WHAT A DEADLINE WILL DO TO YOU

by Cynthia Ruchti

I almost dusted today. Almost vacuumed yesterday. But my deadline for a book releasing next summer is Thursday. So…

I resisted.

Whew. That was a close one.

I've walked past many projects--filing, painting the stool the grandkids use, having lunch with friends, putting clean sheets on the beds in the guest room (they're clean, they just need to be put ON the beds)--because of the deadline. I'm focused. Determined. Researching details. Tweaking. And yes, still writing chapters. Dusting? It's going to have to wait a few more days.

When an acquaintance said "We should meet for coffee" in June, I said, "How about August?" She knew I wasn't kidding. We're only a few days away from that long-awaited get-together. And no, I'm not that much of a slug, avoiding friendships and putting a deadline above relationships. Not always. Travel took me away from home several of the weeks in between. The book I'm working on had a long ways to go in July. My job ramped up in that same time period. And I wanted to use our coffee together as a celebration that I'd made it.

And I have managed to brush my teeth, shower, have the grandkids over, serve at church, make homemade meals more nights than not, encourage others, write blog posts…

But today, I couldn't help but smile…then cringe…over what a deadline can do to a person.

The harsh winter meant that our blueberry crop this summer is suffering. The snow level was so high, the bunnies walked on water--frozen water--to reach the bushes and chewed them down to nubbins. The bushes will bounce back, but the many quarts of blueberries we harvested last summer are small handfuls this year.

In one of my too-rare breaks from the Deadline Computer, I took a short walk outside to see if any blueberries had ripened in the last couple of days. There between scanty bushes, a snake sunned himself. Inches from me.

I checked for ripe blueberries, then turned back toward the house, calling to it over my shoulder. "Yeah, whatever. I'm on deadline."

No time for snake wrangling. No time for caring that a snake was in my garden.

Ouch.

Was Eve on a self-imposed deadline when she sauntered past the blueberries, beets, or beans in Eden, unconcerned that there was a snake in her garden?

I'm willing to bypass dusting and vacuuming and defrosting the freezers when my deadline is so near. But I can't afford to ignore a snake of discontent, or a relationship glitch slithering its way into my home. I don't dare ignore a foul attitude or neglect vital tasks, like filling my soul with God's Word so I can write about God's purposes and with God's passion.

"More than anything you guard, protect your mind, for life flows from it," Proverbs 4:23 CEB.

Until Thursday, and beyond, I'll remain focused on the goal, but not allow myself to become cavalier toward things that slither into relationships or my spiritual health. Too much at stake.

Anything strike you--pardon the pun--in these ponderings?



Cynthia Ruchti is an award-winning author of nine books, including When the Morning Glory Blooms, All My Belongings, and Ragged Hope: Surviving the Fallout of Other People's Choices. She tells stores of Hope-that-glows-in-the-dark through her novels, novellas, devotions, nonfiction, and through speaking events for women and writers. She and her husband of 42 years live in the heart of Wisconsin. www.cynthiaruchti.com or www.facebook.com/CynthiaRuchtiReaderPage

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Doing Time ~ by Deb Raney

DEBORAH RANEY's first novel, A Vow to Cherish, inspired the World Wide Pictures film of the same title and launched her writing career after 20 happy years as a stay-at-home mom. Her books have won numerous awards including the RITA, National Readers Choice Award, HOLT Medallion, the Carol Award, and have twice been Christy Award finalists. Deb's 23rd novel released from Howard/Simon & Schuster this month. She and her husband, Ken Raney, live in Kansas and love traveling together to teach at conferences, and to visit four children and four small grandchildren who all live much too far away. Visit Deb on the Web at www.deborahraney.com.

Doing Time

A writer friend mentioned recently that she was having trouble keeping track of the timeline for her novel. I've struggled with that, too, and it got me thinking about all the different ways I've tracked time in my novels.

Nineteen years ago when I wrote my first novel––a family saga spanning ten years––I taped eight sheets of paper together, drew horizontal lines in various colors to represent each character, and made hashmarks along the line for significant events in each character's life. That sounds so clever and wise until I tell you that I only created this timeline after an editor discovered, just before the book went to press, that I had some characters in college for most of the ten years––and they were still working on their bachelor's degrees. Oops. I quickly cobbled together the timeline and sorted things out in the nick of time.

In my next book, all the action took place in one year's time, so my timeline for that was a simple list down the lines of a legal pad. Easy.

I've never been good with anything number-related, but another writing friend's husband had put together an Excel spreadsheet that calculated all kinds of data about a novel, including timeline, page count, percentage left to write, and I-don't-remember-what-else. I used it for several books, then somehow hit a button that messed up the algorithm that calculated the numerics (I just made that algorithm thing up, but I pushed something wrong and that was the end of that).

My next book had a mystery thread running through it and I needed to do a bit more plotting than my usual seat-of-the-pants method to set up some red herrings, so I tried the index card method. Blue cards for my hero, pink for my heroine, and each card containing the date the scene took place and a sentence about the action. It actually worked pretty well, but like any plotting method I've ever tried, it took all the fun out of writing for me because I hate knowing the ending before I get there––whether reading or writing.

So with my next book––my tried and true women's fiction––I tried simply labeling each chapter and scene with a date. My intention was that those notations would be for my eyes only and I would delete them before the book was published, but I found those datelines caused me to "cheat" and not write decent set-ups for each new scene. I ended up having to go back through the entire book and weave in timeline cues for the reader. I love rewrite and editing, but that was not fun and I was terrified the book would be full of continuity glitches.

Christmas of that year we received several freebie calendars from local businesses. Since I keep all my calendar events on my computer and iPhone and only use one paper calendar, I didn't need any of the giveaway calendars, but as I was getting ready to toss them in the trash, I noticed that one of them had nice big sqares for each day. A light went on and I knew I'd discovered my perfect timeline tool.

For the last dozen or so books, I've kept my timeline on a discarded calendar. I never tell the reader the actual year of the calendar I'm referencing, but using a calendar this way has helped me avoid the pitfall of having a character go to church on Sunday morning and three days later gripe about how much he hates Monday mornings. (Yes, that's happened––but thanks to my sharp-eyed editors I don't think a timeline gaffe like that ever made it into a published book.)

Since I don't plot ahead, after I write a scene, I simply jot on the correct day's square something like: 5 p.m. –– Mitch and Shelley argue at the post office. Seeing those squares lined up Sunday-Saturday helps me organize my characters' lives the way I organize my own.

I did use the dateline-at-the-beginning-of-scene method in my newest series––with the dates in the actual book––and I think it worked well since those novels each had a thread of suspense, but I had to remind myself not to forget to use "markers" for the reader for time of day, day of week, season of year, weather, etc.

I've used the Scrivener software for several years now, and love the idea board, notecards, research options, and other features of the program, but I haven't really found it helpful for keeping timelines. My go-to method for keeping track of time continues to be the paper calendar method and I eagerly look forward to those hometown giveaway calendars every year.

How about you? Have you found a creative way to keep track of your novel's timeline?

Here are a few links you might find useful in creating the timeline that works best for you:

Using Microsoft Excel:

http://www.microsoft.com/education/en-us/teachers/how-to/Pages/timeline.aspx

Using Microsoft Word:

http://www.microsoft.com/education/en-us/teachers/how-to/Pages/creating-timeline.aspx

Creating Your Own Calendar:

http://timeanddate.com/calendar/custommenu.html

Using Three-act Story Structure:

http://www.filmscriptwriting.com/thethreeactstructure.html

Scrivener Software Purchase:

http://www.literatureandlatte.com/scrivener.php

The Face of the Earth

What if she never came home . . . ?

When Mitchell Brannon’s beloved wife sets off for home after a conference, he has no idea that his life is about to change forever. Mitch returns from work early that evening, surprised that Jill’s car isn’t in the garage. But her voice on the answering machine makes him smile. “Hey, babe, I’m just now checking out of the hotel, but I’ll stop and pick up something for dinner. Love you.” Hours later, Jill still hasn’t returned, and Mitch’s irritation turns to dread.

When the police come up empty, Mitch enlists the help of their next-door neighbor, Jill’s best friend, Shelley, to help search. As hours turn into days and days into weeks, Mitch and Shelley’s friendship grows ever closer—and decidedly more complicated. Every lead seems to be a dead end, and Mitch wonders how he can honor the vows he made to a woman who has seemingly disappeared from the face of the earth.

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Writing. For the Fun of It. ~ Don Reid

Don Reid is a member of country music’s legendary Statler
Brothers, has three Grammy awards, nine CMA awards, thirteen gold albums, and eight platinum awards and is a member of the Gospel Music Hall of Fame and the Country Music Hall of Fame. He has published four non-fiction books, and /O/ /Little Town/ was his first novel. Reid lives with his wife, Deborah, in Staunton, Virginia. Learn more online at www.DonReid.net.

I have read so many times of writers bragging about their work schedule. “I get up every morning and write 500 words before dawn,” they like to say.

And I like to say, “Are you sure? Every morning? Always 500?”

My next question to them is do you really enjoy
writing? Are you sure it’s not a burden to you?

Come on now, don’t take the fun out of it. I love to eat but I don’t get up early to do it.

Writing should be a pleasure. You shouldn’t feel pressured to have something to say. If you force a paragraph, it will usually sound as if you have. Let it flow. Let it be a joy and a release.

Every day does not have to be a production as long as you are comfortable inside the deadline you give yourself to finish a project. Just be sure you’re being reasonable when you set those guidelines and you’ll see the thrill come back in what you’re doing.

I’m serious about my writing but not about my schedule. I like to live with an idea long before I commit anything to paper. I may walk around with an idea for a novel perking in my head for a month or six weeks.

I toy with it and change it and test the logic of it. I talk about it inside my head. I scold myself, praise myself, disagree and argue with myself until something akin to a plot completes itself somewhere in the foyer of my mind. Now I’m ready to develop but not write.

Believe it or not, my dog Chipper plays an important part from here on in. We stand in the driveway, sometimes for hours, and toss the tennis ball. I throw and he retrieves while I think of names and locations and settings for scenes. We go to the track and walk untold laps while I test dialogue out loud. Chipper turns every once in a while and looks at me with his head cocked to the side. He thinks I’m talking to him.
I don’t fear losing ideas with this technique. I figure if the idea is good it will stick with me; if I lose it, it probably wasn’t any good anyway. So after all this time of living with these people and a story in my head, it has become as much a part of me as my memories. Now I go to the desk and begin to type. Chipper is lying at my feet and glad this stage has finally come as he likes sleeping much better than the track or even the tennis ball.

Still I’m only typing the outline. I list the characters that I want to interact. I list the chapters and note to myself what I want revealed with each one. This keeps the plot from surprising me someplace along the way.

I always know what I want my characters to do and where I want them to wind up, but I’m not always sure how they will react to certain situations and conversations. This is one of the real thrills of writing - surprising myself with little unexpected jolts as the people take life.

My agent said to me not long ago, “Isn’t
writing fun?” And you know what? It is. Working in the coal mines, farming, standing the factory line, greasing cars; that’s work.

But writing should have plain old, scrubbed-down, unadulterated joy right in the heart of it. It should leave you so exhilarated and high that you can float across the furniture. And if you’re not feeling this, make a change and try it my way. Don’t leave that keypad tired and exhausted; weary and drained. Leave it with an expectation that you can’t wait to get back to. Some days I get so involved I can’t even remember if I’ve eaten or not.

That’s when Chipper figures in again. He always lets me know when it’s time for lunch.

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