Speaking to Kids

One of the funnest things I get to do from time to time is talk to school aged children in the demographic for my book.  This started with the wonderful John Kersten at the Elementary School where I work.  He expressed an interest in reading my book to his class, and the book was such a hit that I have done so once a year for the past four years.  Eventually as other teachers come and go next door to him, he introduces the fact that I am an author to these teachers.  Two have expressed similar interest to read the book to their class and in turn, then later ask me to talk to the kids.

Its so exciting to stand in front of a group of children and talk about the process of writing.  I explain the origins of the story, of my writing in general.  I speak about the importance of journaling, of reading other books.  The kids always seem to have a very keen interest.  I try to tailor things to them.  I ask who enjoys writing and reading and specifically talk about the challenges of these things.  I try to draw in all interests. 

Doing these talks is a great motivator.  It makes me feel like I have accomplished what I set out to do.  And it is in times like recently that I have felt down when I try to harken back to those good moments as short and infrequent as they are.

Getting Established

I apologize for a long departure.  Considering work and some things regarding it, I decided to take a haitus from blog writing.  This was also partly due to feeling very out of sorts with my own writing.  I felt like blogging had become a chore, something that I did and never amounted to much.  Everything I read said that continous blogging brought more interest in ones writing, yet I saw no such numbers. 

Which brings me to my next point.  I write my blog in order to encourage discourse, to inspire ideas.  Part of the problem are hours, difficulty finding a way to segment my writing into an actual critique group.  Our local group, the SLO Nightwriters is the best around, yet I find it difficult to find a group that fits my kind of writing.  Furthermore, I wonder about approaching an established group as a new person.  I worry that I cannot get equal time as those who have been around longer than I have. 

So my question to my fellow writers is this. How do you overcome these fears?   Do you face them head on?  Seek the possible, and hope for the best?  How do you become established so that your own dreams can take wing?

Creating the Character - The Phantom Train

One of the surprising things about the Phantom Train is that the train itself is a character, as much a character as any other in the book.   It is conscious of what it does, where it goes and why.  I have talked at length as to how I came up with the concept of the train, but giving it a voice is perhaps one of the hardest things I did.

In some ways I regret it because the train acts as an expositor in the end.  It explains to the children what has happened to their father, that he has nearly given up on life.   The interesting question, however, is why the train cares.  This is a machine that ferries the dead to the other side, and somewhere in me I always thought it would not take a side in such a regard.  Yet this machine of death has a spirit that values life.  It not only saves our characters, it allows for them to board in order to let their mother pass on.

This is an act of compassion one doesn't usually think about in terms of death.  Long ago, I imagined the train was the physical embodiment of death, given form to carry others where they needed to go.  The Phantom Train is as mysterious as its conductor.  Its origin can be imagined in the recesses of time.   But in a way, this is how I would like to imagine the afterlife to be. 

 In the end, we know not what journey lies ahead.  Death is the ultimate adventure, the ultimate question.  Why can we not take it in the best of care and compassion, with the greatest of ease and speed.  The Phantom Train is that essence, that hope.  At the end of the line, we strive to see those who have gone before waiting on the platform with arms open and the great beyond stretching to a limitless horizon.

Creating the Character - The Conductor

One of the more interesting characters of the Phantom Train is its conductor.  I won't lie, this is a slight nod to one of my favorite books of all time, Polar Express.  In a way, these two stories are so similar and yet polar opposites.  (Not to use a pun.)     Much of what happens on the Polar Express is instigated by the conductor character.  We know next to nothing about him, who he is where he comes from, but he is as much a part of the story and the train as our main hero.  

In my story, the conductor plays a similar role.  He serves as the one who explains what the train is and what it does.  He is a guardian of the train, a ghost himself.  I never really imagined his story too far, unfortunately.  I just assumed he's been with the train since it appeared and will be with it to the end. 

There was another character in the story, an engineer, who appeared in an earlier version.  Originally the kids met him and he spread out a deck of tarot cards to explain the meaning of death.  I changed this however, since Tarot didn't fit with an overall theme.  We don't see an engineer or any other maintenance people, and the train appears to run itself.  I imagine that the conductor is the only real staff aboard, in charge of those coming on and off the train.

In a way I would like to know his story, but I enjoy a bit of the mystery surrounding him.  Its nice to dream of different possibilities as far as the man is concerned.

The Single Writer

I don't want to go too off track, but something has been bothering me for a little while.   I am starting to realize how very lonely my life as a writer is.   This is not to say I don't have a life, I do, but most of it involves work.  I know very few people and my circle is very small.   I am trying to change that, through this blog and other means, but its been six years since I moved back home and I feel I have not advanced at all.

Part of the problem is work schedule.  Working nights makes it hard to do anything since most activities seem to happen during the day and over the course of normal weeknights.  Most writing critique groups locally fall in this category and as such its hard to find a niche.  That is one of the reasons I want to find an editor or a mentor, someone to point me in the right direction.   In itself, that is a challenge.  I recently contacted some wonderful sounding people, but they didn't feel they were a fit for me.

I suppose as a writer I want reassurance.  I want correspondence.  I want right and wrong, good and bad.  I want to be around like-minded people.  At the same time I dread critique.  I sat through years of it in high school and I grew to hate the nit-pick attitude that seemed to radiate from the groups.  Its easy to get defensive about your work though, but even in my older years  I found more people were interested in hawking their own work than equal interest in mine.

I for one always try to give equal interest in people's work.  I love reading and giving suggestions.  I always like seeing new ideas and opportunities.  I miss that the most about groups, about critiques and friends.  My question now is how do I get that back given my schedule?  How to I reach out more with what resources I have?  I yearn for suggestions, for anything?  I yearn for a reason and purpose so that I no longer feel I am shouting to a giant void.

Creating the Character - Daryl Dawson

I think of all my characters in Phantom Express, Daryl is the one that has changed the most and probably for the best.  In the beginning his character was another kid, a bully, who had lost his brother when he was younger.  As I grew up myself though, I realized how juvenile this character was and how unnecessary.   I knew I had to change him to tie into the characters that existed, and I wanted it to become about family, so I changed the character's age, relationship etc, until it was their Dad.

In a way Daryl is an intriguing character because although the story is narrated as scene through Justin and Jessie's perspective, the story is really about Daryl's struggles.  He is a single father who still deals with the terrible grief over his wife's death some years back.  He's got a job, a house, two children to deal with, and yet the loss of his wife weighs heavily on his heart.  I once was told by someone that they sympathized with his character the most and that was very profound.

This person told  me that they considered Daryl's situation in the book as the most precarious and real in relationship to death.  Not to spoil anything, but they saw his decision about death as the most crucial.  In the end, so many people have trouble living after one they love so much dies.   So many lose hope and faith and start to die off slowly inside themselves.  They do not always see the beauty of life right in front of them.  Sometimes people make foolish choices in regards to life.

It is for this reason that the Phantom Train ultimately sought out this family.  Somewhere, somehow, Maria Dawson, Daryl's wife wanted to give her husband a message to keep on living. 

Creating the Character - Jessie

I think of the five characters in the book, Jessie is the one so much like my real self.  She is quiet, more reasoning than Justin.   Where he is my desire of something I wasn't, Jessie is more like I was.  She's less inclined to believe what she sees, even if it is fantastical.  That said, she's not against changing what she believes once she sees proof, understanding it.    In some way's she is Justin's superior in this case, she's the one who can help change him, bring him and her father down to reason from the level of the fantastic that they find themselves within.

In a way, Jessie's recollection of death is the one I am more interested in than Justin's.  Even though Justin is the narrator, the beginning of the story is based on a wait for her.  We see Justin waiting for that reasoning individual.  He is already delved into the fantastic, the cold night, the winds and the light of moon.  He is the one who sees the strange, whereas Jessie would probably see the night as another night.   It would be an interesting exercise to try to write the story from her perspective rather than Justin's.

One of the things I didn't have in this version of the book was a scene where the two characters dine in a dining car.  In an earlier version Jessie mentions Persephone in terms of eating the food of the dead.  I think this shows another aspect of my character in her.  She's more well learned than Justin in this regard.  She's afraid of what the trains power is.   I am glad I got rid of that scene though because it mirrored the source material and inspiration in Final Fantasy where the characters also dined on the train (with no ill effect.) 

Ultimately, Jessie will remain one of my favorite characters.  I always find it hard to write women or girls because I'm not one.  I modeled her after a few girls I knew growing up as such.  But I hope I got the aspects of that side of life correct.