Nikki Loftin

Archive for the ‘People I Love’ Category

Mother’s Day Essays

This month, two of my essays came out in the local parenting magazine, ParentWise:Austin. I wrote one about my mother-in-law Liz, who passed away over six years ago (leaving an enormous hole in my life) and one about my own mother, who is still around and just LOVES it when I tell funny stories about her in such a public way.

Yeah, right. Sure.

Seriously, people. Be careful when and if you have kids. You never know if one of them might turn out to be a writer, and then you’ll be in trouble. If my kids ever grow up and decide to rat out my poor parenting skills in print, they’ll have material for decades. Here’s a couple of quotes from me just this week. “Two words, kid: Foster Care.” and “I have a knife, and if you touch me one more time, I swear I will cut off your little finger.”

Yeah, I’m really not gunning for mom of the year. I’m actually a lot better off than I was a few years back, when I used to dream about calling anonymous false abuse reports in to CPS so I could get a weekend away.*

In unrelated news, I sent my Blessing in Disguise manuscript to a new set of Betas yesterday (yay) and Raymond Mahaney’s Wrong Moves went out on sub on Monday (super yay!) sent by L’Agent Extraordinaire, Miss Suzie. I have a personal goal of finishing the Gingerbread WIP by June 1, which would be a bit tricky, since that means writing, like, 8,000 words a week! But it might happen. We’ll see.

Whoever you are, have a good weekend. Write well, and if you have a mother you love, who still speaks to you even after you’ve sold the stories of all the embarrassing things she did when you were a child, and who has an excellent sense of humor about it all, congratulations. Tell her you love her so much you can’t help but write about her, and buy her a margarita with your ill-gotten gains. That’s the plan chez moi, anyway. Happy Mother’s Day, Mom!

*This is the part where I say I’m kidding, so no one actually does call CPS on me. Seriously, it was years ago. And I only thought it, like, a few dozen times. Wait! I mean, never. Just a joke. Move along, move along, nothing to see here.

May Day Bouquet

When I was a little girl, on the first day of May every year, I would gather wildflowers from the sides of the drainage ditch next to my house, wrap the stems in a bunch of wet paper towels and some tinfoil, and sneak across the street to Catherine and Leon’s house. I would put the flowers down on the elderly couple’s doormat, ring the bell, and run away as fast as I could.

Every year. I never forgot.

I can’t remember where I got the idea. My mom? My sister? Someone, somewhere, told me that was what you did on the first day of May, to celebrate spring. A gift and a practical joke all rolled up in one. What kid could resist?

Some years there were better flowers – years like this one’s been, when the winter was rainy as all get out, and the bluebonnets and daisies answered the call to show off. Some years, it was a straggly handful of henbit, purple verbena, and some rain lilies that wilted almost before the door opened.  It didn’t matter. Every year, hiding in the bushes, I would hear the door open, and Catherine would cry out. “Why, Leon! Come and see! Someone’s left flowers here! I wonder who it could have been?”

I loved those neighbors. Their door and refrigerator was always open to a latchkey kid who had dropped her key somewhere (again), and their candy dish was always full of those peculiar delights: Atkinson’s peanut butter bars. To this day, all I have to do is smell one of those candies, and I am six years old again, my teeth stuck together, listening to Leon playing in the living room with his local wash tub band.

Catherine and Leon were old way back then, and they’ve been gone for decades. But I remember them. On top of my computer desk is Catherine’s favorite vase, given to me after her funeral — an elegant, peach-tinted blown-glass cone, filled with dried flowers all year long.

And every year, on May 1, I wonder: Will there be a barefoot, laughing neighbor girl when I’m old, who hides in the bushes and laughs while I open the door and shout for my husband to come and see the bouquet?

Happy Spring, Writer Friends.

Shameless

Writer Friends, I am pleased to report that my dear Writer Friend Lori and I both made our word quotas for the week. And that means you will not have the special treat of reading the fiery invective I had prepared — insults involving her parentage, her hygiene, and especially her writing technique — for at least another week.

That is, if she agrees to hold me accountable for another 5K next week. (Lori?)

This is a happy day. The only thing that makes me less happy is that I fully recognize the 5,000 words she sent me (to prove her accomplishment) far, far outclass the 5,000 I wrote this week. She is writing the funniest, coolest, most mind-bogglingly commercial YA rural/urban fantasy EVAH. Go, Lori, go!

Now, other news. I sold two essays today – Yay! Links in May when they appear. I am also working/writing  on my new Mac Book. Fun! Also, scary, as I am computer-challenged.

Tomorrow, I attend Chris Barton’s book party for his new picture book Shark Vs. Train at Bookpeople tomorrow. (You HAVE to check out the book trailer, free downloads, and poster at THIS SITE. Seriously, it’s genius marketing stuff. Ideas to steal for weeks.) If you have kids, know kids, or know people who have kids, you need to buy this book. Hilarious, great art, and clever.

Now, go away Internet. I have Old Novel revisions and New Novel word quotas, plus two essay ideas that keep pestering me. Must write more.

Write well, friends!

Prank You Very Much

Happy April Fool’s Day!

I love this holiday. I don’t get QUITE as into it as some of my friends (like the one who painted her sons’ fingernails in the night, and – oh, no! – couldn’t find the remover before school this morning), but I do my share.

This morning, I pranked my Zumba class by replacing the warm-up song with the Coconut Tree Cha Cha for Go, Diego, Go! Imagine 30 middle-aged women doing the “Baby Jaguar” Cha Cha over a pile of invisible coconuts… and trying not to let their growing feelings of horror, shame, confusion, and despair show on their faces. It was awesome. (If you don’t know what Zumba is, just know that we usually dance to groups like the Cumbia Kings, Pitbull, and Lady Gaga.)

I also sent a very special manuscript to my agent for her to consider. Hey, it’s not every day you get a rhyming alphabet picture book about roadkill, is it? (A is for Armadillo, scaly and cold…)

Although, from what I’ve heard about the slush pile, it might happen more frequently than I’d like to think.

Agent Suzie had some fun with her own April Fool’s joke — check it out. Just one more reason to love her… gotta love an agent who fights dirty. And you really, really want her to be fighting on YOUR side.

(I’m totally going to do the nail polish one next year, though.)

A Contest (or two) for You

Oh, Writer Friends, I wasn’t being flippant in my last post. I do adore you. And so, I will share the following with you all: One of my agent-sisters (Suzette Saxton) is having a contest on her blog, with some very nice prizes. The grand prize is a 40-page partial submission WITH critique with Mon Agent Extraordinaire, Suzie Townsend. Seriously, go sign up for this now! Or before March 14th.

Those of you who know me well also know I have a sort of obsession with silent auctions. There’s one going on right now that no one seems to know about. I bid on quite a few items, and felt so guilty at the thought that I might get them without any competition at all… So, I’m sharing the site with you. Go ahead, overbid me. It won’t be hard. There are amazing things/books/critiques available here, and it all goes to help a new independent bookstore in Utah, Fire Petal Books.

Unrelated note: Right now, my sweet husband is upstairs reading the latest draft of Raymond. I think he was worried I loved my Betas more than him, and he wanted in on the hot Beta love action. Smart man.

Hurting the Characters You Love

And no, I’m not talking about your kids or mine, even though they may indeed be “characters.” I’m talking about those kids we kid’s fiction writers create on the page and then — somewhere between writing The End and the call from your friend/agent/beta reader with revision ideas/suggestions/orders/demands to beef up your plot — we fall in love with.

I was sitting on my porch on Monday, wondering why I was having such a hard time revising one of my manuscripts when it popped into my head that the only thing keeping me from tearing into that revision with the necessary gusto was that I loved my main character too much.

Let’s call him Raymond, shall we? Precious little Raymond.

Raymond is just about everything I like in a kid. He’s sneaky, mischievous, funny, overly dramatic, smart, geeky, and deeply insecure. He has his own very special moral code, which might not be immediately recognizable as, well, moral to many old farts/adults. I wrote him, sure. I even found myself disapproving of his antics from time to time. Okay, not really. But I knew I *should* disapprove, if I were a “Good Parent.” Somewhere along the way, I fell in love with the little squirt. He became – like Pinocchio, like so many characters from books I read as a child — a real boy. My perfect, my precious. (Go ahead, do your Smeagol/Gollum voice here; I did.)

Of course, once I realized what I’d done, that the thing holding me back from making my manuscript better (um, hello? The *job* of a writer???) was that I didn’t want Raymond to suffer, it wasn’t a problem any more. Hey, I didn’t stick that post-it on my writing desk with those three magic words just to fill the space! What three words, you ask?

Hurt your characters.

Long story short-ish? I’m applying a whole lotta Tough Love to poor little Raymond this week. I hope it’ll make the book better. Who knows? Maybe it would work in the real world, too. (cue evil laughter)

(No, no. Bad Mommy. Hurt your characters, not your children. Very important to remember.)

Write well, friends. And be vicious and brutal to your fictional children.

Literary Salon Chez Moi

Well, I have a thousand things to do — revisions to plan, manuscripts to finish, lunches to pack, and many, many glasses of wine to drink — so it must be time for a blog post.

I promised a post on writing groups, but I’m mostly planning on telling you what I’ve got going on right now. This morning, a small group of women I call my Literary Salon (because it SOUNDS cool) arrived at my house for a few hours of fabulous food (why, yes, I *did *cook), industry gossip, and chatting about our manuscript-babies. No critiquing allowed, just support, advice, loans of some resources/books, homemade soup and chocolate-dipped strawberries. (Thanks, Erin!)

I don’t know why, but having a group that comes together in person to chat is important to me. Maybe it’s because I am such a terrible typist, so the online thing doesn’t work as well s it does for the typing-unimpaired. It jut takes too darn long to type all those comments. I end up leaving the funny stuff out. Bleah. Of course, this group’s members have to be geographically-linked, and it helps if they write the same genre, which we do (mostly) — MG and YA. Some of these gals are my Trusted Betas, Whom I Love Above All Others. (I privately refer to them as my personal Belles Dames Sans Merci, but don’t tell them.)

I also connived my way into an established online critique group with mostly published authors, some quite well-known. They are invaluable to me for working on picture books and short pieces, but I still feel too new to send great chunks of work their way. Don’t want to make a nuisance of myself. Yet.

I’m the newest member of a group of writers that meets in San Marcos every other Friday for fabulous coffee, some critique, conversation about our lives/health/anything else, and the VERY latest in markets/editors/agents for the various types of things we write. One of these authors writes Western romance, one writes contemporary thrillers, one writes Christian fic/non-fic. And then there’s me, the children’s writer/poet/literary fiction/puppet play/anthology/essayist. These gals are all amazingly supportive. It always feels like they have my back, no matter what I aim for. I love them. They are also all grandmas. I want to be them when I grow up.

Then there’s Suzie, L’Agent Extraordinaire, and her team of underpaid, underfed Minion-Interns, who live to revise my deathless prose. Bwa ha ha ha ha! Kidding, of course. I only send my most gorgeously polished and perfected exampled of Craft to them. Also, fart jokes.

BTW, I’ve only been actively writing novels and networking for a year. (It’s been almost one year to the day since I finished my first MG manuscript! Yes, that one, the Story That Must Not Be Named.) And I also have writer friends on Twitter, Facebook, Verla Kay’s, SCBWI, and the Austin SCBWI group. Even one or two from contest wins like Backspace. (Hi, Lori!)  So, where will I be in a year?
At this rate, probably in a critique/support/lunch group with YOU!

So, share already. Who keeps you honest, writing-wise?

Write Well, Friends.

A Very Cool Thing

Hiya, Peeps! Not much to report this week, besides writing like my life depends on it. (Does it? A good question.) So, instead of coming up with something witty and fabulous to say, I will help you blow a couple of hours at a writerly site. Check this out. Authors tell you how to pronounce their names. * Some give it to you straight up, some give you all sorts of cool little tidbits about the meaning of their name, why their parents picked it, and funny family anecdotes. Very cool and fun. Make sure you have written your daily quota before clicking on the link, of course!

I think my next post will be about writer’s groups. I have quite a few, and they all serve very different functions in my writing life. I’ve got support groups where we chat about our lives/kids/pets/health issues, online groups, in-person groups, professional groups, one-person emergency beta reading pods … and of course, my Literary Salon members, who are all the very coolest.

I’m making the soup and nibbles today for our Salon meeting tomorrow, where I will read from the poetry chapbooks that arrived in the mail yesterday — my prizes from the online poetry contest I won last week! (Okay, third place. But still: PRIZES! Presents for ME! In the MAIL!)

Write well, Friends, and start thinking about what YOU will say when they ask you, Newly Famous and Celebrated Author,  about your name. You can even leave a comment about it, if you like!

*Thanks to Shelli Cornelison for the link.

Why I Love Texas: Reasons 567 and 568

This week, a friend invited me and thirteen other middle-aged chicks to her house for a night of food, fun, and Bunco. (Which, for me, is like saying, Margaritas, Mojitos, and Root Canal. I loathe Bunco. But I like this woman very much and I’d never seen her house, so…)

When I walked in the front door, the first thing I saw, displayed on a table, was a stuffed fox. No, not the toy kind — the taxidermied kind.  “Oh, is your husband a hunter?” I asked, admiring the fox’s glassy eyes, lifelike pose, and the chopped-off rattlensnake rattles they had used to decorate the base the dead thing was standing on. She said yes, but that he hadn’t actaully gone on a fox hunt. Then she explains to me that he saw the fox dying on the side of the road,and I quote — “Probably from rabies or something” — and decided to put it out of its misery.
And, with her full support, cooperation, even urging, they then decided to take it home, have it taxidermied, and put in the entryway of their house.

People, I don’t have to go far to come up with my characters. They come to me. I love Texas.

I also love Texas because we have extremely awesome writing conferences. The one I’m thinking of right now — THE ONE I’M GOING TO TONIGHT!!! I’m so excited, I can’t wait– is the Awesome Austin Destination Publication SCBWI Writing Conference.

Check out the line-up. Marla Frazee? Kirby Larson? Jacqueline Kelly? Rock stars, for crying out loud! Have you ever seen so many award winners and all-around gobsmackingly talented writers all in one place? I’m not even counting the editors (Cheryl Klein, Lisa Graff, Stacy Cantor, etc.) and agents (Ho hum, got a fabu one already, thanks, but I DO want to see if Nathan Bransford is really a surfer-boy) who fill out the star-studded line-up. Who needs NY SCBWI? (Well, I mean, Jane Yolen would be nice. Next year.)

I’m also going to the pre-conference dinner and post-conference BBQ, where I’ll get to hang out with authors (I have actually met and who talk to me) like Jennifer Ziegler (WHO I ACTUALLY KNOW FROM CHILDHOOD!!!), Jessica Lee Anderson (one of the nicest people in the world, not kidding), Bethany Hegedus, P. J. Hoover, and Shelli Cornelison (who is just plain awesome, with or without a book deal).

Sorry for all the capitals, folks, but I’m excited. In my defense, I DO live in the Capitol City: the Capitol Of Awesomeness.

Gonna be there? Look for me. I’ll be the one embarrassing herself at the punch bowl.

Love Notes to Authors

I just finished reading Betsy Lerner‘s The Forest for the Trees: An Editor’s Advice to Writers, and it spurred me to action. I decided, after reading her incredibly funny and depressing chapters about how disappointing and heartbreaking getting published can be (and here I thought the being unpublished part was sucking eggs), I had to speak out.

I love books. I love them so much there aren’t enough of them in the world for me to read. (Well, not enough of the kind I like, then.) I love them so much I must write MORE of them even though it is the most maddening process — the Chinese water torture of professions. Secret? Sometimes I even tell the books I love them. “Oh, dear, sweet Novel. You are the most wonderful book ever written. I will keep you forever, read you until your covers fall off, memorize passages, tell everyone of your charms.” And then the Novel and I smoke a virtual cigarette.

But do I tell the book’s authors how much I love their babies? Almost never! Shame on me!

So, this week, I decided to start my 2010 Valentine’s Campaign: Making Love to Your Favorite Authors*.

No, not the sex kind. Most of my favorite authors are probably like me, frumpy middle-aged women desperately trying to find time between appointments and homework help to write something thrilling. I’m talking about the “personal touch” kind of love. The Swedish massage of emails.

The fan letter.

I started yesterday, with a fan letter to Nan Marino, whose debut middle grade novel Neil Armstrong is my Uncle, and Other Lies Muscle Man McGinty Told Me, knocked my (and my son’s) socks off.

I’ve decided to concentrate my love on debut authors if I can, since I think they must be most like me — insecure, lonely, eating massive quantities of chocolate to keep them this side of the loony bin — and I know I need more petting than a neurotic cat. But I’ll also send love mail to those authors who have changed my life but never knew it.I’ll let you know who as I go.

Have you ever written an author love letter? To whom? And did they write back? Inquiring minds want to know.

*I wanted to title my post this, but was afraid it would get me listed on a bunch of p0rn sites, so…