Category: Writing

Writing Process (Part 5)

On By VickieIn Cassandra's Daughter, WritingLeave a comment
First cover attempt

What follows is Part 5 of my discussion of the writing process I went through to get Cassandra’s Daughter to print. In this installment, I am coming close to feeling like I might actually have a final draft. And I should point out that when I say a final draft, by no means did that mean I thought it was nearly finished. I had just gotten it close to a point where I might be willing to let someone (other than my children) read it.

At this stage, the story was not quite told in chronological order. I was still trying to mix things up – for dramatic effect. Each chapter was devoted to the third-person perspective of a single character, and I had chapters devoted to many more characters than just Cora, Leah, and Cassandra. There were chapters for Bessie, Kevin, Dr. Pendergast, etc. 

But I wanted Cassandra’s story to be told differently. I wanted Cassandra to be rendered voiceless and unable to create as a result of the generational secrets kept from her. But as she discovered the truth, she would be able to gain her voice, to create, to tell her own story. This would mean that I wanted her to tell her own story in first person by the end of the book. But how to make that transition?

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Writing Process (Part 4)

On By VickieIn Cassandra's Daughter, WritingLeave a comment

Some people have been asking about how I ended up writing Cassandra’s Daughter, and so I started this set of posts. If you are just finding this, you can go back to Part One to start from the beginning. In the previous installment, I discussed some of the “big picture” decisions I was making during the early drafts of the book while living in the Outer Banks.

At this point, I was mostly spending my time imagining, finding connections, solving puzzles, doing research, and telling stories.

As I would read through each latest draft, I would constantly find myself asking questions:

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Writing Process (Part 3)

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I made sure to squeeze in a safari when in Africa.

I ended the previous installment of this journey of how the idea of a novel turned into the physical manifestation of the novel in my (and in many other people’s!) bookcase with the decision to move to the Outer Banks where I could begin to do the actual writing. (You can go back to the beginning of the story and start with Part One if you haven’t read that yet.)

As I mentioned in the Part Two, I spent two weeks in Africa at a writers’ workshop. While there, I focused my time on developing the premise of the book as well as pinpointing the emotions that I wanted to elicit from readers both throughout the book and then at the end.

I was curious about what I had come up with while in Africa, so I pulled out all of my notes from that trip to see what I might have jotted down.

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Writing Process (Part 2)

On By VickieIn Cassandra's Daughter, Writing1 Comment
The view from my back porch in the Outer Banks

In my previous post, I explained a bit about my writing process for a screenplay that I wrote before I started working on Cassandra’s Daughter. And the process involved a tight outline and index cards taped to my bedroom wall. That was definitely not the process with this book. 

The spark for this book came not with a desire to write a book. It began as a self-imposed writing exercise. My mother passed away in 2013, so this exercise must have taken place quite a few years prior to that, probably in the early 2000s. At that time, I challenged myself to regularly write, whether I had a project I was working on or not. So I would go to the dentist for a root canal and then try to describe my experience using all my senses: the aesthetics of the office, the TV loudly playing as a failing means of distraction, the pushing and pulling on my teeth, the taste of chemicals, the horrific sounds of the drill and the saliva sucking tube, and finally, the smell (of burning flesh? Tooth? What IS that smell??). Or other times I would people-watch and single out someone to ascribe a personality to. And then I would do a character sketch of that person. One of those writing exercises ignited the spark for what became Cassandra’s Daughter.

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Thoughts on My Writing Process for Cassandra’s Daughter

On By VickieIn Captain, Cassandra's Daughter, Writing4 Comments

Now that my novel Cassandra’s Daughter is available on Amazon, I thought it might be interesting to document the process of bringing this kernel of an idea to fruition.

And that is exactly how it started – as a very small kernel. Previously, I had spent my writing career focusing on nonfiction essays and narratives. For some reason, I had made the decision in high school, if not earlier, that I was not creative and was incapable of doing any type of creative writing. I have no idea why I came to that decision. But that decision led to ridiculous poems about rocks in English class. Clearly, rather than change my belief that I was incapable of writing a poem by putting some actual effort into the writing, I instead purposely produced doggerel in record time.

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Reflections on My 1996 Essay About My Future Family

On By VickieIn family, Writing1 Comment

Searching through a box of essays, opinion pieces, nonfiction narratives, and endless notes on scrap paper of ideas to write about, I found an essay I wrote in early 1996 when I was pregnant with my first child. In it, I reflected on my life with my own family as well as what the future held for this new family I was creating. 

I thought it might be interesting to write a follow-up blog post today, in 2022, 26 years and two children later. If you haven’t read the original post, you can find it HERE.

First of all, the baby I was pregnant with turned out to be my daughter Emily. At the time, we didn’t want to know if she was a boy or a girl, so there was no gender reveal party, cake, or unintentional wildfire. I wanted to do it old school. Also, nearly three years later, I had a second baby, a son. This time, we found out the sex because I thought it would be better for my daughter to prepare for and to be able to accurately visualize the new baby is she knew it was a brother or a sister. Besides, I thought if she had her heart set on a baby sister and it turned out to be a boy, that might be an issue. This way, she could have her heart set on exactly who he was.

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Cassandra’s Daughter NOW available!

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Available on Amazon

It’s HERE!!

Cassandra’s Journal is now available on Amazon as both a paperback and an ebook!
 
This is a book that has been five years in the making. I did take a year off in the middle of writing, however, to write Clara’s Journal: And the Story of Two Pandemics, an unexpected project but one that called to me when we were in COVID lockdowns.

It is a bittersweet moment to get to this point. This novel has been such a big part of my life over the past few years, including my time in the Outer Banks, which was devoted entirely to working on this. 

And now I have to let it go. I have to let it go out into the world where I lose control of it and leave it vulnerable to all who come across it. It is an overwhelming realization. But it is time.

I hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoyed the time writing on it. I am planing on writing a blog post (probably a series of posts) about the writing process that I went through with this book. I thought it might be interesting to document that.

But right now, I think I am going to get some rest. I am exhausted.  In the past two weeks I have read the book at least 7 times, pouring through it for typos, mistakes, formatting problems, etc. I even found an error last night at midnight right before the book went live. So I am sure I missed some, and I have to be ok with that. 

Thanks to you who have supported me in this journey! It means the world.

You can buy your copy HERE.

Thoughts on My Favorite Scar

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My scar, traversing across my swollen womb

No one would willingly ask for a scar. Such defacement is considered as ugly as the word. Hard and cold, it can only be uttered with a sneer. But the scar across my belly carries none of this ugliness. I have no hard feelings about it. I am even willing to wear a two-piece bathing suit in summer, ensuring public exposure. When I shower each morning, my soapy hands do not stop to pause on the six-inch raised line. As I stand before the mirror, desperately searching for an outfit appropriate for whatever my particular mood that day, my eyes never land on it. It goes unnoticed. In fact, the only time I am reminded of it is when someone catches a glimpse of it and recoils, wondering what happened! Then I begin the story revealing the circumstances surrounding my “disfigurement.”

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Something a Bit Different!

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The cover reveal of my upcoming novel!

Today is a big day in a journey I have been on for a few years. The cover of the novel I have been working on, Cassandra’s Daughter, is finished!

When I was only a year old, my mother had electric shock therapy. It was the 1960s. She blurted this news out to me when I was assigned to read One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest in high school English class. The information was delivered matter-of-factly, with no detail or further explanation. And it was never brought up again. I certainly didn’t feel comfortable asking any questions.

But as my mother came near the end of her life, I thought about what that experience must have been like for her. This was also a time that I was doing a lot of writing, mostly essays, op-eds, and narrative nonfiction articles for newspapers and magazines. Between articles, I challenged myself with writing exercises. I wrote about my experience getting a filling while at the dentist, doing my best to capture the sterile environment and the horror that all my senses were going through. I detailed a ride I took on a city bus, describing the indiosyncrasies surrounding me. And I thought it might be a good exercise to try to climb into my mother’s skin and “feel” what it was like for her in a hospital room in 1963. Twenty-five pages later, I was horrified at what I imagined she had gone through.

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Thoughts on Losing Control

On By VickieIn Writing1 Comment
Photo by Jakob Rosen on Unsplash

I have never been so out of control, yet at the same time in complete control. I didn’t even know that was possible.

“Uh oh. That doesn’t feel right.”

How can I be so in tune with my car? I have owned it for seven years and am about as comfortable as you can get when I am driving it. But it is hard for me to believe just how sensitive my feel is when it comes to what is happening with my little two-door Honda Civic. And for a split second, something doesn’t feel right. My back tires suddenly don’t feel connected to the pavement of the freeway. How can I know that?

But a moment later, it is clear that I am absolutely right. I am hydroplaning. 

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