Shawn L. Bird

Original poetry, commentary, and fiction. All copyrights reserved.

necessity, the mom May 27, 2011

Filed under: Commentary — Shawn L. Bird @ 12:51 am
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Topic #137: What invention, as in something not yet invented (jetpack, teleportation ring, time machine) do you most need right now?

The fall that I started Grace Awakening, I also started a high interest low vocab novel I called #8. When Grace took over my life for six months as she told me her 150,000 word story, #8 languished as an outline and one chapter. When Grace was finished, I set to work on #8. I’m aiming for it to be completed at 15,000 words, so it’s a tenth of Grace’s size. You’d think it would have taken a tenth of the time- say eighteen days instead of 180, but no. For all its brevity, #8 has sat with ‘something’ not quite right for almost two years. Every once and awhile I pull it out and add a paragraph here, a chapter there, fine tune a paragraph, crop out a sentence, but the intangible thing has been elusive.
This last week I’ve been reading and thinking about #8. I’ve added half a chapter and decided that I need to crop out the first chapter I wrote for this book (presently it is chapter 2). I realised that I have a beach scene immediately followed by a snow shovelling scene (this is feasible in Calgary, but not in the Shuswap!). Oops. I figured out the biggest area that needs fixing.

As I was drifting off to sleep, one of the minor characters stepped up. She had been in one brief scene in the seventh chapter, but suddenly she had a back story to share that was relevant to the rest of the story. She had been there all along, with the answer to the question, if only I’d been paying attention. I had to be up in a few hours, and I couldn’t afford to get up and write out the scene. I was sure that it would not be lost over night, but I could not shut off the narrative.
It would be so handy for authors to have a brain writing machine. While you sat in a boring meeting, went jogging through the neighborhood, or were drifting off to sleep, your brain writer could dictate the narrative rolling in your thoughts and put it into a file. What a brilliant devise that would be.

 

voices in the wilderness May 9, 2011

Filed under: Commentary — Shawn L. Bird @ 3:42 pm
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During the Canadian election, I was approached by a representative of CanWest to submit blogs for their Election Issues coverage on www.canada.com  Two of my blogs were submitted, and both were selected.  I considered it a serious honour to be invited to participate and to lend my words to those of other Canadians discussing issues on their minds.  Since my blog address was published, presumeably exposure in this national forum would increase blog traffic and I would be able to enjoy the prestige of having my words in such a professional milieu.

http://www.canada.com/Voting+exercise+hope/4709973/story.html is a May 2 reprint of https://shawnbird.com/2011/04/27/young-voices/

http://www.canada.com/hard+respect+Commons/4677890/story.html is a April 25 reprint of   https://shawnbird.com/2011/04/20/responsible-government/

Having permitted them to reprint my words, I was surprised to notice at the bottom of my reprinted piece (c) Postmedia News.  Huh?   Nowhere in our correspondence did they ask for nor did I give them copyright.  I gave them reprint permission.  Interesting, isn’t it?  If some text book or magazine wants to reprint it, will they be paying Postmedia News or will they be coming to me, the author and legitimate copyright holder of the work?  What would it cost me to fight it? 

There is an issue among professional writers with respect to news agencies using nonprofessional, unpaid writers who work for the glory of seeing their byline.  It’s pretty cool, but an unpaid byline doesn’t put bread on the table of anyone’s family, except perhaps the publisher who’s enjoying the free labour.  On the other hand, how does one earn a professional reputation except through giving some words away?  It’s a bit of a tightrope, to be sure.

According to the shawnbird.com  site stats, although there was a bit of a spike on April 26 and 27th, there was no increase in traffic after the May 2 article was posted on canada.com which suggests that the exposure didn’t generate the potential blog traffic. None the less, it was entertaining reading the comments from readers who would not normally have been exposed to my blog, and it was a thrill to see my words in a national forum.  Perhaps there will be some name recognition in the future.   I’m not really counting on it, though.  We Canadian artistes know that with too much free  exposure you can freeze to death, after all.

 

ever considered? April 21, 2011

Filed under: Commentary,Writing — Shawn L. Bird @ 9:08 pm
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Topic #99: Have you ever considered writing a book? If so what would it be about? Make a list of the ideas you want to cover, or the themes it might have. If you’ve never considered writing a book, what other major work have you thought about (a movie? a symphony?).

Ah, yeah…  😀  Well….   Of course there’s Grace Awakening (click the link above).

Mostly, I think I’d like to stick to writing for teens and young adults.  I like themes of acceptance, love, and growth.  I like to teach something as well, so Grace Awakening is full of characters and references to Greek mythology, poetry forms, and history which gives a lot of extra dimension to the story if the reader chooses to pursue additional investigation.

I started writing a book when I was a teen.  I had the theme and some of the key characters figured out early, but it took many tries to get it into a form that worked properly.  In the six months that Grace Awakening was evolving on my keyboard, it was surprising how all the past writing wove itself into the narrative, expanding into something powerful and new. 

Everything that was becomes part of what will be.

I am presently working (or procrastinating) on two novels.  One is ‘just about finished’ (as i t has been for a year or so) and the other is the prequel to Grace Awakening.  Doing the research for that one last month in France makes me yearn for another trip.  There is so much to learn, and the words flew thick and fast while basking in all that atmosphere.  I have several other ideas floating around in my brain as well.  Once you start writing, the words bubble like a spring, and the chapters drift like a river toward a sea of story.

 

Seriously, Cornelia? March 8, 2011

Filed under: Literature — Shawn L. Bird @ 12:31 am
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Sometimes when you’re reading away, the characters do something so absolutely stupid you just have to shut  the book.  The hard snap can give a little of the satisfaction of a smack upside the head.

I had this feeling most recently while reading Cornelia Funke’s Inkspell this weekend.  Meggie read the character of Orpheus into the Inkworld, a stupid, illogical move destined to do nothing but create trouble.  Obviously she needed a new villain for the third book, but that was soooo obvious that it was painful.  It insults the reader’s intelligence.

Inkspell was hard to get through in a number of ways.  I kept falling asleep while reading it in the bath, and that almost never happens with a book I’m reading the first time.   The series is oddly compelling though, and it’s been sneaking into my dreams.  Once  I awoke as the dream me was observing to someone, “The characters are knocking on the door, but they just can’t get out of the dream.” 

A bit freaky, that.

 

waiting for the other shoe February 12, 2011

Filed under: Grace Awakening,Writing — Shawn L. Bird @ 2:46 am
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It felt too easy. No one else had a publishing story that went, “finished my book, pitched in to a publisher at a conference, she took it, seven months later she asked for more, two months later she signed it…”

Every other author I’ve met has a long list of rejection letters. I don’t. Grace has charmed everyone who’s ever heard about her. I know she’s loved, because those first beta-readers were ruthless enough to ensure the later beta-readers (delta readers?) loved it right off, without reservation.

But good though it is, publication coming so easily seemed surreal. Where was the challenge? the suffering for the art? the constant re-sending of the manuscript? I asked if perhaps we could move up release to the summer so I could get in a book tour before school started, and the editor was open to look at that, if the editing went well, when he started it in February. Everything was going just too smoothly.

Then the shoe dropped, and January 31st as I read the email that the publishing house was closing down and that the contract was voided, I actually thought, “Ah there we go. That’s what I was expecting would happen!”

Now Grace Awakening is off to meet a new publisher and the waiting game begins again. Hopefully only another week or two before I hear, and hopefully I hear that they love her as much as everyone else loves her, and is eager to have her out in the world representing their publishing house! Wouldn’t it be awesome if they fast tracked, and got her out by July so I can do a really thorough summer book tour?

 

writerly world January 3, 2011

Filed under: Commentary,Pondering,Writing — Shawn L. Bird @ 11:35 pm
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Shawn at the computer

I’m just pondering how much of our identity is defined by what people know of us. For years I’ve been crafting  poetry and stories, but aside from the odd person who received a poetic gift or judged in a contest, no one ‘outside’ has known that part of my life. I have been “an English teacher” first and foremost. Of course, I’m an English teacher because I love words and love reading and love sharing that passion with young people. Occasionally I light a spark and some kid discovers that joy or I get to delight in encouraging some amazing talents in their infancy. It’s a great job.

Now I have a new identity. When I’m introduced, it’s more often as “writer” than “teacher.” It’s strange to have people redefine me so suddenly and so thoroughly.

I had dreams of being a writer someday, and now my dream is so recognised that others use the label. It’s kind of crazy when dreams come true.

May 2011 be the year that you see dreams coming true as well.  May you enjoy the fruits of your efforts and the satisfaction of reaching your goals.

 

Photo: me in my writer zone with my resources close and the computer in front of me.

 

floating December 19, 2010

Filed under: Poetry,Writing — Shawn L. Bird @ 12:57 am
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There is poetry floating
in the place between waking and dreaming.
There are words meant for grace
between taking and scheming.
There’s a joy born to be
in the stories we’re making
There’s a truth there for me
worth the undertaking.

 

being a statistic November 10, 2010

Filed under: Commentary,Grace Awakening,Writing — Shawn L. Bird @ 7:24 pm
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Meg Tilley says in her blog (September 9, 2010) that of 1.5 million books published in a year, only 1.68% will sell 5000 copies in a year.  I’m not sure if she talking worldwide, English speaking world, US, Canada or what.  1.68% seems like an impossibly miniscule number.  My math is always suspect (i.e. please correct me if you are good at this!) but by my calculations that 1.68% of 1.5 million equals about twenty-five thousand books.  That sounds much more do-able.  I can be one of those lucky twenty-five thousand books that hit over five thousand in sales, right? Let’s do it together, okay? 

In Canada a best seller is 3000 copies a week.  Can we do it?

 

Amateur free verse November 8, 2010

Filed under: Commentary,Poetry,Writing — Shawn L. Bird @ 7:39 am
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Putting on the English teacher hat…

(Free verse: poetry without rhyme scheme or rhythm.  The following poem is a tirade against bad free verse.  It is not written in free verse.)

.

When crafting lines of poetry
Please choose your words most carefully.
If you must vomit onto the page
Clean up all the boring beige
Only the best words should be saved
Everything else, please deftly raze.
Leave your message in a poignant turn
Not lost amid the dross and worms.
In poetry, now please don’t pout,
the best is left,  when you toss out!

.

Do you think a poem about it will make my students more inclined to do it?

No.  Probably not. 

I hate rambling, self-gratifying, free verse poetry.  I wrote a lot of it as a teen, and it was very cathartic.  Not everything we write is  worthy to be shared.  (In the effort to avoid hypocrisy, let me take this opportunity to apologize to the young men who were forced to endure those horrendous, cathartic poems:  I was young.  I was stupid.  Please forgive me).  Let us remember that even free verse should be edited for the most beautiful, evocative, powerful language we can create!  There is power in brevity!

I think I may make a poster that summarizes this idea even further:

Use the best, the perfect words

Don’t bury them beneath the turds

 

Slowing down November 4, 2010

Filed under: Commentary,Writing — Shawn L. Bird @ 9:27 pm
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Yesterday I was listening to CBC as I was coming into the house. The person being interviewed was talking about how science has created significantly smaller unit of time than the nanosecond. He was talking about how a whole other world could co-exist with us in place, but because they were living in a different time, we wouldn’t even notice them. Their world would exist so much more quickly than ours that we would be statues in their midst. Several generations of their lives could pass within a blink of our eye.
It’s not implausible. After all, insects live in a more rapid world than we do. The water cycle is much faster than the rock cycle.
This presents interesting narrative possibilities
Could the beings living in this rapid world be responsible for unexplained phenomena in our world?
Could we be living in someone else’s much slower world? Are those statues on display in museum, really just very slowly living beings?
Hmmmmmmm….