Rock Star Mentors

 

Mentorship: “People ahead of you in their career who inspire you.”

Who doesn’t need writing support? I know my writing life depends on it, and as I've studied other authors, I've found even those on the NYT Bestsellers List depend on feedback and encouragement  from other writers.

I recently read an article by Jessica Conoley about writing support for authors. It was so good, I plan to pick it apart and use many of her points in my Hoosier Ink posts for most of this year.

Conoley says, “If you are lacking in motivation and inspiration, invest some time in finding your mentors.”

I’m not one who lacks motivation, but like a super sponge, I try to soak in gallons of inspiration from those who go before me! I follow blogs, attend conferences, and look for any opportunity to connect with published writers.

Here's one form of mentoring I hadn’t given much thought to: Rock Star Mentors. Big names. Like James Patterson or Dean Koontz or Ted Dekker or Frank Peretti or J.K. Rowling. 

Mentors from afar.

Unless you happen to be a friend of theirs, you won’t get one-on-one instruction, but you can:

1. Read their books and study how they put together their sentences, their scenes, their plot lines, etc. Figure out what they’re doing, and apply it to your own writing.

I used Marie Killilea for my rock star to study. Her book, Karen, about raising a daughter with  cerebral palsy, was the inspiration for my own story of growing up with a deaf sister. Killilea isn't a household name, but her book sold millions of copies.

2.  Look for videos on available platforms. Take notes on the shared wisdom of bestselling authors.

Since Marie Killilea passed on into eternity years ago, I've chosen Lisa Wingate as one of my favorite authors to study. It took me less than five minutes to find a video of her teaching a writing workshop that interested me.

3.  Check out their social media. Study how they interact with their followers.

I’ll admit it’s my weakest area. I’m not a chatty-Kathy type of person, so I can learn from those who appear at ease on these platforms.

I had already followed Lisa Wingate’s website, but for this article, I checked for her name in      all  the social media I use. I found out:

A.   She posts daily on Facebook (and she’s funny).

B.   She posts almost as often on Twitter. It seems to be less personal and more related to her author platform.

C.    She does a lot on Pinterest (I liked her quotes board the best)

D.    And on Instagram. I’m kind of new to both and don’t understand why there are so many different pages to follow (is pages the correct word?).

E.    I couldn’t find her on MeWe or Rumble.

 

Having written this post, I am now giving myself a specific assignment.

Lisa Wingate, who will probably never know it, is now my “Rock Star Mentor.” I plan to tune in everyday to her social media and study any patterns I can find (and shamelessly copy) so I can practice the same skills on my own platforms for my own work.

I challenge you to find your own Rock Star Mentor.

I will also make you a promise: if you write a comment about this post and make sure to advertise your own online presence and your hoped-for Rock Star Mentor, I promise to follow your blog and social media platform(s). Who knows? Maybe a lot of our readers will follow you, too.

And maybe you could return the favor?

Linda Sammaritan writes realistic fiction, mostly for kids ages ten to fourteen. She is currently working on a middle grade trilogy, World Without Sound, based on her own experiences growing up with a deaf sister.

Linda had always figured she’d teach middle-graders until school authorities presented her with a retirement wheelchair at the overripe age of eighty-five. However, God changed those plans when He gave her a growing passion for writing fiction. In May of 2016, she blew goodbye kisses to her students and dedicated her work hours to learning the craft.

A wife, mother of three, grandmother to seven, Linda regales the grandchildren with “Nona Stories,” tales of her childhood. Maybe one day those stories will be in picture books!

Where Linda can be found on the web:

www.lindasammaritan.com

www.facebook.com/lindasammaritan

www.twitter.com/LindaSammaritan

Thank you to Jessica  Conoley, author and writing coach, who inspired this post! https://jessicaconoley.com/

Side note: If you also read and loved the book, Karen, I found out Karen Killilea passed away last year at the age of eighty. A rock star mentor in her own right as a quiet champion of the disabled simply by living her own life.

Authentic Contradictions

Michael Hauge is a Hollywood script consultant whose plot workshop several of us attended at the ACFW conference in Indy a few years ago. He's a keen observer of what animates characters in books and movies, as well as real life, and he made this comment in his Christmas e-mail greeting:

...All those people cramming the malls and clogging the freeways and jostling onto airplanes and enduring long lines so their kids can talk to Santa are doing so in order to bring a bit of happiness to others...Their actions are all driven by a desire to offer someone else a sign of their love or affection or gratitude.

As Michael notes, our holiday actions speak more ardently than our words. We tell our friends and family how much we love them, but we make it even clearer when we brave those crowds at the mall.


On the other hand, holiday stress may cause us to act contrary to our motives. While we want to do something special for those we love, we groan at the thought of elbowing through crowds to buy gifts for them. Nerves fray. Patience fails. Emotional outbursts flare.


Just before Christmas, I overheard a woman criticizing her husband with venomous sarcasm because they had waited so long in a supermarket checkout lane. She stormed out in a fit of pique, her partner following meekly behind, and they abandoned a cart full of groceries selected for their holiday feast. Her actions contradicted her motives.


"Contradiction is character," says New Yorker columnist Adam Gopnik. Be mindful of such contradictions as you write. Complex persons (i.e., authentic ones) often do just the opposite of what they intend.



Joe Allison has been a member of the Indiana Chapter of American Christian Fiction Writers since 2010. He lives in Anderson, IN. His non-fiction books include Setting Goals That Count and Swords and Whetstones.

 

 

"Realists of a Larger Reality"

I draw inspiration from secular writers as much as from Christian writers because they often see with disarming clarity what writers are called to do. A good example was Ursula Le Guin's acceptance speech at the National Book Awards in mid-November. This 85-year-old writer of science fiction observed that sci-fi and fantasy seldom receive national awards, but...

I think hard times are coming when we will be wanting the voices of writers who can see alternatives to how we live now and can see through our fear-stricken society and its obsessive technologies to other ways of being, and even imagine some real grounds for hope. We will need writers who can remember freedom. Poets, visionaries—the realists of a larger reality.

Like secular fantasy writers, we seldom win national literary prizes and we feel pressured to conform to publishers' commercial formulas. But we don't write for prizes or profits. As Le Guin says, we write because we are "the realists of a larger reality." We see blessed "alternatives to how we live now," and we want to write that vision. Our standard of success is how faithfully we depict that vision.

__________________

Joe Allison and his wife, Judy, live in Anderson IN, where Joe serves as Editorial Director of Discipleship Resources & Curriculum for Warner Press, Inc. Joe has several nonfiction books in print, including Swords and Whetstones: A Guide to Christian Bible Study Resources. He's currently writing a trilogy of Christian historical novels set in the Great Depression.

Visit Joe's blog at http://southernmtns.wordpress.com

Interview with Author and Genesis Contest Coordinator Pamela S. Meyers

By Jeff Reynolds

About a year ago, I had been reading a batch of suspense stories. I had thought of reading a novel by my favorite author, Randy Singer, who specializes in legal suspense. But I felt a need for a break, a breath of fresh air. Well, one of the books just below the one by Singer was a title I won on-line – Thyme For Love by Pamela S. Meyers. That book was exactly what I needed. It kept me guessing on who did it, but I also found it lightened my spirits. (I love suspense, but you could say cozy mysteries are my literary comfort food.)

It is my privilege to interview Pamela Meyers this month. Besides her writing, she's very active with American Christian Fiction Writers (ACFW) as the Genesis Contest Coordinator. I'll mention that I had sent her the questions a couple of months ago to give her time to write this.

Jeff Reynolds: Welcome to Hoosier Ink, Pam. Your web-page states that while your debut novel came out in 2011, your desire to write Christian fiction has been around a while. Can you tell us when you first caught the writing bug, and how you got from there to where you are now?

Pam Meyers: I think the desire to write was in me for many years. When I was 8 I asked for a diary for Christmas which I received and I began recording my daily activities in it – which lasted about a month. I may have stopped making regular entries in the little book, but I still came back to it many times over the years -- now it's a hoot to read.

As an adult I have always journaled, mostly related to my spiritual walk, but it wasn't until I returned to college and entered an accelerated adult program where most of the assignments were written reports that the writing bug really took hold. I took all the writing courses I could and was flabbergasted when my writing prof suggested I pursue writing for publication. It was several years before I focused on fiction, but once I did, I've never looked back. Even then, it took a long time of learning the craft, networking, and growing as a writer in many ways. I like to say that when I began the fiction-writing journey Bill Clinton was in the White House and gas cost $1.15 per gallon.

JR: During that time, you had several articles published. Some of them have great titles: "Snared by the Internet", "Finding Mary", "How I Overcame Grief" and "God Helped Me Forgive." What inspired these, and how did these aid you on your road to the publishing of A Thyme For Love?

PM: All of these articles were based on personal experience. "Snared" appeared in Today's Christian Woman and was about getting caught off guard in the new frontier of social networking. I "met" a man on a chat list and before long our private exchanges went a direction I hadn't expected them to go. I shared that experience through my article to help other women. I wrote the story anonymously and just recently learned from the woman who was Editor of the magazine at the time that my article garnered more reader mail than any had up to that point. That was very humbling to know.

Finding Mary was in Ancestry Magazine, published by Ancestry.Com. The article chronicled the steps I took to find an elusive ancestor I knew existed but could not find anything to document who exactly she was. She turned out to be a sister of my paternal grandmother :-). The "grief" article and the "Forgive" article were both in Victory in Grace Magazine. They are short articles relating how God helped me through some difficult periods of my life. As far as how they aided me on my journey to writing my first contracted story, other than being writing credits I'm not sure they helped. I think developing my fiction writing skills really helped with some of the articles as I incorporated those skills in the anecdotes I included in the articles.

JR: Let me deal with where you are now. In the last two months you've had two new releases. Can you tell us about Love Will Find A Way and Love Finds You In Lake Geneva, Wisconsin?

PM: Love Will Find a Way is the sequel to Thyme for Love. Both are romantic mysteries. When Thyme for Love ended my main characters, April Love and Marc Thorne had finally reconciled after an 8-year separation that had begun when their engagement ended. After April had to turn amateur sleuth to find the real killer of their boss before Marc would be falsely accused, they realized they really did love each other. Now that the mystery was solved, they wanted to start dating as a normal couple. In Love Will Find a Way April's eccentric Aunt Kitty buys her an old Victorian to house her new catering business, but before renovations can be completed it's apparent someone doesn't want April's business to open. She's ready now for Marc to pop "the" question, but too many roadblocks keep cropping up which makes her wonder if they ever will get married.

Love Finds You in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin is set in my hometown, a beautiful picturesque small town on the shores of Geneva Lake in southeastern Wisconsin. I have dreamed a long time about setting story there, and when I was given the opportunity to do so, it was a real blessing from God. The story is set in 1933 during the Great Depression--the same year the Riviera Ballroom was opened on the lakeshore. The building still stands today and is featured on the book cover. My characters, Meg Alden and Jack Wallace both work for the Lake Geneva News Tribune, the town's weekly newspaper. Meg aspires to be a news reporter for the paper but, like most in the news biz of that time, her boss believes that news reporting is a man's job. Women should only write society fluff. This creates a lot of conflict because Jack is hired to fill an open reporter position--the position Meg thought should be hers. She doesn't want to fall for Jack but she is. I had a lot of fun researching for the story and writing it. And I learned a lot of things about my hometown I never knew. Through the research I found myself falling in love with my hometown all over again. I could go on and on about the book. It truly is the book of my heart.

JR: These stories both have the words "Love" and "Find(s)" in the title, but they're different genres. (I won't mention that one of them shares a title with one of my favorite Pablo Cruise songs.) Did you have the luxury of writing one at a time, or were they written more or less simultaneously? If the latter, how did you manage to balance the creation of two unique stories?

PM: I actually had nothing to do with the titles of the books. Love Will Find a Way was a title my editor at OakTara gave the story, and Love Finds You in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin is part of the "Love Finds You" line from Summerside Press. They are from different publishers, and are different genres. One has no connection with the other. I had written LFYLG long before I wrote LWFW. I did not have to write them both simultaneously. I would find that difficult to do, although I know that some authors work the way.

JR: Not only do you have two books to market, but at the same time you're also coordinating ACFW's Genesis Contest. How are you managing your time between these various activities?

PM: Well, you see how long it's taken me to complete this interview :-). LWFW was to release in November but, as sometimes happens, the publisher delayed the release date and it ended up coming out just as I was kicking the LFYLG promotion into high gear. And, as you mentioned, I am overseeing the ACFW Genesis writing contest for unpublished writers. Because LFYLG is set in my hometown and we have a specific window of opportunity over the coming summer months to promote the book during Lake Geneva's tourist season, my focus has been nearly 100 percent on that book's promotion. I have scheduled several appearances already in and around the area, beginning with a Power Point presentation at the Geneva Lake Museum on April 27th, followed by a signing the next day at a popular gift shop in town. I plan to mention my other books and have some with me to sell. Once the major push for the Lake Geneva book is over, I'll focus more on getting the word out about LWFW. The Genesis's biggest time consumer is the first round and that will be ending May 3. Right now I'm dividing my time between Genesis and getting ready for April 27th. Just don't ask me how much writing I'm getting done right now LOL.

JR: Speaking of Genesis, how long have you been working with that contest? Any highlights from your work there? (I'm not sure about lowlights -- it might scare me off from entering it.)

PM: I had been a category coordinator for Genesis for several years prior to taking over as head coordinator last year. I had very big shoes to fill when Camy Tang stepped down as contest coordinator. Last year we had an unprecedented 620 entries and it quickly became apparent that we did not have enough volunteer judges. Every entry requires three judges. I relied a great deal on prayer and the willingness of many volunteers to make themselves available. That was truly the highlight of the year for me, when I came to the end of myself and told God I couldn't do it, and He'd have to take over. He provided and then some. This year we have had a new challenge in that the entire contest is now automated with a new software program our techies built. As with any new software, there have been our share of "bugs," and troubleshooting those has been a huge time-grabber. But the highlight of this year has been the team effort by the category coordinators, the techies and other ACFW staff to get it done. Again, all of it is bathed in prayer.

JR: I'll be honest: sometimes the only way I find to keep encouraged to keep writing is to bury my head in the sand and avoid watching the news. I'm sure I sound like Chicken Little, but it's easy to doubt that things will be stable long enough for me to publish my novel. Is there anything from your experience writing and working with Genesis you can encourage me with? (Sometimes I think I spent too much time bonding with my Uncle Eeyore.)

PM: I agree the news can be very unsettling and I do wonder where we're going to be in another year or two. Will the publishing world look the same or will some of the major players even be around by then? Then I come back to where is God in all this? He is still in control and will be always. He's not surprised by any of the negatives that have happened and I just have to trust in Him. If he wants my books, your books, or anyone's books published, it will happen. There are some fantastic gifted writers around, and He keeps giving us more and more ideas for stories to write. If He wills it for you, it will happen.

JR: Thanks for the time from your very busy schedule. I'll be looking forward to your books.

PM: I've enjoyed it, Jeff. You ask some very good questions. Thought-provoking and challenging.

Jeff to readers: Hope you've been encouraged by this interview with Pam Meyers. How do you find encouragement/motivation to keep on in the slow phase of getting published or in our uncertain times? How do you manage your many hats between writing and non-writing duties? Any other thoughts this interview encouraged?

 

Mighty Mo ...

Not the US battleship Missouri, but momentum.

How do I keep this writing thing moving forward?

I thought of this at work while trying to move a line of about 20 refrigerators. They were all sitting in a neat row on their little skids. They looked good and had passed testing and inspection. The next stops were packaging and shipping. But, they had missed their mark. They had stopped several inches short of a sensor that would start a motor to roll the line and send them on their way.

I thought of Buck, the sled dog in Call of the Wild. In a pulling contest, his driver called for him to lean to the left, then the right, to break an overloaded sled loose and get it moving.

That was all I had to do -- just get those things moving, just a few inches. So I leaned into them with my arms braced and tried to budge them just a little farther. If I had reached them earlier I might have been able to start pushing while they were still rolling, even slightly, just enough to continued making forward motion.

Sometimes I feel like my writing is at a stand still and that I have to do something to just get it moving, or keep it moving no matter how slowly.

For me that boils down to continuing to write, inspite of work, the farm, 4-H, band, Cub Scouts, Little League and all else going on. For instance, I am trying to work on more than one project at a time -- a novel, a novella, and had some ideas for more devotionals that I hope to sell. Hanging out with other writers inspires me.

I just have to keep inching forward.

What inspires you?

Source: Wikimedia Commons

As imaginative writers, many things inspire us: sunsets, mountains, romantic candlelight. Maybe it’s a memory of our childhood, a nightmare, or our latest trip to the mall. We're constantly people watching, thinking up new plot lines, creating “what if” scenarios in our minds.

We go to conferences to learn the logistics of fashioning a book,meeting agents or networking with publishers. We spend valuable time on group emails, building an online platform, and gathering friends on Facebook. There’s nothing wrong with doing these things. It’s part of the job. We need to be the best that we can be and  fellowship with other writers to feel inspired, encouraged or validated.

Sometimes, though, we look too hard for inspiration, when as Christians, we have it inside of us. Sadly, we may forget it’s there, or worse, ignore it.

Job was someone in the Bible who got a lot of advice. He was surrounded by “encouraging” nay sayers who shared their expert opinions: “Quit! Give up! Die!” 

But Job knew where to look for inspiration. He knew Who to listen to:

“But there is a spirit in man: and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding. Great men are not always wise: neither do the aged understand judgment” (Job 8 & 9, KJV).

As writers in these last days, we need to work smart, not hard. It’s tempting to take the hard road of going to and fro picking up tidbits here and there. We can wear ourselves out being afraid we might miss some morsel of a publishing secret or writing trend, when all we need to do is get quiet and listen.

To Him.

“What is it you want to say today, Lord? What words do you want on this page?”

I wonder sometimes—do we hurt the Holy Spirit’s tender feelings when we ignore His ideas? His inspiration? How would we feel if we were telling someone the perfect way to succeed but they never took our advice? What makes us think we have better ideas than God?

I am often inspired by thoughtfulness, grief, and the spirit of the overcoming soul. Courageous athletes, cancer survivors, pianists playing Rachmaninoff—these folks receive my awe and attention. But I must remember that my most powerful inspiration comes from the Holy Spirit. He knows better than anyone what needs to be written. He knows better than anyone Who needs a message that God has put me on this planet to write.

He longs to inspire us. He patiently waits for us to listen. All we need do is follow Job’s example, and obey. Obeying His voice is much better than all the sacrifices we make going hither and yon for inspiration. For it is written: “…to obey is better than sacrifice…”(1 Samuel 15:22).

Karla Akins is a pastor's wife, mother of five, grandma to five beautiful little girls and author of O Canada! Her Story. She lives in North Manchester with her husband, twin teenage boys with autism, and three silly dogs. Her favorite color is purple, favorite hobby is book-hoarding, and favorite food group is cupcakes.

Writing Through the C-H-R-I-S-T-M-A-S Season

Christmas season is finally here! It’s my favorite time of year, mainly because we get to celebrate the birth of Christ. And I also get to decorate the tree, buy a bunch of fun gifts, send out Christmas cards, and bake those yummy peanut butter cookies with a Hershey kiss squished on top.

But with all the extras on my to-do list, I have a hard time sitting in front of the computer to creatively write. There’s no time. Sure, I’m finding time to think of a creative comment to post on Jack’s Facebook status, and then quickly check the gold box deals on Amazon, and then back on Facebook to see if Jill finished her laundry…

So I’ve created a new acronym for “CHRISTMAS” to help keep us writing through this Christmas season. These are just some rumble strips for those of us who easily veer off Manuscript Road.

C - Call your peeps back later.

Return phone calls AFTER you write that awesome disaster for Chapter Five. If you spend your time making phone calls before devising the disaster, you may only leave yourself enough time to save the blank Word document and call it a day. That’s not the disaster you’re aiming for here.

H – Hit like Rocky.

Hitting the super sale at Best Buy is not an excuse to blow off your antagonist. If Rocky hit the super sale at K-Mart instead of Apollo Creed, he wouldn’t have won the fight—Oh Wait! He didn’t win, but he went the distance.

R – Read the “Life’s Funny” page in Reader’s Digest.

I guarantee you’ll laugh at least once. Laughing reduces stress and boosts your immune system. You don’t have time to get sick right now.

I - Inner elf.

“This holiday, discover your inner elf.” It may be just a silly tagline from the movie Elf, but there are some good values we can learn from the green guys with pointy shoes. Coincidentally, elves love to tell stories. Here’s three good values of an elf: 1.)Elves, work hard to get their required quota of work done each day, 2.)They only require 40 minutes of sleep each night (we should aim for a little more than that) 3.)Elves burn a lot of calories because they keep moving while working. So don’t be a cotton-headed ninnymuggins, and keep moving! *If you don’t know what I’m talking about, be sure to watch the movie Elf in your oh-so-vast amount of free time.

S – Sleep with a notebook within hands reach.

Have you ever woke up in the middle of the night with a perfect idea for your WIP and then fallen back asleep, only to forget those important details? If you keep a notebook handy, you can quickly jot down the main points you want to remember. Stephanie Meyer, author of the Twilight series, came up with the idea for her vampire story in a dream. She even remembers the exact night of her dream. So make sure you put the date next to your midnight ideas, because you never know…

T - Thank God for everything.

Simple. Thank God for EVERYTHING!

M – Multitask while making Christmas cookies, not while writing your masterpiece.

We all know that it requires a lot of detailed mental processing to write a novel. If you’re not fully concentrating on the story, your writing pace will slow down. Even though you may have folded a load of laundry in-between paragraphs, you will end up with fewer words for the day.

A – Aerobic exercise is a must each day.

Make sure you take time to go for a walk or run, or even jump some rope while on a break from writing. Aerobic exercise reduces stress and blood pressure, and improves mental health and circulation.

S – Smell the Christmas pine tree.

Smells trigger your emotional memory. The woodsy aroma of pine trees are everywhere right now and easily accessible. They can create feelings of nostalgia. Just make sure it’s a real tree. The sense of smell is also great for story writing, because it can give the story a livelier picture.

Merry Christmas!

~Marjorie DeVries