Category Archives: Feature

Bloghopping From North America To Asia

  By Eleni | April 4, 2013 - 09:27 | , , ,
5 Comments

This post is part of a bloghop. Peggy Payne recruited me, and you can check out the answers to her questions here. I feel so privileged to have met so many wonderful authors from all around the world. Below, you’ll find the links to the authors who will be answering the same questions.

I’d also like to mention that all the formatting issues of Unison have been taken care of, and this incarnation of the book is my vision brought to life…finally!

 

What is the working title of your book or project?

Unison, which is Book One of the Spheral Series.

 

Where did the idea come from for the book or project?

Unison started off as a screenplay entitled, The Cabin. I intended it as an indie feature with only four characters and two settings.  As it’s hard to break into the screenwriting business, I wanted to ensure my stories would have an audience. I decided the best way to make it happen would be to write The Cabin in novel form. When I included a prop from a different screenplay, the story grew into an epic. I changed the title to Unison,  and the screenplay  from where I borrowed the prop  is now the outline for book four of The Spheral Series. I always dreamt of writing a series, and it happened without any planning. The writing life can be serendipitous!

 

What genre does it fall under, if any?

It falls under visionary fiction with the sub-genres of science fiction, quantum fiction and Libertarian fiction.

 

If applicable, who would you choose to play your characters in a movie?

Unison is way too long for a movie, but it would make a great mini-series. When I envisioned the characters, I used pictures of non-famous people. However, Nikola Tesla inspired my  protagonist for his mind, and Ibn Battuta, for his love of exploration. I can see Josh Holloway as the lead and  Christina Ricci as his love interest.  What an interesting pair! U.G. Krishnamurti (shown here during his younger years)  inspired the character of Vivek because of his  charisma and the spirited way he challenged people’s belief systems. Alexander Siddig of Deep Space Nine would make an excellent Vivek.  Ooh, I can just picture it so clearly.  Sci-Fi Channel, I’m ready to negotiate a deal for a mini-series!

What is the one-sentence synopsis of your manuscript or project?

A man is condemned to relive his life until he uncovers a suppressed memory.

 

Will your book or story be self-published or represented by an agency?

Self-published. I have a vision of how this series must play out, and I like to have creative freedom…although I wouldn’t turn down a hybrid publishing deal. It’s the best of both worlds.

 

How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?

The first draft took two  months to write. At 136,000 words,  the editing and polishing took two years to complete.

 

What other book or stories would you compare this story to within the genre?

Imagine Atlas Shrugged that champions the individual’s mind and all it can achieve when unbound; the Stand, that promotes strength of faith and will, and A Brave New World, where the individual is controlled by drugs and distraction. Throw them all together and you have Unison!  

 

Who or what inspired you to write this book or story?

My kundalini awakening that happened over fifteen years ago led me on a spiritual journey that challenged my mind, body and spirit to the breaking point.  I survived and needed to find a way to outwardly express the lessons I learned through my visions and experiences.  For me, the main focus of  life is to experience and see it for the beauty that it is, even among the ugliness. That’s what I try to demonstrate in my books…that no matter how tragic a situation may seem, a strength of will can save us. This is particularly apparent in Unison. I view the series as a gift that was given to me to pass on to the world.  It was a challenge to write and still is, but I intend on getting it all out because I want to see how it ends!

 

What else about the book or story might pique the reader’s interest?

It has an exciting storyline and strong characters with  a spiritual theme nestled underneath that will leave readers uplifted and might even bring out some inner-truths.

 

Next on the Bloghop:

Sandy Nathan – Author of Tales from Earth’s End: The Angel & the Brown-Eyed Boy, Lady Grace, and Sam & Emil

Adite Banerjie – Will discuss her up-and-coming debut novel for Harlequin Mills & Boon

Joanna Gawn and Ron Dickerson – The Cordello Quest

Bullies and Creativity

  By Eleni | February 11, 2013 - 07:35 | , ,
3 Comments

This post was inspired by a recent Ground Zero Podcast from January 31st. It focused on transhumanism, a topic that frightens me as we’re mentally and spiritually not ready for this type of advancement. If you’re interested to listen to this podcast, click here.

During the course of the podcast, the host, Clyde Lewis, mentioned how bullies “create creative people by making them introverted.” He pondered over if we were to stop bullying, would that make creative people more rare? I’m not sure about that as not all creative people are or were bullied, but being bullied can certainly draw out your creativity.

INTROVERSION

As an introvert, I personally don’t see introversion as a result of bullying; it’s more of a character trait. We introverts tend to exist more in our heads. I recall when the bullying first started for me. It was mostly over my Greek nationality and that I sucked my  thumb. I didn’t stop until I was twelve! I did this because I existed in my head. My thumb would enter my mouth while I was daydreaming, and I wasn’t aware of what I was consciously doing. So, I was an introvert before the bullying began.

I lost my fluency in Greek as a result of the racism I had to endure. For a time, I was ashamed of being Greek and stopped speaking the language. I was made to feel like there was something wrong with me. The neighborhood kids asked me if I was Catholic or Jewish, as if they were the only two religions in existence. When I responded “Greek Orthodox,” I was made to feel like the Greek Freak they called me.  The bullying was so severe and unrelenting I developed complex PTSD symptoms.  School became my prison from which I couldn’t escape.

It’s hard to describe what it feels like to have a flashback, but a present situation can trigger a past event, and it will literally feel like I’m reliving the experience. I’ll even feel the same emotions I felt on the day the memory was formed. Through the years, I’ve learned to cope with my flashbacks by practicing meditation.  By confronting all my painful experiences, I’ve desensitized myself to many of my hurts, but there are so many; I still have flashbacks. They’re easy to deal with now as I don’t engage with them anymore; I know they’re nothing more than phantoms from the past and have nothing to do with my present life. By practicing mindfulness meditation, I’m able to distinguish them apart from my present-day experiences. When a flashback occurs, I allow myself to feel the feelings associated with the memory, but I don’t attach to the experience.  I bathe myself in white light and forgive the person  imprinted into my brain. It was awareness combined with forgiveness that gave me back control of my life.

THE PATH TO CREATIVITY

I’ve often mentioned to my family how my difficult childhood led to my creativity, which is why I never whine about my past. I even celebrate it because it made me take chances, and I became more resilient.  I developed a strong drive to excel beyond the negative programming of my early years. It’s this drive that got me through one of the best colleges for Jazz at the time, all the way up to my publication of my first novel. In the early years, it had to do with having to prove to everyone that I was more than the Greek Freak I was viewed as, but now it’s more only proving it to myself.

“I do not try to dance better than anyone else. I only try to to dance better than myself.” Mikhail Baryshnikov

Reflecting  over my life, I’ve had many exciting experiences and lived in different places like in Germany and New Zealand. My life literally became an adventure novel once I dropped out of high school. For me, the social stigma of dropping out was the key to my freedom. I was out of jail, and from that moment, I started to live. I also left with a wealth of inspiration, feelings and experiences to draw upon, both in my music, art and writing. Which leads me to my next point:

Being bullied turned me into an artist. 

  • More times spent alone, I learned to introspect about life and the Universe.
  •  I became sensitive to the hardships in life.
  • I became sensitive to others who are having a difficult time
  • I expressed myself through music and writing to release my loneliness and depression.
  • I learned to appreciate life.

BEING BULLIED CAN LEAD TO COMPASSION

I recall having the opportunity to pick on a girl in high school. I had only to gaze upon her face to connect to her, and I immediately stopped myself. My short career as a bully ended after one comment. Upon reflection, I was able to see how bullies were born, first hand. I decided not to pass the pain to someone else. I also realized the school playground is a microcosm of children who never truly grow up. In fact, I’ve noticed adults are even more cliquish than children. This was a shocking revelation to me. The setting changes, but the pain is still passed along by those who don’t take time to introspect. Is it any wonder the world is a mess?

HOW BULLYING CAN HOLD YOU BACK

I can think of three instances when I was bullied as an adult. It doesn’t sound like a lot, but I find adult bullying more harmful in that it can make us give up our dreams if we don’t fight back.

I was preparing a big band chart for my jazz arranging class in my senior year. It was from an original of mine, which will be in my book, Beyond Omega’s Sunrise. I was up for three days straight getting it all down on very large manuscript paper. The lead sheets that I was to give to each player I notated in Encore,music software. The technology was fairly new, and I was eager to play around with it.

After I inputed all the parts into my computer, I played back the music using the midi instruments, and I was pleased with the job I had done. I was eager to show it to my teacher, who had it in his mind that singers had no business arranging music. That was the attitude I was forced to deal with since my first day in his class. (One of the pianists told me he made the comment while I was in the bathroom.) I printed out the lead sheets and presented them to the big band. When they began to play, I thought I was going to faint. I forgot to transpose the horn section! As a cacophony of horrors spilled out from the saxophones, trumpets and trombones, my teacher stood there and had them play through the whole thing. I managed to stay strong and not cry, but that was the most humiliating experience I ever went through. All the hard work I did on my song was never heard because I forgot to push a few buttons on my computer.  I performed the song during my recital, but I was so traumatized, my performance lacked verve because by then, I didn’t want to sing jazz anymore.

Surprisingly, I wasn’t aware that I was bullied. When I recounted the experience to my husband, he brought it up, and I was shocked that I never realized it. Because of my teacher’s negative view on singers, I put a lot of stress on myself to prove him wrong that  it ended up having the same effect.

I gave up jazz after I left school, and now I know it was because I let that one teacher make me forget all the great things that happened to me during my college experience. Soon after that, I started my own original music project. While I enjoyed it, my passion never reawakened to the same degree as it was while I was in college.

FROM SCREENWRITER TO NOVELIST

My next two bouts with a bullies came when I began writing screenplays. I got a scathing review by someone at Triggerstreet who went on to rip apart everything about my work. He told me I didn’t know the first thing about story structure and that I meandered too much. The criticism was harsh in that  the reviewer went on to attack the idea of my story as well.  I completely dismissed all the positive reviews that came before it and decided to give up writing. All this happened while my father-in-law was visiting. When he returned home, he sent me a quote by Jack Welch:

“Control your own destiny or someone else will.”

After I read those words,  I snapped out of my self-pity and became angry with myself for allowing someone else to make me give up my dream of becoming a writer. I then introspected over why one comment affected me so strongly. After some searching, I realized my knowledge of the weaknesses in my writing were pulled  to the surface by the critic. I then had the idea to get rid of those weaknesses, so I’d never be controlled like that again.

I took a screenwriting class with a very good teacher whose classes helped me hone in on story structure, dialogue and subtext. I still use these skills in my novel writing, and I would like to recommend the teacher now, but he’s also bully with some serious coping issues. He didn’t handle stress well at all. When I had a conference call with him, he mentioned he was on the phone all day, and I could hear he was on edge. He eventually snapped over something that he completely misunderstood and took out of context. I remained calm during his tirade against me, and he ended up calming down himself; however, after that conversation, I knew I had outgrown him.  I didn’t give up on writing because I understood what happened had nothing to do with me. And I don’t think he’s a bad person.  I detected a kind heart in him, but he just had trouble coping.  In the end, it was his bullying that eventually led to my writing novels.  I thank him for that.

BULLIES CAN CREATE RESILIENT PEOPLE

We can either allow bullies to defeat us, as my experience with my college professor. Contrarily, we can use them to catapult ourselves forward, like my screenwriting teacher who gave me a taste of Hollywood. I didn’t want all that stress, so I started writing novels. And I should add here there is a lot of stress involved with being an indie author, but that’s a different topic, which I may write about in the future. Regardless, I see it as positive stress in that it leads to personal satisfaction and growth. If a screenwriting gig comes out from my novels, that would be great. However, I’m not that desperate to tolerate abuse over it and will only work with people who are more in control over their emotions!

My teacher’s bullying forced a positive reaction out of me.

I could either give up, or push forward, and that’s what I did. To be a successful writer—and I don’t mean by making money or having fame. I define success by accomplishment, by bringing to life a piece of art, any art, that gives you the feeling that you’ve climbed the tallest mountain. There is no feeling on the world like this, and it makes me want to continue writing and exploring my artistic abilities.

This is my personal recipe for writing success:

  • Learn the craft of writing  through school, books, or a combination of both.
  • Hone in on your weaknesses and make them your strengths.
  • Read a lot, both fiction and non-fiction
  • Be as non-judgemental as you can in life.  It not only makes you more compassionate, but it also allows you to observe the mechanics of behavior in people. This will help you create the most realistic characters and situations.
  • Appreciate being by yourself so you can tap into your inspiration.
  • Don’t work out of the need of having to prove something to anyone else but yourself.
  • Write the best story that you can, irrespective of what you feel others will think about it.
  • Champion your work and honor your accomplishments. Writing a novel is difficult. The fact that you did it demonstrates a strong will. That is definitely something worthy of honor.

By doing all the above, after I typed the words the end in Unison, I knew I wrote a book that’s worthy of being read. I never felt that way before with anything else I wrote.  With my first book, I was tethered to my desk in the attic. I didn’t enjoy the writing process at all. I always had this dark cloud looming over me, and after I finished writing, I told myself I’d never write another book again.  Flash forward to today, and I love writing.

Celebrate your talent, and never let anyone else hold you back from it.

Love and light,

Eleni

Falling In Love With Omniscient Narration

  By Eleni | January 16, 2013 - 09:32 | , , ,
6 Comments

As I’m now going through my official edit of Sunrise, I’m falling in love with omniscient narration. While I was writing the first draft, I had some ambivalence because of my decision to go with a named narrator. I reflected on a previous post I’d written about the subject. My initial worry was about pulling the reader out of the story. However, I now hold a different view as I’m reading through the manuscript. 

STORY TONE

The narration has a mystical quality to it, and this was the effect I wanted. When I analyzed what made it so—even as the dark events began to play out, I realized it was the narrator that added this otherworldly, ethereal quality. It was through this acknowledgement that I started to understand the dynamics of using an omniscient voice. I pondered over why it had fallen out of favor. I’ve read hostile remarks and some people even  refuse to read any book that has an omniscient narrator. I was concerned that I’d limit my readership by using the voice and even considered switching the P.O.V. But then I remembered the reason I write…to tell a story the best way that I can. If I limited myself because of some dogmatic comments, I’d fail on both measures. The type of readers for my books would be those who  are interested in the story, irrespective of what voice I choose to tell it.  If I can pull that off,  I’ll be a very happy author.

If I could take a stance for something in writing, omniscient narration would be my cause. 

Narration is dependent on the type of story you want to tell. As a writer, I don’t want to limit myself to one type of narration.  I prefer to tell the story in the way it presents itself to me.  For Sunrise, I chose omniscient voice for two reasons:

I have a large ensemble. While Unison also has a large cast, Sunrise is different in that there are several main characters. While I could’ve used a close third and broken up each thread by chapter, I wouldn’t have been able to dig deep into the characters as intimately as I could in first person. By using one consistent voice, I was able to tie the characters together with one view point.

With close third, my book would’ve ended up being over 1000 pages. Yikes! With omniscient voice, I was easily able to change perspectives within the same scene, and I even kept that at a minimum. At present, Sunrise is at 90,000 words—up from 86,000 words at the start of my edit.  As  I started off as screenwriter and outline, my writing is usually very terse. I project I’ll end up with a 100,000 word novel. My first draft of Unison moved from 93,000 words to almost 137,000 words! So I’m the type of writer who always ends up adding. 

LEARN SCREENWRITING

I can understand how a beginning author would be guilty of head hopping with this voice.  However, if the narration is focused and well thought out,  it shouldn’t confuse the reader. Learning the craft of screenwriting helped sharpen my writing, and I recommend it to all writers who want to sharpen their dialogue, description and point of view. When writing a screenplay, you learn how to view each scene through the lens of a camera. And because thoughts aren’t part of the story, you have to rely on the description and dialogue to get your point across.  When I write a novel, I think of each scene exactly the same way, and it makes it easier to detect when I mess up my point of view.  A screenplay also makes a great outline in which to base your novel!

GIVING AWAY TOO MUCH

The other main problem with omniscient voice is giving away too much information. How I avoided this was by focusing on what I wanted each scene to accomplish and what I wanted to remain secret until the reveal. I did spot one area where I said too much about the antagonist, and I removed it. The trick is knowing that although an omniscient narrator knows all; he, she or it is also a storyteller who wants to keep the reader guessing and not confuse them with too much details or cause them to shut the book because they already figured out the ending.  

INSECURITIES

When I first wrote the ending for Sunrise, I realized it was going to be difficult to pull off. I toyed with the idea of switching to a close third voice. I’m so glad I stuck to my instincts. Now that I’m sculpting my story, I can see the beauty of allowing it to tell itself. I see storytelling as an organic process.  It sometimes freaks me out when I get ideas that challenge me by pushing me out of my comfort zone, but after I’m finished I realize all the effort was worth it. This is why I write…to challenge myself. Without that feeling, writing would cease to satisfy me.

TIPS ON USING OMNISCIENT NARRATION

As a newbie I read every article I could find on this P.O.V. I thought I’d end with some lessons I learned during the process.  

  • Know who or what is narrating—even if the narrator is neutral. The viewpoint must remain consistent throughout the story, or it will confuse the reader and possibly enter head-hopping territory. 
  • Be clear on why the narrator is telling this story. As opposed to using a close third, what is the importance of having a seeing all narrator?  I found this question to be important because it allowed me to see what motivated the narrator. This demonstrated a personal stake in the story…even though the narrator wasn’t in the story. 
  • What is the tone of the narration? Is it humorous, serious, a combination of both? This also adds more personality, consistency and flavor to the narration.

  • Reveal only whats important to the scene. Sometimes it’s okay to tease the reader, but ensure when you do that, you don’t give too much plot away.  Ask yourself what parts of your story do you want to surprise your readers and go back in your manuscript to ensure you haven’t tipped them off.

The thing that helped me most was to read and analyze books with omniscient narration as I was writing my first draft.  I learned what worked and what pulled me out of the story.  

Well, that’s all for now. I have to get back to my editing.  And as a reminder, if you appreciate visionary fiction, please visit the Visionary Fiction Alliance for interviews, book excerpts and all things visionary.

Synchronicity in Writing and the Great Hen Escapade

  By Eleni | December 4, 2012 - 08:56 | , , ,
2 Comments

I was working on a scene about how our silence keeps us prisoner, and as this is my final edit before publication, I scrutinized a passage and concluded my protagonist, Damon, came off a bit preachy. By grounding his dialogue to his own experiences, the scene packed a more powerful punch. As I don’t want to give the plot away, I’ll only mention that I use a dungeon symbolically throughout the book as a metaphor.  The context related to how some people voluntarily imprison themselves by handing over the key to their oppressors. The key symbolizes fear and how oppressors are given permission to draw it out of their victims as a method of control.

Fast-forward to lunchtime. I went downstairs to eat, and my daughters excitedly told me the hens escaped from the coop. My landlord keeps ten hens for eggs, and the girls have grown fond of them. Apparently, the hens figured out how to open the gate and liberated themselves. With the help of my husband, my daughters proceeded to chased the hens until they were able to lead them back to the coop. During the whole debacle, the cleverest of the hens, managed to make her escape. I cheered when I heard about it.

Being a writer, the slapstick scene played in my head. Imagining my girls running after hens made me laugh, and I wondered why my husband didn’t get out my Iflip and film this screwball moment. As my eldest daughter recounted the event,  my attention went outside, where lo and behold,  a hen was flying outside of the cage.

My husband and youngest daughter ran out to lead her back inside. Meanwhile, I expressed to my eldest how if it were me who saw the hens escape, I probably would’ve turned a blind eye and let them on their way. Much as I don’t judge people for caging hens, I don’t judge a hen’s decision to escape from her prison. If I sound like I’m personifying the situation, that could very well be true. I recently completed my first draft of Forever Valley, in which a hen is one of the main characters. I know what happened will eventually end up in my book.

Coincidence or   synchronicity ushered into my consciousness from the Divine?

I see it as the latter because incidents like this happen too often for me to discount it as mere coincidence.

While the outside chase continued, I recounted to my eldest how the scene I worked on moments before paralleled the hens’ ordeal. My sweet nine-year-old then went on to say, “That’s so weird. It happened at the same time. Just as you were writing about it, we were outside getting the hens back inside.”

“Weird, indeed,” I said as my youngest daughter entered and told me the hen I saw was the one that escaped. They managed to get the hen back in her cage.

I had an eerie feeling as I recounted Damon’s message over how we willingly enslave ourselves by giving the key to our oppressors.  The closing of our real life escapade ended with the hen giving up her own freedom voluntarily.

“She came back because she missed her friends,” my youngest surmised.

She was probably right—that and along with a free meal.  I’ve come to see hens as very social and affectionate. Here, in Hawaii, we have ferrel hens, and the escaped hen would’ve been all right on the outside, but she decided to return to the place where she was most familiar. This was another aspect of the scene I was focusing on; some of us become imprisoned by the comfort of familiarity and security. Of course, that’s not necessarily bad; however, with the wrong person, religion or political ideology it most certainly can be viewed as a weakness and used against us. In the case of the hen, one of her friends ended up on someone’s plate during a Thanksgiving dinner. I leave it up to you to decide whether or not the hen should’ve stayed away.

When synchronous moments in writing happen to me, I ruminate over what I’m supposed to take from the experience.

Did what happen justify or challenge an opinion I hold  dear to me?

 Did it lead me to accept there are some aspects of the human condition that still have a long way to go before evolving…and the changes that will move us forward will happen long after I die?

That last one is the most difficult for me to ponder over, and I’m glad I have my writing to help me express my frustrations. Writing visionary fiction helps me view stories through a holistic and positive lens. In the process of healing my ideal version of the world, I heal myself.

From Vision to Story

  By Eleni | November 27, 2012 - 10:17 | , ,
4 Comments

As of today, I’ve arrived at the last chapter of my proof. While I was teaching my daughter about cell division,  it led me to  pose a question during my meditation. Soon afterwards, I received an intense vision. It ended up in Unison, and it further clarified an expositional scene that is tantamount to the series as a whole.

Writing this book has been a long and winding road, where many times I thought I was going to go off course. Nevertheless,  all things happen for a reason. I had to go through all these read-throughs, so I could write a scene that makes my story stronger. Writing a book has been compared to running in a marathon. That’s a fairly accurate comparison!

Choreographing A Scene

  By Eleni | November 14, 2012 - 09:27 | , ,
3 Comments

I had a very creative week. As with many of my story breakthroughs, it happened at the gym, while running on the treadmill. I knew when I posed my story question, by the time my workout was over, I’d have my answer, but not necessarily to the question I asked. When it comes to tapping into the right brain, scenes typically appear out of order. I view the first draft as a puzzle, except I have no idea how many pieces exist until after I write, “The End.”

I put on the dance music playlist on my Ipod, started running, and asked my right brain to  show me a strong climax for Forever Valley.  I’ve done this several times before but was shown answers to different parts of my story; however, several days ago, I got what I asked for.  When I left the gym, I ran to my car, got out a pen from the glove box and wrote out the climax, which also included the completion of the character arcs. Now that’s a productive run!

The three questions I ask before I begin the scene choreography:

What characters are in the scene?

Where are they?

What’s the scene goal?

To get the best possible scene, I have to envision it first. I do this by running through it in pictures.  There can be no trace of language for this to work. It’s like watching a silent movie, and I formulate no opinions or judgements during the transmission. That’s left brain banter, and it’s a big no no when engaged in right brain work. I continue observing until something pops out at me. Once that happens, I begin to analyze the scene, interpreting what and why it’s happening.

What do the characters say?

How do they react?

I continue the analysis until the language syncs with the visuals.  This works so well, I never fear writer’s block or running out of ideas. With a strong visual, it’s hard not to come up with a strong scene.  The difficulty—for me, at least—is finding the most accurate words to describe it. That takes a lot more effort from me than scene creation.

For anyone interested, here is my method of tapping into the right brain.

  • Find a place or situation where you can disappear into your story world.    Working out, running, walking, taking a bath and lying down listening to music are some ways I connect to my right brain.
  • Pose the three questions, but do it without expecting answer to the questions you asked. Expectations are like a roadblock to the right brain.  Get rid of them, and you’re right brain will throw out some amazing ideas for other scenes in  your story.
  • Place your characters in the proper setting and watch them react, without any hint of language or judgements. There is no such thing as a stupid idea in this exercise.  Unlike real life, stupid oftentimes leads to brilliance in the right brain. Just keep watching stupid until it evolves into a brilliant scene. Being able to tap into the right brain at will makes writing entertaining and fast. Please let me know if this works for you. I always love to hear successful writer stories.

Love and light,

Eleni

Final Is Never Final When it Comes to Writing

  By Eleni | November 2, 2012 - 12:03 | , , , ,
2 Comments

It’s now November 2012, and I still haven’t published Unison. I was aiming for an October release, but after three read-throughs of my proof, I found places for improvement.  My fourth proof is to be my final,  as I’ll be now scanning for typos. I’m ready to say goodbye to this book and move on.  I had some issues with Create Space as they sent me a proof of my old file. I’ve been on the phone with them for the last couple of days, and I’m happy with the way the situation was handled. They’re dealing with a new system which led to some confusion. These things happen, and I’ll still use their service as the interior book design they did is beautiful.

I got my edit back from Jessie’s Song, and I’ve been busy this month making improvements to some excellent suggestions made by Erica Orloff of Editing For Authors. I can’t highly recommend them enough. Thanks to Erica’s attention to detail, I’ve been able to elevate both my novels. Even the smallest suggestions she made led to deeper insights. For Unison, I used only their proofreading service, but after all the time I spent cleaning up the inconsistencies, I found their comprehensive edit service to be invaluable and time-saving.  I’m using this for Jessie’s Song, and it does help speed up the process.

My experience with publishing, thus far, has shown me I need to slow down my production line because of the proofing process which takes much longer than editing. From uploading to publication, I’m seeing that I’ll need at least four months before my book goes live. If I can keep up that pace, I should be able to publish three books by next December. We’ll see!

Lessons Learned During The Proofing.

  • When you get your first proof, assume it’s not ready for publication. All the story problems you thought were solved, weren’t. Changed character names which you thought you cleaned up are still there.  Which leads me to..
  • Get a professional edit. Proofreading isn’t enough. No matter how thorough you think you’ve been, a good editor will definitely find something you’ve overlooked. As objective as I am about my writing, another set of eyes is even more so.
  • If, Like me, you opted for only a professional proofread, assume the second proof that comes to you, is still not finished. After cleaning up the first proof, more inconsistancies will stand out.
  • In the third proof,  the awkward sentences will stand out more. This was my toughest edit as I kept working on these trouble spots until they no longer stood out.
  • The fourth proof, will strictly be my looking for typos,  and I’ll have another reader helping out.

The proofing stage has been the most challenging for me. It makes writing the first draft seem easier. This brings me to my current manuscript, Forever Valley. I put it on hold until this Monday. By then, I’ll have Jessie’s Song back for another edit. Afterwards, I’ll upload it to Create Space and start the four-month process in December.

I’ve learned patience through this whole ordeal, and the invaluable service a good editor provides. I’m already noticing less stress with Jessie’s Song because of this. With time, also comes experience as well. I always keep that in the back of my mind. Through all these trials, I’ve become a better writer and publisher. Furthermore, by accepting that mistakes will be made, both by myself and those I work with, I’m able to keep a level head and enjoy my writing. This is what I love to do, and I don’t want to lose sight of that.

Love and light,

Eleni

When Editing Is Done Well, Everything Falls Into Place Naturally

  By Eleni | August 30, 2012 - 07:00 | , ,
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As of August 24th, I finished my final pass of Jessie’s Song, and it’s now ready for a professional edit.  I even wrote a song to accompany the book which one of my daughters will sing.

Jessie’s Song went through several incarnations, beginning life as a high-concept screenplay I wrote for a screenwriting class. There were several instances where I wanted to drag the Final Draft file to the trash  because I didn’t like Markos Adams, the protagonist.  He began life as a hit man,  evolved into a police officer, and when I decided to do it my way, he found his authentic voice as a jazz musician. It was then that the story sprung to life and was one of the reasons I made the transition from screenwriter to novelist; I wanted to see what made Markos Adams tick inside.  As a side note: Unison also had its beginnings as a screenplay, with only two characters. Now it’s a full-blown epic with a large cast. Talk about story evolution!

LESSONS LEARNED

  • Never give up on a story, especially one with a strong concept and hook.  Once you get it to where it should be, you’ll be a truly satisfied—and  happy writer!
  • Don’t allow an instructor, or anyone else,  steer you away from your vision because that will only lead to confusion and A LOT more rewrites. I have fourteen Final Draft revision files from Jessie’s Song! That’s at least ten two many.  Take only advice that will help you advance in your craft. Incidentally, my screenwriting class was excellent, and I learned a lot from the instructor. I just wasn’t confident enough in my own abilities as a writer to make an authorial  stand.

During the last pass, I cut over 4,200 superfluous words and added a little more than 2000 that deepened the tone and characterization. Through this whole process, I noticed I was harsher on my work than my beta readers. They never took issue with the threads I ended up cutting. This all leads to my suspicion that if you, as an author, can maintain complete objectivity during an edit, you make your own best beta reader. I say this because it’s your book, and no one knows the story as well as you do. I’m not saying  beta readers aren’t necessary. They helped me find a plethora of typos and inconsistencies, but as far as the pacing was concerned, none of them took issue with it. Granted, I do have an extremely short-attention span that might have something to do with my sensitivity to pacing.  In real life, I’m a get-to-your-point-and-make it kind of gal, and that’s how I write my stories. During my final read through, when I sensed even the slightest bit of  drag.  I looked at each chapter and ended up cutting out four chapters.

  • Not necessary to the resolution or advancement of the plot.
  • The cost of the book. Unison’s final word count is at 534 pages! To use extended distribution for a physical book, it would cost eighteen dollars minimum to make a profit. I thought about cutting the word count, but this is the way the story had to be told for me to get my vision across…and readers would still pay more by having to buy two books anyway.  I decided to stall extended distribution for a couple of months until my Kindle edition comes out.
  • I want people with short-attention spans, like yours truly,  to ready my book as well!

MAKING THE CUTS

I reflected over  the book blurb to reconnect to the main idea of my story. Jessie’s Song is a paranormal mystery about Markos Adams, whose daughter is kidnapped, and the ransom calls for his suicide. While most of the journey deals with his search for the kidnapper,  Markos is haunted by visions that make him, along with all those close to him, doubt his interpretations of events. As Markos believes a childhood rival has something to do with the kidnapping, he reflects over his past.  He understands he may have to take his life and looks to his past in an attempt to uncover a motive for what’s happening in the present. These are the necessary plot points to tell the story effectively.

I had to nest chapters from Markos’s past in a way that wouldn’t break up the urgency of the plot. In my first draft, I arranged the chapters and threads on the big cork board seen here on the right. I erroneously believed the chapters would remain where they were, but my mid-point ended up coming in way too late. After I rearranged the chapters in this last read through, I took out a weak thread between Markos and a woman with whom he had a short fling.  Its function was to demonstrate how Markos had evolved from his past, but I realized it was no longer necessary because I depicted enough growth in the main thread.

As I got to the end of my edit, I took out a chapter that dealt with Markos’s estranged wife. I didn’t think that particular chapter would be chopped because she’s an important character. There was also some excellent dialogue.  While it worked well in the screenplay, it wasn’t necessary for the advancement or resolution of the plot in novel form, and it slowed down the third act.  Chop, chop, chop went another darling, and my mid-point ended up where it belonged…in the middle.

The more I write, the more I realize that storytelling is a precise science. Ensuring my structure is solid has become the most important part of an edit for me. When the plot  moves forward, without any distractions or going off-point,  everything  seemingly falls into place as if by design.

I’ve oftentimes joked about how it would be nice if I knew I wouldn’t need a chapter before I write it; however most of my over-writing ends up adding more depth to my characters. After I release Jessie’s Song, I’ll put up the chopped darlings on my website. One way or another, they will be read!

Love and light,

Eleni

Characters Write Themselves When They’re Free

  By Eleni | August 16, 2012 - 07:35 | , ,
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I started working on my fourth novel, On The Farm.  The  antagonist’s personality came to me three days ago. I wanted to know why he would work against his own growth, and once I figured it out, I was ready to begin writing the story…twenty days ahead of schedule!

When I realized what motivated me to begin this new project, I knew I had a topic for my next blog. I find I write the best story when my characters are real enough to take over. I’m not implying chaos over here. Structure is very important to me, and I learned it via my screenwriting experience.  It taught me how to plot effectively and make every scene count. I use the techniques in my novels because it keeps my acts clearly defined, cinematic and razor sharp. Some writers will tell you that structure leads to formulaic writing, and from my own experience, I find that declaration erroneous and harmful advice to those who are just starting out in their writing. How we write depends on how our brains process information.

Some of us can write without an outline, but not me. Because I’m right brain dominant, I need to see the whole picture for it to make sense and to get that, “Eureka, this is it!” feeling about my story. This gives my first draft more direction, but it doesn’t mean I won’t make changes as I go along. What remains is the structure that keeps me grounded to the story and prevents me from going off in irrelevant directions.  This makes my editing job a lot easier.

Before I learned structure, I meandered in my writing, A LOT. And the criticism I received about my work was all about how my story didn’t have well defined acts. Once I learned  various forms of structure, I began to see how a story flowed and how when I got everything right, it worked better.

Books that resonate most with me have both a well-developed plot and strong characters.  Stories heavy on plot and light on character don’t hold my interest, which is why I toil, with great effort, on my own characters.  The stronger they are, the more they take the lead and that’s what I count on.

Outlining prevents chaos, so we can let go and enjoy the ride.

I like outlining my stories because it reinforces the structure.  The reason structure in  our writing works so well is because we live in a structured environment, which means, by default, so do our characters. Even stories where societies fall apart, like in “Mad Max,” develop hierarchal systems. Try as we might, we can’t get away from structure.    Everything around us is structured.  We can either lead boring and predictable lives, or exciting lives, depending on our personalities.  Same thing goes for our characters, which are extensions of our personalities brought on by our imagination. When we let our characters take over we free our imagination, which is far more interesting than when we hold it back because we want to control everything.

It’s all about the characters…

A strong structure and accompanying outline gave my characters more freedom to challenge my pre-determined plot points. If my foundation is solid, my characters will either head towards the story goal or attempt to stop it from happening. Their motivations are clearly related to what’s happening in the story, meaning when Fox leads Ram outside the farm for the first time, they don’t head off to the mall to play video games! Their reaction is always within the proper context. With a clear story goal, they can’t take me out of the plot. They can throw me past my comfort zone, add a twist that will take me a while to think through, or re-write a character’s association with another character, but the change is usually for the best. In Sunrise, my last novel I completed, I explained how one of the characters rewrote the conflict of my story. It was better than what I had, but because the character was strong, she led me down a different path, and  I never looked back. In the middle of writing this blog, my protagonist in Jessie’s Song, did something that surprised me.  It ended up increasing the dramatic tension.

On the contrary, if during the outlining stage my characters are screaming for a different outcome, and that outcome is better than my own, I’ll go ahead and tweak the last act to accommodate them. I do what’s right for the story, and I find if I keep that intention, I have a stronger and more emotionally satisfying read.

Writers as actors…

To write a great character I have to become the character as I’m writing. I have to experience her emotions, cry when she does, laugh at what she finds amusing, and be scared when she feels threatened. If I don’t feel any emotions, then I know she’s a flat character. I’ll work on  a scene until I get the appropriate reaction.

My writing routine evolved into an organic  practice in that I let the story flow where it must be without forcing it into what I want. It’s very Tao-like and it’s as pure as storytelling gets to me. This is why I enjoy the process so much. I never know what to expect, and this  leads to suspenseful and exciting storytelling.

What gets you excited about telling stories?

Love and light,

Eleni

On Being An Author Of Visionary Fiction

  By Eleni | August 3, 2012 - 16:06 | , , ,
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I’ve recently met other visionary authors, and we’ve come together to create the Visionary Fiction Alliance as a means to promote the genre. What I value most about this group is that even though we all have diverse opinions, we get along great. The reason for this is because there is no dogmatism in Visionary Fiction. By letting go of beliefs, we humble ourselves and  recognize there are many roads that lead to the same truth…at least that’s how I see it.

What is my personal philosophy as a visionary author? 

After my kundalini awakening I detached from religion, and accepted I cannot know anything beyond what I’m experiencing, as it’s happening.  My characters tend to have difficulties because of their expectations of an outcome along with inflexible thinking.  Only by exploring and expanding their inner-awareness can they hope to find their way out of the mess they got themselves into.  I deal with this aspect mostly in subtext, but it can definitely be felt in the actions my characters take.

What do I believe in?

All the visions and insights I’ve gained since my awakening have opened my eyes to a myriad of possibilities.  I make no assumptions  or claims as to their meaning. Some people have visions and make pronouncements regarding them, but I see too many possibilities as to what mine can imply. That is why writing fiction is the better option for me.  It gives me the freedom to explore all possibilities.

My personal world view is:

Something exists that is greater than us. It presents itself to those of us who seek it out, and we can connect to it if we so desire. When we are connected to this something, we are at our happiest. If we stray too far, we’re mired in materialism, needless rituals, empty vices and are disconnected from that which makes us whole. This disconnection makes us feel like there’s something missing in our lives when, in fact, what makes us whole is already present in each of us, waiting to be rediscovered. 

The above is my personal truth. I don’t expect, nor would I want, others to accept my world view as I learned this on my own. Being a skeptic allowed me to find and connect to this realization that I’ve now internalized. When I refer to being a skeptic, I don’t mean the type that writes books denouncing God, UFOs and all things paranormal. That’s not being a skeptic; that’s another form of dogmatism. In one of my meditations, I received the following message:

“It’s not about being right or wrong. It’s all about the experience.” 

Being a true skeptic is seeing a world filled with infinite possibilities, and while I personally use the term, Divine when I connect to the inner-light, I don’t attach a definition to what the light is.   Narrowing it down to one absolute meaning is impossible, in my opinion. We can only analyze our visions through the lens of this reality, and our interpretations are based upon our understanding of this reality.

In my stories, my world view is clearly established, and I also write to expand my own consciousness and learn new truths. It’s the receptiveness to all possibilities that makes life more exciting and unpredictable to me. With this mindset, there’s no fear of damnation for questioning or choosing to opt-out of dogmatic practices. This includes politics, nationalism, religion and all other groups that adhere to one fixed opinion.  Out here, in the beautiful chaos of independent thought, I’m responsible for my own fate, and I get along with people of all backgrounds because I don’t hold an opinion that I think is superior to anyone else’s. It’s the most liberating feeling—to think freely and openly.  I liken it to having the mind of a child in that I’m not afraid to take chances. To me, this is what it means to live life to the fullest.

Love and light,

Eleni