I wanted to do a writing practice based on this prompt: I’ve been putting so much into revising, it felt good to rewire my brain for this. It’s not quite focused ALL on one sense, but I tried to center it around hearing/sound as much as I could. I also am trying to test out a new voice to see how it flows. The sounds of my little demons chittering to themselves in the blackness of my room at night are directly correlated with the bruised shadows under my eyes every day. I’m pretty sure the people at school just think it’s part of my ~aesthetic~ which is fine by me. Better than them thinking I’m flat out crazy, cause school is enough of a pain in the ass. But then, who’s gonna come up with the theory that Lex always looks like she was up all night because she was trying to shut out the demons who thrive on the darkness outside? ‘She.’ I did it again. I know I’m not ‘she,’ but they don’t, so my voices for them call me ‘she,’ and even though I can’t hear her, I know Helen’s slithering around my mirror thriving on the dysphoria. God, she’s such a bitch. I’ll look in the mirror tomorrow, and she’ll make sure to highlight all of the things that help the world see me as a girl. Because there’s nothing like having your reflection used against you as a weapon, showing you what the world will always see. Brenda hisses out a stuttered wheeze before her barbed feet dig deeper into my back. I hate that I know she’s laughing at me, even though I’m fairly certain demons don’t understand the concept. Or at least, if they do, they all failed stupendously at that lesson and should not have graduated demon school to stalking their very own fucked-up human. I know what’s coming, and even though I lift my hands to cover my ears, her voice sounds through my head. “What if they knew?” I don’t like the idea of that. Not even a little, but her voice is accented like what I imagine a cockroach would sound like if it were granted a voice box, all sharp angles and grating vowels. “Shut up, Brenda.” I sound stupid talking to my empty room because I’m the only one who knows it isn’t really empty. “You’d go from a loner to an all out freak.” The way she drags out ‘freak’ hurts more than her pincers in my back. My spinal cord is being tugged like a drawstring, and my vertebrae are collecting on themselves as I try to curl away from the sound. “Not all the way a girl, or all the way a boy. A bastardization of the two.” “I’m just as normal as everyone else,” I insist to the room, and the chittering continues. I know I’m normal. I know it. It’s like I have two brains. Logic brain and Brenda brain. Logic brain knows that non-binary people are real. Knows that I’m valid in my identity. Knows that there’s nothing wrong with being a ‘they’ and not a ‘she’ or a ‘he’ or a ‘s(he)’ or a ‘he/she’ or any other stupid way of enforcing a binary that isn’t real. That the punctuation barrier between the pronouns isn’t as solid as it looks typed on a page. The problem is the Brenda brain. The demon on my back whisper-hissing in my ear that I’m crazy. A freak. A bastardization of two genders. That I’ll never be accepted. I know she’s wrong. I know that I shouldn’t listen to the cheese-grater insults that she stabs through my eardrums. Brenda stutter-wheezes in my ear again, and this time it’s accompanied by the squelching ooze of Susan coming to play. I hate the suckling pops and gurgles of her tar-like tendrils winding their way up my blankets and sheets . I hate how they coil around my wrists, holding me on the bed. Covering my ears wasn’t working anyway, so no loss there, but it doesn’t mean I like the weight her sludge puts on me. Susan doesn’t need to speak for me to hear her telling me to give up. She tells me through the way she makes me tired, but not tired enough to sleep. Tired of trying to disprove Brenda. Tired of fighting with Helen in the mirror. Tired of being tired. Susan’s good at sucking my soul out of me through my skin, and the room gets darker every time she does it. Brenda’s engine-failure voice sounds once more in my ears, but I don’t fight her this time. What’s the point? “You can’t ever tell them. They’ll never understand you. Especially Finch.” Finch. I close my eyes, and it’s just as dark is when they’re open, but it feels a little safer. Finch’s voice in my head sounds so much nicer than Brenda’s. It’s higher than the other guys I know; not quite like hot chocolate—that’s too thick. It’s more like a warm tea with honey and milk. The perfect drinking temperature. I don’t quite sleep that night, but thinking about drinking in the tea of Finch’s voice lulls me into enough of a halfway place that I can reduce Brenda to nothing but clicks and snaps and white noise. I can forget that Susan is holding me to my bed and sucking my soul up through a straw. I can forget that I’ll have to face Helen weaponizing my reflection in the morning. I think maybe I can live in that space forever between half-real and half-dreaming, surrounded with the sound of everything that makes me feel safe. I can live forever in Finch’s voice.
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This weekend was…wow. I implore everyone who is able to afford it, please go to a writing conference. Even if it can’t be the Writer’s Digest Conference which was AMAZING, go and soak up what it’s like to be around people with the same passion as you do. Learn all of the different facets of writing you’ve never thought to explore. Feel the inspiration that pours off of the keynotes. And dear god, if you can, attend a pitch session—but that’s a blog post for another day. There are some sessions about craft that I would love to get into more detail about, and that will come, and I’d like to write about the Pitch Slam, but today I want to talk about the experience as a whole. I’ve never been to a writing conference. Sure, I’ve attended conventions—San Diego Comic Con, Anime Boston, New York Comic Con, etc—but this was my first writing conference, and I didn’t know what to expect. For those of you who don’t know me, I’m not great at striking up conversations with strangers. I want to, but it’s difficult for me. The people at this conference didn’t care—they helped me through the hardest part by reaching out to me. So many strangers tapped me on the shoulder, and offered smiles and kind greetings. They asked me about my genre and my book, and when I found the words to talk about it, I was only met with encouragement and excitement. More than that, I got to meet people from all over the country, and indeed, the world. I got to hear about their stories, and get glimpses into their experiences, and it was so beautiful. As for the sessions, I learned so much. I learned about crafting characters through setting. I learned about the publishing process. I learned about how to enhance your voice. I was part of a session about dissecting a well-written first page to learn about why it has such an impact. Plot twists, conflict, pacing—I could go on. I learned more in three days about writing than I think my head can fully hold. More than that, these sessions were inspiring. I can’t WAIT to look back at my manuscript. Scenes jumped to mind that could be strengthened by a sensory detail here, or by taking out a cliché there and replacing it with something more nuanced and concise. This post comes down to this. Open yourself up to experiences. Please, please, open yourself up to them. Be vulnerable. To people. To lessons. To the writers who came before you who want to pour all of their experiences into you so that you can achieve the most with your writing. I paid to have Annalisa Parent, a writing coach, and the dictionary definition of a sweetheart, read my first five pages. Afterward, she would give a fifteen minute session to critique them right there at the conference. I was nervous. I was afraid that the words I’d poured my heart into were going to get torn apart, but I allowed myself to be vulnerable to it—it’s the only way to grow. Annalisa ended up filling me with confidence, and the advice she provided me changed my entire conference and pitching experience. She challenged me to push my pitch in a different direction, and with only two hours before my session. If she hadn’t, and I hadn’t followed her advice, I would have undoubtedly not had the success I did. Writers, be vulnerable. Open yourselves up to everything this community has to offer, because once you get past how scary it is, it’s eye-opening. Of course, maintain your identity. Your work is YOURS and it always will be, but let what you glean from opening yourselves up influence and strengthen your words. You won’t be disappointed—I know I wasn’t. The 2017 Writer's Digest Conference in NYC is four days away and coming fast! With all of the Pitchwars prep, and the wedding, I feel like I blinked and suddenly it's here, looming in the not-so-distant future and waving at me. It's my first writing conference, and I'm going at it alone. Not only that, but I'm pushing out of my comfort zone and trying out the Pitch Slam. For those not familiar, the Pitch Slam is speed dating with agents and editors. You get three minutes to sit down and tell the agent/editor why they should be interested in your work, and then they get to ask you questions. So how did I pick the agents I want to pitch to? Well, I started by narrowing it down to agents that wanted Young Adult Fantasy. No sense pitching to an agent who isn't interested in the genre you write, right? Well, that still left me with about thirty agents. It's like the real world of querying, but on a smaller scale. There's lots of options, but only a handful will be able to provide you and your MS what you need. So how do you figure out what you really need? I decided to think about what was most important to me in an agent. What did I want in the person who was going to be representing me and my manuscript to the big world of publishing? God I miss Bernie... ANYWAY: Diversity! I want an agent who actively seeks diverse works by marginalized authors about marginalized characters. Especially given the place the United States is in today. This country is trying to strip POC and LGBTQ+ voices, and I want an agent who will hold up a megaphone and let marginalized people scream through that silence. To me, if an agent lists that they're seeking writers of color, and LGBTQ+ writers, that means that the diversity in my story will be celebrated rather than washed. That, for me, is the most important thing an agent can offer me. NOW, I am in no way implying that an agent does not value diversity if it is not directly listed in their MSWL or bio. To know if an agent is right for you requires a ton of research. It means:
That's the takeaway here, folks. When it comes to picking agents to query, or Pitchwars mentors to sub to, or who to pitch to at a writing conference, find the most important piece of your MS. Boil it down to its essence. Is it about disability? Overcoming adversity? Love? Joy? Conquering fear? Find the theme in your story that would leave your words empty if you stripped it, and then find an agent who will nurture that. Sure, I don't have representation yet, so maybe it's not perfect advice, but I feel as though I've never been closer once I realized that. Don't settle for any agent that offers representation. This manuscript is your baby, so find someone who will love it just like you do. Have any other advice on how to narrow down if an agent is right for you? Leave it in the comments! Here’s my honest review from Goodreads. I stumbled upon this book by accident. I was scrolling through Twitter and saw a tweet offering an ARC of Mask of Shadows to the first NB/Genderfluid reader that replied. I was intrigued, having known nothing about this book beforehand, so I replied just for fun, and by some strange stroke of luck, I won! Fast-forward and it’s in my mailbox. I didn’t intend to read it right away. I was getting married in a few weeks, and Pitchwars was looming—I needed to prioritize. That ‘prioritizing’ nonsense shot straight out the window when I read the back cover. For those of you who aren’t familiar with the book, here’s all you need to know:
Needless to say, seeing that Sal was a genderfluid character jumped me into overdrive. I’ve never read a book with a genderfluid character, let alone one that wasn’t centered around them coming out. Nope. Couldn’t wait. This demanded to be read, and I would happily obey. I went in wary, and came out overjoyed. It’s cliché to say that it made me laugh out loud and then cry a page later, but it did. I can’t even lie. Sal was endearing and flawed. They were spunky, full of fight, but had moments of vulnerability that anyone could connect with. And while I started reading for Sal, I kept reading for all of the other characters. I came to care deeply for all of them, which is a bad move in a book about assassins killing each other, if you were wondering. I’m all for a good book that kills characters, but I hate when they’re killed just for shock value. There was none of that to be had in Miller’s story. I could curse the moon over why she killed the characters she did, but it was right—necessary, and poignant, and right. And the romance of it. I knew who the love interest would be from the start, but not because it was a cliché meet-cute—anything but. I knew because of the instant chemistry between the characters, especially given their unorthodox meeting. It develops naturally without hindering the plot, and ultimately raises the stakes of the conflict. And it’s really damn cute. Like, I-need-to-put-this-down-for-a-second-and-roll-around-on-the-bed cute. Finally, the most important part of this review: how Sal’s gender was handled. While genderfluid comes in many forms, Sal’s identity and pronouns shift with how they choose to present that day. If they dress masculine, use he/him. If they dress feminine, use she/her. If they’re presenting androgynous, they/them. Sal’s apprehension about being misgendered feels real and relatable. They defend themselves against those who choose to misgender them, but still show how difficult that can be to do. On top of that, the characters who choose to misgender Sal do it as an act of aggression and disrespect. You know the people who do it are assholes, for lack of a better word, and even when Sal isn’t in a position to defend their identity, you can be sure that one of the other characters won’t tolerate it. Despite it being a fantasy setting, the difficulties Sal faces because of their gender identity are realistic and handled tactfully. It comes down to this: Linsey Miller’s Mask of Shadows is fun, poignant, exciting, and important. I came out of reading that inspired. I connected with a character in a way I’ve never done before. Sal’s gender was never a joke or a punchline. It was never something that held them back, or something they needed to overcome. It was just another facet of exploring the beautiful complexity of a character driven by revenge, and the desire for something more than life has yet to offer. I would scream about this book from the mountain tops if I had easy access to a mountain.
Put this book on your TBR shelf on Goodreads. Pre-order it. Spread the word, especially to people in the trans and non-binary communities. Show the publishing world that there needs to be more books like this by supporting the crap out of this. Have more specific questions about how the book handled gender? Read it and want to talk about how you felt about it? Comment below, or message me on Twitter/Facebook! Life has settled for me. The wedding band is firmly on my finger. My Pitchwars entry has been submitted. My apartment could use a good scrub, but that's a project for another day. I thought I would enjoy the nothingness of not being able to work on DUODECIM, but all of the constant working and scrambling the last few months affected me more than I thought it would. I'm bored. So what are my options?
So that's where I'm at. I called this blog Adventures in Writing, so I'm going to document those adventures, big and small. Stay tuned or don't! I'll still be here.
Hello! My name is Mads, and welcome to the blog I'm going to get better at using. If you're here, it probably means you found this link pinned to the top of my twitter. If that's not how you wound up here, then keep the mystery alive. Either way, welcome! This is my bio for the lovely Brenda Drake's Pitchwars where I'm hoping to be the lucky mentee of one of the many fantastic mentors participating this year. I'm a first time mentee, so I've been learning something new every day, and in the end, isn't that really the point? Who am I? I suppose the best place to start would be talking about who I am. How else will you know if I'm the mentee of your dreams? First things first, I'm pansexual and genderfluid, and my pronouns are they/them. If you slip up and use her/hers or him/his, that's okay! I'll pretty much look up and respond to anything. I list those identities first because they play a huge role in why I write. I read everything under the sun as a little kid, but I never quite resonated with the main characters. They were all missing something. I didn't realize I wasn't straight/cis until I met my partner, and once I did, it felt like my entire life made sense, as did why I never saw myself in the books I read. I wonder every day if I would have discovered myself sooner if I read a book about someone who was pansexual, or genderqueer, or both. I don't want future LGBTQ+ kids to spend their lives wondering either, which is why I started writing. I'm now a sort-of adult with a BA in English from SUNY Cortland, living on Long Island with my cat Zack, and my inspirational (and shiny new) life partner. Perks of picking me as a mentee? I'll send you lots of pictures of this little dragon: (I'm not above bribery. You'll get a cute picture every day if you pick me!) That's enough about me. Time to get to the good stuff. What's the book about? So glad you asked! DUODECIM is a YA Diverse Fantasy coming in at 87,000 words. To save on space, you can click HERE for a blurb about the plot and HERE for a breakdown of my characters. What I want to do is give you a run through of all the things that makes my MS unique and special that don't fit neatly into a query letter. Reading DUODECIM, you can expect to find:
You will NOT find:
A few more things:
Mentoring me means having a mentee who will work tirelessly and endlessly to improve their MS. I know tht you're all mentors for a reason. You've done your work and earned your way to where you are, and I want to learn from your experiences. I'm open to feedback and criticism, and while I cry at the drop of a hat, I'm never going to quit! Here's few more things that make me me outside of being a writer:
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