We Confess

So, we weren’t lying when we tweeted that our recent in-person writing session left us exhausted but exhilarated. We do have a bit of a confession to make about that, however: the exhaustion and exhilaration came more from PURE PLAY than from productivity. Yeah, we often derive as much fun from our writing as our guys do from their fishing or shooting. But on this visit together, we did something we haven’t done for years, because our time together is so limited and precious and, we thought, has to be reserved for WRITING.

Maybe it was subconscious manipulation on our part, a yearning to entertain ourselves and each other as we did in the years before we started writing together. Whatever, we found our work-in-progress set in Door County, Wisconsin, where Patty lives and where Roz just came for our writing session/visit. So in the name of research, we did what people DO when they come to Door County! Things like: climbing to the top of the Cana Island Lighthouse; dining at Al Johnson’s Swedish Restaurant, where goats graze atop the roof; tasting wine at the Door Peninsula Winery; and attending the play Lombardi at the Peninsula Players Theatre, which sits among the trees on the shoreline of the Bay.

And hey! We found out some valuable info for our new book. We learned, for example, that the traditional dresses worn by the waitresses at Al Johnson’s do not come clear to the floor. Important stuff J But stuff, nevertheless, that kept us from the plotting that we’d planned to do. In other words, we aren’t much further along in our work-in-progress now that Roz has returned to Texas than we were when she arrived in Wisconsin.

Enter Skype, which might just be the best thing for our writing since we replaced our typewriters with computers and traded snail-mail for e-mail. I mean, what’s the difference whether we’re sitting at opposite ends of a couch, manuscripts and pens in hand as we take turns reading aloud and discuss changes needed and just where we should go from here, or whether we’re sitting on our respective desk chairs in front of our respective Skype cameras in Texas and Wisconsin?

We’re about to find out! Update to follow.

But first, some pictures from the week that was:

Roz (center) and Patty (right) take a break from plotting their latest, um, cliff-hanger to tour The Door with their editor Sarah.

Patty’s husband, John, and Roz’s partner, Mike, join “the girls” at Al Johnson’s.

 

Inquiring Minds Want to Know: How Do We Write TOGETHER?

The most important thing you need to know is how much fun it is. Beyond that, we almost hesitate to give our secrets away. But what the heck?!

Writing really does work so much better with two heads. This we know because we have each written at least one book alone. And it was tough. Now we actually feel sorry for the solitary writer, plunking away on his/her computer, locked away in a study or basement. Or, in the case of the successful (meaning well-paid) author, an office outside the home. (Wait! Forget that last part; we definitely don’t feel sorry for anyone who is well paid for writing books!)

How do we do it? Timing is the biggie. We both lead busy lives, and making time to write can be difficult. But knowing that someone awaits the next chapter is rather like running in a relay. You just gotta get that baton to the next runner as quickly as you can, and it’s got to be a good hand-off. Or at least a presentable one. Only difference is that the baton will come back to you before you can catch your breath and down a gallon of Gatorade. Then the running starts all over again.

It helps that we have few rules. After the briefest of discussions where we bounce around a few ideas (maybe about something as simple as the location or something as important as the victim), one of us writes the first chapter, then e-mails it to the other. (Patty lives in Wisconsin; Roz lives in Texas.)  The recipient adds, deletes and changes as she sees fit (a process we call “sparkling”) and then writes the next hunk and e-mails it back. And the process is repeated, interspersed with phone calls, e-mails and texts as needed.

Admittedly, with our method, consistency can prove as challenging as it is vital. Patty might visualize the kitchen where the murder took place because she wrote that particular chapter. But Roz might see it differently. Was the kitchen table described as round, or was that only imagined? When Roz introduces a main character who is clearly developed (in her mind) with curly red hair and chewed-off nails and then meets up with her in the next chapter sporting hair as straight as a ruler and a French manicure, she realizes she probably didn’t really describe her but rather just thought she did. The cure? We keep a running fact sheet as well as a chapter-by-chapter synopsis and also a time line and/or calendar. Add to those, upon completion of the book, many, many readings by many, many readers.

Then there is the matter of the plot, or in our case, the lack of a (predetermined) plot. Or conversely, too much plot. An outline just doesn’t work for us. It’s way too confining. If we can surprise each other, even if we are heading off in different directions, there is the tiniest hope the eventual reader will be surprised too. Usually we send a chapter to our partner with no idea what will follow the page-turner that ended it. Painting each other into a corner is what we do best, and the reward is seeing how we get out.

Of course, it all has to come together in the end. And that’s the really fun part. We meet twice a year and read our manuscript aloud, each taking a page at a time. By this stage in the process, our words are so closely meshed together it’s difficult even for us to tell who wrote what. (But Patty claims Roz wrote the swear words and such.)

Since we are now on our third book in The Val & Kit Mystery Series, our heroines are real people to us, best friends with a shared love of Starbucks yet distinctly different personalities. Kinda like us, in fact. The brave Kit breaks rules when they get in her way, in spite of the tender-hearted Val’s protests. Best of all, there are now four of us, not two, on this thrilling journey.

Nora Ephron: Roz Remembers

I never met Ms. Ephron, who passed away June 26, but I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t like the term “passed away.”  Perhaps it’s better to just say she is no longer with us, except that’s not true either. Her wise-cracking wit lives on. In the mid-eighties, on one rainy Sunday afternoon, I watched a little movie called Heartburn. I was on the wronged side of a divorce, feeling cheated, miserable, useless. When Meryl Streep’s character, in similar circumstances to poor me, looked to her father for some solace, he said, “If you want monogamy, marry a swan.”  It was cruel, and wonderful, and heartbreaking, and somehow endearing. I wasn’t the only woman in the world forced to start life over; now there was one other. Nora Ephron. She got it.

May she rest in peace, but I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t like that term, either.

Beauty Tips from Roz

Readers of The Val & Kit Mystery Series are privy to a few beauty secrets of our favorite women sleuths. But here Roz shares a few of her own. She stresses that these are HER beauty tips—certainly not Kit's, or even yours— and they might not apply to anyone but her. Then again, they might, so here goes:

I wear lipstick every day, but never without a pencil liner—no one needs to see red lipstick disappearing into the tiny lines around your mouth. And you have to use it sparingly or you'll be Jack Nicholson as the Joker.

Gray hair—get rid of it. The ONLY person it looks good on is George Clooney.

I avoid showing my teeth when I smile for photographs. As I've aged, my teeth have gone on a journey of their own. Apparently they can't all agree on the same destination, so many of them are traveling to different locations. If I weren't so afraid of the dentist, I would have had them straightened years ago—but nah!!!!

I avoid like the devil cleavage, bare arms, and uncovered chunky knees. Not everyone my age has to do this, but I can think of millions who should. For example, I recently saw a picture of Sophia Loren's cleavage. And I do mean her cleavage. That was all I could see. Cover those things up already, Sophia. No one wants to look at ninety-year-old boobs. Well, some probably do, but I don't like those people.

Scarves are tricky. You don't want to be confused for a Muslim if you aren’t one, or the more politically correct Sister Wife. Jackie O made scarves glamorous, but they don't do any favors for Queen Elizabeth. I say, unless you are in disguise (as Val and Kit sometimes are), wear them only around your neck and make sure they are of good designer quality. The two CCs of Chanel are a nice touch.

Unfortunately, I don't wear my four-inch heels anymore, the ones I ran, literally, around in when I was young. These days I'd have more balance on roller skates dipped in bacon grease. But I miss them so much and can't bear to give them away. So I have a space in my closet for all my sexy high heels, and I visit them once a month. Now I buy only flat or very low-heeled shoes. My rule is to avoid SAS shoes or indeed anything made by Scandinavian craftsmen. Sure, they want us to be comfortable, and safe, but all they are really good for is hiking in a fjord.

I have dry skin, so moisturizer at night is vital. This could be a tub of plain old Vaseline that's been in my bathroom closet since the Carter administration (no matter how much I use, I still always end up with a semi-full jar, making me think it regenerates itself). When I'm feeling rich, or have just watched Diane Keaton on TV advertising her jar of "golden cream that is just for us wink wink," I splurge. I won't listen to the theory that Diane's face is air-brushed. I trust her, but I know she can take a joke. She was Woody Allen's girlfriend for a few decades, for goodness’ sakes.

And that brings me to the most important beauty tip of all: Make sure you are prettier than the man in your life. Sorry, George. You are waaaaay too pretty for me to consider seriously.

And lastly, the BEST beauty tip of all: Have at least one person in your life who makes you laugh out loud. I am lucky. I have several, and a good laugh is better than a facial any day.

Our Characters: Fact or Fiction

We are constantly asked which one of you is Kit and which is Val?

Well (as Val would say), we always answer neither. Val and Kit are each an amalgam of good friends (Sarah and Lee to name just two); the women we would like to be; and okay, maybe just a touch of who we are.

We blog, in part, to let you know all four of us better, Val & Kit AND Roz and Patty! Here, a comment from Val about the mystery-solving twosome (and just a glimpse into the third book in The Val & Kit Mystery Series):

Kit is always an adventure, even if it’s only a five-hour drive to the next state. I see the bright sunshine and warm temperature as a plus. Kit sees the possibility of skin cancer. For the drive up to Door County from our Chicago suburb, I wear an old Cubs baseball cap I found in the back of my closet behind the sack of clothes I’ve been meaning to give to Goodwill for the past ten years. Kit wears a stunning wide-brimmed hat she bought at Saks for fifty bucks. She looks like a Vogue cover. I look like someone wearing an old baseball cap.

During the drive, my twentysomething daughter Emily listens to the Black Eyed Peas on her iPod. Kit reads The New York Times on her Kindle. And I’m tuned in to the Golden Oldies station, singing along with The Temptations.

A thought occurs to me. I should check out those Goodwill clothes . . .  they’ve probably come back in style.

BFFs: How We Got Our Start
You’ve heard of friends Rachel and Monica? Laverne and Shirley? Maybe even Lucy and Ethel? Soon, with a little luck and the help of this blog, you might come to know friends Val & Kit. But first, meet friends Roz and Patty.

Once upon a time, two (unbeknownst to each other) wannabe authors lived in Minnesota. Yep, their names were Roz and Patty. They met through mutual friend Lee, whom they both adored, in part because she was a real character, in the best sense of the word.

Not long after they met, Patty moved to South Dakota. Roz and Patty developed their friendship via letters (remember those things?) and occasional, all-too-expensive, long-distance phone calls (anyone in this day of unlimited long-distance remember THOSE?).

When Roz’s letters arrived, Patty read them aloud to her husband, and the couple chuckled frequently and even guffawed from time to time. When Roz read Patty’s letters to her husband, he said, “Point, point” – something Patty rarely got to. Not quickly, anyway.

Patty told Roz she should be a writer because of her keen Brit wit (Roz is a born-and-bred Londoner who now lives in Texas; but back to Minnesota and South Dakota for now). Roz told Patty that she had actually written short stories when she was a teen. Then Patty confessed that she, too, had written (unpublished) short stories and essays for Redbook Magazine and the like. So they each subscribed to Writer’s Digest and The Writer Magazine and began their writing careers in earnest. Separately.

They wrote and shared with each other their yet-to-be (soon-to-be?) published novels (watch for Trousseau and Tangled Webs – in the distant future, if not sooner). Then both came to a creeping if not screeching halt.

So one day Roz called Patty and said, “How about we start a writing exercise? I’ll go first and send you a segment, you can add a segment and send it back, and so forth. At least we’ll be writing.”

And write the friends did. After about 100 pages, one of the friends turned it into a murder mystery. After a few more pages, one of them said, “This is really good!” And thus the friends eventually finished their first co-authored novel. It wasn’t the first of the Val & Kit Mystery Series, but rather a stand-alone murder mystery. Aptly titled Segments, it also remains yet-to-be (soon-to-be?) published. The friends won’t define soon J but watch for it in the near or distant future, too.

For now, they’re busy trying to get the 2^nd in the Val & Kit Mystery Series to their readers, who are clamoring for it. Seriously. And they’re busy pinching themselves.

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