A Letter from a Decided "Nudge"

Hello!
      To everyone who has heard Rachel Heffington speak about Fly Away Home, this is Callie Harper speaking. I butted into my author's usual blog space and schedule because, really: when have you ever known me to care about the proper time for saying things? See, Rachel is a darling author--really darling. She thought up someone as amazing as Mr. Barnett to play opposite me, and really (though there are several dreadful moments in my story when I wondered if Rachel really cared about my feelings at all) I think the book turned out very well. She's a little more honest about my inner thoughts than is really flattering to me, but one cannot know what one's author is up to, much less try to dictate the path of one's story. That is for God and writers.
       This bit of journalism, however, is not to speak about my story, nor to introduce you any further into my own heart (good heavens--Wade and I were quite shocked when we sat down and actually read what she had written!) but instead to lecture Rachel. So:

      Rachel,
           You sat down and listened to me talk and ache and wrestle and yell at Wade Barnett, and you managed to take that wad of mess and formulate it into a tale. You deepened my character, you set me up for a blind date with a blackmailer, and I still managed to tell you my story. You wrote it. You created Wade Barnett and Jerry Atwood (whom, this far removed from my earlier memories, has improved ever so slightly in my opinion) and Nalia and Maralie Barrymore and all the rest. You brought in genuine celebrities and polished my story and theirs' until it shone like Nickleby's fur when he has just finished a cat-bath.
        You did all this, and you fearlessly sent us out to be shredded by the criticism of your friends and relatives and otherwise, and you took those cut-up pieces and pasted them back together, and though I couldn't see it then--and thought I began to be even more contrary than usual--you pressed through. My story is a historical romance, but we are lively enough together that even the boys who read it admitted it was darn good stuff and had little criticism to offer.
        All this you have been through, but now when it comes down to sending us off to an agent, you're balking.
       I ask you, Rachel, what sort of an author is it who just loses faith in her story and characters when the name "Agent" or "Editor" comes up? Listen. Do you think I would have even meet Mr. Barnett if I hadn't got up the courage to ask Mr. Shores for a job? I mean honestly now--he's twice as scary before you meet him, and he's a Ghengis Khan even after you've known him for years like I have.
     Do you think Ladybird Snippets would ever have flown if Mr. Barnett had not teased, cajoled, and cudgeled me into agreeing to his stupidity?
      I watched you write a blog post a day or two ago and you seemed very valiant then. You even made a little picture for the post so that your other friends might remember and be inspired by your call to small-courage. Do you remember?

       Then why in the name of the St. Evan's Post are you doubting yourself? If I had not left Nickleby with Jerry for the afternoon, he certainly would perform a compound-riposte against your backside and inform you that you're a stupid goose.

I tend to agree.

      Wade might use a more tactful representation, but I assure you that he shares my sentiments of the matter.

         In short, I broke into The Inkpen Authoress to tell you (and the world) that the very worst thing They can say is "No." The very worst thing you'll hear when you send a letter to an agent is "No." Perhaps they'll be rude and go further, but the fact doesn't change: My story is a good story. I'm a good character (if this letter hasn't borne witness). And you, my stupid Rachel, are a good writer.
      If you please to hurry up with your query-letter-writing, because I do not relish sitting here boxed up in your computer files. I want to see the world, because I think they'd love me. Yes, do smile. You know I've never struggled with false modesty. Adieu, Rachel, and Public. I must relief Jerry of Nicks-duty, and then change my dress because Wade and I are headed to the Stork Club to cover a story on Gregory Peck.

                      With all my love and best wishes,
                                                Calida Harper
             

Never try to beat a lobster at his own pinching-game.

“Callie…will you please sit down and stop staring at me like a specter rising out of a grave?” He brought a chair to me and rather forcefully pushed me into it. “Now start over and I’ll try to understand you.”

I held my head high—queen that I was—and my cheeks burned hot. I would not stoop to repeat that strange and revealing torrent. I had already said too much—shown my wounds too deep—and all I could hope for was that he had listened to none of it. He stood again and brought me a cup of tepid coffee.

“We have no cream or sugar,” he said. “I hope you don’t mind.”

I stared into the black, oily depths of the cup and thought of the irony—I’d never known a thing to be so alike my own soul.

“Why don’t you pause and reflect for a moment?”

“On what?” Bitter, coffee-stained tones.

“On this hurlement de rage.”

“I don’t speak French, remember?”

“The deuce you don’t. Please, Cal—quit acting like a hydrophobic raccoon; I’m half frightened at that vicious sparking of your eyes.”

“It was you who started it.”

“How?”

“By talking about your…your stupid yacht!”

“You don’t have to go, Callie. I thought you’d enjoy the chance to relax with some of the people we’ll have you friendly with someday.”

His humble, cautious tone somewhat tamed my umbrage. I stirred the lukewarm coffee with one finger and dropped my head. All the fire dwindled out of me and left only a smoldering coal. “Sorry.”

“For what?”

“Splitting.”

“Exploding, rather. But all is forgiven and forgotten.” How easily he said those words—yet I knew he meant them and it was no flippancy. “Callie—I won’t make you be a guest at my yachting party.” His gaze was steady and brown—corduroy breeches with a teddy-bear sheen.

What's this? Disappointment? Callie—what is up with you? You practically shrieked at him that you didn’t want to go.

“But as your boss I am assigning you to work the party. You’ll have all the privileges of a guest, but I expect you to earn your keep. There—does that please the rabid vixen?”

“Does it please her? Gee, Mr. Barnett! You are fabulous!” I actually tipped over my coffee, dashed over to him, and gave him a hug. The lapel of his woolen jacket was rough against my cheek, and his chest solid. My arms dropped limp as soon as I realized what I had done, but Mr. Barnett only laughed and his eyes danced like the ‘netted sunbeams’ in Tennyson’s poem.

“Callie Harper—make sure you don’t show the public this upsy-down side—they might take you for the charmer you are and then it would be all up with us.”

“What is that supposed to me?”

“Nothing and everything in particular.”

I bit my lip and my cheeks flamed again—this time with excitement. “Then while we’re playing at riddles, may I ask a question?”

“Prying, gentle, direct, or merry-go-round?”

“All of the above?”

“Then shoot.”

“Are you any different than everyone else?”

Mr. Barnett sat down on his desk with a hand on each knee. “Jove, She’s turning philosophic on me.” His quick gaze traveled to my face and lingered there. “I could answer that each of us is created differently. But that would not satisfy you.”

“It would not.”

“Methinks you are driving at something a bit more insinuating.”

“Perhaps.”

“You are wondering whether I am like the common rabble…whether I behave like them in every respect. The fact that you ask the question belies a reluctance to believe it…why then, Miss Harper, do you wish it to be untrue?”

I wrapped myself in a hug and turned from him. “And I thought I was the one doing the digging.”

“Never try to beat a lobster at his own pinching-game.”

-Fly Away Home

Masquerade

Fly Away Home--from the writing perspective--has been an interesting experience for me. First of all, it's a genre I don't usually write in. Fly Away Home is primarily an adult novel (20's-30's) , though I'm sure a YA reader would enjoy it.
But the thing that has been most challenging in this novel is the writing of Calida Harper's world-view. She's not a Christian and doesn't have a high opinion of those who are. She has been burnt by her father, deserted by her brother, and let down by life in general. The only thing she clings to or trusts is her ideal of becoming a Successful Woman and all the posturing that must go into her life in order to bring that ideal to a reality. Therefore to write this novel (in first-person too!) takes a bit of mind bending. I can't have Callie's narrative sounding like my own, because I'm a Christian and Callie is not. (Not yet, at least.)

A person's world-view is the lens they view life through. Everyone has one and it flavors and colors their whole perception of the world. Callie's is green. She's jaded and cynical, though like everyone there is portion of her that is still whole and beautiful. But for the most part Callie lives under false pretenses, a sham veneer, and associates among people who are probably just like her. That's part of the reason she and Mr. Barnett collide so often--he's realistic and honest and hearty while she has carefully cultivated her persona so that she is only what she thinks she ought to be.
In fact, Callie's whole world-view can be summed up in this conversation between herself a friend.

“Jamie?” I paused and smiled at him—so jolly and puckish. “Have you ever wondered what it would be like at a masquerade if everyone suddenly removed their masks and could see each other for who they really were?”

“Not much, my sweet. And what would you be wantin’ to see the real person for? The whole point of the game is to be appearin’ like someone else.”

That was the point wasn’t it? Life was just a masquerade—mine more than most—and if I didn’t give Jules what he wanted he’d tear my mask from my face and let the world see the woman who truly lay behind the mask of Calida Harper. My lips trembled and I bit them to keep the tears back.

“It’s a masquerade, darlin’,” Jamie said with a wink. “Everyone’s actin’ like someone else.” He stepped back onto the dance floor and the crowd consumed him.

The privilege I have in this project is to show the gradual change of Callie's worldview as the plot progresses. It's so neat to have an intimate acquaintance with a character who will undergo such changes. But it is a challenge, personally, to think as an unsaved person would think. Every thought of Callie's is tinged with suspicion, jealousy, pride, or hardness, and it has been a great mental and writing exercise to create such a character and write her realistically without making her unlikable or distasteful. I've also grown to remind myself that there are dozens of Callie Harpers living in the world today who are just as precious and just as deceived as she is...just waiting to meet a Mr. Barnett who will take the costumes, masks, and puppetry away and show them the things that make a person truly great.

the cultivation of vanity.

Calida Harper is a mess. But I love her. She's complicated (to say the least), she's insecure, and she never quite knows how to react in a given situation. She has emotional issues leftover from her father abandoning their family when she was a very little girl, she has twisted ideas of success and glory, and she's a perfect basket-case.
But I find that Callie is one of the easiest-to-write characters I've ever created. Because despite all this, the one thing Callie has going for her is a big personality. She's winsome and insecure, frightened, and quaint. And her voice is so distinct that I find the character is really speaking...I'm not speaking for the character. (It does help that Fly Away Home is written in first-person.) Though I'm not a big fan of First Person Present Tense, (i.e. I come in and see that Mr. Barnett is sitting at my desk. "Great," I think, "Now I'm in for it.) I do find that one can get a sense of identification with the character quicker--if written properly--than the usual third-person narrative.

Of course third-person narrative gives you a bit more option as far as POV goes. You can switch from character to character (only one per scene, mind you) whereas in First Person that's a little trickier.
My favorite part of writing in First Person are the clues you can drop as to your protagonist's whole view on life...it's a much more intimate acquaintance with a character--being inside their head:

" 'What will I wear?' If I was like any other woman I would have asked the question of my sister or my best friend or my hairdresser…but my only sibling was dead, I didn’t have friends, and I was scared to death of the German woman who trimmed my hair." 

In just a few short lines you learn a lot about Callie...her mental voice, the fact that she's an only child now, she is lonely, and she has a good sense of humor. This technique is harder to accomplish (I think) when using third-person. Therefore any writer who can accomplish an intimate acquaintance with a character using third-person has my respect. I do use third-person narrative often in my own stories (The Scarlet Gypsy Song, Scuppernong Days, Cottleston Pie) but I knew when I began Fly Away Home that the only way to write Calida Harper was to give her the full stage.
Callie sees the world through a wry, half-smile. She's got a great sense of humor that comes out with her head cocked to one side. I love her so much.

"I was going to have to start scoring some vanity-points. I was in the habit of cultivating a good opinion of myself much as the average housewife is in the habit of cultivating ferns and geraniums and other plants on her windowsill. Recently we’d been in a drought in that category—my battered pride couldn’t take much more of this."

Yes she's vain and she has her faults, but the lovely thing about Callie is that she knows it and she's able to laugh at herself after the storm's over. :) It's a privilege getting so close to a character, and I am enjoying every moment of my time with Callie.

Which style of narrative do you write? What are the pros/cons of it?

In defense of Callie Harper

After last post I realized I had made quite a mistake in not explaining Callie Harper to you better. In wanting you to love Jerry, I ended up making quite a pool of loyal Callie-despisers. That was not the intention of the post and now I find myself saddled with the enormous job of reclaiming her sullied reputation. Let me see how I do.

First of all, Callie is not a mean girl. She is only insecure in every way imaginable. Witness her mind in  action. :)

    All at once I realized the cabbie wasn’t taking me down Fifth Avenue. We had turned off Columbus Avenue where my apartment was, and were now meandering toward Broadway. I reached through the little pane of glass separating me from mine worthy host and rapped him on the shoulder. “Excuse me. It is quite illegal for you to take me a different route from the one agreed upon. I have a constitutional right to go where I wish, as long as I pay.” 

    The cabbie shrugged and kept his eyes on the road, but through the rear-view mirror I could see he looked a bit unnerved. “What are you? A lawyer or sumpin?” 

    “I’m a newspaper reporter, actually, and if you don’t want to see your seedy cab-business written up on the front page of the St. Evan’s Post, you’d better take me where I want to go.” 

    My words sounded braver than I felt—I hated getting stuck in this sort of cab—having to use that constitution spiel. Now I wasn’t even certain I wanted to go down Fifth Avenue. I hadn’t any real business there—just wanted to scout out which penthouse I’d rent once I made it big.  Should I tell the cabbie to proceed on the course he’d chosen? But no—a woman had to stick to her word in NYC or the men would take shameless advantage over her.

Truth is, Calida Harper is a fish out of water. She doesn't know it, and even if she did, she wouldn't acknowledge it. But her father deserted the family when she was two years old. Her brother died in WWII. The men in her life have not stuck around and gradually Callie has grown a bit cynical. Still, she's not all bad. There remains in her a humorous, gentle, sweet streak that consistently appears for her cat, Nickleby, and at random moments for other people.
She wills desperately to be successful, glamorous, and famous. Her measure of her worth is in what other people think of her--therefore she gets complexes rather often, and wavers between self-satisfaction and self-doubt. Her issue is not her self-image. She knows she's pretty and can carry off pretty nearly whatever she puts her mind to, but rather she's wrapped up in the measure of professional success.
When Callie first meets Mr. Wade Barnett, she gets a jolt. He's like no one she's ever met, and truth be told, he annoys her. You see, she's rather jealous of Mr. Barnett. He's a man who cares not a jot for the world's opinion, nor tried to work his way up, and yet he's reached dizzying heights of success. Callie, on the other hand, lives for being a big-time reporter and it irks her to see him making so little of her favorite dream.
I think what makes Callie and Mr. Barnett tick as a pair is the fact that he consistently brings out her fun, easy-going, genuine side and gives her a new idea of what a successful woman might be after all. Callie's double-duty personality can be seen briefly here:

     Growling to myself over the unfairness of it all, I fled the office and stopped at the edge of the street. There—just across the constant stream of yellow traffic—was my destiny. “Wish me luck, Nickleby,” I muttered. I took a large breath, drew myself to my stylish height of five-foot-eight, and dashed across the street in a brief lull between cars. Shores never told me which building I belonged in—but I never bothered about such things, just followed my intuition. I walked with a firm step up the sidewalk, enjoying the clandestine sensation of treading on the golden side and belonging there. I grinned like a loony at everyone that passed by before realizing that sort of a loose, girlish expression in no way fit the image I’d built of the famous Callie Harper. I pooched my lips, dropped into a lazy saunter, and ambled up the sidewalk, searching for the place I belonged. 

“Miss Harper? Are you well? You look a bit faint.”To my extreme horror, Mr. Barnett was at my elbow; brown eyes bent on me with concern. “I was just looking out for you." 

That's what I got for elegance. I pulled my arm away from his touch and summoned all the hauteur I could manage. “I am exceptionally well, Mr. Barnett. And you?”

You can see how hard Callie tries to look and act and be perfect. Poor girl. Gradually as Callie works alongside Mr. Barnett on their Ladybird Snippets project her views are constantly opposed and challenged on every point. Will their individual differences get in the way of business? Will Mr. Barnett turn out to be just like every other man in her life so far? You will have to wait to find out. :) But I do hope I've given you a bit of a better picture of Calida Harper. I don't condone her behavior toward Jerry, and sometimes she's downright horrid. But don't hate her, for my sake. :)

I popped a chocolate caramel into my mouth and grabbed Pickwick off the table, opening to the silk ribbon that marked my place.  “Observe, Nicks,” I said. And even around the lump of chocolate my voice had a determined edge to it. “I take notes from the best masters.” I nodded out the dim window in the directions of Shores’ office and sucked my chocolate. “Let that be a lesson to you, Mr. High-and-Mighty. I won’t be easily squashed.”

Fly Away Home: That Feeling in my Bones

That Feeling in my Bones now has a tentative name: Fly Away Home. You've all heard the rhyme:

Ladybird, Ladybird fly away home--

Your house is on fire, your children all gone.

All but one and her name is Anne

And she crept under the puddin' pan.

Not exactly cheerful, but for some reason I've always liked that little ditty. Now, you will be wanting to hear more about this story, I know. I will oblige you, but right now you will understand that this is a bit of a New Project, in that it is not fleshed out entirely. You know the sort. And I will also tell you that I pledge not to work on Fly Away Home any day until I've written my allotment of The Scarlet-Gypsy Song. I will not be guilty of neglect.I rebel against the charge. ;)

So. Fly Away Home. Where to start....? With a blurb, I suppose:

"Callie Harper--St. Evan's Post, New York. Journalism, short-hand, and the occasional obituary." Yep. Looking back on it, that's a pretty grim way to earn your bread--writing up obituaries for bereaved families. But then, someone's got to do it so why not me?

Callie Harper is a career woman stuck in a fourth-floor office in New York City. It isn't exactly the big break she was looking for straight out of school, but it'll have to do. That is, until she gets the opportunity to start a magazine with America's most famous journalist: Mr. Wade Barnett. He's famous. He's rich. He's Society's darling. It's a diamond-deal--a once in a life-time gig for a city-girl in the early 1950's.
But Callie soon realizes that her ideas and Mr. Barnett's collide at every point. She sees a woman's worth as the number on her paycheck--the width of the circles that know her name. His ideal is a woman of character--be she a mother surrounded by children or the First Lady of the United States. She wants a quick ticket to fame and fortune. He wants to work steadily and thoroughly at the task at hand. It seems that Ladybird Snippets is an ill-fated venture that will go down in the annals of journalism as a gigantic flop. But the worldly-wise Callie was prepared to be ditched from the start--why would this man be any different from the leagues of other in his profession. It might just take a man of Mr. Barnett's tenacity to convince Miss Callie Harper that the measure of success is not always wrapped up in a town-car and glitzy dinners at the Ritz-Carlton...

So. How does that sound? Interesting? Dull as powder? For some time I've been wanting to write a book with a specific theme. I suppose the theme of this book could be "finding the way home." That's where the name comes from. Right after the start of the Rosie-the-Riveter movement, Mr. Barnett is an old-fashioned man with timeless wisdom who is thrown together with a Callie Harper--a girl dead set on making it big in journalism.Their relationship is caustic to say the least.

But why am I babbling? Meet the main characters:

Miss Calida Harper (Callie)

She's beautiful, successful, witty, poised, and utterly confused as to what she really wants out of life. Her name is Greek for "Most beautiful; warm" and the fact that Mr. Barnett knows the meaning and she does not perfectly sums up their individual personalities.

Mr. Wade Barnett:

“This is Mr. Wade Barnett.”

At the words my eyes flew open, my stomach leaped into my heart and I struggled to keep my mouth from dropping open. Mr. Wade Barnett. The Mr. Wade Barnett. America’s most famous journalist—the idol of every kid coming out of school. The Charles Dickens of this century, so to speak. And here I was sitting in his presence wearing a dress with a limp collar, needing a hair-cut, and not even wearing hose. Somebody must have a sense of humor.

 He's middle-aged, kind, simple, and gorgeously rich and famous. Callie describes him as "an old-fashioned goose." I would rather let him speak for himself. His entire character can be summed up in this one paragraph:

“Oh, posh. I wouldn’t put that much stock in me, Miss Harper.” The kind, reassuring voice startled me—I was expecting something throaty and soft—perhaps even silken, like a gentleman’s smoking-jacket. But there was nothing more prosaic than the voice I had heard.

It gave me enough pluck to lift my chin. “I don’t make you an idol, Mr. Barnett. I don’t put that much stock in your talents.” Then, realizing my blunder, I hastened to put it right. “What I mean to say is, gee, you’re a fabulous writer and I love to read your work but I don’t idolize you.”

He put up a hand and smiled.  His eyes were lighter than in the pictures—almost a chestnut color. “Don’t worry about it—it’s better that you don’t idolize me since you’ll soon find out I’m nothing that special.”

He is a gentleman among gentleman, but he's stubborn as a mule. He's got an iron will beneath that gentle smile, and when Callie's hot-headed remarks and juvenile theories brush up against that iron will, you can be assured the sparks fly.

Oh yes. I have a good feeling about this.