Life’s Weirder Than Fiction

Author Mayra Calvani is launching two very different books this Fall: Dark Lullaby, a Horror story about merging reality and illusion and an unborn child, and The Magic Violin, a children’s story about self-esteem and magic.

Huh, you’ll say. Horror and children’s stories. How can they be compatible? In this guest spot, a new feature of this blog I’ve decided to start, Mayra Calvani gives us her take on writing both… and not confusing them together. Here’s what Mayra had to say:

A lot of people ask me how I can write chilling horror and sweet children’s picture books at the same time. Somehow they cannot imagine a writer doing that, switching from two absolutely different modes and wandering in such dissimilar imaginary worlds at the touch of a mouse. That question flatters me to some extend, but it also makes me wonder… am I weird? Is there something wrong with me? Do I have split personalities? I hope not!

Nah, I’m just a multi-genre, multi-faceted person who is inspired by many things and who feels the need to bring those ideas to life. I don’t think I could ever write in only one genre, as many authors are able to. For me, it would feel claustrophobic! I simply write what I love and I love paranormal, suspense, satire, mystery, modern fantasy, literary, romantic comedy, picture books, tween and young adult fiction, and even nonfiction. Each genre transports me into a marvelous, different dreamland where everything is possible and where I set the rules—except, of course, when my characters take over, as sometimes they seem to think they have control over me.

I can write a scary story in the morning, have lunch, then work on a sweet picture book in the afternoon. It’s like switching modes and happens pretty much automatically, though my mood changes as well. Of course, although the actual writing process is the same for all fiction (after all, it doesn’t matter what you write, it all must contain a good plot and flow, compelling characters, sparkling dialogue, etc.), the actual ‘atmospheric’ aids I use for writing change. For instance, I like to listen to haunting, mysterious music when I write horror and paranormal suspense. During the writing of latest horror novel, Dark Lullaby, I spent months listening to the music score of the movie The Village. On occasions I even lit candelabra on my desk. It goes without saying that I would never do this while writing a picture book! During the writing and editing of The Doll Violinist and The Magic Violin, both children’s picture books, I selected soul-filling, sublime violin music.

In the end, there is that absolute need to put those thoughts to paper, to convert those ideas to the ‘reality’ of my fictional world, yes, to bring those dreams to life until they become so real, I find myself thinking about the story and conversing with the characters day and night—no matter the genre. This is the way creativity works.

Mayra Calvani is a multi-genre author and reviewer. For her horror and paranormal suspense novels, visit www.MayraCalvani.com. For her children’s books, visit www.MayrasSecretBookcase.com.

Technorati Tags: mayra calvani, magic violin, violins, violin playing, children’s books, picture books, horror, supernatural, paranormal, dark lullaby, faeries

I found this image on the internet (unfortunately there was no attribution to it) and found it not only hilarious but very telling. I’ve read somewhere that there are really only seven plots in all litterature. This is a small confirmation of it.

I found the image at http://i.thefairest.info/funniest_thumbs/QaDdYu.jpeg

Jack Meter, the private investigator in my SF mystery series The Jack Meter Case Files, loves to eat. Beside opera, it’s his favorite thing. Not only does he love to eat, but he loves to cook.

In his next adventure, Meter Destiny, Jack has settled into an apartment and has returned to his habit of cooking for comfort and thinking through cases. Jack is not a meat-and-potatoes kind of guy (unless it’s Chateaubriand with Mediterranean roasted potatoes): he likes fish, game, chicken, anything that tastes really good but that he can prepare in less than 45 minutes.

He’s running out of ideas, though, and he doesn’t have time to consult cookbooks to find new recipes. Ialysa, one of the Fates of Mythology, is missing, which is creating havoc on Earth; the telecarb he doesn’t have anymore is giving him twinges; and he thinks Isabel Giordani, his new and beautiful neighbour, may have him in her sights. Too much to think about, too little time.

So I’ve decided to run a recipe contest for Jack. The three best recipe authors (which Jack and I will choose) will receive a signed copy of Meter Made, the second book in the Jack Meter Case Files Series. I will also mention one of the three recipes, along with your name, in the next book after Meter Destiny, Meter Parents. Contest ends August 19th, 11:59pm EST.

What you do:

Submit a favorite recipe in the comments section, leaving your name or username and email address where I can reach you.

Rules:

• recipes must take no more than 45 minutes to prepare and cook
• ethnic recipes are encouraged; the sky’s the limit
• Jack likes fresh, so nothing out of a can if possible (he hates anything made with cans of soup or pouches, like hamburger helper — he’s watching his fat and salt intake)
• meat (especially red) is not a must
• no desserts, please. Jack doesn’t have a sweet tooth

Comments on the contest are also welcome. Good luck!

If you’re a reader, you know that most stories don’t begin when the main character is born, following him/her through childhood and teenage years, etc. unless that’s the purpose of the story. Stories begin in the middle of people’s lives, they assume a background (which the writer may hint at or develop during the story), an already formed personality, friends, family or lack thereof, a place to live in, a path chosen. Authors usually concentrate on one slice of life, even when they write a family saga. That’s why the first sentence of a book is so important.

The first sentence allows you to jump in the middle but also to hook the readers and prompt them to read the next sentence, then the next, then the next…

John Gardner was a master at the first sentence. Here are a few of his most intriguing ones:

“One day in April–a clear, blue day when there were crocuses in bloom–Jack Hawthorne rand over and killed his brother, David.” (Redemption)

“I had been troubled for days–odd sounds, objects our of place, all the pitiful and mundane symptoms of a disordered mind, symptoms I know all too well, coming as I do from a family of lunatics, as everyone knows–when a few odd phrases in a book on aesthetics threw everything into sharp new perspective.” (The Library Horror)

“There once was a man who made pictures on boxes.” (Vlemk the Box-painter)

“There used to be a cook in our town, a “chef” he was called in the restaurant where he worked–one of those big, dark Italian places with red fake-leather seat cushions, fake paintings on the walls, and on every table a Chianti bottle with a candle in it–but he preferred to think of himself as simply a cook, since he’d never been comfortable with high-falutin pretense, or so he claimed, though heaven knew the world was full of it, and since, whereas he knew what cooking was, all he knew for sure about chefs, he said, was that they wore those big, obsene-looking hats, which he himself wouldn’t be caught dead in.” (The Art of Living)

Now jump in the middle of ten stories by writing the first sentence of it:

1. The first time I met my future husband, I disliked him on sight.
2. Sally hated her name; she said it was a dog’s name, or even a horse’s name, but certainly not a girl’s name.
3. Squeezed between the mountains to the south, and the tundra to the north, there lives a village with no personality.
4. We all are prisoners of our memories; reality and history do not necessarily coincide.
5. Torver Lockwood checked his watch. Damn, he thought, I blinked and another year disappeared.
6. That night, Lucy began to plot ways of getting rid of all the kids she had to watch over.
7. Sam Trudeau had not sold a car for three weeks now, and he was afraid he might have lost the magic.
8. The road to Quepos slices through the mountains before it plunges, like a pearl diver, to sea level.
9. “If you knew my secret,” said Lando the Magician, “it would damn you along with me.”
10. “In the name of His Majesty, King George V, you are hereby sentenced to hang by the neck until death.”

A wonderful piece of flash fiction, Mara’s Jellyfish, by Heidi Ruby Miller, one of the hosts on my virtual book tour for Synergy.