in Life's name and for Life's sake

I had two opportunities to talk about writing today with writers, which is really weird and unusual and lovely and should happen more often. Both of these too-brief conversations were held before the beginning of a class, and inevitably there were other (non-writer) people listening. In my Clarissa seminar the guy who sits across from me noticed my NaNoWriMo travel mug, asked about my history with NaNo, and was sincerely impressed that I'd managed it for seven years (this last year was his first). Of course my seminar leader/advisor/all around awesome person Jenny is a novelist in addition to being a professor and she started talking about writing too and it was awesome.

I was thinking about NaNo so when I somehow got onto the subject of writing fiction with a girl in the MA before my next class, I ended up mentioning a couple of my novels-in-progress. I gave her the flippant/irreverent/shorthand description of The Printer's Tale and she sounded interested, but one of the other girls in my cohort, who was sitting in front of us, turned around and made a disparaging comment that implied I was following up on the popularity of Twilight, of all things, simply because my less-than-one-sentence synopsis mentioned werewolves.

And the thing is, yes, my flippant, irreverent, shorthand description of the novels I write will always leave something out. And if you're not already into the few things that show up in the shorthand, that kind of description isn't going to interest you. But if you are? Then I can convince you in less than a sentence...or at least get a laugh out of you. In fact hopefully that's exactly what these will do!

Lunar Reflections (2005): teenage angst on the moon

Kes Running (2006): unpremeditated gap year in space

The Printer's Daughter (2007): Beauty and the Beast meets Jane Eyre with werewolves

Gil and Leah (2008): feminist fantasy cross-dressing farce

The Inconvenient Dreamer (2009): woman travels to alternate universes in her dreams

Beneath Strange Stars (2010): gender-swapped Pride and Prejudice in space

Chasing Ghosts (2011): Possession meets Neverwhere with cross-dressing

The moral of the story: I need to find more fantasy/sci-fi writers (or at least writers who are sympathetic to these genres even if not writers of them) with whom to talk about my novels.

Post a sentence (or two) from as many of your WIPs as you want, with no explanation attached. Meme from araine. Perhaps as expected, very few of these are actually one sentence.

--

“How did you two deal with going off to college?” Nita asked.

Tom and Carl shared a look that was one part nostalgia and one part “I told you this question was going to come up and that when it did, I didn’t want to be the one to answer it.”

--

“So let me get this straight,” he said. “You,” he pointed a finger at her, “want me,” he poked a finger into his own chest, “to help you learn how to act like a man. You want me to give you lessons in being a man, and then you want me to lend you a few sets of clothes and keep the secret that this mysterious man who’s just become engaged to your best friend is, in fact, you--dressed as a man, of course.”

Gil nodded. “Yeah. That pretty much explains it.” She paused for a second, then added, “And the sooner the better. We’d like to announce our engagement next week.”

--

Much has been said on the subject of universal truths, to the extent that a modern author, upon attempting to annex another aphorism to this collection, must be circumspect to say the least; but to the compendium of factual evidence thus sanctioned, I find it profitable to append one truth more: that is, that a man who does not know what it is like to be laughed at, cannot possibly have a wife, or cannot have had one for long.

--

For a moment, it’s all that Carl can do to look at Tom, wide-eyed and wondering which Power to thank. For safety’s sake, he decides to thank all of them. “You’re sure?” he asks breathlessly, in a voice so faint he can barely hear it.

“Carl,” Tom says, and there’s something new in his voice: impatience, and need. “Do you really think I’d have bothered with asking if I wasn’t?” He reaches up a hand to Carl’s face and traces the curve of his jaw with tentative fingers, his eyes never leaving Carl’s, not for a second.

--

It’s twilight when I open my eyes and find myself in the cemetery.

--

Everyone knew the witch’s house by its roses.

--

“Beautiful,” she heard him say, barely above a whisper. “Don’t you think?”

“Dangerous,” she returned.

“The fire warms as well as burns, you know.”

“It’s all a function of how close one gets,” she replied. “The closer you are, the greater the danger.”

“But the greater the warmth.”

“I don’t think I’m cold enough yet that I’d be willing to endure the pain of the burn for those few moments’ heat.”

Suddenly, he was looking right at her, his eyes cool and piercing. “Are you sure?”

--

Gah, going back through and looking for these quotes makes me really want to write the stories they belong to! Aaaaand now I have to stop procrastinating and actually get some work done. Less fun, but more productive than the alternative!

My main character is Justine Petreya. She was born in Akron, Ohio, but has lived most of her life in California. In her childhood, she had a naked mole rat for a pet, but I suspect some kind of tragedy befell it (possibly in the form of one of her four siblings). She works as a receptionist or secretary (location undetermined) but somehow manages to live in a mansion and drive a Chevy Malibu. She has bright red curly hair, and her favorite place in the world is the conservatory within the mansion. (Idea: perhaps she works as a live-in secretary to a rather wealthy man and that's how she's a secretary but manages to live in a mansion? This could assist in the production of my love quadrangle -- triangles are so last year.)

Her mother, Lydia, is a famous food critic (she probably has a show on Food Network); her father, Joe, is a math textbook editor. I have a feeling they're divorced by the time my novel begins...and for rather obvious reasons. [Side note: it almost turned out that Joe was a movie critic, which would have made a fantastic story as well -- two parents who are both critics would be hell to live but great to write about. It also almost turned out that Joe's name was Batman, but that did not come to pass. Sorry Luke.]

Of her siblings (the rest of whom don't have names or personalities or even genders yet), Justine is closest to her sister Evelyn (goes by Evie), who is a Civil War reenactor. Justine's best friend who is not related to her is Patrick, an artsy type who makes money as a glassblower.

The man of Justine's dreams is named Jonathan. He is a junior high teacher. They meet beside a large boulder. I do not know where this boulder is. Neither does Justine. Questing ensues.

Speaking of aforementioned love quadrangle: I also have no idea who Justine 'ends up with' -- or indeed, if she ends up with anyone at all. I think that's a refreshing change from the past two years of novels (although I still love reading/writing Noelle and Roman). Of course there's the guy of her dreams, but what if that's all he turns out to be? What is she's really been in love all along with the friend who got her through high school, the boy who went to prom with her when no one else asked, the only one to whom she ever told her secret? Or what if a sensible man of business, an acquaintance from work (perhaps via her disgustingly wealthy employer) promises to give her the comfort of a normal life and she wants to cling to that?

November's going to start soon, and I'm going to get the chance to figure it out.