D. Hart St. Martin

I make female heroes badass AND believable

Writing

Thanking

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Just a few miles away from my destination—the Ovitt Library in Ontario, California—I found myself thinking about what a friend had reminded me to do in approaching the presentation I was about to give. I blogged just a couple of days ago about my fears as I neared this moment. My friend, who knew she’d be out of the country and unable to come, had called me before leaving to wish me luck. I mentioned that I’d given a whole slew of speeches in my teen years in my church and had even competed and won an award. She said, “Find the girl. Remember the girl.” I knew that girl still lived on somewhere inside me, so I wrote my friend’s words down and kept them close.

I drove past Chaffey High School.  It’s a very large campus on Euclid Avenue, the main drag through Ontario and Upland. I never attended school there; my alma mater is in Pomona, a couple of cities away. But Chaffey remains an important part of my personal story. At the age of five, I appeared as one of the kids in Finian’s Rainbow at the Gardiner W. Spring Auditorium on the campus. I have few memories of those moments, but I have been told that one night a piece of scenery either fell on me or knocked me over.  I ran off the stage crying with many commiserating mumblings following from the audience. I recovered quickly and returned for my final scene, and the audience applauded my spunk.

So, as I drove, I remembered the girl—the girl who gave speeches, the girl who played the secondary lead in the high school musical, the girl who walked back out onto a stage at the age of five after an unpleasant encounter with scenery—and I knew I would do well this day when I was about to test that public person.

And I did. There were at least 30 people in the room, a room with bad acoustics, and I connected with many, if not all, of them. They laughed in all the right places. They smiled and I smiled back. I made eye contact. I spoke clearly and relatively succinctly about a 37-year journey making Lisen of Solsta happen. I spoke mostly about self-publishing, something I’ve done through three incarnations and 20 years.

I ate lunch with several of the club members afterwards and enjoyed the company. Being an introvert, it’s hard for me to spend much time out with other people, but I managed to stay for nearly an hour, and that’s pretty damn good for me.

I only sold four books, gave out many bookmarks, lost all four pens I’d brought for people to sign a mail sheet, but three of the pens mysteriously returned before I left. But the fact that I, the zaftig writer, got up in front of people, without a podium, stood for nearly an hour as I talked in clear and ringing tones about a subject both near and dear is where I claim my success. Next time I won’t fret, at least not anywhere near as much as I did this time.

Oh, and did I mention my posse? Several members of my writing workshop who’ve provided valuable critique of everything I write (except for most of what I post here) showed up to cheer me on. My sister came as well. At this time of giving thanks, I give thanks for this day in which I proved to myself I could do it and thanks for the people who helped make it happen.

Shaking

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Tomorrow I greet a bunch of strangers and hopefully regale them with the story of my 37-year journey writing the Lisen of Solsta series. This is hard for me (like it isn’t hard for everybody?). It’s hard because I have an anxiety disorder. It’s hard because I’m a zaftig woman, a very zaftig woman, and people tend to judge me as not terribly bright on first impressions. It’s hard because I’m an introvert who is uncomfortable in groups of unknown people. It’s hard because… Oh, damn, it’s just hard.

I’ve prepped my presentation. I’m planning on speaking off the cuff, but I’ve written out notes to keep me on topic (and not wondering off on some tangent or other and using up valuable time—an hour is a lot but not unlimited). I’m taking a few props. I chose not to use PowerPoint this time as I’m not familiar with it and couldn’t think of more than one slide I’d actually want to put up for this particular “lecture.” So I’ll be passing around the various self-published versions of the story—one of which I actually printed and bound myself with the help of my father—for them to ooh and ah over. (I’m not actually expecting oohs and ahs, but a little appreciation of my commitment would be nice.)

I’m taking a sign-up sheet in case they want to be notified of the publication of book 3 (hopefully near the end of December). I have a hand-out of my web sites and sites that might be helpful if any of them want to self-publish. I have four pens, a sign that says “Please make checks payable to…,” and a butt load of book marks. Oh, and books. Yes, I’m taking plenty of books. Just in case, you know. And a single printed-out manuscript copy of a scene from Fractured.

Do you know how hard it is to pick a sample to read in front of a group? When an agent or publisher requests sample chapters, they mean chapter 1 through whatever number of chapters they ask for. Easy-peasy. But for a reading, I feel that a true taste of the spirit of the book is required. This meant finding a scene where Lisen was at her outspoken best, but one where I wasn’t giving the bank away by reading it. I tried several scenes from both published books and finally settled on the end of Chapter 6 from book 1. Lisen is telling off the sooth who got her into all this trouble in the first place, and it contains a lot of questions that I do eventually answer (but not until the end of book 3).

So that’s where I’ll be tomorrow (Saturday, November 22)—at a library in Ontario, California, shaking inside but smiling and breathing deeply to keep the nerves from sending me running from the room. I plan to bring my MP3 player so I can listen to Taylor Swift’s “Shake it Off” before I begin—you know, just to shake out the cobwebs. I’d like to find someplace private, say, the bathroom, where I can dance like white girls dance. And then I’ll step out and shake the room up. Well, at least I hope so. Wish me luck.

I’ve Lost my Voice!

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A writer’s voice is a combination of style, phrasing, and flow. It is potentially the most useful tool in the writer’s little pencil box. Some writers possess a voice so easily identifiable that all an astute reader needs are a few sentences to name the source. And voice does not manifest in fiction alone; with the possible exception of newspaper reporting, it can exist anywhere that words are brought together to tell a story.

Now, enough of defining voice. This is a personal story. This is not a training session on how to find your voice. (The way to find your voice is to keep writing until you find it. That’s it. Moving on.)

Several months ago, my brain began doing a rather odd thing—probably brought on by one or more of a few stressors which I won’t go into here. My brain began applying a sing-song inflection to everything I thought, everything I heard, everything I read, and everything I wrote. All words strung together in any perceivable manner turned into this kind of chant in my head.

At the time, I was working on the first draft of the third and final book of my series, Lisen of Solsta.  In first draft, my brain’s affliction was active but did not harm the text.

(And, so you’ll know, I ran this past my psychiatrist recently, and he deemed it a passing problem, likely stress related. But he’s not a writer; what does he know?)

A week ago, I moved on to second draft, and I found myself fighting the work but not knowing why. Last night, a painful epiphany hit me like a hammer. If I can’t perceive my writing as anything more than a sing-songy mish-mash of words, how am I going to find the flow? I mean, there’s singing and there’s sing-songing. The former allows words to soar; the latter, a pain in the ass. If I can’t tell if a sentence or a paragraph flows, what the hell am I doing writing at all? Needless, to say, a great many things got thrown around my office last night. Sigh.

So if anyone has dealt with something like this or knows someone who has, let me know. For now the plan is for me to let the writing go for a little while and let my poor, aching brain rest and hope to God (hear me, God?) that the little chanting person in my head moves on to some other soul and lets me have my mojo back. I am a writer, damn it! And Lisen’s story needs an ending.

Thank You for the Music (A Father’s Day Orchestration)

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I’m sitting here tonight doing what I do nearly every night—listening to symphonic music on my Walkman while I write. And as I was writing and listening, I grew aware of my highly trained ear and its evolution. At the moment, it’s the soundtrack to the Sci-Fi* channel’s Children of Dune, the first cut, “Summon the Worms.” The piece begins softly with mournful strings and then begins to build until the strings and brass play point and counterpoint back and forth on the same theme. And then it bursts wide open with the tympani leading the rest of the orchestra into the billowing centerpiece. I play it over and over again because it, quite simply, makes my body tingle.

When I was in elementary school, my father would sometimes take me to his weekly orchestra rehearsals. He belonged to the local community orchestra which put on maybe three or four concerts a year. I would sit at the back of the rehearsal hall at the local high school with him and rejoice in the music that surrounded me. He played percussion. If it wasn’t brass, strings or woodwinds, he was your guy (except for piano and harp, of course).

orchestra
The Pomona Valley Symphony Orchestra in rehearsal  circa 1958

My very favorite instrument he played was the tympani—the big copper kettledrums. I loved, and still love, that deep-throated pounding sound, almost like the beating of a heart. You have to tune those, you know. There are usually two or more in the orchestra, and they’re tuned to different notes. Each time before my dad would perform, he’d spend many minutes with his ear within millimeters of the drumhead tapping it lightly with the padded tympani mallet, and as he did so, he would turn one tuning screw a skosh clockwise or counterclockwise to get the desired pitch. (The drums typically have a range of a perfect fifth, according to Wikipedia.) And then he’d repeat the process with the other one. He loved those drums, but they didn’t belong to him. The school district owned them.

DaddysPOV
The orchestra from my father’s point of view

Dad would also let me sit with him during performances. That’s when all the hard work week after week came together in a perfect whole. I would sit on a chair just like his chair—an angelic-looking little blond girl—and watch and listen as the orchestra gave life to black dots on paper. I learned to play the piano starting in first grade, moved on to accordion and then violin along the way, but I believe that the greatest music education I ever got was sitting in that orchestra absorbing the contribution of every instrument alone and then together. I can tear “Summon the Worms” apart and appreciate its soaring due to the time I spent sitting at the back of that orchestra.

DaddyLauraMe
My father, my younger sister and
myself in a publicity photo for the orchestra.

So, to my father who’s been gone for nearly six years now, I say thank you. Thank you, Daddy, for the music, all the music. My life would falter were it not for my love of music. And while rock-and-roll is great and I love it dearly, it’s the magic of an orchestra that never fails to take me places I’ve never been before.

*That’s what the SyFy network was called when the miniseries first aired.

Worthy Women of Courage

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I’m pissed.  A few days ago I wrote a lovely piece about my father I intended to upload this weekend.  I’ll still upload it, but I’m pissed and I need to tell you why.  Several months ago I allied myself with a group on the internet and Facebook called Ordain Women (OW).  I’ve written about this before and about my concerns if the general authorities of the Mormon church decide to come down hard on these women.

The war has begun.  On June 8, 2014, Kate Kelly, the founder of Ordain Women, received an “invitation” to answer charges of apostasy (see NYT article here).  Likely the evidence will include the belief on the part of the church that Ordain Women and its members and supporters are directly questioning the authority of the “divinely” inspired leadership of the church.  The fact that these women always speak softly, dress in their Sunday best whenever they perform some sort of public action and only ask that said leadership ask God the question “Has the time come for women to be ordained?” means nothing to these men in charge.  They see these women as questioning the laws of God.  The LAWS of GAWD, for heaven’s sake.  (And remember that this is a church that was founded on the principle of “ask and it shall be answered.”)

Silent vigils are planned for the day and time this “disciplinary council” is scheduled to meet (June 22, 7 p.m. ET).  Sister Kelly, who, as an attorney, knows how to answers these fools and refute their charges, will not be present.  Knowing that Ms. Kelly has just moved from Virginia to Utah, her “former” bishop has ordered the meeting to take place in Virginia in a ward (a small community of church members) to which Ms. Kelly no longer belongs and to which she will be unable to travel (especially at the tail end of a weekend).  She will be allowed to send a written statement, but no phone or internet will be allowed.  Either show up or shut up.

To the wonderful women of OW who are reeling from this betrayal, I say, be strong.  Be not afraid.  I don’t believe in God as you perceive him, but I believe that there’s something out there which, when petitioned, will send you the strength and courage you require.  The bigwigs of Mormondom may have fired the first salvo and the wounds may feel deadly, but the recognition you seek as human beings of equal value to me is a worthy cause.  I know that often one of you will quote a line or two from “Come, Come Ye Saints,” but I choose to end with words from the Finale of Les Miserables.

“Will you join in our crusade?
Who will be strong and stand with me?
Somewhere beyond the barricade
Is there a world you long to see?
Do you hear the people sing?
Say, do you hear the distant drums?
It is the future that they bring
When tomorrow comes!”

Applause, Applause, a Little Applause

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Many, many years ago, I began collecting buttons. Not the kind you use for fastening clothing; the kind with statements on them. You know, the original memes? My first one, given to me by a guy in my senior English class in high school after the summer I first fell in love with The Lord of the Rings read “FRODO LIVES,” in dark blue letters on pale pink. Many more TLoR buttons followed—“COME TO MIDDLE EARTH!,” “FRODO FOREVER,” “FRODO FREAKS OUT,”  and my favorite, “FRODO GAVE HIS FINGER FOR YOU.” I keep those in a small cloth drawstring pouch in my Wedgewood tin along with the rest of these treasures.

The summer after high school I visited Wales, Ireland, England and France. I must have come home with a dozen buttons from that trip. My favorite is the one that reads “UNINHIBIT.” Well, it was the 60s, after all. I loaned that one to someone who never returned it (and if you’re reading this, I want it back). There were also the requisite 60s staples—“MAKE LOVE NOT WAR,” “LONG LIVE THE ETERNAL NOW,” and “MELTS IN YOUR MIND, NOT IN YOUR MOUTH.” Others that were not so common were “EATING PEOPLE IS WRONG” and “UP IS A NICE PLACE TO BE.”

I also own several political buttons, from Tom Hayden’s Senate campaign in 1976 to Kerry/Edwards in 2004. I have a great quote on a beautifully crafted piece which reads, “Don’t compromise yourself. You are all you’ve got!” credited to Janis Joplin. And how about “NO MATTER WHERE YOU GO THERE YOU ARE”? Ain’t that the truth.

“HOMOPHOBIA DESTROYS FAMILIES”

“to Life, AIDS ACTION COMMITTEE”

“PRO CHILD PRO CHOICE”

You can see it’s an eclectic selection (though the politics remain fairly stable). I even have one that simply says, “HERO,” in white on red.

Today I’m a hero to me. Today I can announce that I am now officially “Award-Winning Author D. Hart St. Martin” whose second book in the Lisen of Solsta series, Tainted, won the Indie Reader Discovery Award in young adult fiction. See their review. Long live the eternal now!

front cover shot - low rez (2)

Celebrate this event with me. Both Fractured and Tainted books are free for Kindle from 5/30 through 6/3/14.

*The theater cat from Archy and Mehitabel