Does writing fiction affect the non-fiction writing process?

The launch of my debut novel, Climbing the Stairs, is going very well indeed. On the 1^st of May, we celebrated with a reading and autograph party at The Other Tiger Bookstore in Westerly, RI, on the 17^th at Barrington Books, RI, on the 18^th at Front Street Books, MA, and on the 31^st there will be another reading at Books on the Square in Providence.

Fine, you’re thinking. So what in heaven does this have to do with the INK Blog? This blog isn’t about novel writing, for Pete’s sake, you’re saying to yourself. It’s about interesting nonfiction.

Well, that’s true. But since I read Tanya's post of long ago and her very true words "I suspect that rethinking nonfiction means different things to each of us", I've realized that to me, one aspect of rethinking nonfiction that interests me is how fiction writing has influences nonfiction writing and vice versa.

That's been on my mind quite a bit these days – especially because I was also recently notified that I won the SCBWI Magazine Merit Award in the Nonfiction category for my article, The Power of Peace, which appeared in the October issue of Faces – and, incidentally, incorporated some of the research I’d done for the novel. The novel is set in India in the 1940’s – the time of the nonviolent Indian independence movement, led by Gandhi. The article is a nonfiction piece about the Gandhian revolution. That's one obvious example of how my fiction affected my nonfiction.

But was there anything in the actual process of writing a novel that I can apply to my nonfiction writing? That’s what I plan to blog about for the next few months: how features that we often associate with novel writing (such as “show don’t tell”, “plot”, “character”, “pacing” and “setting”) translate in terms of writing creative nonfiction. Yes, I can assure you that in my head, anyway, these terms apply equally well in the nonfiction world. And I will try to blog about why and how they do.

But before we go there, I’d like to start with one of the most important lessons I learned through writing my novel, which is about writing even on the "bad" days. Writing a novel or a long nonfiction book is like running a marathon, I think, while writing a picture book is like running the 100m dash – somewhat different in terms of the training and mindset required in some ways - but both require sustained effort and there are many similarities between the two types of writing. As I (and every other author of a picture book is well aware) a picture book is just as time-consuming and all-enveloping an effort as is writing a longer book.
Here are two tips on one important question about sustaining effort and staying interested enough in a topic to write hundreds of pages about it (or writing 16 pages and revising and polishing those 100 times over).

1.I switch to another book-related activity.For instance, I might decide to visit a writing blog, read a book that is somehow connected to the work at hand. And I don’t just do this passively – I take out my pencil and write down notes – if nothing else – even just words that leap out at me while I read. The key here, though, is that I set my alarm clock first, so it goes off in about 20 minutes or half an hour. Once that time elapses, I get right back to writing again.

2.I’m no artist, but sometimes I get out a pencil and draw the scene/concept/topic I’m having difficulty with. I think this can be really helpful at times, because it forces you to think of the topic in a different way and it can turn on the creative switch and thus help me explain it better.

That, at any rate, is my 2 cents. I’d love to have others comment on what they do on days when the muse doesn't seem to sit on their shoulders (or whatever it is that muses do to get their authors in shape). WHAT DO YOU DO ON DAYS WHEN THE MUSE DOESN’T SIT ON YOUR SHOULDER - or even flit your room for that matter?

The devil (or the angel) is in the details…

Hello again.

Highlight of the month for me: My novel, Climbing the Stairs, received a lovely review in Kirkus, a starred review in the April 15^th issue of Booklist and is a May Booksense Notable pick. All the reviews pointed to the intricate details that make the story vivid. Which got me thinking about the importance of detail in any work – whether fiction or nonfiction.

The most important thing about detail, in my opinion, is deciding what and how much to include. This is especially hard in nonfiction, because there’s no fictional storyline to act as a “guide” to tell you what to throw out and what to keep in. And, of course, if you’re anything like I am, even if you’re about to write a nonfiction picture book that’s well under 1000 words, you probably read 100 reference books on that topic. At least.

SO how do I choose what to include and what not to when I write nonfiction? First, I sort the information I’ve gathered into little heaps (or group the references in some way – putting the books in different piles, for example).

Then, I list what got me excited about the topic. A few lines on why I like that area of nonfiction enough to want to write a book about it. That sometimes helps me understand the new angle that I see or what I want the book to do that’s different from others on the same topic that are already out there.

And that also helps me to see what I want to be just “background” material, versus what I want to focus on and emphasize. Usually all this is pretty clear when I conceive the project, but by the time I finish my research, it can get pretty muddled. Or, on rare occasions, the focus shifts and I have an even better idea that cropped up when I was doing research which I decide to focus on. Whatever the case may be, it helps me to clearly state my focus and my goal and what I love best about the topic on paper. If there are many things I love about the topic, I write them all down and then pick what I love best.

That means, of course, there will be a huge chunk of material I won’t be able to use. But leaving out the right stuff is just as important as what you leave in!

Once I have the first draft together (and it’s usually 5 times longer than the length I have in my mind as a target), I use my focus/goal paragraph to pick out the details I need to keep in. And I keep asking myself, what’s the main question this book is trying to answer? Anything l that’s not directly part of the answer I start to take out.

Then, I stare hard and once again take a look with the main theme in mind. The theme is the part that needs the greatest detail. Everything else is superfluous. I prune and prune and prune.( Which, by the way, is extremely hard for me to do. I hate pruning our potted plants – my husband does that because I just don’t like to chop the poor things.)

Pruning my writing is equally hard. There are so many interesting facts I have to toss out. But one thing that helps me is to remember that a good book has a focal point, just as a good painting does. The composition of a painting helps to train the eye to the part the artist wants us to see, and a well composed book uses facts to augment a central idea, theme, or argument.

Another tool I sometimes use is my “wheel of ideas”. In the center of a blank sheet of paper, I write the word or set of words that’s most important to me – what best describes what the book is about. Then, radiating out from the center, I write adjectives or themes that relate to the book – and link them to one another, or sometimes make a chain that radiates outward. It’s usually a pretty tangled web, but it helps me pick out the thread or threads I want to use to embroider with in detail.

Here’s a quote I use when I teach nonfiction writing. “The fool collects facts; the wise man selects them.” Powell, president of AAS, 1888. That about sums it up.

Now, for my question of the month – how do you pick what details you’re going to include in a nonfiction work?

Fact:Fantasy::Words:Pictures

One of the comments on my last post came from an illustrator. She pointed out how nice she felt that her work had been appreciated.

No wonder, then, that after my last post, I’ve been thinking a lot about the role that illustrations play in nonfiction. Of course, pictures can be purely functional. I’m not sure that a picture always can or should “replace a thousand words” but in some instances, pictures are very helpful in making a point or clarifying something – especially in nonfiction books. Imagine, for instance, if we writers had to rely on written instructions alone when we wanted to tell kids how to do an experiment or make an object! That, in itself, should make us value illustrators – and I certainly hope we do.

However, pictures can be so much more than purely functional or even just attractive. They can transform a work of nonfiction in an intangible way. The example I’m thinking of is JUMP! - a biography written and illustrated by Floyd Cooper. This lovely book about Michael Jordan focuses on an incident in Jordan’s childhood. I did make it to the basketball team in my high school, long, long ago, but I can’t say I’ve really kept up with the sport- I rarely watch it (or any other sport for that matter) – and I hardly ever read stories about sports personalities – so it’s unusual for me to rave about a book like JUMP!

It’s not that words aren’t important in JUMP! They certainly are. Cooper’s spare yet beautiful prose kept me smiling throughout the book – it touched just the right chord, it had just the right lilt. The words bounced along ever so smoothly – and if that sounds like a contradiction to you, then think about your favorite basketball player dribbling, passing and shooting, and you’ll know what I mean.

But it was the illustrations that made the book so incredibly special to me. Cooper uses a palette of browns and grays that seem to melt onto the page and transport the reader into another world – a world that seems to be more fantasy than reality. His illustrations confer a dream-like quality onto the pages – they seem not to be made of paper, but rather woven out of some gossamer fairy-tale fabric.

And that special combination – of words rooted in fact and pictures that seem to swirl with magic – makes this one of those very special works of creative nonfiction that brings alive the dream-like quality of life of the sports celebrity whose life it celebrates.

A beak for science

 

What makes a nonfiction picture book come to life?

I've been wondering about that for a while. One thing I do know (or think I know) is this: simplicity works.

Take, for instance, one of my favorite nonfiction picture books of all time.

"Birds have no teeth. No hands. No antlers, horns or spines. But birds have beaks. And beaks are enough." Thus begins Sneed B. Collard III's fascinating book "Beaks!" illustrated by Robin Brickman and published by Charlesbridge. It goes on to describe some of the fascinating uses of beaks, and shows why birds need no teeth, hands, antlers, horns or spines to do all that they need to.

Sneed has also written other books along the same lines – "teeth" and "wings". They are all "just" lists. But what wonderful lists they are.

Lists, which can so easily deteriorate into boring repetition in the hands of a less remarkable writer, are transformed into incredibly interesting work in his hands. You want to turn the pages and find out more, more, more.

Why? Because his prose is evocative, clear, and crisp.

Because each book is packed with wonderful information. They are like mini-encyclopedias in that they contain an amazing trove of knowledge; but the way the information is presented is anything but encyclopedic.

And because the illustrations are superb – scientifically accurate eye-candy.

Those are three reasons that I can think of that make the books as wonderful as they are. But surely, there are other reasons, too.

For those of you who might already be planning ahead for father's day in June, here's an idea for an special father's day gift: "Animal Dads" – another elegant book and a wonderful "list" by Sneed B. Collard III.

Sneed B. Collard is not the only successful nonfiction children's book author to use the "list" format successfully, of course. Visit any bookstore or library and look at nonfiction picture books on scientific topics, and you'll see that many of them are lists.

As an oceanographer-turned author, my "training" was in science and mathematics. In those fields, we were always taught of the importance of a good question. So I'd like to throw out a question that I hope will be good enough to spur discussion: What transforms a nonfiction picture book written using the "list" form into a special, creative, exceptional and exciting work?