What's Missing

Before Dave and I watched "Win-Win," I browsed through some reviews and their replies. One reply summed: "The only good part of this movie is the acting."

Do you remember when good acting was enough? When things didn't blow up or transform or strip down to nothing, but when dialogue was rich and actors' eyes told stories?

Story telling. It's falling behind on the media fast track. But, sheesh, when we experience it, it really is something.

Last week, Dave and I went to a local storytelling night. Six random community members spoke on one theme: "Love Hurts." There were big laughs from the audience during a tale of two tussling roommates, some sniffles over a marriage that evaporated without warning.

Each story was an authentic conversation between the talker and the listener. For days afterwards, this conversation lingered: a phrase, a word, the raise of an eyebrow.

There was thinking and feeling.

Which makes me wonder.

What are we doing when we're watching "Fast and Furious...5?"

Check It!

Because of my last post, I am 5,000 words into a new WIP. I love it, love it, love it! Like, I've been wondering, why haven't I been writing this story, this way, the whole time?

It's a genre I'm not usually drawn to (science fiction), and it's not YA, and it's taking more time to research than to write.

But I. Am. So. Excited!

So excited, in fact, that I haven't had time to blog. I haven't even had anything to blog about.

And I sure haven't been traveling the blogosphere much, though I do miss it.

Until recently, I had no idea that Nathan Bransford isn't in publishing anymore. I wasn't aware that Jay Asher's 13 R3asons Why will be a movie. But I did know that LK Madigan passed away, and every day I have thought of her and her family and the legend she left in her books.

There seems to be an awful lot of pink hair in the YA-writers cyber world right now.

I can't wait to finish my 1,000 words for the day (my good man, who is helping me conceive this thing, has set me a goal to finish by June), so I can vacation a bit with you bloggers!

See you soon!

Good Excuse?

My lovely husband invited me to see "Jackass 3" in 3-D with him last weekend.

I politely declined, however, telling him that I hadn't seen the first two, and it might mess up plot continuity.

They Might Be Writers

Some actors get into their roles so deeply, they would have to be excellent writers of first-person fiction, don't you think?

At the top of my list:

Sean Penn

Tilda Swinton

Steve Buscemi

(And...um...Hugh Jackman?)

Who else? Who's on your list?

Fabulous Fiction

My friend Karlee and I have this little debate sometimes about which is better: fiction or non-fiction.

And tonight, when Dave and I watched the quirky comedy The Invention of Lying, I really thought about the real differences between the two genres.

Non-fiction is straightforward, clean. It tells us what to believe. There's no wrong, no mess, no controversy.

Fiction, on the other hand, uses the higher-order thinking skills that Benjamin Bloom defined and categorized over 70 years ago: interpretation, evaluation, analysis. With fiction, we are pushed to wonder, to question. We react emotionally. We feel. We make it personal.

Fiction is created. It takes imagination and some serious hard work to produce.

It is exaggerative, enhanced with stylistic devices like metaphor, hyperbole, and setting. It welcomes ownership and debate; promotes thought; and fills the human need to study, to understand.

To me, this is what reading is all about--when the actual reading itself is secondary to the interpretation and emotion and discussion that comes from it. To not have truth all spelled out, but to find it for myself.

Delivery or Short-Change?

The other day, Dave and I were finishing up "The Boys Are Back," a film about Clive Owen's character trying to survive the death of his wife. This was based on the life and novel The Boys Are Back In Town, by former sportswriter Simon Carr.

It took us a couple days to finish the movie because 1) I had that flu, and 2) the movie was really slow.

I thought about how YA books don't have the luxury of being slow. How they have to please with plot, and right away.

On the other hand, for a film, being visually stimulating is often enough. There might be no dialogue, no narration, for minutes on end, but music and movement and scene still happen.

All that takes pages and pages of scriptwriting (words) to create.This reminds me of an NPR story I heard years ago on the ginormous (6- or 700-page) screenplay of "Brokeback Mountain," in which, besides the famous "I wish I knew how to quit you," had minimal dialogue. But every time a cowboy brushed his hand across a horse, that was probably 10 pages of script right there. So oodles more words were added to the original short story by E. Annie Proulx.

Okay, where is all this going? Well, with the slow films, it's not going anywhere, at least anytime soon.

But with YA literature, this just isn't the case. There's no more allowance for sinking into a story through scene, through description. It's all action, right from The Hook.

Which makes me wonder: what is the fate of The YA Introduction's evolution? Is it reflective of today's young readers? Have authors pinned themselves into a corner by delivering what's demanded? What is lost by having a hook? What is gained? And where, in terms of beginnings, will we be 20 years from now?

When Delivery Trumps Plot

What if everything you were fighting for was a lie?

That's the essence of "The Green Zone," a movie in which a US soldier questions the existence of the weapons of mass destruction he's supposed to be finding in Iraq.

Believe it or not, the film reminded me of the book Abundance, a novel about Marie Antoinette.

In both cases, going in to the stories, the audience knows what's going to happen: that no WMD exist, that Antoinette is beheaded. What we don't know is how the plot will get us there.

In both cases, the story is personal. It's credible, compelling, twisty. There's an angle, a question.

Will Saddam's top man meet up with our soldier? Will Antoinette maintain her composure?

What do the characters think? Feel? HOW do they get to their end?

"Titanic" is another good example of predictable conclusion. We know it sinks. What we don't know is when, or why, or how. Or if the two lovers live or die together.

I respect stories that take an audience's common knowledge and add depth and dimension. It can't be easy to pull off. But it sure is fascinating to think about.

At Maximum Capacity, With Room For Some Good News

It's the end of the term, of winter term. There's a stack of 30 analysis papers in my living room. And a pile of 10 billion Legoes on the floor.

Conferences are coming up. For my students. For my kids. Grades are due. Bills are due.

I didn't even realize yesterday (the FOURTH) was March, and forgot to pay the piano teacher.

I left my grading sheet (!) at school.

I left my phone at my friend Wendi's house. So I missed my first ever call FROM AN AGENT!

But!

Things are really really good right now.

My marriage is strong, and will be even better when Dave gets off shift today.

My kids are healthy.

There's enough fruit to throw in the blender for a smoothie.

"Brookyn's Finest" opens tonight, and I'm a sucker for a good bad-cop movie.

We get to go to "Grease." For free.

The daffodils are right outside my door, if I'm in doubt that spring will ever come.

It's my friend Leslie's birthday and she's having a Circus Party.

Christy sold book rights to Russia!

AAAAAnnnnnddddd....

An agent I enormously admire has completely renewed my faith in YA writing. I absolutely LOVED my conversation with her yesterday, and am hoping whole-heartedly.

What the Apocalypse Sounds Like

Since I'm presently teaching my composition students the elements of descriptive writing,appeal to senses is at the forefront of my mind.

So when I saw a movie with Dave today, where the end of the world was more than shown, it was heard, I was intrigued.

The scuttling of a cockroach up a wall; a dry, dusty wind whistling over a collapsed bridge; the scrape of a metal water pump; the scuff of worn boots across cracked asphalt...In the Hughes' brothers' latest film, not only does sound make Armageddon more real to its viewers, it is paramount to its characters' survival. They rely on this sense to keep safe, to get food.

If the flap of a crow's wings and the buzz of silence don't get you, the music definitely will.

The Apocalypse sounds like "The Book of Eli."

The Glory of "Inglourious"

If revenge trumps love, and a bumbling Southern idiot pulls one over on villainous masterminds; if humor is injected into an interpretation of one of the darkest times in human history, and if all predictions are pointless; if you've left the end of the movie feeling confused but satisfied, with more questions than answers, it has to be Quentin Tarantino.

No master of brevity, Tarantino whittled "Inglourious Basterds" to over two and a half hours, with serious devotion to dialogue.

There are chapters, obscure actors, interwoven stories, and a (distracting)comic infuse.

There is action.

My favorite part of going to the film was not only admiring the movie itself, but watching viewers leave the theater with looks of sheer shock and perplexity. Tarantino delivers big concepts to small towns.

This is not a documentary, though, which is important to remember. "Inglourious Basterds" is entertainment. And art. And an exercise of the "What if..."

Wish List

If I ever make it big in the literary world, here's what I'm going to buy:

A refrigerator with automatic ice.

This Tin Man doll for Daney.

A trip to Alaska with Dave, and a trip to Finland with my dad.

A secret study with bookshelves and a bathtub.

Dinner at Chateaulin for my writing group.

A night out for all my family and friends at the movies, with bottomless popcorn and Junior Mints.

A year-long pass to yoga, during which I'll dedicate every practice to gratitude for my Big Success.