The Book of June
Reading, Writing, Making Good Food
How was your June?
If it was, let’s say, a book, how would you review it? What unfolded in these past pages that you would highlight, underline, share with a friend?
It's been a while since I've posted here so I’m offering a (hopefully brief) review of the Book of June.
What I've been reading, what I've been writing, what I've been listening to.
What I’m Reading: Nonfiction
Last week, I pulled a book off my “favorites” shelf, one I read several years ago: He Saw That It Was Good by Sho Baraka. The subtitle of the book is Reimagining Your Creative Life to Repair a Broken World.
In the first chapter, the author talks about his role as a storyteller, employed for his imagination. He speaks of the freedom he has as an artist and performer to “construct worlds” and “rearrange reality.” He states:
“Part of this storytelling work is learning the stories that have already been told, good and bad. Part of the work is trying to understand how our culture and faith and very lives have been shaped by the words of others. I dig for the gold of the past. I also try to trace its shadows. And in both the light and the dark, I am learning about myself, about us today.
To be a good storyteller, you must first be an honest observer. No matter what you're cooking, honesty is the best ingredient."
A couple of days before that, I began rereading one of my favorite nonfiction books by Madeline L’Engle, The Rock That is Higher. She also speaks of the importance of telling the truth in story.
She wrote a lot of fiction, and some great works of fantasy, but she makes a distinction of sorts between truth and fact—how something doesn’t have to be fact to be true. I find the concept helpful, especially when it comes to writing fantasy.
What I’m Writing
This month, I’m in the middle of writing a fantasy trilogy. I finished draft two of the second book. Here’s how it happened:
My sister, heading out of town for a stretch, offered her place in San Francisco—complete with a friendly Maine Coon. I have been doing some creative mentoring and was talking with a new writer about the importance of creating margin in one’s schedule for solid writing. And there it was before me: some space for solid writing. (Thank you, Jess!)
My husband graciously agreed to handle things at home, and our daughter and I headed up north. I’m grateful for the time; it kept me away from things I tend to procrastinate with when I get stuck in writing. There is so much to do in one's home—cleaning, organizing, decluttering, gardening, and, Oh look, a squirrel!
I made the goal to finish the second draft of my second book. Some chapters were a few plot points while others were fleshed out pretty well. I had the overall flow but a lot of missing spaces. I needed something to push me past those places where I kept getting stuck, and the time at my sister’s place was exactly what I needed.
Draft two now stands complete at 95,641 words.
And I hope that what I’m writing, while not exactly fact, is in fact true.
What I’m Reading: Fiction
A close friend recommended a book series. She mentioned it several times, then right before I headed out on the trip, she loaned me the first three books in The Unselected Journals of Emma M Lion. (Thanks, Sharon!) So, I took them on the trip.
I started the first one right before heading out of town and had it in my purse on the train. I finished it on the train. Those books were my entertainment. I didn’t watch anything and tried to focus on writing, but there was little else to procrastinate with, so Emma M. Lion’s adventures and misadventures were how I came up for air when needed.
What I’m Listening To
I don't listen to a lot of podcasts, except on the rare occasion I get absorbed in one and binge on it. This month, I've been listening to Stories Are Soul Food, by N.D. Wilson and Brian Kohl.
N.D. Wilson is the author of several fiction series: The Ashtown Burials, The 100 Cupboards trilogy, and The Outlaws of Time trilogy, among others. He is a terrific writer; his books have great description and pacing, as well as some lines that knock your brain sideways, or perhaps right side up.
In the podcast, the hosts talk a lot about stories—whether book or movie or TV show—as food. Food for one’s soul. They explore what kind of meal a story is. Maybe that book is like a flavorful grilled chicken while that one is more like a bag of Doritos. That movie feels like chocolate mousse while this one is a bowl of salty butter popcorn.
Some things are more substantial and others are light. Some things take a while to get through and others, you can snack on the side. Some really do feed you and others … well, there's a lot out there that is so much empty air.
I find the podcast helpful as far as thinking more critically about what things I’m listening to and reading. But it also helps me ask myself, “What is it that I'm creating in my kitchen? What type of meal is this going to be for a reader’s soul?”
More and more, a lot feels artificial. It’s stuff that real hands don't touch. It’s prepackaged food that might fill the belly but doesn't have much substance or flavor. Microwave meals.
With the ability of AI now to write, more and more books are produced that way. (The majority of books I’ve been invited to edit the past few months on Upwork have been AI written; they want someone to make the writing sound “human”.)
For those of us who are pushing back against what one writer recently deemed “the slop life,” we bear that responsibility to create with attention, to slow down and allow the story to form as it will, to rework it with care and intention.
These are the types of stories that I think will begin to stand out more because so much is being rapidly and haphazardly constructed.
N.D. Wilson put it this way:
“This is an enormous opportunity for good creators … to put stuff out in the world that will stand out more than ever before … Try to make real food for real people. … We are, in fact, incarnate creatures in an incarnational world, and there still is a chance to reach people and resonate on a profound level.”
— Stories Are Soul Food, Ep. 186
So, as I sit down in front of a blank page, I have that responsibility to hone my skill, to sit with a paragraph or a line or a page and make it the best it can be. There are better writers than me, lots of them. Folks whose lines strike like lightning. Whose writing reads like decadent chocolate mousse, whose work you bite into and savor like a succulent steak.
My tendency sometimes is to sigh and think to myself, I'll never write like that. But maybe what I need to do is try. And I don't mean to mimic a favorite author but to write as the best author I can be.
A writer needs to find what they do well and lean into that, hone that and strengthen that … as well as work to strengthen the things they don’t do as well.
Plans for July
So, that’s one goal I have in the upcoming month: write good. :)
Another goal is to finish writing draft one of book three.
(Side note—Don’t write 25,000 words in book three of a fantasy trilogy and then leave it untouched for nearly three years. With trying to figure out where you were going with various characters and plot points, you might wonder whether it’s better to scrap it all.)
Yesterday, I mapped out the missing pieces, and my goal in July is to complete draft one of book three. I feel like I’ve got some momentum going now.
I’d love to hear what you’ve been reading and listening to … or what your plans for July are. Leave a comment, if you would.
(I also need to gather a playlist for writing. If you have suggestions that might inspire one in the area of the fantastical, send them my way.)
Thanks for reading!