Technical Goulash

I'm nearing the 10,000-word mark of a new project that is very different from other books I've written for a number of reasons, the first being that I'm writing in present tense.

Goodreads List of Present-Tense Novels

Interestingly, I taught Naomi Hirahara's Murder on Bamboo Lane this past year, and none of my students noticed the tense (or mentioned it until I did). As a teacher, that was frustrating; as a writer (nice job, Naomi!), that's a good thing. I know if I'm consistent in voice, point-of-view, and tense, I'll go unnoticed, something I'm always striking for: I want readers to be so lost in the story they forget they're turning pages at all.

Writing present tense is interesting on many levels. The syntax, for one, has changed. Sentences are shorter (for me, that's never a bad thing.) I find myself writing a lot of fragments (missing subjects). This is happening naturally. Just riding the rhythm of the book. And my nemesis, the To Be verb, is getting very little airtime, something that pleases me immensely. The chapters are averaging less than a thousand words.

Additionally, the pace of the book is faster because of the tense choice. Dialogue propels the action for me, as always. But the I see this book being shorter than some others I've written in recent years. (Whether that holds up or not remains to be seen. Every time I start a book I tell myself this time I'll be really efficient.)

Like any writer, I will do my best to show and not tell: 

My second-floor classroom looked out onto the quad. There was a grass courtyard nearly the size of a soccer pitch and boxed in by brick dorms and brick office and academic buildings. Morning sunlight reflected off benches that glistened with ice and snow. Christmas was a full three weeks away, but twenty inches of snow had already fallen. Parents' Weekend took place only a month earlier, when cobblestone paths were ablaze with autumn's fallen leaves and playing fields' sidelines were awash in light blue swag and proud parental voices. That seemed a distant memory.

My second-floor classroom looks out onto the quad, a grass courtyard nearly the size of a soccer pitch, boxed in by brick dorms and brick office and academic buildings. Morning sunlight reflects off benches glistening with ice and snow. Christmas is a full three weeks away, but twenty inches of snow have already fallen. Parents' Weekend – only a month ago, when cobblestone paths were ablaze with autumn's fallen leaves and playing fields' sidelines were awash in light blue swag and proud parental voices – seems a distant memory.

The differences are evident. Immediacy being the most obvious. No surprise there. But more subtly, the imagery, particularly of the final line, is punched up. The present tense version in the second paragraph is more forceful.

Now I put the challenge to you: Take a paragraph you've written recently, and rewrite it in the present tense. What differences do you find? This might serve as another technique for your toolbox. After all, a present-tense scene well-placed in a past-tense novel might heighten suspense and add to your reader's experience.

I'd love to hear readers' thoughts on this and my Type M colleagues' opinions.

Virtual Book Club Talk

I've begun setting up my June book tour for Destiny's Pawn, and like any frugal author, I'm trying to get the most bang for my buck.

My pilgrimage north usually takes a week, starting in western Massachusetts and concluding in northern Maine – some 600 miles later – where the Peyton Cote novels are set. I sign at various stores, street events, read, and this year will even host an "author luncheon" to benefit a local library. As you can imagine, it's a costly friend-raising journey. Last summer, I had $500 into the trip before hotel costs.

Something happened last week that has me (almost) rethinking this whole thing: Laura Cummings, at White Birch Bookstore, reached out to host a signing on said tour and mentioned her store's book club was discussing Bitter Crossing. Coincidentally, after my students recently read Naomi Hirahara's terrific Murder of Bamboo Lane, I shot Naomi an e-mail to see if she'd be interested in hosting a Google Hangout session Q@A with my students. She said sure, and we successfully used Google.

So when Laura mentioned her book club, I offered to do the same. We used Google Hangouts for this event, too, and it worked reasonably well.

A new business model? A more cost-effective one for sure.

Can a virtual author visit replace a face-to-face interaction? No way. But North Conway, NH, is three hours from my house. I spoke to maybe ten readers and answered questions for 30 minutes. And I was still home to read my 7-year-old daughter a story and kiss her goodnight. And the trip didn't cost so much as one cup of coffee, let alone gas expenses.

Will the virtual author visit replace the real deal? Not anytime soon. But there's a definite upside to this structure. And it makes me wonder how authors will be interacting with readers in the future.