Getting away to it all
Posted: May 23, 2012 Filed under: book news and views Leave a comment »This has been my least productive year as a fiction writer since I learned to hold a pencil. So far, anyhow. Since January I have been so busy with everything but writing that I occasionally forget that it is, as Sue Goyette frequently points out to me, my true work.
Instead of writing I have been running, and writing about running. And I have been struggling to learn to play the piano well enough to play it in front of a bunch of strangers at a recital in June. And I have been editing a book for a publisher on the South Shore, one that’s taken up a lot of my time, but has been an edifying project for a variety of reasons–though it has taken me MONTHS more to finish it than I thought it would. And I have been mentoring a young writer through the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia. Again, satisfying work to be engaged in, but it all takes time from my true work. And I also wrote an essay for a McGraw-Hill Ryerson e-text-book for use in high school English classes. Which I was definitely not going to turn down. Even though it meant several hundred more words written that had nothing to do with Evan and Lansing and Dacey.
Who are, by the way, finally all together in one place. I got them all together and then abandoned them to work on these other things.
This may not be coincidental. In the past, I have stopped short at important places in whatever I’m writing, usually to give myself time to figure out what the hell is going to happen next.
I’ll find out this weekend. The Common is taking its show on the road, travelling to Tatamagouche tomorrow night. We’ll spend a few days in a beach house in River John, writing and hanging out, and on Friday night, we’ll read en masse at Fables. We are very excited about this! We’ve never done an event together before.
As for me, I love these retreats. Generally, I get a tonne of work done. Last fall, when we went to Windhorse Farm for a couple of days, I managed about five thousand words. If you think your manuscript overall is going to be around eighty or ninety thousand words, five thousand is a pretty significant chunk. So I’ll be hoping to get much, much deeper into my story this time.
And when I get back to Halifax I’ll be working as hard as I can to land the plane on all those other projects so that I can get back to my true work without needing to leave town to do it!
For your information
Posted: March 29, 2012 Filed under: book news and views Leave a comment »Oh hello! Thanks for dropping by! It seems there’s a spate of interest out there about some of my activities beyond writing.
The rumours are true, I am learning to run. I am training for a 5K at the Bluenose Marathon, and you can read all about my adventures in running here.
Also, lots of people curious about my marital status. I am indeed married. To this amazing man.
And some people are wondering how they can contact me about matters related to public broadcasting. I can be best reached in that regard at stephanie dot domet at cbc dot ca
And yes, it’s true, Homing is being made into a movie! Trish Fish is writing it, and I couldn’t be more pleased. Better her than me!
We now return you to your regular programming — infrequent updates about the ongoing interminable process of writing a second novel.
Squeezing it in
Posted: January 31, 2012 Filed under: book news and views Leave a comment »This is the method I’m currently using for getting stuff done. I’m editing a book for one writer, and mentoring another and still trying to finish my own first draft. So I am cramming in bits of writing where I can, and trying not to freak out. The good news is I just booked off most of a week in February for writing. The bad news is, that’s still three weeks away.
Sigh.
Stephanie Domet is fat, rude, sucks and is married to Kev Corbett
Posted: June 16, 2011 Filed under: book news and views 10 Comments »Figured I might as well address all the most recent web searches that have brought people to this website. Every couple of weeks, some very flattering search turns up like Stephanie Domet rude or Stephanie Domet is fat or, this week, Stephanie Domet sucks. And there is perennial curiousity, it seems, about my little husband.
So let’s take these one at a time. Fat. Well, duh. Moving on.
Rude. I suspect it depends: on the day, who you ask, what you said to me first, how many people before you also said it to me that day. If I have been rude to you, I do apologize. I get a little ragged and snappish sometimes. Who doesn’t? It’s just, most people are able to get ragged and snappish and be halfway anonymous. Me, not so much.
Sucks. Well now, surely that’s subjective. What a thing to google! I mean, if you think so, do you really need the internet to shore you up?
Is married to Kev Corbett. Who loves me despite all of the above. Imagine.
Days in May
Posted: May 17, 2011 Filed under: Getting to know you, Readings and writings 2 Comments »Well, May, here you are, halfway gone, you complicated month, you. May is one of the most crowded months in our family calendar, and one of the most reviled. There’s mother’s day, Jeff’s birthday, Chris’s birthday, Chris and Em’s dating anniversary, Em’s birthday. It used to be a whirlwind of cake and celebration. But then Chris got sick, and added to May got less noble anniversaries like the day Chris slipped into a coma, the day the doctor told us we had to unplug him, the day he died, his funeral. Less cake and way less celebrating. Stupid May. Month that both brought Chris and took him away. Month that made Mother’s Day a complicated joke of a holiday. Month that gave us all so much sadness only heightened by all those years of May gladness. Stupid May when everything is in bloom but all our thoughts are witheredy death. Stupid.
So then you think, how am I supposed to live? Honestly, how am I supposed to go on, in the face of such sadness, but more importantly, how should I comport myself in order to truly honour the memory of someone who wanted so much to stay on this earth? I made a decision, early on, that I was not doing anyone any good by being in perpetual mourning. That if Chris couldn’t be here to live, then damn it, I was going to have to do it for both of us. The sadness helped me up to a point, and then after that, being sad and angry was kind of holding me back. So I cut it out, by and large. Writing a book from those feelings helped too.
And then eight years ago, Jeff and Michelle made the excellent, brave and healing decision to hold their wedding on May 17, Chris’s birthday, the most confusing day of them all. The other sorrowful anniversaries were straightforward. But how could you be sad on Chris’s birthday? It just didn’t make sense. So Jeff and Mich made it make more sense by turning it back into a day of cake and celebration.
And here we are again. May 17. My amazing older brother would have been 43 today, and doubtless king of the world. He was so smart, he was kind, he was funny, he could play guitar and write songs better than you. He had two gorgeous daughters he’d be in awe of now. Today he’d be sitting back with his lovely wife, watching them go out into the world, making sure they came home in time for cake and celebration.
May 17 and Jeff and Michelle celebrate another year together, their two great kids, the life they’ve built close by family and friends. Cake and celebration. There’s not much more that’s needed in this life.
As for that book, in honour of Chris’s birthday, here’s a piece from Homing, a piece of fiction loosely inspired by Chris and his guitar. Happy birthday, brother.
When you’re having fun
Posted: April 7, 2011 Filed under: Getting to know you Leave a comment »Wow, where does the time go? I went back to work and suddenly five weeks flew by. It’s been a wild ride, with a city hall scandal, a federal election and a provincial budget, plus the usual news and interviews. And it’s ratings, which means I’m busy as can be, hosting this and appearing at that. (This being the Folk Fiesta in Lunenburg, that being the Home Show in Halifax). And there’s been piteously little writing, I am sorry to say.
Very sorry to say. I am having no luck finding balance. I may not have been looking for it very hard, either, though. It’s so easy to fall back into old patterns, and just work work work, and then fritter away my free time with the excuse that I worked hard all day and have earned a few hours of staring out the window (or at Plants vs Zombies). But that’s not how you get a novel written. I know that. And I need to snap out of it. (Deleted Plants vs Zombies from my phone, that was a good first step.)
And being back at work, though I do enjoy my job, is making me snappish. I was so mellow while unemployed. Now I am frantic-frantic-frantic and not very patient. Among the google searches that brought readers here in the last seven days: “stephanie domet rude.” Yeah, well, she is, sometimes, actually. More often than not, lately. If you’re googling that to find out if you’re alone in finding me rude, nah, join the club. And also, sorry about that. Other searches I am entertained by “stephanie domet singer” (only in the shower) “stephanie domet miss world canada” (I think you’re looking for my cousin, Stephanie Domet, and “stephanie domet email” (at work it’s stephanie dot domet at cbc dot ca and for personal stuff it’s stephanie dot domet at gmail dot com).
Meantime, I am working on the balance thing, and on being less rude. And I know in my soul they’re connected.
What kind of book
Posted: March 6, 2011 Filed under: book news and views, Readings and writings 2 Comments »This is a question I get all the time. What kind of book are you writing? I find this question almost impossible to answer, because really, the answer is, a good one, I hope. After that, what does it matter what other descriptors? And what does the interlocutor mean to do with the information anyhow? What will it really tell anyone about Fallsy Downsies?
The other day, as I made my way into the office, the woman who works the front desk during the day asked me the question. I was late for a meeting, as usual, and had only had one coffee, and so I looked at her with confusion. And she said, you know, sci fi, romance…? This is the other part of the question that stymies me. The genre question. I think this is the only way we have to talk about stories in a broader way, it seems. I mean writers, and constant readers of a certain kind have specific ways to talk about books and kinds of stories. But what I think of as casual readers, and those who maybe haven’t read a book since high school, because it’s just not how they choose to consume narrative, seem to only be able to relate to books and stories by assigning them a genre.
The only answer I have is “literary fiction.” Highly unsatisfactory response. I was once accused, in my bookseller days, of being pretentious. Because I referred to a Jack Whyte book as “not our kind of book”–by which I meant the shop up the street had more a speciality in that area, and would likely have stock, while we had sold through the three copies we’d ordered. The customer didn’t like the implication, and plainly told me so. I didn’t need her to tell me I was pretentious–I was a writer/bookseller in my mid-twenties OF COURSE I was pretentious. It was basically my full time job to be so. Anyhow, older and only a little wiser, answering Literary Fiction to the genre question makes me feel genuinely pretentious.
So, here’s the thing. Why is genre the only way the casual/non-reading public at large can relate to a story?
How else to describe something that is not a mystery, nor a romance, nor sci fi, nor a western, but may have elements of all of those, except maybe the sci fi part?
What’s the point of describing something that isn’t even done? Whose purposes does it serve, anyhow?
Does any of it matter to anyone but writers?
What do you think?
In the homestretch
Posted: February 24, 2011 Filed under: book news and views Leave a comment »Well, here we are, just a few days of writing sabbatical left. Big sigh. At the farmers’ market yesterday, the clerk at Fox Hill said, that went fast. I said, yeah, if you think it went fast for you, imagine how fast it went for me. I can’t believe it’s almost over, but I’m so gratified to have had the time, and so pleased with what I accomplished, and with what I’ve discovered about the story and characters. I would love to have produced more pages, ultimately, what writer wouldn’t? But I feel like I have a solid jumping off point now to see it through to completion by September, second draft by the end of December.
Tour was great and exhausting and I learned a lot, and figured out some of my most important stuff on the road.
I’m feeling a bit nervous about my return to work. It’s a funny feeling. I know I’ll remember how to do it… though it make take me a few days to get back in the groove. I hope they still like me! I’ve been leading such a solitary life for the last couple of months, mostly talking to myself. I imagine I’ll feel somewhat flayed the first couple of days, imagining all those pairs of ears. Go easy on me, people. At least for the first week. After that, you can let fly.
Life imitating art
Posted: February 15, 2011 Filed under: book news and views, Getting to know you, Out and about, Tunes you can use, Working holiday Leave a comment »Or the other way around, or maybe both. I am on the road right now, as Kev takes living rooms and basements around Ontario by storm. He earned a Home Routes tour and so we’ve spent the last couple weeks together in the car, touring around, playing a concert in a different house each night. It’s been intense and awesome, and I’ve even managed to get some writing done.
More importantly, I’ve had that magic time in the car to let my mind wander and pick through the elements of my story that still stymie me. And I’ve had some important breakthroughs–some insights into what actually motivates Lansing Meadows, and what eventually leads to the rift between him and Evan Cornfield. And even Dacey Brown is moving into sharper focus.
I will be sorry to leave this full time artist life behind in two weeks. Though I hear from afar there are a number of juicy stories unfolding in Nova Scotia, and I feel the pull of daily radio. It’s a tough balance, the two lives, and I will be spending some of my remaining time figuring out how to balance them better. I’ll be back on the air on February 28th. The novel’s first draft won’t be finished–but at least I’ll know how to proceed. And that feels like a huge triumph. A more reasonable, achievable goal is a completed first draft by September, a completed second draft by the end of December. And if it goes my way, maybe publication by fall 2012.
In other news, it looks like Lady Hammond has received first draft funding for Homing, with Tricia Fish screenwriting. This is great news for that team, and I’ll be interested to see what happens next.
So, lots of forward momentum. And, for a taste of what I’ve been up to on the road, here’s a little video from our stop in Kanata, Ontario. Don’t say I never gave you anything.
You think you know someone…
Posted: January 20, 2011 Filed under: book news and views Leave a comment »So, lately, I’ve been struggling with Dacey Brown. I thought I knew her, and then I sit down to write her, and she comes out all robotic and weird, making snap decisions about things and refusing to smile pretty for the camera. I got super frustrated with it all today and had a very short day of writing. I said one sentence about it to Kev and he said, maybe she’s mentally ill. And I’m like, no, uh-uh, no way, she is not, I don’t know anything about that, I’m not writing it. Then I went to Ryan’s to play Boggle for a couple hours (oh Boggle, how I love you), and we had further conversations, during which his partner Erica brightly suggested, maybe she’s bi-polar. And again, I’m all in denial nope no way no how.
Then I get home and I have a couple hours to kill before my next thing and so I go spend a little time with my pen and paper and Dacey Brown and whaddya know… she’s a little on the bi-polar side. Like, on the spectrum. You know? Not diagnosed, not medicated, not dangerous to herself just–a little up and down. She’s making some crazy decisions right now, and we’re just going with it. The writing I did once I accepted Dacey as she is… best writing of the day.
This is one wild ride, that’s for sure.
