Being Well-Read, Music, and the Excerpt!

Sorry I didn't blog the past two days. I was tied up with doctor visits for Tiana and myself.

Today's blog by Nathan Bransford brings up a good question that I've thought about myself: Do you need to be well-read to be a good writer?

As a writer, it's certainly something I've pondered. Am I well-read enough to do this right? Am I reading too much of my genre to keep my own voice or am I reading just enough to learn what not to do or vice versa? Nathan weighted the question with a William Faulkner quote: "Read, read, read. Read everything -- trash, classics, good and bad, and see how they do it. Just like a carpenter who works as an apprentice and studies the master. Read! You'll absorb it. Then write. If it is good, you'll find out. If it's not, throw it out the window." Nathan agreed that you need to be somewhat to well-read in order to be a good writer but raised the question: What does it mean to be well-read?

I posted a response in the comments on Nathan's blog: I don't know that I consider myself to be highly well-read, but I do read a lot. In fact, everyone at the library knows me since I'm in so often. However, I wouldn't say I'm so much well-read in the classics as I am more contemporary fiction that catches my eye or someone recommends to me.

Now, I have to say, I have read many classic lit books and have a small collection of them at my house, but I do prefer to read contemporary fiction because it's more in tune with my writing interests.

Would anyone care to comment on this subject? I'd appreciate a discussion on this topic. Please post your comments below.

Today I'm listening to my WMP playlist and the music of the moment is "Disease" by Matchbox 20. I happen to really love that band although it doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the books I'm writing. I just like them!

The excerpt of the day is the end of chapter 11 and begins with Elyssia waking up for school Monday morning after the weekend of the altercation with Jackson. That means we're down to the final chapter I will post excerpts from. I WILL NOT POST EXCERPTS FROM THE FINAL CHAPTER OF THE BOOK. If you want to know about how the book ends, you will have to order one from Amazon.com!

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My sleep was dreamless that night. I woke up feeling well rested when my alarm went off, realizing I hadn’t had the vision again. I earnestly hoped that meant we had laid plans that would prevent those events from happening, but I wasn’t going to make assumptions after only one quiet night.

Mom popped her head in quickly as I was climbing out of bed. “Just wanted to let you know we’re heading to work already. Will you be okay this morning?”

“I’ll be fine, Mom. I’m just going to get ready for school and ride with Evander. I think he wants to keep me close to him during all of this turmoil with Jackson. I’ll be fine. You two have a good day and I’ll see you after soccer practice this evening.”

She looked skeptical, but waved good-bye, ducked back out, and closed the door behind her. I finished climbing out of bed and twenty minutes later was dressed and ready for school. I gathered up my gym bag, soccer bag, book bag, and purse, grabbed my sunglasses and proceeded to drag all my gear downstairs.

Jasper met me at the bottom step so I dropped it all in the foyer and headed to the kitchen to feed him. The doorbell rang and I could sense Evander on the other side of it. Come on in. It was easier to send him a mental message than to holler from the kitchen while running the can opener.

Evander stepped inside and nearly tripped over all of my stuff. “Do you always leave your stuff lying about like this?” he called out to me. “I’m more of a neat and tidy person. We’ll definitely need to work on that with you. I can’t live married to a slob.” He was laughing as he entered the kitchen.

I smiled and retorted, “I’m not a slob. I just had too much to carry this morning and had to feed Jasper. I couldn’t let the poor thing starve. Just so you know. You’re marrying him too.”

“Oh, I’m fine with cats. It is messes I can’t deal with.” He glanced at his watch. “We need to be going though. Did you eat breakfast yet?”

“Not yet, I was going to do that before you got over. Wait a minute I’ll grab a banana and a granola bar. Oh, I need to put a sports drink in my soccer bag too. Let me see if there’s a travel mug I can put the last of the coffee into and take with me. It doesn’t need to go to waste.”

He watched me in silence as I scurried around trying to get ready to go. I took the cat food can out to the recyclable bin in the garage, fixed my mug of coffee with a little sweetener, ate a banana and grabbed a granola bar, and then picked a sports drink out of the fridge for soccer.

“Are you ready now?” he asked trying not to sound exasperated with me. When we got to my mess on the floor, I stuffed the drink in my soccer bag and picked up my purse. He grabbed my book bag and gym bag for me, and we left.

We were running a bit later than usual and the parking lot was nearly full by the time we arrived. However, creatures of habit as all the students were, the parking spot next to Nate’s car had already been designated mine so we had no trouble finding parking.

Amie was looking particularly anxious this morning and I doubted she had slept well worrying about what would happen at school with Jackson. Nate seemed to be in a better mood though. “I haven’t seen a single glimpse of Jackson this morning. His car was still parked in front of his house when we drove by and the lights didn’t look to be on in the house. Maybe he’s not coming to school today,” Nate commented with a hint of relief in his voice.

Nate was right. Jackson didn’t show up for school that day, or the next, or Wednesday or Thursday either. Each day he reported that Jackson’s car was sitting in his driveway unmoved and no lights appeared to be on in the house.

The rest of us were gladly enjoying the time without Jackson at school. It was much livelier among our group without his constant menacing threat looming over us. Each day I had no further vision of the haunting events we supposed were for Friday night and that made us relax even further.

Thursday night on the way home from our practices though, Evander was in a solemn mood. “What’s wrong,” I asked him.

“I have a bad feeling that Jackson will be back tomorrow and things are not going to go well at the bonfire. I think all our planning is in vain. Jackson has visions of the future too, and they have been able to plan ahead.”