Music Monday: Lizzy Ross

This weekend I had the distinctive pleasure of a quick road trip to Durham, NC to see Lizzy Ross perform. Lizzy just released a new album, Traces, in June. Her sound is technically alternative rock... but it's hard to categorize what I heard on Friday night. Her music is a delicious hybrid of folk, jazz, rock, and blues, with clever lyrics and riffs impossible to resist dancing to.

The venue was a private little gathering spot out in the country, and as the sun went down, tiki torches blazed and strings of tiny Christmas lights twinkled under the stage rafters. As the evening deepened, the music became more and more intoxicating, with the band effortlessly spinning out tracks from the new album like "Wedding Cake" (a fast-paced song with a playful sound but a serious subject) and "Cross the Cuyahoga" (an ambitious track that alternates between a driving beat and a lyrical chill-out chorus). More and more people got up to dance as the show went on, and it was remarkable how easy it was to get lost in the music with complete strangers - the sound just took us all over, and we gave in happily.

I was reminded a bit of KT Tunstall with some of her songs, and Norah Jones on others, but it was about the time Lizzy busted out a cover of Chocolate Jesus by Tom Waits that I knew she had her own style and sound. It's obvious she's worked hard to become as good as she is, and even though the show was a small one, she and her band played their hearts out. They finished up with a great couple of songs - the bluesy, dance-hall crowd pleaser "Bones" got the audience up on its feet and out on the dance floor, and Lizzy treated us to a solo version of the title track from her new album, a bittersweet, poignant song about remembering love and having the hope to try and claim it one more time.

I really enjoyed the show and would definitely go see Lizzy again. I bought a copy of her new album, Traces, and I've already been listening to it this weekend. I'd highly recommend if you're in the Durham, NC area sometime in the next couple of months trying to make it to one of her shows. You'll have a great time. Here's a video of her performing her song "Bones" at the Festival for the Eno in July.


Bones from Lizzy Ross on Vimeo.

Happy Monday! Hope the new music makes it a little easier today.

KillerCon!

KillerCon was a great first-time conference experience. Absolute aces. I made amazing new friends, networked, got my name out there. I passed out business cards. I befriended the editors of at least three horror markets. I met so many writers... artists who inspire and astound me, new names on the playing field, experienced authors who had plenty of advice to offer - it was just a matter of asking.

KillerCon had a lot to offer, and here's a little bit about the different aspects of the conference:

Panels - Nine panels were offered at this year's KillerCon. There was a great variety of topics, from women in publishing to shapeshifters in horror fiction. Informative and interesting, and they offered the chance to ask questions and add to the conversation on most panels, as long as there was time. I took some great notes on the query letters and screenwriting panels, and I will post those here later in the week, if you're inclined to know my thoughts.

Prose - Between panels, writers read from their works. I listened to amazing prose from Brian Lumley, Adam Pepper, Michael Louis Calvillo, John Skipp, Cody Goodfellow, and Tananarive Due. It was a thrill to listen to these authors and have the opportunity to ask them questions about their work and their careers. There wasn't a single boring or bad reader and I wish I'd had the opportunity to sit in on every single reading there was.

Pitch - My pitch session was with an established horror agent, and it went really well. He seemed impressed with my concept, and asked for the first few chapters of my novel, plus a synopsis. He also asked for an excerpt featuring the monster of the novel, once he found out what the monster was. Hell of a nice guy; he set me at ease immediately and we had a real conversation that lasted much longer than the initial pitch session was supposed to - we talked for half an hour or so instead of the customary ten minutes.

Parties - After ten and eleven hour days of working, it was time to party. I had a great time mingling with everyone and talking about a little bit of everything, from writing to books, music, movies, and moonshine. Anything under the sun (and some things that aren't) came up over the two nights we had together. Saturday evening never ended for me, because a group of us stayed up forever - no kidding, three of us never went to bed. It was fulfilling to spend time with other writers - people who understand who I am and where I am in this process of crafting my career. And it was effortless. I clicked immediately with several people, and I'm looking forward to discovering and developing those friendships.

Particulars - The staff was dedicated to making sure everyone had something to take away from the experience. They had a snafu with the original conference hotel on the first day, but they worked hard to overcome the difficulty and make sure everyone was accommodated. The Stratosphere was a stellar hotel for a convention. The KillerCon attendees were welcoming and happy to talk with me, and I made a lot of new friends this weekend. I'm looking forward to seeing most of them again at KillerCon 3, if not at World Horror Con in 2011.

Them's the basics. Now - I know you've got questions, kids. Lay 'em on me. I'll be posting more this week on the panels I attended, and I had some really great ideas for an upcoming contest and a blog hop, too. I missed y'all and am glad to be back; now it's time to get to work!

Back in the Land of Sweet Tea and Free Internet

Howdy, y'all!

I'm back on the east coast after my trip to Vegas for KillerCon! I had a fantastic time, made lots of new friends, and had a wonderful pitch session on Friday. I'm in Atlanta at the moment, staying with a friend. Tomorrow I head back to Greenville and I'm so ready to get back. I've got a lot to work on and it's exciting!

Thanks so much to everyone who sent good vibes and encouragement my way! It really paid off. Expect a full report tomorrow on the convention!

See you back here tomorrow! I can't wait to fill you in on what all happened at the convention, but I gotta crash for now. I can't keep my eyes open. I'm wiped out!

Have a fantastic Monday!

Along for the Ride

Travel plans are falling into place, and I'm starting to get really excited about KillerCon at the end of August. You know you're still not a grown-up when the question "aisle or window seat?" gets you all giddy.

Window seat, please... :D

I am so excited about the prospect of meeting other horror writers and participating in workshops for the craft. There are going to be authors there to offer lots of helpful insight, and a dealer's room with all kinds of goodies for sale. Two contests, mixers and meet-and-greets, and three nights in Las Vegas! I mean... if that's not daydream fodder for the next few weeks, I don't know what is.

In other news, I'm about 20% of the way through the editing of the MS. I added a handy-dandy progress tracker to my sidebar, if any of y'all are interested.

I'm really hoping I can get this done in my original timeframe, but I just have no idea how long it's gonna take. I keep finding things that need to be rewritten, or added on to flesh out a concept. As I've said many times before, I'm just making this up as I go along, and it's kinda hard to gauge how fast this will go since I've never really done it before.

The work has, however, progressed famously since I realized I needed to scrap almost the entire first section of the novel (about 30 pages or so). I don't lament this at all; I look at the removed section as backstory that I will probably dip into later to beef up other parts of the book. It's good that it's written because it gives me a clear sense of exactly what happened, and that allows me to use foreshadowing and drop little hints here and there as to what's going on.

This is a fun process, but an exhausting one. So far, I definitely prefer composing to editing. But it's a necessary part of the writing process and I am throwing myself into it full-on like I have everything else.

I'm just happy I have you guys along for the ride. :)

Conventions vs. Conferences

Things are heating up at the Clark Kent job, so you haven't seen much of me lately. The summer is when I'm busiest, 'cause that's when we're slow. It's my job to get people in the door. So, I'm working ALL THE TIME. Which doesn't leave much time for anything else except sleeping in the coldest place I can find (and fit in to; it's no good to fall asleep with your head in the freezer 'cause you just end up on the kitchen floor). South Carolina is HOT this week, friends and neighbors. And it ain't gettin any better any time soon.

It's probably all for the best as I'm taking a little break creatively to let my brain rest after finishing the novel. I've been tinkering with the short story I was talking about last week and have no doubt I'll finish it in the next few days, but it's nice not to feel pushed... especially when "real life" is so insistent upon intruding.

Right now I'm working on figuring out the South Carolina Writers' Workshop Conference. I hadn't given much thought to the conference before this - I'll go and meet people and shake hands and buy a few books and listen to some panels was pretty much my plan - but now that I've started reading in-depth about what's being offered, I'm more excited than I was before... there's a lot of classes being offered, and a chance to talk with faculty about your novel, and query assessments... all kinds of stuff. You can come a day early and participate in intensive classes that are, like, four frickin' hours long. Which I really wanna do.

But, of course, it all costs money... and I'm trying to figure out the things that are worth the money and the things which aren't (should I care about a formal dinner with all the faculty of the SC Writers' Workshop including a keynote speech and awards banquet for the members of the SCWW, which I'm not a member of?). If I had lots of expendable income, I'd sign up for everything, but that's about $600 worth of stuff plus the hotel room plus the gas money to get down there... so close to $1000? There's no frickin way.

Any suggestions about what I should include or leave out? The schedule of events is here, and the prices are here. There's also add-ons like pitch sessions ($10, definitely worth the extra cash) and real-time query assistance ($25, probably worth the extra cash), but there's also prose critiques ($50-$100, is it really worth it?). I'm terrible at this. I've never done it before. Any and all advice is much appreciated.

Going through all this information has made me even more excited about the World Horror Convention next year... and it's really teaching me the difference between conventions and conferences. Conferences have classes and mixers. Conventions have booths and panels. Uh... right?

Timelines

I think one of the most important things that's kept me motivated in writing my first novel is setting a timeline for the things I want to accomplish in this endeavor.

When I made the concrete decision to sit down and give this whole book-writing thing a serious try, I was dubious. I've mentioned before how I have trouble completing long-term projects (a hallmark of attention deficit disorder, I still need to contact someone about the royalties for all those posters I should be on). When I knew I was serious about giving this a try, I sat down and planned out a loose timeline for what I wanted to accomplish.

I decided to give myself nine months to complete the first draft. My writing hero, Stephen King, says in his book On Writing that he finishes a draft of 100,000 words in three months - that's cranking out about 2000 words a day, every day, with no breaks. Of course, Mr. King only has one job - making things up and writing 'em down. He doesn't have to deal with another full-time job like I do. Also, he has this whole book-writing thing down to a science. Since this is my first book, I decided to give myself more time than he recommended, mainly so I wouldn't kill myself with my own project.

After setting a date for first draft completion (the first of May), I looked at what else I wanted to do with the book. I want to give it four to six weeks to rest in the proverbial bottom drawer after it's complete, so I can go back to it and edit all its pages with a fresh eye. So that puts me in early to mid June before I can even look at it to begin the second draft (but it's all right, I have a few short stories rolling around in my head to keep me out of that bottom drawer for a few weeks). I'll give myself about a month to go back through and clean it up, add in the things I want to add (there are several bits of foreshadowing which need to be put in, to sort of spice up the story), change what needs to be changed.

So around July 15th, I'll get a few spiral-bound copies of my manuscript printed, and I'll be handing them out to a few dedicated First Readers. I've picked out a handful already, each of them with a different skill set for looking at the book. One of them, of course, is my writing compatriot and fellow Reedy River Rat Gail Gray, who has offered invaluable advice and direction during the process of creating the first draft. The other readers I have lined up are from varying backgrounds, education levels and mindsets. Each of them has been chosen to read for one reason or another - one person I want to focus on theme, one on setting, one on that terrible issue of romance I talked about yesterday... and they're all excited as hell to read my book.

I want to give them a month to read, then start gently prodding for returns (hopefully with lots of notes in the margins). So, mid-August will be the beginning of the third draft and subsequent revisions. I'll give myself another two to four weeks to get those done, and then start drafting query letters for agents and publishers. By September 15th or so (a couple of weeks before my birthday), I want to have a finished package ready to send out where it needs to go.

And then a month later, the South Carolina Writers' Conference will meet in Myrtle Beach, SC. There will be agents and publishing houses represented there, so I'm going down there to shake hands, network, and hopefully meet someone who can help me get my foot in the door to get my baby - now grown into a big, strapping, stand-on-its-own novel - looked at by a publisher. Gail and I are already planning our trip, and I'm excited about it!

When I saw all this laid out on a timeline back in August, the structure of the plan made me feel as if I had a real chance of finishing this project. It's something I return to on an almost daily basis to help remind myself of what I'm working towards. I need to get this done in a timely manner, so I can ultimately take it where it needs to go in October.

And so far, it's working.

Live Music

I went to see Murder By Death this weekend in Bloomington, IN. It was a fantastic show. The band is from Indiana, so there were a lot of die-hard fans in the crowd - but we got the prize for driving the farthest to see them. We hung with the band for just a bit, shared a bottle of Gentleman Jack with them during their set (they signed the bottle for me and it's on a shelf in my room now), and had a great time. The drummer, Dagan, hurt his hand last week, so they had a stripped-down acoustic session with their old organ/piano player Vincent (he's no longer with the band) added in to beef up the sound. They played a lot of old songs and some things I'd never heard before in concert. There were also three songs from the new album in the set list. Incredible!

I love live shows. There's something elemental and raw about being in the crowd, hearing music so loud it rattles your joints and presses against your eardrums. I get taken over by the music, and have to move and dance and express the passion I feel coursing through me as I listen to a band churn out their sound. This was fostered at a young age - my first live concert was Chicago, when I was five. I had the best seat in the house, because we saw them at a Carowinds show and I sat on my dad's shoulders for the whole set list.

My parents were live music enthusiasts, and during the decade of decadence that was the 80's they took my sister and I to over fifty live shows. I saw bands like Huey Lewis, Starship, The Eagles, and Genesis. We also went to solo acts such as Bruce Springsteen, Tina Turner, Michael Jackson, and Bob Seger. My mom was a pop music fanatic, and she took my sister and I to see Duran Duran and The Power Station and Madonna. Dad was more of a blues and rock lover, so he took us to see Eric Clapton, ZZ Top, and Styx. It was a great upbringing... I learned a lot about live music and fell in love with the energy and passion in concerts. Of course, in the early 90's concert tickets skyrocketed to ridiculous prices and we had to stop going for the most part, but it was fun while it lasted. I've been to a few big concerts in the last decade - Nine Inch Nails, the Indigo Girls, the Eels - but nothing like the summers in the 80's when my parents went nuts and bought tickets to everything coming to Atlanta.

Now I prefer small clubs or bars to large venues, not just because of the cost but also because I feel a much stronger connection to the band and the crowd when the show is smaller. Saturday night at the Bishop in Bloomington, it felt as if we were all part of the same organism, living and breathing and screaming along with the music. There was a current of power running through the crowd, fueled by the songs we loved and the band that thundered through their set on the stage above us. The bass from the speakers along the sides of the stage thrummed in my joints while the melodies of Sarah's cello strings reverberated in my chest. I felt charged, energized, more than just myself - I was part of the animal Crowd, and the animal was satisfied with Saturday night's offering. There's nothing else like that feeling in the world - you just don't get that kind of up-close and personal experience in a large venue like an arena.

Now, two days later, I feel recharged. I went to the river of energy fueled by live music and was fulfilled. I'm ready to jump into my story and pump out pages (as soon as I get home from the Clark Kent job tonight, of course). Murder By Death is coming to Atlanta in April, and I already have plans to go see them then too. I just can't resist that kind of rush.

Traveling Adventure

I'm heading out of town today. In a little while I'll be packed and in Jeff, heading down 85 to Atlanta. I'll pick up a couple friends and from there drive on to Bloomington, IN for a weekend road trip. We're going to see one of our favorite bands, Murder By Death. (You know they're a favorite if we're driving 800 miles one-way to see 'em).

I love road trips, I always have. Seeing new places excites me. Plus, I feel like a sponge right now, soaking up everything in sight to put back into my book. I love driving down the highway to the music blasting out of Jeff's speakers, pushing the gas pedal just a little too much. I love letting someone else drive, too, so I can sit in the passenger seat and stare out the window for a while at the passing scenery. Any passing scenery will do - everything interests me. I like to think about the people who might be living in the houses I'm passing. What the farm I see from a mile away on the highway might be harvesting this summer. I love watching woods and creeks and fenced-off land roll along just beyond my window, all the time using my imagination to put myself along the trails I see, kicking through the blanket of fallen leaves and listening to the hum of the highway just over my left shoulder.

Road trip adventures are a nice little reset on real life, as well. There's nothing like getting out of town for a couple of days to help you get perspective on your life. The Clark Kent job fades and becomes a whisper in the back of my mind (unless, of course, we pass a bowling alley). I focus on what's before me, the road, the adventure, and forget about the stress and frustration of everyday life. It's refreshing.

I lived in Indiana for four years, and though it's a helluva drive to deal with in just one weekend, visiting is also always fun. It's a different environment from the South entirely - Hoosiers are so strange to my South Carolina born-and-bred brain. I mean... I mean, these are people who work when it snows. Can you really trust someone who drives to work when it snows? It's a foreign concept to me (which had to be put on hold for those four years, but that's a different blog entry). Bloomington is a college town - it's where IU is - and it's a fun little burg, about an hour from Indianapolis.

I'm taking the laptop with me and hope to continue banging out words on the novel, at least for a little while, during the weekend. I'm thinking I'll use it to get me to sleep tonight and tomorrow instead of a book. That's the plan, anyway. I don't want to be away from it for three days; the story's too hot in my head. I need to get it down, and fast. I may even find out if I can spread out in Jeff's back seat while a friend drives, that's how urgent the need to write has become. Besides, I need to learn to write on the road, right? Sooner or later I might have to do a book tour. ;)

This particular trip to Indiana seems like a pilgrimage. I don't know if nearing the end of a long creative work elevates everything to a surreal significance in everyone else's mind, but it seems to be doing that in mine. Everything has a strange confluence at the moment that lurks just below the surface of reality. It's like the whole world has been covered with a thin skin of solidity and I can see through to the odd (but beautiful) workings beneath. I can almost hear the clockwork of reality ticking right now. It makes everything important to me. I'm counting dates, adding up numbers, attaching special significance to every synchronicity I run across. It makes me feel like a lunatic sometimes, but I don't worry about that. Artists are crazy; we've known that since time immemorial.

Speaking of time... as Alice's white-furred friend says, I'm late! I must go pack for my mini-adventure. I'll report back on Monday how the trip went for all of your records (I know you're keeping them). Have a great weekend, friends!