Tragedy in Florida It was a sad week to be in Florida, one week ago. I can only begin to imagine being one of those parents. Even now they surely must wonder how the world can continue to turn without their child in it. How indeed? But, somehow, the world does turn, and life goes on, doesn’t it? The traffic still stalls at the intersection, the checkout line waits impatiently; obstetricians, school buses, and the UPS trucks make their deliveries. The flags fly at half-mast, the huge ones that can’t, wave long black mourning streamers from their finials mocking the cheerful blue sky. After every tragedy, we go on. We drag our sorrow along like a ball and chain, pack our sadness into our backpacks, and move forward grasping all the courage we can find. We must do this, or we hand a victory to Evil. Prime Minister Churchill said it: My dear people. We must carry on. We must. Carry on.
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The Weekend in Olustee Olustee, Fl, is one of my favorite Civil War reenactments. I’ve blogged about the event before, so I won’t give you the history that’s covered at this event, but I’ll tell you what the weekend was like for this author.
Friday was school day. Great weather. Hundreds of kids. School days are an opportunity to get my information to teachers and interest the kids, but I don’t usually sell much. My sales were over the top all three days! But even better than the sales were things that happened. My earliest customer set the happy tone of the weekend. I knew she was a reader. She walked by, looked at my display and began to gravitate toward my table. She studied the covers, picked up a book, and read the back. Yep. A reader. Her finger rested on my name; she studied every wrinkle in my face. Then, suspiciously, asked, “Is this you?” Yes. “Did you write Cracks in the Ice?” Yes, I did. She threw herself into rapture. “Oh my gosh! That’s my favorite book in all the world. It’s the best book I ever read in my whole entire life!!” (7th grade.) She told me it was in the library of the school she formerly attended. Her new school doesn’t have it; she wished she could find it and read it again. “I couldn’t stop reading it. I couldn’t put it down. Mom said, ‘Riley, it’s time to take your shower,’ and I said, ‘I can’t because I can’t stop reading this book.’ She said I could have an extra 30 minutes if I stopped now, so I did and while I was in the shower she picked it up and started reading then she couldn’t put it down, either, and we had this big pretend fight over the book!” Hidden under the table is the subject of my last blog, the Sample Box. I pulled out Cracks in the Ice, signed it and gave it to her. She was so thrilled. “She loves to read,” her family said. And she recognized my name. What a nice thing. Here’s the fifth-grade gentleman: “You like to read?” “Oh, yes ma’am.” I launch into my spiel; he listens intently, nodding. At the conclusion I say, “I’m the author of the books and I’d be happy to sign one for you.” His mouth drops open. “You’re an Author?” Yes. “Oh, boy! I always wanted to meet a real author. I never met an author before. My name is Daniel Horowitz and I’m happy to meet you.” (He’s been pumping my hand since the ‘Oh boy!’) “Meeting a real author is on my bucket list! Wait here! I’ll be back with my grandpa.” He took off in a cloud of dust. The author sitting beside me is Dr. Edward Arnoff. He’s 80 years old. He laughs so hard, he nearly falls off his stool. He dries his eyes and says, “Maybe I should get going on a bucket list. You think it might be too late for me?” “Well,” I said, “that probably depends on what you want to put on the list.” He thinks about my answer then starts laughing all over again. Now we’re both out of control. “Get back to work!” A woman pulled out her wallet and showed me a picture of a sweet little baby. “She’s almost one now,” she said. “Last year we bought an Avery book from you here. You signed it “to Avery.” I told you my daughter was having my first grandchild soon and they were naming her Avery. This is her. My daughter took her Avery book with her into the labor room. It’s special to her.” Another mom told me her son was 20 now, and in college. Four years ago he bought the Avery books here at Olustee. When she told him he had to get rid of his stuff before he left for college he got rid of piles of books, but he said he needed to keep his Avery and Gunner books. Said he might have kids someday. “They were always his favorite books,” she said. The customer with the cotton candy stuck in her hair: “Look at her, Mom! She’s a real author!” Many weekends like this one, and I will start to believe that myself. The Sample Box I've seen pictures of the horse-drawn tinker's caravan with his samples displayed, rattling down the road. I remember the door-to-door Hoover salesman, the Encyclopedia salesman, and the Jewel Tea truck. My mother couldn't afford them, but she never turned them away. "They're just trying to make a living," she'd say. I know, I'm dating myself. But, I wonder if they were my mentors in marketing?
Since 2010, when I began marketing my books, I've learned how important those salesman's samples are. There are always samples on the display table of whatever I'm selling at the moment, but one never knows the opportunities beyond that moment. I always carry business cards, publisher's catalog and a protective plastic tote with every title in every format, just-in-case. A few years ago I stopped at a diner in rural Georgia for lunch and discovered they had a children's reading corner for their little diners. I brought in my sample box and he bought every picture book I had. When I drive through a small town and spot a bookstore, I go in, introduce myself with a card and ask if they'd like to see what I have. They are usually pleased that I've stopped, sometimes buy some books, but promise to look for the titles with their distributor. I give them a publisher's catalog and they are overjoyed. Small indie booksellers don't get a lot of attention. Last week in Ponte Vedra, FL, my hostess drove us to do some shopping. She was surprised to see a brand new store called 2nd & Charlie's. At first we couldn't tell what kind of store it was -- games, puzzles,electronics --books! Old and new in all genres, it was a bookstore! My sample box and cards were in my own car back at her home. But, we went in and met the manager. He laughed at my predicament and was delighted I came in. We exchanged information and he planned to go on line and see what my publisher had and check my site for other titles. At the event on Saturday in Olustee, FL, I slipped my sample box under the display table, just in case. Early in the day a woman popped up and said she wanted one of everything I had, which was 3 YA Civil War titles. She said it was for her school, so I gave her a different card that has the younger titles on it, and a catalog. "Do you have any here?" I started to say no, but then, "as a matter-of-fact, I do!" She emptied my sample box, bought all 16 titles. I'm thinking of renaming my sample box to my "Just-in-Case" box. My tip for authors today is never leave home without it. A Second Pair of Eyes Continuing our comparison of editing and restoration, I notice yet another similarity: the need for another set of eyes. No matter how practiced we are at spotting editing oversights on other people’s works, it’s easy to fail to see our own. We know what we wanted to say, and that’s what we read. We all need editorial services for works-in-progress prior to submission.
Blogs, as you might expect, sometimes slip by scrutiny as they are frequently written and immediately delivered, unlike a work-in-progress that has months to be fine-tuned and seen by other eyes. I prefer to write blogs in advance to have time to edit, but that doesn’t always happen as the miniblog can be a journal in real time that I expect to edit after the posting. Dawson is an expert at what he does, which is historical restoration. But, he doesn’t hesitate to call in another pair of eyes making sure he doesn’t overlook any detail and to authenticate any discovery. Quick to ask for second opinions and humble enough to hear them, authors should be that careful and receptive. An Indiana Jones Moment Sometimes researching the background of a story leads to surprising or amazing discoveries never envisioned. History is like that; full of hidden secrets. I remember years ago researching Civil War Soldiers’ Recreation and discovered Abner Doubleday, as an officer, visited the very hospital Avery and Gunner, my characters, were working. What a wonderful surprise! I imagine every history writer can tell of at least one memory when they shouted, “What? No way! Yes! I didn’t know that! It’s going to be a chapter!”
Something like that happened last week on our restoration project. When I last posted, Dawson was working on the “middle passage” becoming a library. He was in the process of widening a single doorway into a double doorway and pulling off the wall. When the plaster settled, there before his eyes was an incredible, exposed beam. He knew in an instant he’d discovered something unexpected. The construction technique, wooden nails, heart timber too dense for termites, this beam and others like it, have supported the house built in 1770. Dawson must have felt like Indiana Jones. He called us, of course, but was almost too excited to talk. Historians are at the courthouse now trying to uncover the secrets of our tract. What we know for certain is that the John R. Wheeler House of the 1900s is not the original structure, but a modernization facade built over the top of a much older building. Dawson wonders if it will turn out to be an ancillary building of the plantation whose house is about a current block or two away. Perhaps it was a provision house, a store; perhaps Revolutionary soldiers were garrisoned there. Did George Washington sleep here? Dawson is framing the doorway using the lovely old molding. But one old beam will be left exposed. “It’ll be a great conversation piece,” he says. Y’all need to come and see it. Editing the Middle Passage So, our first restoration project in the new old house is the library. Dawson calls the room “a missed opportunity.” I call it the middle passage. It seems to exist only to get from one room to another; I’m glad it has some bookshelves. Dave, of course, paces it off, and turns it into a mathematical equation. He decides the closet, which takes a chunk out of the room was an afterthought and needs to go. Dawson sees an awkward wall arrangement that left the plan behind, unfinished. I see a dark space, bigger than necessary for a passageway, too small for a room; finished only on one side. Dawson sees a footprint that wants to become a traditional library; a missed opportunity. Dave sees potential in his measurements and says the air vent in the closet wall isn’t connected to anything. Dawson says he’ll have the closet out in under an hour. It will add 10 square feet to that middle passage. I watch and listen and think about paint color. Buddy sprawls in the intersection since this is where the action is, and he suddenly needs a nap under our feet.
The plan is set. The outline in place. The closet is coming out. The two narrow doors in and out of the passage will both become double doorways, giving the little library a welcoming appearance from all the rooms, while becoming a room itself. The unfinished side of the room will be finished exactly like the finished side and it’ll all be tied together with the marvelous old molding. “It will look like it’s always been this way,” Dawson assures me. When editing a novel, we need to look at the overall story plan. The arc, the story progression; where is it going? What is in that middle passage that weighs it down, doesn’t add anything, just gives it heft, uses up space. Does it enlighten the plot, move the whole thing along? Or, is boredom setting in? Is it misdirected, away from the original plan? Is there a missed opportunity here? Take it apart. Rework it. Do something drastic; give it purpose. But get out of the languishing middle passage; put a new bend in the story arc or remove one that doesn’t work for you. Don’t leave the middle unfinished, boring, useless, a missed opportunity. Why have a wall when you can have a library? We’re finishing week one of the new old house edit/restoration/rewrite project. It’s an exciting beginning. Surprise! Surprise! Surprise! Restoration Underway. Last week I blogged the first of the Restoration stories about our new old house. In a paragraph near the end, I recall writing, “There will be no surprises, we’re told.” I can hear Gomer Pyle right now: Su’prahz, su’prahz, su’prahz.
Our last visit there, when we decided to buy the old house, there were 8-10 inches of snow on the ground. In Edenton, where they say it only snows every five years, it’s snowed three times since we first looked at the house, and that week was a doozy. This week we saw the first surprise. The snow and ice caused the three old cement steps on the front porch to crumble. Three new concrete steps weren’t in the budget plan, but, there you go. Surprise! After we met with our restoration expert, Dawson, we learned the cabinetry in the kitchen, nice from a distance, wasn’t made of real wood. The finish was peeling off, hanging like Band-Aids on the doors. Dawson said the face of the cabinet really was wood, so he recommended new wooden doors. He’d have some for us to look at when we returned. We budgeted in new doors. We returned. He was surprised when he got into the cabinetry to discover poor construction and hap-hazard installation. We need new cabinets. Surprise! Ca-ching. I discovered what I had thought was a utility closet next to the kitchen holding a fuse box, paint cans, and so much stuff I really hadn’t looked farther than the door, is a surprisingly deep and very utilitarian space that is unfinished. Imagine? 100 years unfinished? This is the most wonderful surprise! Here is that place that every homeowner dreams of. An unclaimed place full of deep shelves to hold crock pots, baking dishes, trays, platters that get used once a year, and all those flower vases we can’t part with. What a great surprise this is. It even has a light! Dawson will finish it to my specs. What I thought was a really little house is turning out to have amazing space. Dawson’s electrical guys will begin today to remove the nob and tube wiring and rewiring to bring it up to code and safety standards. I do love the old brass plates, though; the little pushbuttons with the mother-of-pearl tops. I hate to replace those with beige plastic; loses some of the elegance. But ever since he explained the chaotic wiring affair to me, I’ve listened all night for the firetrucks zooming down East Queen Street! It hasn’t burned down yet. Happy surprise. The place is growing on me. I think I like it! Surprise, surprise, surprise. Dave knows me better than I know myself, apparently. I’m a writer; I love a happy surprise ending. Restoration, A rewrite in 3-D We’re beginning the restoration on our new home, a 1900s bungalow in the heart of a historic district.
I’m a lover of architecture and history but my least favorite is twentieth century. I seem to be a minority here; everyone who has seen the picture of our house has truthfully proclaimed how they love it! I thought it was kind of a clumsy little house. I prefer the clean lines of a traditional 18th or 19th century colonial: symmetric, generous, graceful. None of which are attributes of our early 20th century Craftsman Bungalow. When I first saw it, I wanted to walk on by. And I did walk on by, everyday for three weeks, noticing that every day I disliked it less. It was growing on me. Fast-forward, we bought it. Our realtor introduced us to Dawson, an historical restoration specialist. I should introduce you first, to my husband Dave, the partner in this restoration. We’ve been married 55 years, and have been best friends since we were 13 and 15 years old. We don’t have the answer to the question, “What would I do without you?” We’ve no idea what that would be like! We’ve lived in many places, in different style houses, and did some work on all of them. This historical restoration, however, is something new for us. Dave is a pragmatic mathematician. He worked most of his life for IBM, then became a realtor/broker after retirement. He loves houses and seeing their potential. I wouldn’t call Dave the creative type; more left brain. He doesn’t readily see details. But what he does see, far better than I, is the foundation of potential. He’s a smart guy, valedictorian, top in his field, an above average vocabulary that doesn’t include vulgarity, and decidedly short on adjectives. When we look at the same room in a house, I describe the color, the moldings, the details. I notice how the light changes and what kind of windows. I imagine what kind of living went on in the room, what kind of history it hides. He will pace off the size and comment on the shape. He didn’t notice the draperies, but he can tell you where all the air ducts are. He knows if the windows are in good shape. He can figure out what was original, what was added. Then he knows what should be done. The inspection shows the house to be “built like a fortress.” Even the 15-year-old the addition is over built. It has some old knob and tube wiring that needs to come up to code, but no roof leaks, no mold, no foundation issues. There will be no surprises, we’re told. We can do this, I say. It’s like editing. Well, actually, renovation is more like editing. Restoration is more like the rewrite. Start taking out some of those commas and postscripts that seemed like a good idea at the time. What can you remove that doesn’t negatively impact the vision? What’s important? How can we best restore this masterpiece back to its original self? And that begins today. |
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Author Deanna lives in the inner-coastal area of Eastern North Carolina in historic Edenton. She belongs to a local bookclub, SCBWI, Catholic Writers Guild, ACFW, NCWN and other writing groups. Categories |