Report on the Kindle

It's actually a lot of fun to read on the Kindle. My first and so far only book is Josephine Tey's Daughter of Time. It's not what I expected, but her writing is sublime and I am enjoying it a lot. No way to lose your place. Shuts off when you get up to do something.

I'm still working on getting my novel downloaded to it, and the learning curve is a little, well, curvier. I'll definitely put another book or two on it before leaving for south Florida. Taking my new notebook as well. A high tech trip, along with the digital camera.

The trip is for research on my WIP. Work In Process to the uninitiated. I have travelled to South Florida for years and years, either on business or pleasure and sometimes both. However, I never thought I would find myself writing about it. Heaven knows, there are so many authors who use the setting, and it's a great setting. Carl Hiaasen comes to mind. John McDonald's Travis Magee (sp?) hung out, as well as many others. The Florida MWA is a large and productive group.

Nevertheless, my character headed to Florida and I followed her, and she went to Miami and Key West, locales I only had a passing acquaintance with, and now I need some telling details. My drug lord lives in Miami and the character makes a crucial trip to the Keys. Again, the plot follows its wimsey, in a controlled way, of course.

The web is good for research, but nothing beats being there. So I'm off. The best thing is the book takes place this time of year, so I should be able to nail weather, sunsets, what's blooming, how wilted one feels, and all that good stuff. Yes!

More anon.

Grapeshot

Being there

It is so hard to put myself in the feet and heart and mind of a 21 year old woman on a train to California in 1928. I've got 900 hard fought words. Seems like each word took an hour.

We're planning a California trip this summer and I have high hopes that the trip will be the cattle prod that ignites this novel.

When I wrote about Burning Man, I had been there--tasted the dust, heard the techno beat, experienced the craziness, and when I wanted to write, I could conjure it up from my brain and memories to the keyboard. When I wrote about the sailboat in the fog on the Baltic I recalled the sailing trips in Long Island Sound, and the fog going into Cuttyhunk, and it all came back and became the Baltic. BEING THERE.

When I wrote about the funky Berlin neighborhoods, I had been there, sitting on the bar stool, roaming the streets, seeing, smelling, listening, feeling.

I haven't been to Southern California for years, and the books about it keep piling up, but nothing will substituting for BEING THERE.

I wrote about a float plane trip in the Adironacks, but not until I had flown on one. Same for the Molotov Cocktail in the Charles boatyard. I took endless photos, and stared down into the water, and observed the coromant, saw the floating upside down coke bottle, got the details and the explosion and fire just came. BEING THERE.

When I set scenes in Singapore and Hong Kong, I had been there. So, California, here I come. In the meantime, write the scene and leave a note to fill in the details. And keep reading.

Being There.