Standing behind Deidre . . .

I'm taking daily lessons on how to improve my ability to fully realize a scene. The resulting writing exercises may or may not add to my current revision of Years of Stone, but, like journaling or morning lines, keep me focused.

This came about as I began the hopefully last round of revision and perhaps another six months of work. After reading that so important first chapter, the critters over at the Internet Writing Workshop said I needed more sense-based imagery to flesh out the story. I talked with my hubby, a sometimes ferocious critic but always supportive, about different strategies and we came up with this scheme.

My first exercise on Wednesday was to hover in my imagination 20 feet above the foundering ship and describe what I see. What I realized immediately was that I couldn't SEE the ship! I didn't know what type of ship, how large, how many crew, how far out from land she had run aground. Aaargh! No wonder those sensory details were missing! So I wrote a little and jumped back into research.

Allen:  "That's cheating! You can't rely on research. You must force yourself to use your imagination, write from what you see, what you imagine you smell, taste, hear, touch." (I told you he could be ferocious.)

Me: "But I'm writing historical fiction. How can I write without knowing absolutely . . . etc, etc."

Source: D'Entrecasteaux National Park

That led to more conversation. We are both stubborn. It's my book, and I will do research. But I will also approach these exercises to focus on spinning out the story that uses the five senses. So today's exercise -- to stand behind Deidre and write what I see -- brought this draft.

Remember, Van Diemen's Land, 1842, the ship has foundered along the D'Entrecasteaux Channel near Southport:

Deidre holds Amalie’s hand tightly as they stand in line. The sailors, their faces sweaty and fearful, rush past them. One sailor drops a coil of rope and bumps into Deidre, shoving her to the deck. For a moment, Deidre loses her grasp of Amalie. “Deidre!” Amalie shrieks. “Don’t let go!” The little girl presses against Deidre and winds her arms around Deidre’s waist.

First Mate Banks roars just ahead of them. “Hold tight. Easy there.”

Deidre wraps Amalie close and leans over the bulwarks to look down at the churning sea. She can taste the salt in the wind that buffets her face. The sailors have rigged up a rope chair and are lowering Mrs. Rafferty over the side, her pudgy eyes closed tightly as she moans. The sailors groan as they lower her to the sea. One of the ropes slips, and she falls the last five feet, dumped unceremoniously into the water. The sailor waiting at the side of the ship tries to pull her out of the water. He goes under, Mrs. Rafferty clinging around his neck. He resurfaces and clouts her on the chin. She slumps, her skirts spread out behind her as he wraps a rope under her meaty arms and begins to haul her to shore.

“We won’t fall, will we?” asks Amalie.

 The Captain’s longboat pulls alongside. The sailors snug the boat to the ship. Immediately the waiting women and children are wound in rope and lowered over the side. Deidre moves forward in the line, Amalie with her, hoping this time they will go in the boat.

“No more ‘else we founder,” cries one of the sailors from below, and the line in front of Deidre stops. The ship’s list has increased. Moans of fear bubble up from the women behind her. Is this the day I die?

ROW80 UPDATE: The round of 80 days has ended. I'm late with my update, having joined this writing community in the middle of the 80 days, but the postings of other writers in the midst of working toward their writing goals has been a wonderful experience. Twice a week we are accountable for what we write. The next round begins October 1. I will be ready with a new set of measurable goals, ready to read what others write, and more than ready to write on!

My update is simple. Writing goals have shifted as I realize I cannot complete the final revisions to Years of Stone in under a month (that is, before leaving for Africa). Unbelievably optimistic! But, good progress on e-publishing as The Mermaid Quilt & Other Tales is up on Amazon and available in Kindle and Amazon formats. Whew! These skills were not easy to learn. I've made very good progress in professional reading, though the backlog stack of magazines is very high. And the last goal, building a marketing plan starts with a list and understanding what's involved -- and what I'm willing to do. Ordered Mermaid bookmarks! Next? Think ahead to the next three months.

Book Cover from Oz . . .

There's something unexpected about researching online. Since it's increasingly unlikely I'll be traveling to Tasmania anytime soon, I've been searching out videos on YouTube and images about key points, Port Arthur, Hobart Town, and the midlands of Tasmania, then trying to imagine what these places must have been like in the mid 1840s -- what plants, what birds, what bugs, what weather, what people. I've found impossibly blue skies and a rich terrain from tropical fern forests, to trackless brush covered mountains, a myriad of small islands, and milder flat plains, ideal for sheep and cattle. 

Intrepid photographer, historian, motorcycle buff, antique book lover, and writer Murray Bernard of Tasmania has posted many exquisite photos online. But this picture of Sarah Island seems to capture the essence of my current work in progress, Years of Stone. 

Sarah Island (@ Murray Bernard)

Perhaps the sharp contrast between the ruined stones of what was once a prison on Sarah Island and the natural beauty of towering eucalyptus draws me. Few letters or books speak to what conditions were like so long ago for those men and women transported to Tasmania, to the land beyond. But should I choose to self-publish in about a year's time, this will be the cover. Thank you, Murray!

Sarah Island, active between 1822-1833, has the reputation of being the harshest penal colony in Van Diemen's Land. I've read somewhere that writers are to 'torture' their characters, but because my story is set in 1842-1844, my characters didn't have to go to Sarah Island. They suffered enough. Here's my other favorite of the view from Port Arthur, also taken by Murray Bernard.

Port Arthur (@ Murray Bernard)

C is for Convict . . .

Three women of three different classes interact throughout my current work in progress, Years of Stone. Deidre, a schoolteacher, has followed the man she loves to Van Diemen's Land. Deidre was quickly befriended by Lady Jane Franklin, an actual historical person, the wife of ill-fated and quite famous Lieutenant-Governor John Franklin, who later died on his quest to find a Northwest Passage.

At first I thought my story would be about these two women, Deidre, fictional, and Lady Jane, this fascinating, quirky woman of the 19th Century, who was villified by the press in Van Dieman's Land as the 'petticoat' behind the scenes who unduly influenced government decisions. This intrepid woman actually lobbied local leaders on policy, wrote correspondence to the London Home Office, climbed mountains, and in many ways would have been more comfortable in modern times.

But then along came Mary Dallow, what I call 'blue collar scrappy,' a conduit between prison life and the very small middle class and the elite class of Van Diemen's Land. Mary, like other transported women, moves in and out of the Cascades Female Factory, a euphemism for a woman's prison, shaped by the Victorian passion for reform through work.

I am comfortable with Deidre, the middle class schoolteacher. for I did teach. Lady Franklin is the least accessible for me, but letters and diaries are available, as well as histories that track the accomplishments of the elite. Mary Dallow is the most fun for she takes me in unexpected places.

My father was a bartender, and and one of my stepfathers was a steelworker. As a kid, I knew about neighborhood taverns and how to 'make do' with my baby sister when no one was home. We moved often, as one joke goes, when the rent was due, and I found solace in books, working my way through college and into the middle class at a time when college tuition was much lower than it is today.

At first I wanted to be a social worker, but a field trip for a criminal justice class to a local prison changed my goals immediately. As we entered the prison, each of us were taken -- one at a time -- through a double locked door. For just a moment, as I stood there alone, locked in a sort of cage with bars on both sides, I knew I was totally dependent on whoever held the key. Later, the young women in our group were taken to an all female facility. I watched the girls fawn on the guards, saying what 'the man' wanted. But when the guard turned away, sneers and asides showed me what those young women really felt and how they survived. As Mary Dallow would say, "An' who wants to know, ya pig sticker."

I'm still working on Mary Dallow and whether she will have a happy ending. Is happiness a middle class invention?

About April . . .

April has its writing challenges. National Poetry Month -- a poem a day with Robert Lee Brewer from Writer's Digest's Poetic Asides and new to me, Blogging from A to Z, a blog hop with daily blog entries. Most days I find it easier to write on my current project (Years of Stone, historical fiction set in mid 19th Century Tasmania) and leave my blog to languish. But this April, prompted by writers from the IWW (Internet Writing Workshop), I will take on both challenges.

And continue work on Years of Stone. On good days, the writing is fun, the characters talk to me, and the story unfolds in dialogue. I can see Tasmania of 1842, sense the conflict between characters, their desires and their realities, and the words spill onto the page. My goal is simply to finish the draft by  the end of 2012. OK, maybe by the end of summer. My word count is 50,000 so far; goal maybe 70,000 to finish the story.

The biggest unresolved plot question I have right now is tied up with smart-mouthed secondary/main character Mary Dallow. Mary survived the four-month voyage to Hobart Town by sleeping in sailors' quarters whenever she was bored (did I say this story is not YA and not a bodice ripper?). She found work at a waterfront tavern, fell in lust with a bushranger, and serves as a conduit between the two main characters -- Mac (a transportee) and Deidre (Mac's fiance who follows him to Tasmania). So, would Mary (despite her many travails) jump to get married? I'm beginning to think not. Or would she?

Some mystery writers start with a dead body and figure out who-done-it by the end of the book. Maybe Mary Dallow will let me know what she really wants . . . by the end of the book! But whoever she winds up with will have to be her equal, no pandering to convention for Mary, even in 1842. Unless . . .

Visiting Tasmania . . .

So what's a writer to do when actually visiting the locale of your current work in progress is impossible? Ask if you are a visual person and jump on the internet. This panorama of paintings showing Hobart Town between 1820-1860 helped me "see" into a very different time and place where my characters live and struggle.



This day trip to Port Arthur by Tim Hoosier helps me to visualize what was once a harsh and forbidding prison. Few escaped for the wardens and guards perpetuated the idea that the waters surrounding this stubby peninsula were shark-infested.



This grisly National Geographic video highlights the dreaded Tasmanian Devil. In photos, this small cousin to the more familiar kangaroo is rather cute. But after seeing this video, I now have a scene where Mac goes out into the night to investigate what sounds like a woman screaming.



National Novel Writing Month was good to me. After a month of not writing at all (due to travel and family illness), November kicked me back. Years of Stone is now at 36,000 words and I'm facing my next challenge: Making sure the historical underpinning is dead accurate.

May your own writing go well.