Nikki Loftin

Archive for the ‘Children’s Fiction’ Category

News from Nikkiland

Hiya, Writer Friends!

I’m writing up a storm on my Work-in-Progress. It makes me so sad (this one’s a doozy), I have to stop and eat massive doses of chocolate just to get through the day. (More than usual, I mean. Which is saying something, folks.)

Of course, then I go teach Zumba classes to ward off Writer’s Butt. (Yesterday, one of my class members commented on how much we were sweating. I wiped off my forehead and said, “Sweat? This isn’t sweat. It’s the blood of a thousand vanquished M&Ms.” Real life dialogue for the WIN!)

The week started off with sadness, as two of our sweet pet chickens died horribly. Then I got a bit of lovely writer news — a poem accepted into a new anthology put out by Mutabilis Press for poets with ties/connections to Texas and Louisiana. The anthology comes out rather soon, and I’ll post a link here when it does.

And then there was some other Happy News I can’t share until later in the week! Intrigued? You must wait!

I hope you all had Happy News in your week. And no dead pets, because that part really sucked.

Now, I’m off to torture my characters yet again. Huh. Where’d I put those Snickers bars?

Possess: How A Book Saved My Whole Neighborhood*

I was supposed to be writing today. I came home from my other job, setlled down in front of my computer, checked the email… and gazed longingly at this.

My new book, the book I’d been hearing all those good things about.What? You haven’t heard of it?

Well then, here’s the blurb from Goodreads:

Fifteen-year-old Bridget Liu just wants to be left alone: by her overprotective mom, by the hunky son of the police officer who got her father killed, and by the eerie voices which she can suddenly and inexplicably hear. Turns out the voices are demons–the Biblical kind, not the Buffy kind–and Bridget possesses the rare ability to banish them.

San Francisco’s senior exorcist and his newly assigned partner from the Vatican enlist Bridget’s help with increasingly bizarre and dangerous cases of demonic possession. But when one of Bridget’s oldest friends turns up dead in a ritualistic sacrifice that mirrors her father’s murder, Bridget realizes she can’t trust anyone. An interview with her father’s murderer reveals a link between Bridget and the Emim: a race of part-demons intent on raising their forefathers to the earth in human form. Now Bridget must unlock the secret to the Emim’s plan before someone else close to her winds up dead, or worse–the human vessel for a Demon King.

 

It was supposed to be my Reward Read – the one I let myself devour after I finished the week’s word quota.

But it kept calling me.

The call of this book was stronger than chocolate.

Of course, I really NEEDED a good read – I’d been stressed to the limit by all the Texas wildfires, and the one that had broken out twice across the street over the weekend had made me pack and unpack my Most Precious Preciouses more than once. (Look for a vlog on that late this week.)

You know what happened. I started reading. But what you don’t know was that I couldn’t put the book down. It was un-put-downable. I kid you not, this book? AMAZING. It reminded me of Lisa DesRocher’s excellent Personal Demons a bit, but maybe more scary. It has everything: hot guys, a great, strong female main character (maybe I should hve put that before hot guys?), scary demonic possession stuff, and pacing to beat the band.

LOVED it. You need this book – go out and buy it. But how, you might ask, could this book have saved my whole neighborhood?*

I’m getting there.

My favorite reading chair is upstairs, in my bedroom, next to the window that overlooks the valley by my house. After I read a while in my office, near my computer, I got tired of the way Ms. SmartyPants Computer was staring at me, whispering tacky things about “word count failure” and “lazy procrastinators” and “reward books are the Devil,” so I gave up and went upstairs.

I was reading there, by the window. I happened to look up (probably to entreat the Heavens to allow me to write something this awesome) and saw a wisp of smoke out the window. And then, red flames.

Yep, the next door property was on fire again.

Poeple, if I had been downstairs, I would not have seen this. I would not have KNOWN to call the fire in. It’s entirely possible that Gretchen McNeil’s book, POSSESS, saved my home, my neighborhood… possibly my life.

So, seriously. But this book NOW. The next life it saves could be your own.

* Okay, truthfully? One other neighbor saw the smoke and called it in, so maybe we wouldn’t have all been left without homes. But you NEVER KNOW.

Move Along, Nothing to See Here

Happy Labor Day, Writer Friends! I hope you’re celebrating in whatever ways you desire.

Me? I’m cleaning the entire house, including the porches. I even had my son clean out his goldfish bowl. For those of you who know me, this is deeply frightening, since me voluntarily cleaning is one of the sure signs of the Apocalypse.

It may very well be the End Times, Friends. Because if the Four Horsemen came to my door this morning and asked me for directions to the party, I would point them to my hard drive. I’m pretty sure my current WIP is possessed. Or something.

It’s scaring me like this anyway.

By possessed I mean that it’s taken on a life of its own – and not one I would have chosen for it. It’s gone from merely tragic to horrifically frightening (for me at least). And while it has all the beautiful images I like to play with, the things that some of the characters are doing? Oh, holy cow.

It’s all I can do to sit down and keep writing. I’m terrified, and my own characters are making me cry. Betrayals galore, terrible secrets revealed at great expense to the helpless children there… I think I’ll stop now and go clean the mud room and pantry.

No. I can’t.

The manuscript is calling, in its horrifying little Carol Anne-from-Poltergeist voice. I have to go back into the closet, and figure out if I’m just mining my own well of crazy, or if the story knows what it’s doing.

Or maybe both.

Beta readers? Be afraid. Be very afraid.

 

 

 

Origami Yoda, or How To Do an Author Signing

So, one of those things Debut Authors do in those months up to The Big Day (whch I have found out recently for MY first book, is August 21, 2012!! Woo hoo!) is go to other author’s events.

Of course, we do this anyway, sometimes because the authors are friends/heroes/mentors, and/or because we love their books, and sometimes because we have no other lives anyways and the Roller Derby was sold out. But anyway…  we debuts go, and take notes.

Oh, wow. I could have *filled* a notebook last week at Tom Angleberger’s Darth Paper Strikes Back book signing at Bookpeople in Austin. I could have… but I was laughing too hard to take any notes at ALL!

Now, I’ve been to some pretty good author events. But this guy? He remembered something, I think, that many of us forget when we start talking to a large group of people about our writing-y things.

He remembered who his real audience was. And he spoke to them.

Adults were there, sure, but Tom writes for middle grade kids (of which there were MANY in attendance) and he never forgot that. It was like a stand-up comedy skit for kids, with some juggling and reading thrown in to break things up.

How’s this for getting your audience? He dressed a kid up in an enormous origami Yoda costume.

Every kid there was taught how to make a five-fold “emergency” Yoda, to take home. You know, just in case you need some Jedi wisdom some afternoon.

He drew pictures in all the books he signed.

And every time a kid raised a hand, even if their comment was way off-base (as can happen when kids get REALLY excited and try to make jokes with their favorite author), he was respectful and considerate.

And in doing that last one? He had every single parent there in the palm of his hand, too. Like me. He could write a thousand books, and I would buy them all in hardcover at full price, just because I want to show my appreciation.

Now, I don’t fold paper in my debut novel. I also can’t juggle, and I don’t have a hilarious scene about pee stains guaranteed to have the elementary-aged set rolling on the floor. But Tom gave me a whole lot to think about for my upcoming signings. Things about connecting with your target audience, dressing the part, and giving respect to the whole crowd.

Even the tiny, noisy little 3rd grade Sith Lords.

Sixth Grade PTSD

Today is one of the worst days of the year for me: the first day of school. No, not school for me, sillies. For my kids.

I know, I know. It’s dumb. I get all worked up, worrying about them all day. Will they get to eat lunch with a friend? Will their teachers like them? Will they be teased/bullied/left out?

And this year I have a sixth grader, so my fears are intensified. My memories of sixth grade are… painful. Yes, that’s a word that fits. But not painful in the “wincing when I think about my clothing choices back then” way. More like “throwing up in my mouth when I even hear the words ‘sixth grade’ and curling into the fetal position for a week” way.

Yes, Friends. THAT bad. I had to transfer out of one school and into another one in the middle of February in sixth grade, when my mother finally figured out just how psychologically disturbed I was getting.  (Of course, when we had that talk, she switched me to my new school in two days. And those two days were hooky days, where we went shopping and to movies. Good mom, right?)

Anyway, all this got me to thinking — why in the name of all that’s holy do I write middle grade? Because, seriously, I have to put myself in the head space of an 11 year-old kid every freaking day!!! I have to remember exactly what that was like, and recreate it on the page, and then try to solve the problems of my poor, tortured characters. I’m trapped, mentally, in sixth grade.

I think I have PTSD. Sixth grade PTSD, to be exact.

Anyone else out there conducting their own self-therapy regimen through your writing? Maybe your freshman year at high school was the one. Think about it — are all your characters 14/15 years old? Or am I the only one who seems to be stuck in the WWI Foxhole Year of My Youth?

On a side note, it is rather satisfying to make money off all that pain. So there is that.

Thoughts? Sympathy? Horrible stories about swirlies and sadistic teachers? (FYI, I’m going to be writing a book in November/December set in a demon-infested sixth grade where I poorly veil and only ever-so-slightly change the names of all the teachers and kids who tortured me. Maybe then I’ll have peace. )

 

Unicorns in the Desert

So, the thing is, there were unicorns there.

No, not the kind with sparkly horns and magical rainbow-surfing skills. The real kind.

Last week, I got back from the A Room of her Own Writing Retreat in Ghost Ranch, New Mexico. I’m pretty sure the founders of the conference, Mary Johnson and Darlene Chandler-Bassett, chose to host the conference there because it’s one of the most beautiful places in the world. Like, this beautiful:

So, it shouldn’t surprise anyone that unicorns would hang out there, right? But here’s what I mean by “unicorns.” You know how no one with a philosophy degree ever finds a use for it? At dinner one night, I was talking to another writer who admitted she’d majored in philosophy. “Did that turn out to be useful?” I joked, fully expecting her to laugh and tell about her mother’s despair at the endless string of fast-food jobs philosophy degrees usually auger. “Well, I guess so,” she said to my surprise. “I’m teaching philosophy at XXX College now.”

Seriously? These people do not exist. A total unicorn.

A day later, on a drive back from the Ojo Caliente hot mineral springs spa (yeah, we totally took a day off from the writing — mud baths, too!), one of the poets in my car protested that “poets can make money! I did it.” I asked her to explain, and she spilled the details of her recent win of a major national poetry competition, the prize being publication of her debut chapbook AND a wad of money. Sweet. And also, a unicorn.

So, you know how your mom told you to for-Gods’-sake go to law school and not that Creative Writing program that was just a money pit and who ever gets a job as a writer anyway?*

Yeah, turns out? This conference was full of exceptions to the norm.

And the readings — every night, the unicorns read from their work. And it was glorious. First off, I took this picture from my outside seat on the second night:

And the words they read… I was stunned. I’ve never been in a group that was so talented, such a large gathering (about 80 of us) who all had something to say , and had found a way to say it that transformed the listener. Poetry that brought tears to my eyes, short fiction that made me laugh so hard I thought I’d pee, excerpts of novels that made me grab my pen and write down the name of the book so I wouldn’t miss it.

Okay, I’m gushing.

Anyway, it was a glorious week. Readings and a keynote address from Marilynne Robinson (who is pretty much a unicorn herself, with her Pulitzer prize and all) set the tone, and Mary Johnson’s surprise Oprah-like book giveaway to the entire assembly (perhaps brought on by the news that Oprah magazine is planning to do a piece on her forthcoming memoir!) wrapped it up nicely.

I’ve never been to any of those other conferences – Breadloaf and the like — but this one was amazing, and I’m so glad I went. Oh, and I also got ten thousand words written on my new, tragically beautiful WIP!

So, Writer Friends, how was your summer vacation?

 

* Okay, to be fair, my mother never said that to me. But I knew a lot of other writers whose moms did. My mom was mostly happy I wasn’t going to law school. I think.

Wonderful News for My Dear Writer Friend!

What a lovely week! Why so lovely? Well… I spent mine in the Caribbean, cruising around, petting dolphins and paddling near white sand beaches. Hard life, I know. But right before I left, I also found out some amazing news!! Shelli Cornelison, one of the people I love the very most in the Entire World, whose manuscripts I have critiqued and adored, whose children I have taken on mission trips, the woman who took me to my first SCBWI conference and force-fed me chocolate and encouragement when I was about to Give Up on the Whole Writing Thing a while back… just signed with her agent.

Congratulations to Karen Grencik, of Red Fox Literary. You probably don’t know yet how lucky you are to work with Shelli Cornelison. But you will.

Oh, frabjous day!

In Other News: As if that weren’t enough, I got home to an email from my own darling agent, with positive notes on my Next Manuscript! The Dark House will be on its way to Editor L so very, very soon.

And, um, while I was on that cruise? I snuck in some writing time. I’m in love again, Writer Friends. In love with my own words.*sigh* and LOL

This one will be tragic and dark, fairy-tale-ish and magical realistic, beautiful and heart-breaking. I. Can’t. Wait.

But I will have to. I’m leaving for the AROHO conference in New Mexico in four days!! Laundry, laundry, laundry…

 

 

Scared to Let Go

It’s been an interesting summer. My first book, The Sinister Sweeetness of Splendid Academy, is off at copy edits right now. I’ll admit, on the final round of line edits, I found myself almost physically unwilling/unable to hit send. To declare myself DONE! There had to be something I could do to make it better, right? Maybe just rewrite that first chapter one more time? It was — and remains — a scary thing, that letting go of a manuscript, handing it over to an editor/copyeditor. (And someday soon, it probably will be just as difficult to know it’s in the hands of a critic/critical reader. Excuse me while I wet my pants now.)

But it had to be done. I cashed the check.

And I wrote another book.

And then got even another idea. An amazing idea that gives me the shivers.

Now I’m in that prayerful time, the last weeks leading up to my total immersion in that New Idea. There’s only one thing –I shouldn’t call it new. This one is a manuscript I’ve started and stopped so many times, rewritten in different points of view — different genres, even! — that it feels like an old friend.

An old friend I wanted to poison with arsenic at times, but an old friend. You know what I mean.

The thing is, I just realized — it wasn’t the story that was at fault. It wasn’t weak, or flawed, or any of that other nonsense that can lead to the manuscript graveyard. It was me — I had the story muddled. I’ve been telling it from the POV of the wrong character. Now that I’ve realized that, it all seems so… obvious. Natural. But I had to let go of my original idea, my belief that the story belonged to this other character.

If I made this “realization” sound easy, it wasn’t. I’ve been fooling with this one for a long, long time. I just couldn’t let the other POV character go.

Do you find yourself doing that? Staying married to one idea of how a story “should” go, when the story itself is telling you something else entirely? Does it derail you? Does it invigorate you? Does it drive you to drink copious amounts of gin, and flirt with a diabetic coma brought on by too much British chocolate?

Or is that just me?

Maybe you find yourself feeling like this in your writing life:

I know I do, and often. But usually it’s a good scared.

Stay scared, Writer Friends. Terrified even. Hold on as long as you can.

Just know when it’s time to let go.

 

 

 

 

Story at Literature4Kids

Hi, Peeps!

I am pleased to announce one of my short stories is in this month’s online kid’s mag, Literature4Kids. This one is about a crab called Tarquin — named after one of my son’s hermit crabs. And, yes. It is an anthropomorphic kid’s story. I write those, too. So there.

In other news, I am busy entertaining company from Scotland, writing Christmas greeting cards (gotta love those holiday deadlines in July!), and enjoying my kids.

I’ve been reading, too! Just finished Boys Are Dogs, by Leslie Margolis. Lots of fun, and funny, too. The perfect “beach read” for an eleven-year-old girl. Er, or for me. (I’m secretly reading middle-grade girl books now. Just wait.I have a reason.)

 

What are you reading this summer?

 

 

Dark Middle Grade, Anyone?

There’s a been a bit of a furor on the Internet/Twitter/Author circuit about the Terrible Darkness that’s infecting the Young Adult bookshelves at Barnes and Noble.

I am SO not going to weigh in on this argument, folks. Not that my opinion would make a difference. Let’s just say I’ve been shaking my head a lot.

And wondering what in the world they’re going to think once the Darkness Police get their hands on my current manuscript.

Why do I wonder this? Well, to give you a very vague, non-spoilerish hint…

I was at my dad’s house the other day. I’d dropped in for a cup of coffee and a chat, and he very politely asked what my next book was about. (He’s good that way — he knows all his writer-daughter really ever wants to talk about is ice cream and/or her novels.) When I told him, he smiled, hopped up, and said, “Oh! That sounds great. I think you might need a book I have.” And then he went and got this for me:

What would those Wall Street Journal folks think of that? We may very well find out.Won’t that be fun?

So… what awesome books have you collected for your research, Writer Friends? Anything scary/weird/dodgy?

(Oh, and my dad is a Methodist minister, so it’s totally all right that he had this book in his library. Don’t want you all thinking he’s some sort of devil-worshipper. Hi, Dad!)