Thanks Again Janet Reid

This  quote from Janet Reid's  Biblio Buffet interview From The Editors Desk, the tough work of writing a reported version of their lives, makes me want to give it another try, to write a memoir.

About six months ago I wrote to Janet Reid thanking her for her blog because I realized that I am not a writer.  I am just another one of those laughing stock the editors snicker over. Someone who feels compelled to tell their story. At least I don't have blue hair, though I may wear a bracelet made by my daughter. I thank her again for her generous blog. 

I didn't know what genre I was writing but now I know thanks to a book I splurged for as soon as I read about and thanks again to Janet Reid's blog.  (Her blog and her Query Shark blog are always the first one's I read on the stratosphere.)  The book is  Shimmering Images by Lisa Dale Norton.  Ms.  Reid describes the genre as Non-commercial Memoir but she also refers to it as Commercial Non-fiction. Surely the first is a sub to the second.  

Long ago I wanted to major in creative writing, instead became an oil painter.  But writing gives me great pleasure, even if I am a rookie.  So I'm starting this blog again and will be  returning to the saturday afternoon writing workshops at Shakespeare and Co.  Last year I signed up for a writing workshop at WICE and did not like it.  The Shakespeare and Co. workshops are way more interesting for me, perhaps because they are so brutal.    

After trashing the third first draft, over 150 pages written passionately, here I am again. This time I have a method and a structure that draws my plan like the affiches marking the Parisian metro exits.

Vitoria Lynn Schimdt's Book in a Month and her Story Structure Architect are part of the material that  I've been studying to understand structuring a longer work.  There is no way I'll write it in a month with an upcoming show and house move in the planning.

Here we go again. 

Wice in Paris and manuscript lengths

Today I start the five day marathon at the GMAC - Grand Marche d'Art Contemporain at the Bastille in Paris.  Today is for hanging but tomorrow visitors come and I'll be there for 11 hours then only 9 hours for the following four days.  I'll be happy when it's finished.  It feels good to prepare for a show and finally hang it and sell paintings.

Then I start the first course at Wice.  It is a gift to myself to help me organize and finish the manuscript White Sky in Paris.  Seven dates with Dr. Gretel Furner who offers  Writing the Migrant Soul.  I am a migrant soul.

When the show is over I can concentrate on the write1sub1 shorts and start planning that other story about  time travel that has circled in my head.  I realized after reading a post on Querytracker blog that each story has it's length and should organically reach its length.  This makes sense to me as a painter.  Each painting plays itself out and forcing it into something is always artificial.  One brush stroke can change the whole tone of the painting and even kill it.  

Tagged Truck

Another tagged truck in Paris.  This one has a great mix of pochoir and NY style graffitti.  I like  the forgotten white top.

Robert Crais

I just finished the The Forgotten Man by Robert Crais.  Check out his website.  He's pretty hot and how accomplished.  

You may say, wow that was published five years ago, yeah well.  But I lived in a mental cave for the past 20 years or so and I don't have a Kindle, not many people do here in Paris.  When I was in the English books' isle of my local library trying to choose a novel, my three year old picked out Robert Crais.  Awhile back I saw Janet Reid blogging about meeting him at the Bouchercon so made a mental note.

The Missing Copy

Last night at the Other Writers' Workshop at Shakespeare and Co. only 10 people showed, few compared to the 20+ from last week.  It was the first time I've shared a story so was terribly nervous while reading mine but received overwhelming appreciation and excellent critiques on what to cut out or change.  Bruce told me my voice was amazing, all the others agreed, big smile but pronouns are lacking, yeah.  Kate, a poet visiting from London, said that quoting lyrics can be expensive, so I've removed that line from the Rolling Stones.

The MC is named Kad in the General's Demise— the story I shared. I liked the sound of his name and he is a kade.

"What is a kade?" I asked.  The Urban Dictionary says it is a nice person who smiles no matter what.  Yes, this is my MC.  Serendipity.

This morning I looked at the copies that other attendees are free to scribble on and realized that one of them is missing.  Someone took a copy.  It is upsetting because they took it, they could have asked I may have said yes, but why take it?

Perhaps I should feel it a compliment but it feels like stealing.  I mean would they take a book in the store? I wonder.

#40 write one sub one

This week I submitted The General’s Demise, a short story about a sculptor, to a literary journal.

I'm late in joining the write 1 sub1 blog but there are still 12 weeks left to 2011.  Today there is an interview by the editor Angela Roberts of the Gloaming Magazine.  The Write1Sub1 blog has great links to many places that take all kinds of short stories.

Tags in Paris

Tagging in Paris plays a big role in my contemporary urban manuscript, White Sky of Paris.

Trucks are tagged and metallic security gates are tagged and the high parts of buildings are tagged.   There are different types of tags in Paris.  What you see on this truck has a NY influence but pochoirs are Parisian.  Here is a pochoir (stencil) from the artist NEMO.  See an article about him HERE where I got this picture

Keith Harring became famous for his underground graffitti like many Parisian pochoir artists,  MISSTIC and Blek the Rat.

The protagonist, Jake, in White Sky of Paris falls into night-time tagging raids throughout Paris.