by Roseanna White | Sep 29, 2009 | Uncategorized
My reading time has all but disappeared in the last couple weeks, so rather than delve into the shelves of books I’ve already read for a blog topic, I figure I’ll talk about stories in general today.
I’ll credit my husband for inspiring this particular topic. Last night we were watching House and he said something like, “Okay, so it’s not disease A. What presents as disease A but isn’t?” Then he growled and said, “See, this is the thing about this show. I have no clue about this stuff, so I can’t answer the questions, but it’s still fun.”
You must keep in mind that this is the same man who will watch NCIS with his eye on the clock. By 8:30 he will take account of all the characters we’ve seen thus far and come up with his whodunit. Let it be noted that 95% of the time he’s right . . . even if he’s not sure why until a twist bring it all to light.
See, for my honey, it’s all about the problem solving. Figuring it out. Me, I just like to watch and wonder and wait. That’s the fun of a good TV show for me–sitting back and letting it come.
I’m slightly more proactive when reading, though I think it’s not necessarily that I try to figure it out–more that I understand book plots enough to be able to. But boy do I love those unexpected twists. I just had one of those in The Familiar Stranger last night (which I hadn’t quite finished when I blogged about it last week). One of those “Wow. Didn’t see that one coming” thing. I love those. I love that shock, that gasp, and then the following “Oh . . . that’s why that thing was in there earlier!”
I think we all love a good twist. I also think our personalities emerge as we see them, just as they do when we get one in life. My hubby’s the type to want to figure out whatever gets thrown at him, to make sense of it and use it. I’m the type to wait and see what happens.
Gotta love when our dealings with fiction teaches us about ourselves!
by Roseanna White | Sep 28, 2009 | Uncategorized
I went to a tiny little college in Annapolis, MD, where we studied original texts by the great thinkers of Western civilization (St. John’s College–the picture above is one of the classrooms there). Everything from Homer and Plato and Aristotle up through Marx and Neitche and Austen (a strange collection to group together in that list, eh?). I
love my college. I loved the experience. I loved the reading. But I gotta say . . . I also feel that the fact that college has become all but required of people strikes me as a bad thing.
My best friend Stephanie opted to focus on her writing career instead of heading to college, and I’m really impressed with her for that. It allowed her to spend time with her craft, to help out her dad at his company, and to really focus her life. (I mean, let’s face it. How many study toward a degree in a field that end up not entering??) I think she made a great decision, and I applaud her for that.
In Yesterday’s Tides, which my agent just sent out on Friday (prayers, please!), my main character got pregnant at 16 and made the choice to get her GED and then give up on dreams of college to raise the twins. This happened 9 years before the first page of the book. So while we don’t see that decision, we see the results of it. To the world, she probably looks like a failure. She does handiwork, she cleans the church.
And she’s there every day to get her kids off the bus.
This decision she made is a crucial part of her character, and we see its many manifestations as the story unfolds. She could have done it all–raised the kids, finished school, gone on to higher education. There are those women who do, and who manage it all well. They’re an inspiration, because they have a dream they fight for.
And isn’t that what college should be? The means to a dream? A dream itself? Why has it become obligatory? My character made a different decision, and she has never regretted it. Because her dream was for family. Why does the world judge that as less important?
by Roseanna White | Sep 24, 2009 | Thoughtful Thursdays, Uncategorized
Yesterday a couple things happened. Though I spent my free-time de-adverbing
Yesterday’s Tides so that it can go out to the editors who requested it today (I’m addicted to adverbs, I swear), I spent the rest of my day with family.
For starters, my awesome and gorgeous cousin Andrea came to visit in the morning. We were always close as kids, though we saw each other only twice a year or so, but it’s been approximately forever since we’ve seen each other. So it was very cool to hug her again, and she now has a daughter who’s two, so the kids could all play together. Or play in the same room anyway, lol.
I also received the first solid proof that Rowyn, a.k.a. Mr. Independence, did indeed miss me while I was gone. He didn’t seem fazed when I left him at my mom’s for an hour on Tuesday to take Xoe to Story Time, and he hasn’t been extra-clingy or anything since I got back. But yesterday afternoon I needed to run to the market and he was still napping. So David stayed home with him, and I took Xoe with me. When we got home, he was up and looked thrilled to see me walk through the door. He sat on my lap for, like, an hour. Followed me everywhere I went. Kept giving me hugs and kisses.
Not. Normal. Wonderful, but not normal. And it occurred to me that the last time he woke up and Mama wasn’t here, I’d been gone for days. So it was great to see his gladness that this was NOT the case this time.
And for the record, after about a millennium of editing, I did indeed get the adverbs cut down in my manuscript, and it should be winging its way across email to various editors’ inboxes today. So anyone with a prayer to spare, feel free to apply it to that! And now, let the waiting begin . . .
Roseanna M. White is a bestselling, Christy Award winning author who has long claimed that words are the air she breathes. When not writing fiction, she’s homeschooling her two kids, editing, designing book covers, and pretending her house will clean itself. Roseanna is the author of a slew of historical novels that span several continents and thousands of years. Spies and war and mayhem always seem to find their way into her books…to offset her real life, which is blessedly ordinary.