Author Interview: Stephanie Perkins

November is National Novel Writing Month (often shortened to NaNoWriMo), an event that challenges people to write 175 pages (50,000 words) in 30 days. When I heard about it last year I thought, "That's nuts. These people are nuts. I have to sign up." And then I wondered, "Is anyone ever successful?"


The answer to that question is yes! And to celebrate all the possibilities NaNoWriMo brings and get a few NaNoWriMo tips, I decided to interview a successful WriMo writer.

Today I have the pleasure of posting an interview with author Stephanie Perkins, who graciously answered my NaNoWriMo questions via e-mail. Stephanie has two NaNoWriMo novels under her belt and her first book, Anna and the Boy Masterpiece, will be released by Dutton in Fall 2010. ___________________________________________

Do you make detailed plans before plunging into NaNoWriMo?

Oh goodness, no. This is, without a doubt, the biggest and most common mistake among participants. There's often a misconception that NaNo is about writing a book in a month. I mean, National Novel Writing Month. It's there in the title! But that's really not what it's about. It's about creating a first, very very rough draft that you can eventually — with a lot of hard work — turn into a novel. Many participants believe they have one month to write a BOOK. A good one. One that they can sell, that people will want to read. So they do all sorts of outlining and research before beginning, sometimes months in advance! But the problem with this is that the more you know about your story beforehand, the more pressure you put on yourself to write something GOOD. And few people (I'm certainly not one of them) can write a GOOD book in a month. So what happens? The participant starts the novel, realizes that the words coming out aren't nearly as beautiful and perfect as the idea they had in their head and in their notes, and they become frustrated and discouraged. It becomes impossible to move forward. And if you aren't moving forward during NaNo, it's over.

The founder of NaNoWriMo, Chris Baty, recommends only one week of preparation in his fantastic book No Plot? No Problem!. Solid advice. It gets the gears in your brain turning, but it's not nearly enough time to turn your idea into something perfect, and therefore, unattainable.

Was writer’s block a problem for you during NaNoWriMo? If so, how did you overcome it?

Yeah, a little bit. I'm a slow writer, so not having the time to think my story through is both liberating and frustrating. I hit road blocks frequently. This was where Chris Baty's book came in handy again. He talks a lot about how to keep the story moving forward, even when you have no idea what's supposed to happen next. Anything from freewriting (this is what I do most frequently, my NaNo drafts of Anna and Lola have horrifyingly long passages of nonsense), to interviewing your characters, to introducing random llamas into a scene just to see how your characters react or to give them something to talk about.

Again, this has a lot to do with distancing yourself from that notion that NaNo is about creating a capital-N Novel, rather than what NaNo works best at, which is pushing you to create as many ideas as possible within a one month span. Who cares if all of the ideas are good? One or two WILL be, and that's where you begin writing/revising in December, with the ideas that worked.

So . . . just barrel through it. Write anything. Seriously. Anything. Word count is still word count!

Do you have any must-have objects with you while you write?

Ritual was more important for me the first year. I had a green plastic flower ring that a friend had given me, and I wore it whenever I sat down. It was a nice reminder of the support I had behind me. (My family and friends have always been tremendously supportive. I am lucky.) Now that I'm used to sitting for long periods of time and big writing pushes, I only keep around the necessities — laptop, research books, notes, coffee, tea, and gum.

And OF COURSE coffee, tea, and gum are necessities!

Describe your NaNoWriMo experience in three words.

Life-changing month. (Oh man. That sounds so unbelievably corny, but it's true.)

What, in your opinion, is the best reason to participate in NaNoWriMo?

NaNo is fantastic for people like me who have a difficult time writing first drafts. It forces you to spit one out, quick and dirty. And then you get to move on to the better stages — beefing up the story, cleaning and tweaking it, and making the language sparkle! If it weren't for NaNoWriMo, I would not be in the position that I am today. I doubt that I'd even have a complete first draft by now.

Publishing a book involves a lot of revising. Is NaNoWriMo in your plans this year, or will you have your hands full working on Anna and Second Novel?

Yes, I'm participating! It's true my hands are full — I'm still shaping Lola and the Boy Next Door (formerly known as Second Novel) into a working draft, and Anna and the Boy Masterpiece will probably hit the line editing stage smack in the middle of November — but absolutely, I'm doing it. NaNo changed my life. It brought me Anna (and her delicious boy), and I will be eternally grateful for that. I'm positively giddy to star this year's project. Something NEW. What a relief!

Any tips, tricks, or words of NaNo wisdom that you’d like to share?

I learned two important things last year. First of all, I did the Bad Thing — worked on a project that I had a lot of preconceived ideas and notions about — and it was dreadful. Seriously, do NOT do this to yourself. I spent the entire month agonizing at how awful it was, whereas my first year (when I had no idea what my story was), I was just happy for the high word count! So this year, I'm starting with a significantly blanker slate.

The second important thing I learned was to nail down the tense early on. I never picked one last November. Never. I wrote some of Lola in first, some in third, some in present, some in past. (I told you my NaNo drafts are terrible!) I didn't think it would be a big deal in revisions, but it turned into a HUGE ordeal. I had more salvageable ideas in that draft than I realized, so when I moved them into my REAL novel, it required several weeks of painstaking revisions to get them all into the same voice. I won't make that mistake again! So bite the bullet and pick a tense within the first few days. Even if you decide on a different tense for your next draft, it'll still make the transition easier.

Not that you would be as silly as me and not pick a tense. I mean, really. What was I thinking?

Thanks for the fab interview! . . . . GOOD LUCK! And if you or any of your blog readers are looking for a NaNoWriMo cheering squad, I love having writing buddies. You can add me here: http://www.nanowrimo.org/eng/user/230633

— Steph
_______________________________________

Actually *looking down at my shoes* choosing a tense was a problem for me last year. Thanks for the awesome advice, Steph!

You can read more about Stephanie's NaNoWriMo experience HERE, and I strongly recommend visiting her enormously entertaining blog HERE.

NaNo-ly yours,

November is National Novel Writing Month!

National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo, is an annual event that challenges participants to write a 175 page (or 50,000 word) novel in one month. NaNoWriMo is more about the fun and the making-it-happen than it is about writing a perfect work of fiction: the only thing that matters is that WriMo writers finish. It's an invitation to take that dream of writing a novel and make it real.

When I heard about it last October I thought the whole thing was crazy--and I wanted to do it. I told some friends, and my then friend and dorm neighbor/now friend and roommate Kayla decided to attempt NaNoWriMo with me.

October 31st rolled around, and we dressed up in our Halloween costumes and signed a contract that entitled us to mock each other if we did not meet the 50,000 word goal.

Me and Kayla all dressed up and NaNo-naive. I'm the cat; she's the iPod ad.

We went about our Halloween festivities all optimistic and giggly. And then November came. I started excitedly writing my novel and promptly ran into a wall. I'd decided to write a story that I'd been outlining and turning over in my mind for about two years--and I liked that story. I did not, however, like any of the words I was pounding out, and I felt like I was letting my story down.

That was a great costume idea. So great I'm posting another picture of it.

And Blogger is doing that thing again where it stops letting me press "enter" and put space between my paragraphs, so the text is about to become very cramped--sorry!)

And then I got slammed with boatloads of homework and gave up trying to write daily. In order to meet the deadline, Wrimo Writers need to type approximately 1,667 words per day. Many days I didn't attempt writing any words because it had become so daunting.

With Thanksgiving Break, however, came freetime, and I decided to give my novel my all. At this point, though, I was so behind that I needed to type almost all day every day of break, and I decided that I could find better ways to spend my precious days off. I gave up at 29,000 words.

Kayla got busy and never started her novel, and since neither of us finished, there was no mocking.

Kayla's friends from a university in another town. They dressed up as Jack and Karen from Will and Grace. They're more fun than my NaNo sob story, so it's okay if you've stopped reading that and are just looking at the pictures.

It's been nearly a year since I signed my first NaNoWriMo contract, and I'm doing it all over again this Halloween--and this time I'm determined to have fun and make those 50,000 words happen.

I may not have finished last year's WriMo challenge, but I learned a lot in the attempt. For one, since NaNoWriMo novels are not meant to be perfect and polished as they are being written, it really doesn't take that long to write 1,667 words per day. Forty-five minutes to an hour tops. Knowing this makes the scheduling factor less intimidating, and I feel more sure of being able to make time for NaNoWriMo.

I am also planning less and writing from new ideas that I brainstormed yesterday--new ideas means less pressure to write something "good", and if I should ever return to my old idea, I discovered many useful things about it.

Aww, look! It's Jack and Karen again.

I'm excited to do NaNoWriMo again, and I see it as win-win whether I finish it or not. I've wanted to write a book--not necessarily as a career--ever since I was five years old and made one with crayons about my cat, and NaNoWriMo is a great opportunity to do that. Without that deadline and all those other crazy WriMo writers it's too easy to say I'm too busy right now; I'll finish a rough draft Someday. (A day which has a habit of never coming around.)

And if I fail again? I'm sure I will have learned many new things in the process.

In celebration of NaNoWriMo and all the possibilities it brings, I interviewed Stephanie Perkins, a successful NaNoWriMo writer whose first novel, Anna and the Boy Masterpiece, will be released by Dutton in Fall 2010. This is Bookduck's--and my--first author interview, and it will be posted tomorrow. Come visit for some NaNo chat and handy NaNo tips!

NaNoWriMo-ly yours,

Musical Monday (14)

Every Monday I post whatever song I can't get out of my head or just can't get enough of because Mondays can often be less than marvelous, and music is happy--even when it's sad. If you'd like to join the party, just make your own Musical Monday post and leave a comment!

This week's song is "Invasion" by Eisley from their album Combinations. Their sound is beautiful, their lyrics are often whimsical, and I've been listening to them a lot over the past week while I finished paintings and papers for Midterm deadlines. I picked "Invasion" because this is the last Musical Monday of October, and the song appears to be about an alien invasion, which just fits. Also, the music video is appropriately strange and creepy. Enjoy!


Eisley - Invasion

EISLEY MySpace Video

Wishing you a Memorable (in a good way) Monday,

Dream Girl Giveaway on Lauren Mechling's Blog!

Author Lauren Mechling is giving away a copy of the brand new paperback edition of her novel Dream Girl, and it's pretty:


If you're interested--and if you like books and free things, you probably should be--go HERE, click "The Blog", and go to the "Paperback Writer//Dream Girl Giveaway" post and leave a comment telling Lauren about the best looking paperback book you've ever seen. A winner will be picked on Friday (tomorrow) and the winner will receive the paperback before its official release date. So far there are only 2 entries, so your chances are good! (Although it is a mildly difficult question...I've got to think about it for awhile.)

Off to finish some papers and such,

Musical Monday (13)

Every Monday I post whatever song I can't get out of my head or just can't get enough of because Mondays can often be less than marvelous, and music is happy--even when it's sad. If you'd like to join the party, just make your own Musical Monday post and leave a comment!

This week's song is "Forget And Not Slow Down" by Relient K from their new album Forget And Not Slow Down--which I've had on repeat for about a week now. I really really like Relient K and I also really really like this album. Relient K is musical about music, meaning that the melodies are dynamic--they go somewhere--and the songs all have great texture and use of instruments. I also dig the lyrics, which are usually thoughtful and contain word play here and there. Enjoy!



Wishing you a Mysterious Monday (It is October, after all),

Book Review: Viola in Reel Life by Adriana Trigiani

Release Date: September 1, 2009
Publisher: HarperTeen
Age Group: Young Adult
Pages: 288Summary:
I'm marooned.

Abandoned.

Left to rot in boarding school . . .

Viola doesn't want to go to boarding school, but somehow she ends up at an all-girls school in South Bend, Indiana, far, far away from her home in Brooklyn, New York. Now Viola is stuck for a whole year in the sherbet-colored sweater capital of the world.

Ick.

There's no way Viola's going to survive the year—especially since she has to replace her best friend Andrew with three new roommates who, disturbingly, actually seem to like it there. She resorts to viewing the world (and hiding) behind the lens of her video camera.

Boarding school, though, and her roommates and even the Midwest are nothing like she thought they would be, and soon Viola realizes she may be in for the most incredible year of her life.

But first she has to put the camera down and let the world in. (From Amazon.com)
_______________________________________
Viola in Reel Life is a novel that is what it sounds like--plus a little extra. As the summary suggests, Viola goes to boarding school, complains, meets people, learns Important Lessons, and spends a lot of time with her camera. But there is also a ghost, massive amounts of creativity, phenomenal friendships, a wonderful depth of emotion, a lot of laughs--and it just made me happy.

I really enjoyed listening to Viola tell her story--Adriana Trigiani crafted a good-natured, savvy, and funny narrator. Viola makes one hilarious--and true--observation about life after another. On Viola's first night at her new school she says:

I'm sure everybody will be wearing new pajamas tonight. I know I will. My mother got rid of my "Vote for Pedro" T-shirt and cupcake jam pants because they had holes in them. I'll be mad at her until the day I die for that one. This is one thing all mothers have in common. When it comes to boarding school, or sleepaway camp, or a visit with the grand-p's, a girl needs a new wardrobe from the underwear out.

That statement is so true I guffawed and got a strange look from my college roommate.

As for the plot, I enjoyed it: there are a few twists and turns, but nothing that shook my world too drastically--it's predictable in a comfortable, fuzzy slippers sort of way, and I had no serious issues with anything in the writing.

The most striking element of Viola, however, is the close friendship that develops between Viola and her roommates. It's genuine and downright heartwarming. In fact, all of the relationships in the novel are very well-drawn, as are the characters from Viola herself to Trish, the sparkly, enthusisastic resident assistant who lives on Viola's floor.

Viola in Reel Life is a feel-good book; Trigiani tells the story she chose to tell well, and I recommend reading it. I laughed, I said, "Aww," and I closed the book with a satisfied smile.

Book source: My local library.

Musical Monday (12)

Every Monday I post whatever song I can't get out of my head or just can't get enough of because Mondays can often be less than marvelous, and music is happy--even when it's sad. If you'd like to join the party, just make your own Musical Monday post and leave a comment!

This week's song is "Work" by Jars of Clay from their album Good Monsters. Why? Because I'll be doing a lot of homework this week, as I've been doing most weeks lately. I have a few book reviews in the draft stages, and I'd love to find time to post them soon, but I'm not sure when that will be. And back to the song: I happen to like it, although you are not obligated to :)

Also, you may notice that there is no video in this post; this is because the video I wanted to embed is disabled for embedding. So if you're interested in watching the video/listening to the song, please click here.

Wishing you a Magnificent Monday,

The first snow!!!

It's happening right now. I was squeezing in a little internet time--difficult to do lately--when a friend texted me that it was snowing! So I jammed my hat on my head, grabbed my coat, and went outside pajama pants and all to watch the snow and catch a few flakes on my tongue.

I know there won't be much of it, and it will melt quickly--and I don't even want piles of snow on the ground until after Thanksgiving, thank you very much--but it's still exciting to see the first snowflakes of the season.



Enjoying the little things,

Musical Monday (11)

Every Monday I post whatever song I can't get out of my head or just can't get enough of because Mondays can often be less than marvelous, and music is happy--even when it's sad. If you'd like to join the party, just make your own Musical Monday post and leave a comment!

This week's song is "the Fox, the Crow And the Cookie" by mewithoutyou from their album it's all crazy! it's all false! it's all a dream! it's alright. And it needs no other introduction. Enjoy!
*You may want to double click the video and watch it on youtube for the full wide screen effect.

An Award!

I recently received the Great Look Award from Eli at The Tainted Poet's YA Book Review! Thanks Eli! I like your blog's look, too. (I've never received one of these before, and it's kind of fun.)

This award is meant to pat on the back the ones paying particular attention to their blog presentation, and god knows some of them looks awesome! Of course none of them are pretty empty shells, so there's no shame to mention how nice their blogs are!

Here are the rules:

1. Post the award on your blog, with the name of the person who has granted the award, and his or her blog link.
2. Pass the award to 5 other blogs that you particularly like. Remember to contact the bloggers to let them know they have been chosen for this award.

The 5 other blogs I particularly like:

1. Eli at The Tainted Poet's YA Book Review

2. Steph Bowe at Hey! Teenager of the Year

3. Cate at Sparrow Review

4. Stephanie at Natural/Artificial

5. Nina at J'adorehappyendings