward unless I understood the setting.

Writing out the rules to the magic system

As I continued to build the setting, I suddenly understood my characters so much better. Once I understand their world, I was able to understand their thoughts, their reactions, and their motives. It’s amazing how plot, character, and setting are all so intertwined.

What preparations are you making for NaNoWriMo?

Old Project/New Project

For the past few weeks, I’ve been very unfocused. Not in a bad way, but I haven’t been able to concentrate on one project long enough to really do anything effective.

This last week, I decided to read through the Orphans of Jadox, just for fun. It’s been quite a whole since I’ve really focused on it, almost 2 years, to be exact. Since then I’ve rewritten King’s Councilor three times, and written the Stone Mason and Jen’s story (still unnamed).

As I read through it I had a giant realization. The Orphans of Jadox is written in 2 different points of view: Larzo and Aydra. Yet, as I read, I realized that there was no distinction between voice. I’ve been reading a lot of reviews on different books, and that always seems to be the biggest complaint. If there are two different people, then they should talk differently, think differently.

So two days ago, I separated their points of view. I printed them out separately so that as I can focus on one point of view before moving to the other.  Larzo is a shapeshifter, a cat. He needs to focus on tactile senses: smell, sight, sound. Each small detail is heightened by his senses. Aydra, on the other hand, as I later found out in in The Stone Mason, has mild empathy, which her son inherits. So she focuses on emotions, reactions, feelings of those around her.

Right now, I’m working on Larzo’s point of view. It’s odd, focusing so much on details, the smells, the sounds, but I’m loving it. I don’t think I’ve ever felt like I’m completely within someone else’s head. It’s quite fun, and now, when I go on my writer’s retreat next week, I have something definite and concrete to work on.

It’s also been quite a while since I’ve printed out my project, and working in a different medium has definitely got my creative juices flowing.

How about the rest of you? What are you working on right now?

Writing Something Familiar

I’m almost done with my purple WIP.  So close.  This is the one that I started during November for NaNoWriMo.  I wrote 50,000 words in November, and now I’ve written about 20,000 words since then, so my momentum has definitely slowed.  Though, to be fair, half of that was written this month.

This week though, I’ve been able to get back on track, and I’m in an interesting part of the story.  I’d accidentally started a section before realizing that I skipped a whole part, so I’ve been simultaneously working on both at the same time.

One of the sections, the main character is taking a tour of a city that is very important to my family.  It’s a teeny tiny town on the edge of Illinois, where the early members of our church gathered, and many important things happened there.  My character is currently taking tours and watching shows that are more than familiar to me.  In fact, one of them, I’ve been in for four years.  She’s also meeting people that I know out there, though I never specify them by name.

With hubby in Nauvoo

The second section, her father falls and hits his head and is rushed to the hospital.  As a nurse, I know what it’s like when someone hits their head, I know how they bleed, what the paramedics will ask, I even know what kinds of things a doctor will look for in that kind of an incident.

Both sections are familiar, and yet, it’s almost surreal writing because it’s not familiar to my MC.  She’s never been to Nauvoo, and she doesn’t know where each building is, how to get from one place to another.  She doesn’t know where the shows are, or which ones she needs tickets to.  And as an added difficulty, all of her travel companions speak Spanish, which she barely understands. 

With the paramedics and hospital, it’s not something that comes naturally to her.  This is her father, and she’s going to react on fear and probably not understand everything that’s going on.

I’ve never had to work so hard to think in someone else’s head.  In all of my other stories, I’m discovering the world with my characters.  They all live in foreign and exotic worlds, so I’m still trying to get an idea of the territory as I write.  But now, these are real world places and situations.  I have to be true to them, make sure that they are exactly right, and show them through the eyes of someone who’s not going to know what kind of assessments a doctor will do in an emergency room.  Or who doesn’t know the difference between Parley and Muholland Street.

Have you ever had to write about something you know well, but present it in a way that’s utterly foreign to you?

Secondary Characters

This week, my husband and I decided to go see Maleficent.  I was interested to see how they would turn the fairy tale upside down.  As I’ve said before, I love retellings of fairy tales, and I’ve seen it done quite well.

As we watched, especially near the end, there was one thing that really bothered me.  It wasn’t anything major, or anything that really spoiled the movie, but it was one that’s kept me thinking for a while.  There was a character in the movie who had a lot of potential.  He was in almost every scene.  Yet he did absolutely nothing for the plot.  He was a fluff character who sat back and watched everything else happen.

I’m talking about the crow.  Okay, I know he played little part in the actual movie as well, but he had so much potential.  He was the one there as Maleficent was learning to like the ‘little beastie’ and he was the only one who was willing to talk back to her when he thought she’d done something wrong.  With just a little creativity, I think he could have been more than just a flat secondary character.

So what is the importance of secondary characters?  Are they there to support the main character?  Provide guidance?  Maybe even conflict.

As I look through the different WIPs that I’m working on, I’ve started to really look at those secondary characters and try to determine exactly what their purpose is.  I’ve come up with three things that I think are necessary for a secondary character to be round and to really draw the reader in.

1.  A secondary character must have a role in the story.

                I guess that should be pretty self-explanatory.  If there’s no reason for them to be there, then why are they there?  Except I know I’ve seen and read many stories where there are secondary characters who are only there for filler.  I’ve even created characters like that.  In The Orphans of Jadox, there are quite a few orphans running around.  Though they play a part, most didn’t have a role in the story, other than to show that there were children.  I ended up cutting five of them, and it didn’t even affect the story. 

                In Maleficent, the crow really didn’t have a role.  He was probably there just because there was a crow in the original movie.  If he had been deleted from the story, I think everything would have been exactly the same.  Honestly, she could have been speaking to herself with all the interaction that they had.

2. A secondary character must move the plot forward.

                Now this may sound similar to point number one, but here’s the difference.  You can have a character in the story, who has a role (father, boss, child, etc) but as much as they play a role, they don’t do anything for the plot.  It’s like taking the scenic route when you want to get to your destination. 

                I’ll give another example.  I had a character who was sold as a servant and ended up learning to sew.  The seamstress taught her everything she knew, and despite all odds, they became friends.  Then she was sold again, and she never saw the seamstress after that.  I had a beta call me out on that.  She told me that unless my character needed to use her sewing skills in the final conflict, the entire side plot didn’t do anything for the story.  Did she have a role?  Yes.  She taught my main character, they formed a friendship.  Yet, she did nothing for the story and plot itself.

3. A secondary character needs to have motivation of their own.

                I think this is the most important.  Everyone has some purpose for existing.  Even if the story is told from the main character’s point of view, that doesn’t mean that every character within the story doesn’t have their own agenda.

                I love bringing up Wreck it Ralph for that exact reason.  You’ve got the bad guy, Ralph, who wants to get a medal.  He’s the main character.  But all of the secondary characters have their own agendas too.  Finding the cybug.  Winning a race.  Saving his game.  Their paths intersect, and every interaction is propelled forward by each of their individual desires.  Having a secondary character there just to help the main character doesn’t help either of them.  Give them a reason to do what they do.

Anything else you’d add to the list?  What secondary characters do you love?

Skimming the Story

 Over the past few days, I’ve been reading a book that had been recommended on multiple sites and was so popular, it had a pilot created for a TV series (which was unfortunately not picked up.)

Unfortunately, it took me several days to finish.  Usually, if I’m hooked, if I have to put it down, it’ll only take me two days to finish.  This one took me five or six.  And I wasn’t that upset when I had to put it down.  Add to that, I ended up skimming a large portion of the story.  Not because it wasn’t well written, but because it didn’t add to the plot.  There was a lot of background information, a lot of narrative and not so much action.

I’m not a huge action person, but I can get impatient if I want to know what’s going on in the story and all I get is a detail of the trees standing in the yard.  On some beta reads, I’ve told various people “get back to the story.” 

Fortunately, I had one beta tell me the same exact thing.  It’s so easy to see it in others’ writings, but sometimes it takes someone to point it out in our own. 

Conflict and action is what moves the story forward.  Taking long, meandering side trips can sometimes frustrate the reader.  They’d better be some awesome side roads with amazing views.

What about the rest of you?  What makes you skip sections of a story?  What makes you put down a book?

Emotional Senses

Over Memorial Day, my sister and her husband invited us to go to a park with them for some roasted hot dogs.  We were excited because it was finally warm enough that was an option!

When we got there, we started the fire, and I’ll admit that the little girl in me did a giddy dance.  There’s something about campouts and smores and just sitting around the fire that brings back the best of memories.  Everything from Family Reunions to Girls’ Camps to activities with friends in high school.

Picture taken by me

Sure the burning of the fire was a great visual, but that wasn’t what triggered the happy feelings.  It was the smell.  I’m a sucker for the smell of campfire.  Random, I know.  When we got home, my husband wanted to shower right away because he thought we stunk.  I wanted to bask in the smell for just a bit longer.

When writing, there’s the tendency to focus on sights.  After all, most of us are very visual learners.  I tend to remember faces much better than I remember names.  (Okay, maybe not just a tendency.  I can’t remember names at all.)  There’s a reason why teachers use chalkboards, whiteboards and PowerPoint Presentations.  We all want to see it for ourselves.

But is there any sight that can evolve the same memories and emotions as a smell?  In my own humble opinion (and feel free to disagree), I think that smell and taste are the two most emotional of the senses.

Remember the scene in the Parent Trap?  The really old one?  The first time Susan meets her grandfather, she smells him.  Then she says, “All my life, when I’m quite grown-up, I will always remember my grandfather and how he smelled of tobacco and peppermint.”

In one of my favorite animated movies, Anastasia can’t remember anything about her past.  At least, she can’t until she catches a whiff of her grandmother’s perfume.  The smell is enough to open up the gates.

I’ve been working on using more smells in my writing.  Smells that the readers will know.  Ones that could set the scene better than if I described every piece of furniture. 

What’s your favorite smell?

Working on Multiple Projects

I have a question for all of you.

Do you work on multiple projects at once? 

I tend to work on one at a time, but once I finish a draft, I move to the next one.  However, this month has been a bit odd for me.  I don’t know if it’s that I’ve got enough going on that I feel like I’m jumping from one thing to another without any clear direction.  Maybe I’m losing my ability to multitask.  Or maybe I’m using it too much.  I don’t know.

In April, I finished my Blue WIP, and now it’s up for critiques.  I’ve been getting some awesome feedback, and I love it.  While I wait for the critiques to finish, I’ve been trying to use May to work on revising my Yellow WIP.  As much as I’m enjoying this one, (and trust me, it’s one of my favorites) I’m having a hard time concentrating on it. 

Actually, it’s not as much a matter of concentrating.  It’s a matter of getting down to work.  Every time that I start a section, I get so caught up, I keep reading to the end.  I think I’ve read the whole thing three times this month already.  I love these characters and the story, but I can’t concentrate on it enough to focus on revisions. 

Whenever I’m working on a novel, the characters take up residence in my brain.  In my spare time, or when I have a chance to stare out the window, I let them bumble around in there.  They tell me what their story needs or if there are any changes that need to be made.

Except this time, the characters from the Blue WIP haven’t moved out.  They’re fighting over space in my brain and I feel torn between the two stories.

So now I’m wondering how all of you deal with it.  Do you work on multiple projects at once?  How do you bounce from one to another?

Learning a skill

I don’t think that there’s any point in our lives that we don’t need to learn.  Or that we aren’t learning something.  There’s so much out there that all it really takes is going out and finding out what interests us.  I know that I’m always finding new hobbies, new skills that I want to improve on. 

Recently, I’ve been working on making flowers with buttercream frosting.  I didn’t attach any pictures because I need a lot more practice.  Someday though, I’ll show all of you.

For me, it’s almost natural for my characters to learn as well.  They’re going through experiences that teach them, shape them.  It’s only natural that they pick up a few more skills.  And I love the chance to be able to learn with them.  If it weren’t for some of my characters, I would never have learned anything about stone masonry, home repairs or gardening. 

When I first started sending my stories to beta readers, I received a piece of advice that I’ll never forget.  I was told that if my characters spent any times learning anything, whether it be cooking, sewing, or horseback riding, it had better be a skill that they use in the final conflict. 

I think she only said that because she had to endure two chapters of sewing lessons that never benefitted my character in the end.

Even so, the lesson had been learned.  While outlining for my Yellow WIP, I knew that I wanted my character to learn a skill, some sort of trade.  I couldn’t even decide the final battle until I knew what he was going to learn on his journey.  Once I chose stone masonry, I had to find a situation where he could use the new skill to his advantage. 

Rowell's greatest challenge is building and tearing down walls

Honestly, it’s one of the most exciting climaxes I’ve ever written.

How about the rest of you?  Do you focus on your characters skills and how it would benefit them in the long run?  What skills are you working on yourself?

Voice

This week, I started revising my yellow WIP.  My main character, Rowell, is very different from all of the other main characters that I’ve created, and I love getting into his mind.  He’s a teenage boy who's got a chip on his shoulder that clouds his perception of everything around him.  Yet there's something about him that affects the way that interacts with others, something he's not even aware of.

 

One of the main elements of this revision is focusing on voice.  I've already got a bit of it within the story, but as I've delved into what really makes him tick, I've realized that I've sold him short.  Rowell's personality is so clear that this draft has been one of the easiest to write. 

I've read many articles on the importance on finding a characters voice.  It can affect the tone of the story and the way that it reads.  Consider the differences here between the first and second drafts:

Rowell dropped his book, startled by his father's voice.  Lori shot him a guilty glance before scooting out and jumping up.

Rowell's head whipped up, and he flinched under Larzo's gaze.  After a moment, he glared down at Lori.  The little rat!

They're just small changes, but I can't help but smile with the second example.  Probably because I can completely see him glaring down at his little sister.  I have younger siblings, and I know what it's like when they tattle-tale.

Voice needs to feel natural.  It needs to come from the character, rather than from the writer.  Or maybe they should be working together to create it.

What do you think?  Any advice on creating effective voice?

Another One Bites the Dust

Today’s the 25^th of April, and a few hours ago, I just finished my Camp NaNoWriMo goal.  Actually, I exceeded it.  For the month of April, I wanted to revise my Blue WIP, which is now tentatively titled, The King’s Councilor.

The final word count is a little over 65,000 words, which is almost 6,000 more than the previous draft.  And there were quite a few changes – again.  However, this is one of the most painless revisions I’ve ever had to do.

Revising is one of the things I enjoy the most.  There’s always excitement when starting out, writing the first draft, getting the words on the page, but there’s something different when it comes to revising.  It’s almost like the chance to go back, live the story again and fix it.  How many times would I love to be able to do that in my own life?  It’s the chance to delve even deeper into my characters, to explore roads that I hadn’t seen on the first journey.

Plus, being a homebody like myself, it’s always nice to be somewhere familiar.

When I say painless, I mean this is the fastest I have ever revised a draft. 

A previously edited draft

With my first WIP, way back, I began working on a major revision.  It included changing the POV from 1^st to 3^rd person (personal preference) and fixing an ending that just never quite felt right to me.  It took almost 5 months of grueling rewriting, fixing and of course, lots and lots of colored pens.

As I’ve continued writing and revising, I’ve noticed a definite increase in my productivity.  First drafts read like 2^nd or 3^rd drafts of previous works.  I can focus more on the big picture before going into a revision, which decreases the work that I’d have to do later.  Even this WIP, which was a disaster of a first draft (due to my attempt at pantsing), this is only the third draft, and it already feels ready to go out to critiquers.  And the novel I wrote in November will probably need even less revision.

So what’s up?  Have I actually improved without realizing it?  Have I picked up the habits I wished I had when I first started?  OF course, this is all biased opinion, but I feel like I have.  I’m learning what to avoid, so I don’t even put it in the first draft.  That means I don’t have to take it out in later drafts.  I’m learning to add details when I first started out, rather than throwing them in as I revise.  It’s all a matter of practice and hard work.  Really, really hard work.

So while I have critiquers tear up this draft (I love you all!) it’s time to move to the next novel.  Or maybe even start a new one.  The possibilities are endless.

The Small Details

Years ago, I took a tour of Salamanca.  It’s a city in Spain that’s known for the knowledge and education.  There’s old architecture and fascinating legends associated with it.  There are three notable ‘secrets’ hidden details of the buildings.  Amongst everything else, the intricate details and carving in the buildings, there’s three things that just don’t quite match.

That is a frog, an astronaut and a gargoyle eating ice cream. I found two of the three while there.

Here’s a picture that I took.  Can you see the frog?

How about now?

Most people probably wouldn’t even notice them if they weren’t told to look for them.  But having it hidden there really makes the experience even better.  It helps the tourists really stop to enjoy the artwork, to pay attention to the small details that it took to create the masterpieces that spent years to create.

I’d like to think that while writing, I add those details that are so subtle that it might be missed by the average reader, but could still help increase the beauty of the art.  It’s a matter of finding the balance between too much and not enough.  It’s putting in the details that matter while making sure they blend into the story.

Easy Isn’t Always Better

Let’s face it.  We’re creatures of habit.  Humans have a way of gravitating toward what feels most natural: what they know.

I’m that way.  Easier is… well… easy. 

But easy doesn’t mean it’s always the best option.  I’ve learned that the hard way.  And on multiple occasions.  The times of my life that I remember the most, the moments that changed me for good have been the times that were hard. 

Here's my story.

 I grew up in Colorado.  I wasn’t really an adventurer.  I preferred to stay home with a good book rather than go out and do something new.  My plan for my life was to get a nursing degree at a university near home, with my cousin as a roommate.  From there, I planned on living my life without any excitement and without any difficulties.

I would have been perfectly content with a life like that.  No fuss, no injuries.  But who’d want to read about that?

As a senior in high school, I received a pamphlet for Saint Louis University’s Madrid Campus.   It had an opportunity to obtain a bachelor’s degree in nursing from both the United States and Spain.  The thought both intrigued and terrified me.  I won’t go into the details, but after a year of debating, dealing with the fear of the unknown, I moved to Spain.

In the two years I lived in Madrid, I experienced things that I’d never dreamed of.  I learned a new language, I traveled to Germany, I met a handsome Bolivian and brought him back to the US where we got married.  I even learned how to dance.  Each experience is one that I treasure, and the person that I became is who I am today. 

Castle Manzanares El Real

Symbol of Madrid

Segovia

As a writer, I search for those moments that take my characters out of their comfort levels.  I want them to struggle, to learn, and to grow.  Because ultimately, that’s the story that I would want to read. 

How about you?  Have there been moments when you stepped out of your comfort zone and experienced something new?

Gaining Momentum

I’m about 35,000 words into my new version of the Blue WIP, and I’ve reached the point that I’m wanting to write all the time.  I usually find that between words 0-10,000, I’m rushing to write, the ideas are fresh, and the story is just starting with so much potential.  But by about word 10,000, I lose a bit of momentum.  And this time, I had enough stuff going on in my own, personal life that writing wasn’t really a priority.

Yet, there’s always that desire to keep going.  To finish the story.  The characters become insistent, begging me to tell their story, to give them their happy ending.  And they deserve that.  We started out this journey together, and they can’t finish it on their own. 

So I continue.  I push through, and then once I reach about 30,000 words, I gain momentum again.  The story’s at its peak, the climax, and things are starting to get good.  There’s so much going on that it’s hard to pull away.  Just like reading a book, writing the book is the same.  The climax makes it hard to put it down and leave it be.  I find myself waking up early to spend more time writing, and using spare moments of time to get a few more words in. 

Whenever my husband or I get home, I can’t wait to tell him what happened.  Not during my day, but during my characters’ day.  They’re such a large part of my life that I feel like they’re real. 

And with the changes that I’ve made, I’m loving the story more and more.  There’s enough that I want to see how the changes effect the story.  I want to see if the changes pull through to the end.  I’ve got a good feeling about this, and it makes me happy despite the crazy things that are going on in my own life. 

So here’s to the next 10,000 words!  

Hero’s Journey

I spend a lot of time driving to and from work.  Each week, it can be up to 4-5 hours.  And when I drive, I think a lot about all sorts of stuff, especially my writing and stories.  The novel I’m working on right now has felt a bit lackluster.  As I started to sort through my story and what’s missing, I realized that I like one specific plotline.  That’s the hero’s journey. 

When I was much younger, I remember going to my cousins’ house over the summer.  They had a lot of awesome computer games that encouraged creativity.  There was one specific game that allowed you to create your own stories, put different characters in different scenes, allow them to interact with one another and change settings.  They would create amazing scenarios and stories.  When they gave me the chance to try, my story consisted of 8-9 characters walking from place to place until they get to their final destination.  I even remember one of my cousins telling me that “nothing’s happening.”

Most of my stories consist of my characters traveling from one place to another on a ‘hero’s journey.’  Most of the novel will actually consist of the journey, and this novel is no exception.  So as I’m sorting through the plot, I realized that it’s just like that story I created when I was younger.  Nothing was happening.  They were just traveling.

But that’s not what the hero’s journey is.  If a character has to move from point A to point B, then it can’t be the story of a drive down I-80 in Wyoming.  (Which if any of you have driven down I-80, then you know what I mean.)  Think of The Hobbit or the Lord of the Rings.  Those characters did nothing but travel, but they ran into Orcs, Dragons, Dwarves, even Gollum.  The entire story isn’t about where they’re going, but how they get there and what they face as they travel.

And that’s what my story was missing.  My characters needed more conflict, even if they’re just traveling.  So I started with a ball of fire.  And an earthquake.  Suddenly, my story wasn’t stalled, and my characters weren’t just traveling, they were living a story.  And that’s what the reader wants.  They want to see the characters struggle, to empathize with them. 

So if your story feels lackluster, maybe you should take the scenic route instead of driving straight down the highway.  

Holidays and Traditions

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday.  There's just really no competition.

It's the spirit of the holiday, the gathering of family and friends to give thanks that always made it special for me.  My mother was the kind of person who always invited many, many people over for Thanksgiving - sometimes as many as 20.  I can remember different traditions that were started when I was younger, and they still warm my heart.  When I was in junior high, we used to set up the ping pong table either outside if it was warm or inside the garage if it was cold.

But probably my favorite tradition of Thanksgiving was baking day.  That's what we called the Wednesday before Thanksgiving.  It was the day to make rolls and pies in preparation of the big celebration.  And that's where I learned my love of making pies.  Every once in awhile I still get the urge to make 5-6 for no reason.  My husband loves it.

2011 'Early Thanksgiving' pies

2012 Thanksgiving pies

While going through my pictures, I found that every Thanksgiving, I have many, many pictures of friends and family meeting together - probably the greatest memories of that year.


Holidays and traditions make up a big part of any culture.  Though I write fantasy, I've found that adding that small part in a culture makes it richer and makes it feel real.  While writing my White WIP, I was struggling with a scene where two main characters fall in love.

I finally decided to rewrite the scene, having them celebrating a holiday together, among all of their family and friends.  Just putting them in that situation made the scene so rich that it's still probably one of my favorites that I've ever written.  And every single one of my betas has said that it's their favorite as well. Here's just a snippet:

“Are you enjoying yourself?” Anthalor asked.  His hand tightened on her waist as he directed her away from another couple.

Kanya nodded.  “I’ve never been to a…” she paused, attempting to remember what Miha and Zeugal had called the evening.

“Harvest celebration,” Anthalor supplied.  He spun her under his arm before drawing her back toward him.  “It’s a celebration that began in the Kingdom of Gekun.  The harvest is so important to them down here.  It’s really their greatest source of income.”

“Then why do you celebrate it here?”

Anthalor smiled.  “My mother is from Gekun.  When she married my father, she missed the celebration and although he didn’t care for it much, we always had a harvest celebration.”  His grip tightened and he drew her in even closer.  “This is my way of keeping her memory alive.”

How about you?  Do you like to add holidays to your writing?  What are some of your favorite holiday traditions?