Things Never Go the Way You Planned, and That's Cool

Lots of stories have morals, but lately I've been wondering if the moral of every story should be "Things Never Go the Way You Planned, and That's Cool." Authors work hard to keep their readers guessing, even though there are far more patterns on the page than in real life.

People who live great lives never know what they're getting into ahead of time -- they just manage to exist in a way that fascinates other people.

Whenever I've dreamed ahead, or looked forward to something, it never turns out like I imagined. Real experiences don't care what we want.

And here comes the close-out for the year 2015. My debut year that wasn't. A year that did not go as planned, so much so that I made a list:

1) I had a bizarre and random health scare that directly impacted work.

2) I lost my son's day care through particularly unfortunate circumstances.

3) There has been a lot of loss around me -- the kind that would have broken lesser humans, including myself. And it brought back some feelings from the past that I'd much rather have kept back there.

4) I bounced between feeling like the best and worst father on a daily basis.

5) Oh yeah, there was that one thing about my book losing its publisher. That hit me like a bag of poop to the face.

So yeah, 2015 threw me a lot of surprises. And these weren't so much surprise-party-on-your-multiple-of-ten-birthday surprises so much as pigeon-dumped-on-your-shoulder-while-walking-under-the-El-tracks surprises.

I got to thinking about that list. I drew an imaginary T-chart in my mind's eye, and put it in the left column. Then I added things to the right column to balance it out.

1) I'm still standing at work and giving all I can to my students. Parents had kind words for me at parent-teacher conferences. How bad can things be when people are going out of their way to assure you things are okay?

2) My parents jumped in to help with daycare, and my son is doing better than ever with so much individual love and attention. Many parents can't afford daycare, and don't have parents capable of helping.

3) The people I've watched experience loss are healing in their own personal ways. They will make it through the darkness, and while they won't be unscathed, none of us are at the end of the day.

4) Maybe it's possible that I make both good and bad parental decisions sometimes, and that's the best parents can expect from themselves.

5) It sucks to lose a publisher, but it's really great to land a new one. It makes for a great debut story. And I still have the Fall Fifteeners, and Fearless Fifteeners, and Sweet Sixteens backing me up every step of the way. The kidlit community rocks my face off.

Maybe 2015 didn't go the way I wanted it to at all, and that's okay.

Mike Grosso is the author of I AM DRUMS, a debut contemporary middle grade novel for musicians of all ages. It was orphaned due to the closing of Egmont USA, but has found a new home at Clarion Books and an updated release date of September 6, 2016. The Fall Fifteeners have been nice enough to let him hang out even though he's technically a sixteener now.

You can visit Mike's website here or follow him on Twitter @mgrossoauthor.

The Mystery of Creativity: Should You Be Surfing the Internet or Should You Be Writing?

This is excerpted from a post I did on Through the Toll Booth in 2008.

You are a writer; an artist. If all your novels, stories and poems flow forth abundantly—golden words, clever concepts, satisfying connections and solid structure tumbling fruitfully from your brain to your fingertips and onto the page or screen, then this post will be of no interest.

If you occasionally struggle, or if you are procrastinating right now because you sat down to write and could not think of a darn thing to type, read on.

I’D RATHER BE WRITING (NOT).

George Orwell said, “All writers are vain, selfish, and lazy, and at the very bottom of their motives there lies a mystery. Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not DRIVEN ON BY SOME DEMON whom one can neither resist nor understand.”

If it’s so hard, why do we write?

Because we're driven on by some demon – whom one can neither resist nor understand.

  

We all know that writing productively is magic. But sometimes it's that being productive part that's hard.

Robert Olen Butler says in his book, From Where You Dream, that “…Writer’s block probably suggests that you have an artist’s instinct. [It happens to writers] because  some important part of them knows that they’ve got to get to the unconscious. But they’re not getting there; they’re thinking too much, so there’s nothing there. Except it’s not quite nothing—you sit there thinking, fussing, and worrying: ‘Gee, I’m not writing,’ ‘I’ve got to write now and I’m not writing,’ ‘Oh my God, I’m not writing.’”

Creativity. Visits from the muse. How can we as artists tap into that all-important creative part of our brains? Keep it healthy and well-oiled? Strengthen it so it’s not fragile and temperamental?

After all is said and done, when our writing is not flowing, we’ve got two choices:

1. Show up with no excuses. If necessary, force yourself with tricks and treats to work and plunge past the block,

or

2. Back off and go “refill the well.” (See Jane Cameron and THE ARTIST’S WAY)

Option 1 is usually the right answer, and the more you do it the better you get at it. If you’re a pro, you produce. But every now and then you have to go with option 2. And surf the Internet.

If there’s one thing to learn about the writing life, it’s patience. Patience for learning the craft, patience with the process and learning how you work best, patience for a “finished” work, patience, lord knows, for publication. And faith all along the way.

In the end, we must have faith. In ourselves. And, I believe, in the universe.

Remember in the film, Shakespeare in Love, how the theater troupe was always one step from disaster? Financial, creative or legal? But how the production would always come together beautifully, even transcendentally in the end, and the players all had faith in the fact that it would work out?

Phillip Henslowe: Mr. Fennyman, allow me to explain about the theatre business. The natural condition is one of insurmountable obstacles on the road to imminent disaster.

Hugh Fennyman: So what do we do?

Phillip Henslowe: Nothing. Strangely enough, it all turns out well.

Hugh Fennyman: How?

Phillip Henslowe: I don't know. It's a mystery.

It is that, for sure. 
Now go back to work.

Ann Jacobus's YA thriller ROMANCING THE DARK IN THE CITY OF LIGHT will be out from St. Martin's Press on October 6, 2015.

ARCs Trump Plans For Blog Post (Natasha Sinel)

I'd planned to write this month's post about books that have significantly influenced my career. And I'll do that...next month. In the meantime, today I was pleasantly sidetracked when my editor sent a photo of my ARCs (advanced reading copies) that she'd just received. It's an exciting day! Even though my book won't be its final hardcover self for a few more months, seeing it in the form of a book is surreal, amazing, a dream come true. I am speechless. So, here's the photo:

Natasha Sinel writes YA fiction from her home on a dirt road in Northern Westchester, NY. She drives her kids around all afternoon, but in her head, she's still in high school, and hopes that no one near her can read minds. Her debut YA novel THE FIX will be out from Sky Pony Press on September 1, 2015.