Kindle Author Interview

Five of my titles are now available in the Amazon Kindle Store:
The Saint of Florenville: A Love Story (NEW NOVEL!)
The Wisdom of Les Miserables: Lessons From the Heart of Jean Valjean (nonfiction)

Novels

Circles of Stone
Down a Narrow Alley (sequel to Circles of Stone)
A Love Forbidden

This week  I was interviewed by writer, director, producer David Wisehart for his "Kindle Author" blog. I invite you to take a look.

Evolution of a Novel: Conception to Birth

On the morning of July 26, 2010, something entirely new and quite unexpected happened to me. But first, let me backtrack. I had already written and published five novels, the most recent, Down a Narrow Alley (2005). Since then I've turned my attention mostly to nonfiction projects, the most satisfying of which was The Wisdom of Les Miserables: Lessons From the Heart of Jean Valjean (2008). This set of personal reflections on themes from Victor Hugo's classic novel have been well-received (with limited sales, my literary fate).

I had no intention of writing another novel. I thought I'd told all the stories I had in me, except for one half-finished, dead-in-the-water novel (and stories I make up for my grandson's entertainment). That's why I was surprised to wake up that July morning a year ago with a rough, but complete, narrative arc in my head, three main characters who would carry the story from beginning to end. I even had a working title,  A Train to Bruges. For the next six weeks, I continued to wake up with snippets of story and characterization, all of which I scribbled in the notebook I keep bedside, just in case (rarely) I  think of something brilliant during the night.*

As always, writing the first draft was exhilarating. My dreamed-up characters came to life. My villain was sufficiently evil. Best of all, I knew from Day 1 how the story would end. Studying the completed draft, I realized as many novelists do in that situation, that all I had in hand was a skeleton. My story needed flesh, which came only with grinding effort through subsequent drafts, along with  whatever research I needed to make the setting and characters seem real.

By June 18, 2011, I had arrived at Draft 8.2 and could finally add the # # # symbols to indicate "The End." Somewhere along the way, my working title had yielded to the current pre-pub title, The Saint of Florenville: A Love Story. Not that a novel is ever really finished as long as it's still in the author's hands. Once already, I've gone back in to add a few sentences to close an information gap that will keep the reader from wondering, "What about . . . ?" 

Now the real work begins: marketing a manuscript the book-reading world is not panting for and competing with the other million or so books being published this year. Like a lot of my colleagues of a "certain age," the question is, do I set out to find another agent (I've had three over the course of my career, but no one currently)? Or do I play my "Go Directly to Self- and E-pub" card? I'm pulled in both directions. Response to the ms. from my beta readers has been encouraging (overwhelming, in fact): "the most powerful novel I've ever read" . . . "the characters drew me as if I was attached to them by rope or chain" . . . "a powerful story" . . . "a gorgeous, romantic novel, beautiful, masterful." Heady stuff. I still haven't decided which way to go. I'll let you know which direction I take in future posts.

For a sample, click on the heading, "Work In Progress," above.

* The lined, hardcover notebook was a gift from writer-friend Elizabeth Koehler-Pentacoff in May 2010 for my role in helping with the California Writers Club, Mount Diablo Branch's Young Writers Contest. The notebook had rested on my night stand unused until that moment in July when I began filling its pages each morning with plot, character, and setting notes.

Battling Writer's Guilt

It’s five years since my last novel, Down a Narrow Alley.* I had begun to think that I had no more book-length stories left in me. To my surprise, I woke up one late July morning with what seems like a viable novel project, complete with interesting characters,  at least a rudimentary plot line/narrative arc (always my nemesis). 

Since I've been sitting on a half-written novel and a bunch of other “concepts,” I promised myself that I would not begin to write until I had a compass, in the form of a nearly complete outline (beginning, middle, and end). 

Typically, the brainstorms that fly from my imagination have a short lifespan. This new one, whose working title is A Train to Bruges, feels different. It breathes pure oxygen and includes subplots/obstacles/solutions/twists that show promise of getting me beyond Chapter 5. The first 5,000 words flooded into an MS Word document. "Hey, world, A. J. Garrotto's got his groove back!" Then, I got sucker-punched. Never saw it coming. My attacker's name was Guilt (capitalized and italicized). 

"Do you know how long it'll to take you to finish this thing?" 

I recognized the strident, mocking voice. It has hounded me through every attempt to write a good novel, if not the Great American Novel. "Yeah," I said, already rocked back on my heels, "about a year."

"How can you justify a commitment like that when you already have a close-to-full-time job . . . and a family?" Not having a ready answer left me open to another jab. "And, even if you finish your sorry-ass novel, who's going to read it besides your relatives and most loyal friends? Oh, and by the way, have you checked the sales of your last three novels lately? Just how many millions down are they on Amazon's sales chart?"

I'm chagrined at how easily I succumb to this kind of writer-abuse, but there is a positive side. In the euphoria of inspiration and renewed dedication, I hadn't stopped to ask myself why I want to write this novel. This question is the step-child of the greater question, why do I write at all. Granting the validity of some of the negatives in my adversary’s mockery, are there any good reasons to write what might turn out to be another “dead-end” novel? 

Yes! And let me point them out.

1. The search for meaning is the great work of my life. Writing a novel helps me to explore parts of my inner Self that I neglect in other aspects of my daily existence. Through my characters, I learn things about myself. Is it selfish to write for one's own benefit and growth? In a way, but I’d rather think of writing as a unique way for the divine to reach into my heart and put a few more pieces of the puzzle of my life in place.

2. I write to leave a personal legacy to my daughters and grandchildren. Maybe they’ll learn things about me that I have not disclosed in face to face revelation and understand how I got to be who I am.

3. Recently, while journaling, I had an insight about myself. I wrote, “I am a storyteller. That’s who I am.” Everything I do in life is related to story, whether it's journaling in private or writing fiction and nonfiction for publication. In my professional life as lay minister in my local parish, I listen to human stories and share my own jagged story--connecting all of it to the Great Story that God is telling in the history of planet Earth and the expanding universe. 

4.  Making up stories is fun!
Now that I’m warmed up, I could add to that list, but I don’t need to. I already have enough reasons to add chapters to this new work, mining its personal treasures and deferring judgments about its ultimate literary value and its future in the publishing universe. Let it end up two millionth on Amazon. The writing is the thing. And for this storyteller, that’s enough.

* Down a Narrow Alley is the sequel to Circles of Stone (2002, Hilliard and Harris Publishers)

(c) 2010 by Alfred J. Garrotto