Author: Laura Langston

My May Reads

pollen-1880x1249It’s allergy season around here. Like so many other climate-related things, it seems to be happening earlier and earlier. Years ago, my allergies would hit in June. We got married at the beginning of June and I was a congested mess for weeks before and after. I had a reprieve for many years and barely suffered at all. But this year, my hay fever is back, and it’s been uncomfortable for weeks. So I’m avoiding dairy, popping decongestants and working in the garden when the wind isn’t blowing the cottonwood around. When I come inside to read, I make sure I have tissues nearby.

Here’s what I’m reading this month:

At the Gym: The Humans by Matt Haig

On the Kindle: The Light Between Us by Laura Lynne Jackson

Beside the Bed: Some Nerve by Jojo Moyes

Books read to date in 2016: 32

Congratulations White Pine Winners!

 

The Ontario White Pine awards ceremony was held earlier today in Toronto. Congratulations to Jeyn Roberts who won for her title The Bodies We Wear. Honour book status was awarded to Don Aker for Delusion Road and Nick Cutter for The Troop. I was privileged to be nominated for The Art of Getting Stared At. The Ontario Library Association does a tremendous job of running the program which encourages thousands of students to read the nominated titles.

Here are the three winning titles:

bodies-We-Wear-2-e1414534497262The Bodies We Wear by Jeyn Roberts. Faye was eleven when a powerful new drug named Heam was forced on her and her best friend, Christian. Faye saw hell and vowed retribution. After years spent training,Faye is ready to take revenge on the men who destroyed her future and killed her best friend.But vengeance has its price and a mysterious young man doesn’t want Faye to pay up.

 

 

 

 

delusionroadDelusion Road by Don Aker. Willa Jaffrey is beautiful, rich, dating the perfect guy and determined to have a fabulous senior year. Enter Keegan Fraser, a handsome new student who wants no part of the games everyone plays at Willa’s school. Despite a rocky start, Keegan and Willa gradually become closer, even as Willa’s carefully constructed universe begins to fall apart. But little does Willa know that Keegan’s past holds the darkest of secrets – and it’s about to catch up to him.

 

 

 

troop-NickCutterThe Troop by Nick Cutter.  Scoutmaster Tim takes five boys for a weekend camping trip to Falstaff Island. He thinks the worst he’ll have to deal with is the boys’ different personalities clashing, or perhaps the leader of the pack challenging his authority, but the truth is much worse. A disturbing stranger stumbles onto their island campground and their camping weekend turns into a fight for survival as they find themselves with a monster in their midst.

 

 

 

All three sound like edge-of-the-seat reads! Congratulations again to the winners!

Taking in the View

mountainimageWhen mountain climbers reach the summit, they stop to take in the view. They might even rest a while, have a snack, and reflect on how the climb’s been going so far. That pause, I am told, not only refuels them but also provides helpful perspective.

Writers aren’t much for taking in the view. We’re not inclined to look back either, at least not the writers I know. And I include myself in that group. We’re all about the next set of edits, the next re-write, the next book, the next challenge. It’s good to strive, and to look ahead. But I think we miss out a little bit when we don’t stop to take in the view.

A few years ago, I was in a library getting ready to talk to a group of high school kids. They were still in the classroom; they hadn’t arrived yet. I organized my set up on a table at the front of the room and then I left to get a glass of water. When I walked back in, it was like I was seeing that table for the first time. All those books . . . and I’d written every single one. I remember feeling almost startled. And then satisfied. And then, as I scanned the table, somewhat reflective because each book was a signpost along my career path.

Last week, Orca Book Publishers and Munro’s Books hosted a spring book launch. It was a welcome opportunity to pause and celebrate the release of our books. But since then, I’ve been looking back – not a lot, just a little – and thinking about my career path so far, how things have worked or not worked, what goals I’ve let slide that maybe I need to recommit to, and what detours have taken me in a direction that needs some correcting.

I can’t say I’ve reached the summit – I’m not even sure I can see the summit – but I am taking in the view, both the path that’s in front of me and the path I’ve already walked. I’m having the odd snack as I do it. Taking the occasional rest. And in the process I’m gaining much-needed perspective.

Take a breath, take a break, take in the view. You won’t be disappointed. I guarantee it.

It’s Book Launch Time!

If you find  yourself in downtown Victoria this Wednesday night, join me at Munro’s Books while I launch Stepping Out.  I’ll be in fabulous company – Penny Draper, Sarah Harvey, Laurie Elmquist, Monique Gray Smith, Jillian Roberts and Jeff Rudd will also be there.

I’d love to see your smiling face too!

spring launch poster EMAIL

Revise, Revisit, Retreat

reviseI’ve been in revision mode for the last few weeks, working on In Plain Sight, a YA novel about a girl who learns her father was a terrorist. I’ve also been cutting and shaping Million Dollar Blues, a women’s fiction novel about a lottery win.

This Friday, however, I’ll be leaving the desk and heading up island. I’ll catch up with a dear friend that night and then on Saturday, I’ll head to the Red Door for a two-day writing retreat with my friends, the Pen Warriors.

It’s a revise, revisit, retreat kind of week. With luck, I’ll find time for a beach walk.

And that’ll make it rejuvenating too.   P1000623

My April Reads

lilacs-vaseThe lilacs are blooming weeks ahead of their usual bloom time. The rest of the garden is ahead of schedule too. That means I’m spending more time digging in the dirt and less time between the pages of a book. And when I do sit down to read, I’m either after information or I’m looking for an escape.

Apparently not everyone understands.

At the gym a few weeks ago, I got on the elliptical with a Susan Elizabeth Phillips book in hand. As I positioned the novel and fired up the machine, the woman beside me glanced over. “That’s not exactly book club material, is it?” She smiled the way condescending people sometimes do and lifted up her novel. “We’re discussing this book next week.”

Yep, book shaming is alive and well at Steve Nash Fitness World in Victoria.

I smiled back and said, “You’ll have lots to talk about. The mother gets Alzheimer’s, the father dies, and the daughter’s marriage implodes.”

Okay, I didn’t say that. But I could have. Because I read the book a while back and that’s exactly what happened. Instead I looked at the woman and said, “You’re at the wrong gym. Skinny thighed book shamers belong at the Pilates studio next door.”

Okay, I didn’t say that either. I said, “Susan Elizabeth Phillips is a very good writer and book clubs are overrated.”

I said half of that (I like book clubs). And then I turned the elliptical up to 15 and pretended the woman’s head was underneath the pedals.

These days, I don’t need to read anything depressing. For the last seven months or so, some Really Big Uglies have hit us hard, one after another, like a series of winter storms that won’t let up. So when it comes to novels, I’m happy to have a soft place to land.

Kudos to the talented authors who do such a good job writing books where the test results are always negative . . . the good guy always wins . . . couples always find their happily ever after . . . laughter is as important as breath . . . and cookies are their own food group.

Here’s what I’m reading this month:

At the gym: The Girls of Mischief Bay by Susan Mallery

On the Kindle: Take Off Your Pants* by Libbie Hawker

In the Kitchen: Everyday Super Food by Jamie Oliver

Books read to date in 2016: 28

*Hawker’s book happens to be about writing. Can you imagine book shamer’s reaction to that title?

Seeding Heavy

I usually plant heavy and I tend to write long. That means my garden overflows even after I thin and prune. And it means my novels sometimes get a little out of control before I revise them down to an acceptable length.

I can plant sparsely. I’ve done it plenty of times. I can write lean prose too. I do it when I produce novella length books for reluctant readers (watch for In Plain Sight coming in 2017).

Gardens and books start with seeds – the seed of an idea or the seed of a tomato – and in the beginning stages, it’s my nature to seed heavy. With garden seeds, you rarely get 100% germination so it’s prudent to allow for some failure. With novels, you never know which tiny tangent, random piece of dialogue, or secondary character might play an important role in the final novel. I outline, but not rigidly, and I like to leave room for surprises.

That means starting out like this if I want a garden bed of basil:basilseedlings 002

 

 

 

 

And starting like this if I want to work my way down to something publishable:april 11 2016 032

 

 

 

 

Then I need to take that overwritten book and revise it, and take that over seeded flat and thin it. I like the process. But last weekend, as I worked outside transplanting peppers I’d grown from seed, I felt a little sad at the number of plants that wouldn’t make it to the garden. They’d germinated but they were either stunted or so far behind the other seedlings that there was no point potting them up.

april 11 2016 023

Coincidentally, the day after I finished my garden work, I was back at the computer editing Million Dollar Blues and feeling a little blue myself at the passages and phrases I had to delete.

But if I want to get to this:april 11 2016 033

 

 

 

 

 

And eventually this: STEPPINGOUTCOVER9781459808959

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Then the work of thinning and revising has to be done. It requires a certain ruthlessness that can be painful. But the end result is always worth it.  basilpot

A Matter of Perception

bigmagicWriters love getting their books reviewed. You hear that all the time, and it’s true. We do. But every once in a while, a review comes along that makes me wonder if I’ve stepped into the Twilight Zone. Or if the reader has. Those reviews inevitably reference something – it could be a person, place or a plot point – that never happened in the book I wrote. And yet there are always just enough references to make it clear that the reviewer read my book and wants to share their views. Unfortunately they seem to be viewing things through their very own, highly polished, fun house mirror.

I thought this particular treat was reserved just for me. Apparently not.

Elizabeth Gilbert writes about this in her latest book Big Magic. In her case, a reader approached her at a book signing for Eat, Pray, Love and thanked Gilbert for writing about a restraining order she’d put on her ex-husband because she’d had enough of his violence. The reader went on to say that Gilbert’s words had given her the courage to leave her abusive marriage. Those words, however, were never written. In fact, Gilbert says you can’t even read that narrative between the lines of her memoir because it’s so far from the truth.

Rather than being shocked/angry/frustrated/amused (pick one), Gilbert was philosophical. She decided the woman had every right to misread her book. “Once my book entered her hands,” Gilbert says, “everything about it belonged to her, and never again to me.”

I’ve always known that not everyone will like the novels I write. I also understand that while 100 readers might find one of my characters strong and sympathetic, 100 others may see her as wimpy or harsh or critical or simply rotten. It’s all a matter of perspective. I get that, objectively. But it can be brutally hard to maintain objectivity when a reader reads something into my book that I never put there in the first place. Especially if they don’t like what they think they read. It can be crazy-making.

My cousin is a visual artist. Some of her paintings are abstracts. They’re open to interpretation. People see whatever they see. That’s the nature, and the joy, of her work. But my books, at least the ones I’ve published so far, are reality-based. There’s only so much interpretation possible. What you see is what you get. At least, that’s what I used to believe.

Now, Gilbert’s perspective has me re-thinking. Maybe I should embrace whatever readers find (or think they find) in my words. Hand each book off and let the readers own it. After all, Elizabeth Gilbert says their reactions don’t belong to me. My only job is to create . . . create . . . and create some more.

And that’s more than enough for me to handle.

Eclipse Season

lunareclipseDepending on where you live (and how early you rise) you may have gotten a glimpse of this morning’s lunar eclipse. It was visible in much of North and South America, as well as Asia, Australia and the Artic.

As you may know, eclipses always come in pairs. This morning’s lunar eclipse finishes the cycle which started with a solar eclipse two weeks ago, on March 8th. People who love astronomy (and astrology too) refer to this time of year as eclipse season because the alignments that cause the eclipses to happen actually take a little more than a month to play out.

There are many myths about eclipses. The ancient Greeks believed that a solar eclipse was the sign of angry Gods and the beginning of death and destruction. On a more positive note, Italians believe that flowers planted during a solar eclipse are brighter and more colorful than flowers planted at any other time of the year.

Lunar eclipse myths are similar, with many ancient cultures interpreting the moon’s eclipse as wreaking ‘havoc in the sky’ and believing that the same havoc was destined to happen on Earth. Personally, I like the attitude of the Batammaliba people from Togo and Benin in Africa. Their ancient myth tells them that the sun and moon are fighting during an eclipse, and the people encourage them to stop. To this day, they see eclipse season as a time of coming together and resolving old feuds and anger.

To me, eclipses signal change and new beginnings, which happens to fit perfectly with the start of spring and the Easter weekend.

Happy Solar Eclipse Season . . . and Happy Easter too. Easterpeeps-bouquet-491x368

Digging for Facts

diggingfactsI spent the better part of the last few weeks digging for a few key pieces of information I needed in order to finish my latest novel, In Plain Sight.

When I’m conceptualizing a book, I don’t think about the challenges I’ll face writing it. I think about the kind of story I want to tell and the best way to tell it. I think about my character, their story goal, and their character arc. I consider secondary characters too, and turning points and rising stakes and setting. I also think about setting.

In Plain Sight is set in Las Vegas and Los Angeles. I’ve been to both cities; I’m moderately familiar with them. And if I don’t know something, I know where to go to find the answer. I love research, I’m somewhat tenacious when it comes to digging, and I’m more than a little obsessive about making sure I have my facts straight. Thanks to all those years at the CBC, my old journalism roots go deep.

I was well into the story before I realized In Plain Sight might pose problems (This wasn’t as much naiveté as it was overwhelming enthusiasm to dive into the story and get the basics down).

The novel revolves around 16-year-old Farah Caliente who learns the father she thought was dead is in jail for committing an act of terrorism. Farah was an infant when it happened; she never knew the man. Her mother, who had nothing to do with the crime, was supposed to testify at his trial but she took Farah and bolted. Since then, she and Farah have been living under false identities. Hiding in plain sight, if you will. When her mother’s real identity comes to light and she’s taken into custody, Farah’s world is shattered. Life, as she knows it, will never be the same.

I was most interested in Farah. What does this mean to her? How does she cope? Who stands by her? Who doesn’t? And where does she go from here? But the story doesn’t play out in an emotional vacuum. Stuff happens. Legal stuff. Lots of it. And while much of it takes place ‘off the page’ it had to be realistic and it had to be factual.

I began to write. At the same time, I began to research some of the legal points I was fuzzy on. For every fact I uncovered there was another fact discounting the first one. I’m reasonably familiar with the Canadian judicial system but less so with the American one. After weeks of going around in circles (and writing around a few key points) I knew I’d need help. I put out feelers to a couple of U.S. law firms with PR departments. I didn’t get far. I put out more feelers to legal aid foundations and legal non-profit groups. I continued to strike out.

I could have changed the setting to Canada but I didn’t want to. As I’d structured the story, the terrorism act committed by Farah’s father would have taken place six months after 9-11. At that time, there was a huge backlash in the United States against anyone even remotely connected with terrorism. In fact, many innocent people were the subject of intense police scrutiny. I wanted that to be one reason Farah’s mother ran.

I could have paid for a legal consult. As I neared the end of my first draft, I considered it. But then I thought about my days in the newsroom when we’d be scrambling to find an expert. We always found one, often minutes before air time, generally when panic was setting in.

My panic was looming; that had to be a good sign. I took another shot at things, this time approaching the media departments of the Los Angeles County Superior Court and the Clark County Court systems. And rather than hitting them with all my questions, I selected the few I thought they’d best be able to answer. Success!

But I had one last hurdle to jump. So I turned to other writers. My plea for a U.S. legal source turned up a retired California attorney who was more than happy to answer my questions. Not only was Robin Wonder Siefkin able to comment and clarify the facts, she added a lawyerly layer of depth to the story that I hadn’t considered. While her input won’t stand out in the finished book, it is there. And without it, In Plain Sight would lack the realism and honesty I was shooting for.

Last week, I submitted the manuscript to the publisher. My digging is over. For the time being, at least.