I’m a huge fan of the Surrey International Writers’ Conference, so that one tops my list. It takes place in October each year, in Surrey, BC, Canada (Vancouver area). There’s always an amazing line-up of editors, agents, and authors presenting workshops and keynotes, plus there are pitch sessions and “blue pencil” sessions included in your registration, great networking opportunities, book fair, trade show, writing contest (with thousands of dollars in prizes!), and fun late-night events (official and not-so-official ).

I’ve been to SiWC every second year since I began writing fiction six years ago–I’ll be attending for the fourth time this October, and yes, I’m already excited about it! I always learn so much and come away from it totally inspired and fired-up to write.

Other than Surrey, I’d love to attend a regional SCBWI conference some day. I think it would be great to be part of something so focussed on writing for young people. (And I bet it would be a great opportunity to meet some more of my online kidlit/yalit friends in person, which would be awesome!)

How about you? Have you been to any great conferences? Are there any you’d really love to go to someday?

Peace….

Catherine, like Cassandra Mercredi in SHADOWS CAST BY STARS, is a member of the Métis nation.  She lives on Vancouver Island, on which the fictional Island of her novel is based, and divides her time between working with horses, singing, and writing.

Here’s the blurb about SHADOWS:

Old ways are pitted against new horrors in this compellingly crafted dystopian tale about a girl who is both healer and seer. Two hundred years from now, blood has become the most valuable commodity on the planet—especially the blood of aboriginal peoples, for it contains antibodies that protect them from the Plague ravaging the rest of the world.

Sixteen-year-old Cassandra Mercredi might be immune to Plague, but that doesn’t mean she’s safe—government forces are searching for those of aboriginal heritage to harvest their blood. When a search threatens Cassandra and her family, they flee to the Island: a mysterious and idyllic territory protected by the Band, a group of guerilla warriors—and by an enigmatic energy barrier that keeps outsiders out and the spirit world in. And though the village healer has taken her under her wing, and the tribal leader’s son into his heart, the creatures of the spirit world are angry, and they have chosen Cassandra to be their voice and instrument….

Incorporating the traditions of the First Peoples as well as the more familiar stories of Greek mythology and Arthurian legend, SHADOWS CAST BY STARS is a haunting, beautifully written story that breathes new life into ancient customs.

Well….I’d call myself a drafter.  Or a muller, perhaps.  I start writing a story when a line or two arrives in my head.  I don’t know who says the lines, or what they’re about, but they strike me as important, and I write them down.  Then, I try to figure out what story they belong to.  That’s literally what happened with SHADOWS CAST BY STARS – the first line “We live the Old Way.” arrived, and then, I had to match up the story.

Next, I write for a bit.  Generally, I write a couple of chapters, and then, take a big step back to do what I call “writing around”.  That’s when I spend time trying to find the core of the story, what makes it tick, what elements I want to work with, sort of like a painter choosing a palette, I think.  Then, I write a bit more, let it sit, revise, let it sit, revise, let it sit…and repeat.  What I do try to do early on is write the “hook” paragraph of a query letter, as that really helps me wrap my brain around the story I’m trying to tell – who the characters are, what’s at stake, the big picture stuff – as I find I get too micro-focused sometimes, and forget about the macro.

And, while all of this is going on, and especially during the “sitting” phases (which can take a long time!), I read non-fiction.  For SHADOWS CAST BY STARS, I read a lot about non-western modes of healing (for example WHEN THE SPIRIT CATCHES YOU AND YOU FALL DOWN by Anne Fadiman and LANGUAGE OF EMOTIONS by Karla McLaren) and a ton of world mythology and anthropology.  Non-fiction tickles my brain in a different way than fiction, and I find it can really help settle the core of the story in my mind, as well as giving me new colours to play with!

These days, though, I’m spending more and more time working on structure.  I’m beginning to understand that if I don’t supply a solid framework for my story, it sort of crumbles, and I end up having to toss what I’ve done and start again.  That’s fine when I’ve got tons of time on my hands, but with deadlines and projects and contracts and such, I need to start working in a more streamlined way, and I’m hoping my structural studies will help with that!

SHADOWS is rich with ancient beliefs and First Nations mythology. I’m wondering how difficult it was to blend “fact and fiction”. How did you find the right balance? Was it challenging to stay true to those beliefs and myths while incorporating them into Cass’ story?

Really difficult.  One of the things that was always in the back of my mind was cultural misappropriation.  My undergrad degree is in Art History, and in my First Nations/Native American art history courses, we discussed cultural misappropriation (in the context of repatriating cultural artifacts).  That’s where I started to garner an awareness of the damage cultural misappropriation can do, especially in light of the aftermath of residential schools.  Little did I know I was learning about my own cultural heritage!  And, because of that, I tried to write from a place of honour, especially since story functions in a different way in many aboriginal cultures.  For example, Kwawakawak people “give” stories, and you don’t get to tell that story unless it’s been given to you first.  So, receiving a story is a real honour, because the stories are sacred.  I was aware of this, and though some of the characters in SHADOWS CAST BY STARS are part of traditional stories, I tried to stay away from the stories themselves, because I hadn’t been given them to use.

And, I also spent a lot of time imagining what life would look like for First Nations and Métis peoples two hundred years in the future, given how dramatically life has changed for them (and all people, really!) in the last hundred years – or even the last decade!  That allowed me some leeway to explore how traditional societies might evolve, and one of those ways in this story includes banding together in a community made up of peoples from all different nations, so that their mythology and beliefs and practices would blend together out of necessity, rather than because I was resorting to stereotypes.  And, in many ways, that’s led me down some interesting paths myself.  I’m beginning to learn Michif, the language of the Métis people, as a result, for example!

What I can say with absolutely certainty is that I really struggled with finding the right balance between fact and fiction, and I really hope that I got it right!

Catherine, I know you’re a musician as well as a writer. Do you find those two creative pursuits complement one another? (and if so, how?)

Well, all those hours in the practice room really prepared me for the long hours at the keyboard!  Sometimes, when I’m having a rough day and it feels like I’m so far away from being a competent writer, I remember the piano lessons where I spent the entire hour on a single bar of a fugue (ah, Bach!) or worked on a song for an entire year (Black Anemones, I’m looking at you) and still wasn’t able to sing it as well as I wanted to, or a thousand other struggles that musicians encounter daily.  That doesn’t always make things easier, but it’s a springboard, I guess.  If nothing else, I know how to practice!

I’m also very lucky that I had such great teachers who taught me more than just music.  My Alexander technique teacher taught me about end-gaining, or, the quagmire we create for ourselves by focusing on the result rather than the process.  My acting teacher taught me about character study, subtext, plot, and motivation.  My singing teacher during my associateship had been a children’s librarian before becoming a pro singer, and taught me so much about the magic and power of words – she’s the one who really got me thinking about how the sound of a word can create a whole visceral experience, and word choice is a big part of how I write, thinking about how words sound together, and the physical response they create.

And, all my theory/analysis/composition lessons really taught me a lot about structure and conflict.  Am I always able to apply it?  Hah, no.  But, still, I find these days I’m thinking about musical structure and relating it to my writing more and more.  I never got the math/music connection, myself, but writing/music?  Yep.  I think the two are sisters!

I definitely agree that there’s a writing/music connection. And now I’m curious about the Alexander technique–time for some research! 

What’s the last book you read & loved? And also, what book in your current TBR pile are you most looking forward to reading?

Can I have two last-books-I-loved?  Yes?  Okay!  First of all, I just read GEORGE’S MARVELOUS MEDICINE by Roald Dahl, and laughed so much!  I love Roald Dahl so much.  The other was WHEN THE SEA IS RISING RED, which happens to be by my friend Cat Hellisen.  However, even if she wasn’t my friend, I would still have loved the book.  Gorgeous prose, a haunting story, and characters that are challenging in all sorts of ways.  The world needs more Cat Hellisen stories!

As for the TBR pile, which is less a pile and more a series of shelves, I’ve got a few that I’m looking forward to – DOGSBODY, by Diana Wynne Jones, and THERE IS NO DOG, by Meg Rosoff are two that are sitting there, waiting for me.  But I am super-extra excited about CODE NAME VERITY, by Elizabeth Hand, which I recently ordered, even though I was supposed to have a moratorium on book buying.  Oops!

LOL, I can totally understand that kind of oops! 

Would you share a favourite quote or piece of advice for writers?

This is  one that I’ve come across recently, but I copied it out and taped it to my monitor so I’ll see it every time I sit down to work.  It’s from Robert McKee’s STORY:

Of the total creative effort represented in a finished work, 75 percent or more of a writer’s labor goes into designing story.  Who are these characters?  What do they want?  Why do they want it? How do they go about getting it?  What stops them?  What are the consequences?  Finding the answers to these grand questions and shaping them into story is our overwhelming creative task.

Finally, can you tell us what’s up next for you?

I’ve got a few irons in the fire – the sequel to SHADOWS CAST BY STARS, a contemporary YA, an alt-history MG, and a middle eastern-inspired fantasy project (think GAME OF THRONES meets ARABIAN NIGHTS).  Oh, and a couple of adult stories, though I’m still mid-research with those.

Because I need so much time between drafts, I find it’s really helpful to have a bunch of things on the go at the same time, so I can put one thing aside and work on something else while the rest stew!

Stewing is good! (Seems to me, you taught me that….) It sounds like we can look forward to lots of awesome stories from you–yay!

Thank you, Catherine! Congratulations on the release of your debut novel! 

SHADOWS CAST BY STARS, by Catherine Knutsson
June 5, 2012
Atheneum/Simon & Schuster

Visit Catherine online!   website   facebook   twitter

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

GIVEAWAY! Catherine is offering a signed copy of SHADOWS CAST BY STARS for one lucky winner, and some gorgeous SHADOWS swag for another! Contest closes June 5 at midnight EST. Open internationally.  

To enter, leave a comment on this post — be sure to include your email so I can contact you if you win!

Earn an extra entry by tweeting about the giveaway (mention @sharigreen to be sure your entry gets counted).

Good luck!

In March, author Elle Strauss was here on the blog when I featured her fun YA time-travel novel, CLOCKWISE. Today I’m happy to feature the exciting  sequel  – CLOCKWISER.

Sometimes I wished I were an only child. But then I’d be walking or taking transit instead of getting a lift from my brother Tim in his Cavalier beater. He didn’t have air conditioning either, and the wind blowing in from our open windows was hot and moist. The humidity made me feel like I was wearing a warm, wet washcloth for a shirt.

“Can’t you drop me off first?” I said, fanning myself with my hand. I was meeting my best friend Lucinda at the mall, and she only had a thirty minute break from her job at Forever21. Plus, the mall was air conditioned. Bonus.

“I gotta get some cash first. Besides, I’m not your personal taxi service, Casey.” Tim snarled, turning the volume up on his stereo. The bass beat was so loud it rattled the trunk. “Get off your lazy butt and get your license already.”

I gave him a dirty look and reached over to turn the music down. I had a very good reason for not getting my license, but I could never tell Tim or any member of my family what it was. There were only three people currently living who knew the reason. One of them was my boyfriend Nate Mackenzie.

My heart still fluttered a bit when I thought of him in those terms. My boyfriend. Not just some out-of-reach guy I crushed hard on my whole sophomore year, but my boyfriend.

We’d already been an official couple for an entire year, totally blowing all the doomsday predictions that we’d never make it. No one thought a college boy would stick it out with a junior in high school–especially Nate’s evil former girlfriend!

But he did, and we were still going strong. I’d be starting my senior year in a few weeks and then I’d join him at Boston University, too.

“If you dropped me off first, you wouldn’t have to deal with me,” I tried to reason.

“If I didn’t shuttle you around at all I wouldn’t have to deal with you.”

The only reason he did was because my parents were putting the screws in. Tim’s bad attitude, questionable choice of friends and poor grades put him in their bad books. Driving me around was penance.

He pulled into the parking lot of the bank and hopped out, leaving the car running. I reached over and turned it off. Idling the car was bad for the environment for one, and a waste of Tim’s hard-earned minimum-wage job gas money for another. You’d think he’d know better.

I checked the time on my phone and grew anxious as Lucinda’s break time grew nearer. Tim had his back to me as he stood in line at the ATM window. I looked at my reflection in the visor mirror. Since I’d grown out of my skinny awkwardness last year (and snagged a hot boyfriend), I was more mindful of my looks. Instead of trying to hide behind a bush of dark, curly hair, I used better hair products and found a great stylist, and I liked the way my curls framed my face now. I took a tube of lip gloss out of my purse and rolled it onto my lips.

I tugged on my shorts and rubbed my bare legs. They were so long, my knees almost touched the glove compartment. Height had its advantages, but getting comfortable in a small car wasn’t one of them.

I turned the radio on and hummed along. I daydreamed about me and Nate and how we could relax for the rest of the summer, hopefully stretching the lazy days out as long as possible.

I checked the time on my phone again and immediately started stressing about being late to meet Lucinda. C’mon, Tim! He was second in line now. I texted Lucinda to let her know I might be a little late.

I heard sirens and I perked up. This wasn’t the best neighborhood. The bank wasn’t huge, just tucked into a strip mall along with a nail place, a dollar store, and a thrift shop. Litter overflowed from the bin and a good amount had been blown up against the cement foundation.

I checked on Tim. He’d finally made it to the front, the last one in line. If I’d known it was going to take him this long, I would’ve run into the dollar store and picked up cheap nail polish.

The siren noise grew increasingly louder and suddenly three cop cars pulled into the parking lot beside me. My heart jumped, and I thought fleetingly that maybe Tim was in trouble with the law again. Only, he was getting money out of the ATM, not robbing the bank. But someone was.

Everything happened so fast.

A guy with a ski mask pushed past Tim as he ran out the bank doors. A cop shouted, “Stop or I’ll shoot,” and another masked man followed. Guns went off. Tim stood there, stunned and frozen.

I heard myself shout, “Tim!” He was right in the middle of the cross-fire!

A police officer ran to him, pushing him to the ground just as the second armed man shot in their direction. The officer fell to the ground, taking the bullet instead of Tim.

The robbers ran around the corner and out of sight, chased by police officers on foot and a cruiser down the back ally.

I sprinted to Tim where he was on the ground by the fallen cop.

“Are you okay?” I asked, my voice tight.

His face was white, and he motioned to the woman beside him. “Yeah, but I don’t think she is.”

The officer moaned, holding her hand on her chest.

“Oh, ma’am, are you okay?” I searched for blood but couldn’t see any.

“I will be,” she said gasping for breath. “I have a vest on.”

Another officer kneeled beside her. “Ambulance is on its way.”

The woman had dark hair pulled back in a low bun. Her eyes stayed pinched together and her pale face glistened with sweat. The impact of the bullet was enough to do some damage. I picked up her police hat that had fallen off her head and handed it to her.

“Thank you,” I said.

“Just doing my duty.”

The ambulance arrived. The paramedics pushed us aside and lifted the woman onto a gurney.

The cop who’d checked her pulse stepped forward from his open door cruiser. Radio dispatch noises leaked out. I watched the ambulance pull away, siren blasting, and realized I didn’t know her name. I asked the officer standing beside me.

“That’s Officer Clarice Porter,” he said. “Now, would you two mind coming with me to the station to file a report?”

We agreed, and I took my first ride in a police car. It was Tim’s second, but his first was not for noble reasons. He still claimed it was his friend Alex, and not him, who’d stolen the cigarettes from the convenience store.

A thought like a loud banner ran through my mind as the doors of the police cruiser slammed shut and we drove away.

Clarice Porter saved my brother’s life.

]]> http://sharigreen.wordpress.com/2012/05/08/clockwiser/feed/ 0 shari ClockwiseR http://sharigreen.wordpress.com/2012/05/06/reef-day/ http://sharigreen.wordpress.com/2012/05/06/reef-day/#comments Mon, 07 May 2012 01:43:18 +0000 Shari Green http://sharigreen.wordpress.com/?p=3210 ]]> The conditions were perfect for a visit to Willow Point Reef this afternoon — sunshine plus a super-low tide. I thought you might like to go with me….

Peace.

• two bald eagles
• about a thousand gulls (okay, maybe not that many)
• a bunch of cormorants drying their wings
• two seals sunning themselves on a rock
• and AN ORCA with an enormous dorsal fin!

Yup, whale sighting today. So awesome! I was watching the seals when the dorsal fin of a single orca rose up, then dipped beneath the surface again, the spray of mist lingering in the air. I saw him surface several times as he made his way south through the passage. I’m not sure why it seems so amazing, so extraordinary, but it really does.

I was writing in my journal this morning — hours before my walk on the beach — about being aware of just how extraordinary the ordinary really is. That we wake up each day. That our heart beats, our lungs know to breathe. That the sun rises, sets, rises, sets. Air, sea, earth. Plants and wildlife. Voice, language, words, and stories. Music. Grace. Hope. All of it…extraordinary.

Whatever “sightings” I have each day, be they mundane or unusual, I hope I view them through a lens of awe and wonder. I hope I remember they are extraordinary.

Peace….

1. Who knew hope had a colour? For me, it seems it does: the pale green haze of fresh growth on deciduous trees. Yes, it really is spring! Finally!
2. I always expect bald eagles to have a bigger, scarier voice than they do. But no–they chirp.
3. Is a book art in the same way poetry or a painting is art? And if so, should it be judged and reviewed, or just experienced?
4. Despite what Marilyn Monroe may have believed, I think a piano is a girl’s best friend. Good for what ails you. (Perhaps this is not a belief as widely held as the diamonds version, but it’s true for me, at least.)
   
5. I’m cheering for a hockey team I would normally NEVER cheer for, all because of one player — a backup goalie from small-town Saskatchewan, thrust into starting-goalie position in the playoffs. Which tells you how important characterization is when you’re writing — give me a sympathetic character I can identify with in some way, and I’ll follow him anywhere. (You knew there’d be a writing analogy in this list somewhere, right? LOL)

What’s on your mind today?

Of course, these didn’t all arrive “in my mailbox”. Many are from the library, some I bought, some I borrowed from friends, some were gifts. I am a lucky, lucky girl, but man, I need to take a vacation and just read, read, read! But where should I start?! Any suggestions? See anything in that pile you think I should definitely give priority?

Kicked out for refusing to join a cult, seventeen-year-old Jamie must find a way to survive on her own.

Jamie should have known something was off about the church of the Right and the Real from the start, especially when the Teacher claimed he wasn’t just an ordinary spiritual leader, but Jesus Christ, himself. But she was too taken by Josh, the eldest son of one of the church’s disciples, and his all-American good looks. Josh is the most popular boy at school too, and the first boy outside the drama geeks to give Jamie a second look. But getting her Dad involved in a cult was not part of the plan when she started dating Josh. Neither was her dad’s marriage to the fanatic Mira, or getting kicked out, or seeing Josh in secret because the church has deemed her persona non grata.

Jamie’s life has completely fallen apart. Finding her way back won’t be easy, but when her Dad gets himself into serious trouble, will Jamie be ready to rescue him, and maybe even forgive him?

Sounds great, right? Just wait ’til you see the trailer (turn up the volume!)….

THE RIGHT & THE REAL, by Joelle Anthony
coming April 26

Look at your writing career.

Now look at mine.

Now back to yours.

Now back to mine.

Happily, your writing career is not my writing career, and mine is not yours.

Look down. Back up. Where are you? You’re on a journey with the writing career that is uniquely your own.

What’s in my hand? It’s two rejection letters for the manuscript you love. Look again: the rejections letters are now a book contract. Anything can happen (in it’s own good time and not according to anyone else’s idea of when or if it should happen) if you work your butt off and don’t give up.

I’m on a unicorn.