The PAYA Chronicles: The Alligator Duck Stalks at Midnight

I don't know if PAYA will be held in the same location next year, but if it is, all I have to say is this: If you follow the directions and find yourself driving around an industrial park, convinced there's no way you're in the right place, you're in the right place.

PAYA, like many a gem, was hidden away amongst a collection of paint stores, construction firms, and automotive supply centers. Thankfully, there was a sign...



No, not like that. But there was one colorful sign that told us we had made it to our destination.

PAYA was being held at West Chester's Center for Performing and Fine Arts, which meant as we waited for the Listening and Critique Workshop to begin, and as I tried not to freak out, we were able to enjoy the art on display. There were a couple of pieces that stood out to me, but strangely enough, the one I remember most was a drawing that said, "A is for Alligator Duck." Apparently alligator ducks have big, fearsome teeth, so if you run into one in your neighborhood, best to run the other way.

The workshop started right on time with six incredible authors: Amy Brecount White (Forget-Her-Nots), Jon Skovron (Struts and Frets), Josh Berk (The Dark Days of Hamburger Halpin), Stephanie Kuehnert (Ballads of Suburbia), Jeri Smith-Ready (Shade), and Shannon Delany (13 to Life). The gathering was intimate, which is my way of saying there were about seven people in attendance, including Aine, who was allowed to tag along, since she had woken up at 5am to get my late-waking butt there on time.

Six talented authors, seven attendees. I don't think I'll ever have such an incredible opportunity again. It started with each author speaking on an aspect of the writing process:

• Jon Skovron spoke about rough drafts and how they don't have to be perfect. Give yourself permission to have a rough draft that sucks. It's more important to get started writing than to never write at all for fear that what you're putting on the page isn't perfect.
• Jeri Smith-Ready discussed the revision process. For her, the process includes three steps: 1) The Re-write, where the writer steps back and assesses the entire book, tries to re-imagine it and to really take a look at the work as a whole. 2) Revision, where gaps in the story start to be smoothed out. 3) Polish, where the writer gets into the nitty-gritty and focuses on things like overuse of words and sentence structure.
• Josh Berk talked about working with an editor and how much his novel, The Dark Days of Hamburger Halpin, was changed and improved in the process. Honestly, this scared the heck out of me, as I'm very open to revisions, but Josh's editor asked him to change tense (I can do that, I've already changed POV at an agent's suggestion), asked him to change the starting point of the story (I could do that too), and asked him to get rid of one character and to include a new one (eeeek!!!). OK, it's that last one that scares me. I get very, very attached to my characters. But I guess I'd deal with it, if and when it came to that.
• Amy Brecount White gave six tips on originality: 1) Think like a freelancer, always be on the lookout for a great story idea, don't wait for that idea to be handed to you. 2) Write for an audience you care about. 3) Write the novel that only you can write. 4) Figure out what you love and what you want to share with the world. 5) Pay attention to your life - What do you know that is unique to you? 6) Listen to the universe. Sometimes the universe will give you little hints as to what direction to take (or sometimes it'll hit you over the head with a 2x4).
• Stephanie Kuehnert talked about character development. The way she does it, each of her characters has a notecard with their name and birthdate, then she includes details like nervous habits, physical description, etc. She also writes a scene for each character, from their point of view, on the defining moment of their lives. By doing this, she's basically trying to answer the question: Why is the character the way they are?
• Finally, Shannon Delany wrapped up by telling us one important truth about being an author: Writing a book is a group effort. To be a good writer, you have to be a good team player. Embrace your support system, from your agent, to your editor, to the marketing team and cover artist on down.

Not bad advice, huh? Next up, the Critique, and how I almost gave myself a concussion in the process (because I'm smooth like that).

The Road to PAYA

It started at 6:38am. That's when I was woken up by the insistent buzzing of my cell phone. I peered blearily at the caller ID, it was Aine...who had come to pick me up at 6:30am.

I had overslept. I never oversleep when I'm this excited about an event. Usually I'm up half an hour before the alarm goes off. Not this time.

I screamed, I actually screamed. Not quite the Darth Vader, "Nooooooo!" More like an "AHHHHHH!" of sheer panic. Luckily, I had packed and laid out my clothes the night before. After scrambling about like a mad woman, I had the dogs walked and was out the door in a little under a half an hour. Aine pointed out, probably quite rightly, that maybe next time I should spend more time getting to bed early and less time tweeting and blogging till 2 in the morning. Just an idea.

We got on the road, and it was a beautiful drive up to West Chester, PA. We crossed over picturesque stone bridges that spanned rushing creeks, drove through lush forest, and finally passed some lovely parks. At one point, I suggested that maybe we pull over and frolic in one particularly inviting green meadow, but Aine said there would be no frolicking (no frolicking!), as we had to get to my Listen and Critique Workshop on time.

Oh yeah, the Listen and Critique Workshop. As we entered West Chester, I started to panic all over again. Would I make a fool of myself? (most definitely) Would I get the feedback I needed? (heck yeah) And most importantly, how had we ended up in this industrial park and where was PAYA?


One of many parks in West Chester. I could frolic here! Frolic!

It's a Mango, It's a Pineapple, No, It's Paya!

Papaya?



No, PAYA! AKA, Bringing YA to PA, a coalition of authors, bloggers, librarians and readers dedicated to promoting YA literature in Pennsylvania. PAYA is having their first annual event...oh, TOMORROW, and my BFF Aine and I are going. There'll be over eighteen YA authors there, signing books, along with a used book sale, a listen and critique workshop, and a bake sale.

How excited am I? Probably a little too excited. It's like Christmas in August as far as I'm concerned. I even packed and prepped ahead of time. I never do that. Here's what I'm bringing to the Festival:

• My backpack, with stylish Mockingjay pin attached (Team Katniss!)
• Ten copies of the first three pages of my manuscript, Knights of Avalon, for the listen and critique workshop
• Five pens, in case four of the pens run out of ink
• Two notebooks, one is small and pink and covered in smiling kitty cats. I usually bring a larger, more practical notebook as well, but I just discovered they're all filled up, so I'll bring my leather-bound journal instead, aka "The Noodle Book," because I noodle around with ideas on its pages
• Cash, for books and baked goodies

Though my latest manuscript, Knights of Avalon, is finished, revised, and currently running amuck in Query-land, I decided to do the workshop because I've never done one before and it promised to be an incredible learning opportunity.

Plus, I'm still having issues with the beginning of my book. I like to think that I'm getting a lot better at 'diagnosing' weaknesses in my work and fixing them, but in this case, my instincts are horribly off. What I think works doesn't work and vice versa. I've revised and revised and sometimes only made the problems worse, not better, so maybe I need to step back and get some perspective. Maybe if I can see what works for other writers, I'll be able to apply those lessons learned to my own story. That's the idea, anyways.

I know the draw of the listen and critique workshop is that there'll be several YA authors there to give feedback, but the reality just hit me, and oh my gods, THERE'LL BE PUBLISHED YA AUTHORS THERE TO GIVE ME FEEDBACK. La-la-la-la, I can't hear you! Not curling into a ball and freaking out.

Somehow I had convinced myself it'd just be me and some fellow writers. I think I could handle that. We'd be like The League of Not Yet Extraordinary Aspiring Authors, there'd be some comraderie and it wouldn't be at all scary. But now...there are going to be real, live, actual authors there. Yikes!

Green Men, King Arthur, People Singing to My Camera!

Somewhere, long lost to the mists of time, I promised to regale you all with my adventures at RenCon 2010. So let's go back, back to April 2010, when you could buy pop for a nickel and children always listened to their parents, and I shall tell you a tale of myth and legend and retail therapy.

This was the first ever RenCon, and as such, I didn't really know what to expect. I was thinking 'Indoor RenFaire,' and it was definitely some of that, but along the way, the convention got some Steampunk in their Renaissance and some Renaissance in their Steampunk. Not that that was necessarily bad. I can't hide it anymore, this Steampunk thing is growing on me. Which means by the time I've fully embraced it, it'll be out of style.

But besides the Steampunk and inordinate quantity of fairies, there was this scholarly vibe to the con which I really liked. There were panels on Renaissance food and dress, on the Green Man, and yes, on King Arthur. Because how can you have something called RenCon and not mention King Arthur?

I think as most of my readers know, my YA Urban Fantasy, Knights of Avalon, is about the Knights of the Round Table being reincarnated as New Jersey teens, so I especially wanted to attend those King Arthur panels.

Unfortunately, I missed the one on the Holy Grail, due to my bothersome need to have a job, and to keep a roof over my head and to eat, but I was able to attend the Arthurian Love Triangle panel led by Caitlin Matthews. Yes, THAT Caitlin Matthews, legendary author, artist, and scholar. OK, she's a legend to me, and she's insanely cool, and she sang to my camera, but more on that later.


I've heard her speak before and not only does she know her stuff, but she's a riot to listen to. She actually spent a lot of time discussing Welsh love triangles (for example, the story of Lleu Llaw Gyffes, Blodeuwedd, and Gronw Pebr), before tying them into the Arthurian ones and discussing the concept of the Flower Bride as it pertained to Queen Guinevere. What's a Flower Bride? It's basically an archetype, a woman who represents the strength and life of the land, who is intimately tied to the kingdom itself, and who men constantly fight over, because to have her as a wife is a symbol of right of rulership.

Which is why poor Guinevere is always getting kidnapped, because she's a symbol of legitimate authority.

Towards the end, Caitlin Matthews somehow got onto the subject of how Lancelot became known as Lancelot du Lac (Lancelot of the Lake). As the story goes, his father was a powerful king caught in the midst of a bloody war. As his castle was being stormed, Lancelot's mother took her infant son and fled. During all the confusion, she set her son down for a moment and Viviane, the Lady of the Lake, stole him away. Only Caitlin Matthews acted it all out to hilarious effect. She ran around in a panic, pretending to be Lancelot's mother, then did her best impression of Viviane, sneaking up to the baby and grabbing him when Mom wasn't looking. I guess you had to be there, but it was pretty awesome.

After the panel was over, I went up to Caitlin to ask her a couple of questions and to take her picture...and my camera died. Caitlin was unfazed. She told me she had a trick to getting electronic devices to power up: She sang to them. In her lovely, rich voice, she bade my camera to turn on, and you know what, it did.

Before I left the convention, I did some shopping. Not much, due to the aforementioned need to eat and have someplace to sleep, but I did get myself two pendants: One of Brigid, Celtic Goddess of Fire and Inspiration, and one of the Lady of the Lake.

If I Had a Pen Name

Hanging out with my Dad a couple of weeks ago, he asked me out of the blue what my pen name was going to be. The conversation went something like this:

Me: Um, pen name? I was thinking of using, you know, my actual name.

Dad: But you could have a pen name. Don't you want a pen name?

Me: Nah, I think I'm good. I know my name's not the most exciting or catchy, but it works for me.

Dad: Or you could write under your beagle's name, since anytime anyone asks for a picture of you, you just give them a picture of your beagle. Then you could write stuff like, "Marley & Me," but from the viewpoint of the dog (this is admittedly true, if you ask for a photo of me for a blog interview, for example, you're going to get a lovely, photogenic picture of Lucy the beagle).



Me: So my pen name could be Lucy T. Beagle then? There is a famous author called Peter Beagle, I guess it could work.

Dad: What's the T. stand for?

Me: The, as in Lucy The Beagle.

While I do want to use my real name, I admit I've been toying with the idea a little, and I think I'd like to add a middle name at some point. You see, I don't have a middle name in real life, so part of the fun would be in choosing one. I have a couple of ideas, but all I know is that it has to start with the letter 'A'.

Why that letter? Because at my work, everyone is required to have a middle initial, it's just how the computer system works, and by committee, it was pretty much decided that my middle initial would be 'A', because that'd be cool. No really, the CFO declared that having my initials be 'MAB' would be 'cool'. It was either that or 'MOB', but he said he didn't want to be mean.

Shortly afterwards, on some paperwork completely unrelated to my job, I saw that my middle initial was listed as 'A'. I figure it's a sign from the universe, so I'll go with it.

Here There Be Fairies

Last month I made my semi-annual trek to the Spoutwood Fairy Festival near Glen Rock, PA. As far as I'm concerned, it's one of the highlights of the year, filled with food, music, shopping, and yes, plenty of fairies.



It's a dog-friendly event and this year, I feared against my better judgment, I decided to bring along my hound mix Hope, aka li'l dingo, aka the evil sofa-eater. As much as I wish I could've brought the beagle, Lucy is terrified of crowds and the Rottweiler...well, that just wasn't going to work out either.



Much to my shock, Hope was the star of the show. Well, except for that unfortunate ATM incident (if you saw a girl in a silver car at the ATM, with a strange brindle hound mix hanging half-way out the window, the girl hanging onto the dog's collar for dear life...yes, that was me). But otherwise she was fabulous. People were petting her, hugging her, kindly feeding her pepperoni and other treats. I've never seen Hope look so happy, not even after she ate my couch. For the record, I have no idea what type of dog she is. She is a mystery, wrapped inside a furniture-eating enigma.



While it's not a book-centric event by any means, it's a lot of fun and a great place to get creative and to find your inspiration. And there was at least one booth there dedicated to books. Browsing through them, I've pretty much decided that I'm going to have to read Incarceron at some point. It just might take me a while as I still haven't made a dent in my considerably large TBR pile.

Look! An Interview!

Soooo....I've been so busy lately that I totally forgot to post about my first ever interview on my very own blog. Clearly I must work on this self-promotion stuff if I am ever to become a successful author. Me=Fail.

Did I mention it was my first interview? Ever? How cool is that?! And many thanks to Dorothy Dreyer for the interview and for her excellent site. The one thing I learned, having never done one of these before, is that interviews take time. At least it did for me. Maybe I'll get better at it with more experience, but I have a new found appreciation for all those authors out there kind enough to answer a few questions for the bloggerly masses (*cough* Amy Brecount White *cough*).

Coming soon to a blog, possibly this blog, soon: Pics from several cons and festivals I've been to, as well as a recap of the first annual Gaithersburg Book Festival, where I totally made a fool out of myself in front of Phyllis Reynolds Naylor.