Author: Elizabeth Spann Craig

I had a disaster Wednesday, similar to what you’d find in one of my Myrtle Clover mysteries.

I realized after my daughter had been up for several hours, that her cough sounded different than it had the last few days. I called the doctor and quickly made an appointment.

I was already halfway through my preparation for Salmon Shirred Eggs for my blog today on the Mystery Lovers’ Kitchen. Since the recipe involved eggs and we didn’t need to leave for the doctor’s appointment for 30 minutes, I decided to go ahead and pop it in the oven.

Naturally, I was in a hurry. The recipe itself is very easy. It can be made complicated, however—if you dump the contents of the cups onto the floor of the oven. Which I did.

I was well-behaved and used absolutely no profanity. My 8 year old was standing right there, so I just bit down on my tongue. I scraped out the salmon and eggs and cream from the bottom of the hot oven very quickly, hopped in the car and we drove off for the doctor.

We’re in the pediatric waiting room and my mind is spinning. I’ve got to get more eggs for the recipe. Oh shoot…and some smoked salmon. I need to pick up that book at the library for my other sick child to read. Oh—I needed to email my agent about that one thing. And then, ideas for my book started flooding into my head at the same time—unwelcomed. I got a pencil and jotted them down on the back of a receipt. My cell phone buzzed me. I tried ignoring it.

“Mama? Let’s play I Spy.”

I Spy is the game my daughter and I always play in waiting rooms. It’s a good sit-down game.

“I spy something…gold!” she said.

Really? In the doctor’s waiting room? All I spied was a polka-dotted floor, primary-colored chairs, and some really upset babies in blankets.

“That lady’s watch?” I asked. “The outlet cover? No? The…well, the doorstop over there?”

“Mama! That’s brass. Not gold.” This around her hacking coughs.

Try as I might? I couldn’t find anything gold. Or, for that matter, pink, aqua, or tan. I also couldn’t find the correct brown object she was looking for.

“You’re not even trying,” she said.

But I was trying. And then it struck me that it wasn’t that I’d suddenly been struck colorblind. I was so distracted that I couldn’t even focus on the task at hand. I was definitely trying to play I Spy. I was looking at my daughter and looking around the waiting room. But my mind was in and out of contact. It was too full.

My daughter? She was diagnosed with acute bronchitis, following the bout of seasonal flu. Me? I diagnosed myself with observational failure.

I do really well with big observations (like the fact my daughter’s cough had changed), but the bitty things—the small sounds, bits of color, warm breezes—they can get lost in the shuffle. Or lost following an epicurean disaster.

I dropped off the antibiotic prescription at the pharmacy. I drove to the store for more eggs and smoked salmon. And I tried to empty out my head from all the noise in there. Quiet the voice that reminded me of the things that needed to be done that were not getting done. I slowed down. And found, despite two sick children and an oven waiting to be cleaned, that it was actually a pretty nice day.

Next time I play I Spy? I’m going to ace that game.

Is there anything you’re working on? As a writer or as a person?

This fall and winter have really tested my nursing abilities.

Unfortunately, both my children have the seasonal flu right now. One of those kids has already had H1N1 recently (October.)

I’ve been busily refilling water glasses, taking temperatures, handing out bowls of cut fruit, and checking in with doctors’ offices and schools.

Monday my daughter was only interested in either sleeping or curling up in a tight ball of misery on the sofa and watching “Spongebob.” It’s amazing the work you can do, sitting beside a sick child with a cartoon running in the background.

Tuesday morning I got a text message from my son. “I’m sick.” Sure enough, the middle school was delighted for me to take my feverish, hollow-eyed child back home. They’d both been fine only a couple of hours before the flu hit them like a ton of bricks.

Do your characters get sick? I’ve got illness on the brain now and my characters will probably come down with something nasty.

The thing about illness is that it’s intrinsically boring. You feel like you can barely lug yourself out of the bed. You’re not running around leading an interesting life when you’re sick.

But getting sick is real life. And it’s another way of adding some depth to a character.

In my Myrtle Clover series, I’ve had Myrtle fake being sick more than once. It’s proven a good gimmick for getting her way or to get suspects bearing casseroles to her house (all the better to question these suspects.)

What if it’s a chronic illness and the character is the protagonist’s child or mother? Then the illness provides a good vehicle for conflict or for the protagonist’s growth as a character.

If the protagonist learns to deal with medical problems like heart disease, diabetes, or even the flu, it not only shows the vulnerability of the character, but their strength, too.

Do you plan on inflicting any illnesses on your characters?

I’m guessing we’re all trying to see if we’re on track as far as scheduling different writing tasks.

For what it’s worth, here’s my average total for different activities. It varies some days, but my goal is always to finish by 2:00 p.m. (when my daughter gets off the school bus.) Some days I’m way off my goal, but most days I finish the brunt of it before 2:00.

Writing blogs: 30 minutes.

Social media:

Twitter: 10 minutes a day, tops
Facebook: 10 minutes a day, tops
Blogging (visiting blogs and answering comments): 1 1/2 hours
Daily writing: I usually write half a chapter a day. If this takes 30 minutes, I’m done in 30 minutes. If it takes 2 hours, I’m done in 2 hours.

Writing a book:
It takes me a little over a month to write a first draft.

To get the book into submission condition for my editor:
It takes a total of 3 months (including the 6 weeks it took to write the first draft.)

To get the book on the shelves:
It takes about 6-7 months for the publisher to release the book.

Promotion:
With my last release, I spent about 3 hours a day on promotional activities—this included my own blogging and visiting, but expanded into numerous guest blogs, tweets, Facebooking (even on my personal FB page). I also made (for me) lots of in-person appearances at bookstores and libraries and writing workshops in the two months following the release. We’ll say 24 hours worth (all together) of preparation and attendance at signings, etc.

How do you manage your time? Or do you feel like your time manages you? (Like I do some days!)

I cut off the rest of this one-page synopsis of Disney’s Pocahontas, which has Avatar’s characters and plot plugged into it…I didn’t want to create a spoiler for the movie, if you haven’t seen it. This is something that’s been circling the internet for about a week. You can see the full story on Media Bistro.

This is one reason why I’ve never been worried about sharing my WIP (work in progress) ideas with other writers—there are only so many plots out there. They could take my basic premise and come up with a completely different novel. Why? Because they’re different from me. They think differently, have different experiences, and have a different background.

No one is saying James Cameron hasn’t made an innovative film.

But what makes it innovative? The cutting edge technology and his characters. He brought all his creativity into the project and that made it fresh.

It’s been said that there are only seven basic plots in all of literature. Actually, there have been said to be several different numbers of basic plots, but seven is the number mentioned most frequently.

Those are:

1. man vs. nature
2. man vs. man
3. man vs. the environment
4. man vs. machines/technology
5. man vs. the supernatural
6. man vs. self
7. man vs. god/religion

Writer’s Digest proposes 20 basic plots:

1. Quest
2. Adventure
3. Pursuit
4. Rescue
5. Escape
6. Revenge
7. The Riddle
8. Rivalry
9. Underdog
10. Temptation
11. Metamorphosis
12. Transformation
13. Maturation
14. Love
15. Forbidden Love
16. Sacrifice
17. Discovery
18. Wretched Excess
19. Ascension
20. Descension.

Then we have Georges Polti’s The Thirty-Six Dramatic Situations. I’ll let you click over and scroll to the bottom of the page if you’re interested, considering the length of this post.

Let’s say, for the sake of argument, that there are as many as 36 basic plots or dramatic situations. That’s not very many.

But do we get bored with the books we’re reading? Not usually. Because each author brings something fresh and new to the plot. It might be a unique setting. It might be a fabulous character or a fun twist ending. It might be the writer’s voice, itself.

I think we could give twenty people the same basic plot assignment and we would get twenty wildly different books in varying degrees of complexity, humor, and even genre.

It’s our different takes on life that make plots unique.

Do you ever notice the repetition of plots? Or are the authors’ different voices enough to help you forget the plot similarities?

I’ve said before that the biggest moment for me in getting published was when I determined what I wanted as a writer.

There are so many directions that you can follow with writing. If you want to write professionally, you can choose a job where you’ll write: advertising, radio, TV, stage, newspapers, freelance writing, etc. You don’t have to write novels or nonfiction books to satisfy the writing urge.

I’ve also spoken to several writing groups before. There were writers in these groups who were perfectly satisfied writing for a small audience of readers. Maybe they were penning a family history or writing a memoir to be handed down. And there is nothing wrong with that—you save yourself a lot of trouble by realizing that’s what you want and that you don’t need to query or write synopses.

Then there are writers who are really writing just to please themselves. Many poets I’ve met fall into this category. And it’s an incredibly satisfying thing—writing poetry and journaling. It’s a voyage of self-discovery.

The important thing is to know what you want to do. Maybe you’re interested in being published but you don’t want to go through the hassle of agents, editors, and publishers. If you’re wanting to share your book with some family and friends, then self-publishing might be an option for you (you need to be careful and go through a reputable self-publisher. Check Preditors and Editors and Writers Beware.)

You might be satisfied by being published by magazines, or ezines. You might be satisfied by entering contests (watch those entry fees. Again…Writers Beware.)

Small publishers might be the perfect fit for you. It’s usually not necessary to have an agent and you usually get the distribution (and paycheck) you’re looking for.

None of these things is better than the others. They’re just different. I was just as happy writing for myself as I am writing for my publishers and readers now. I just wasn’t quite satisfied with it, so I decided to take the next step. There are good points and bad points for all of them. But you have to figure out what exactly it is that you want. Only then can you do the research and work required to achieve your goal.