It's Harder to Edit Real Life

By the time I turn in a manuscript for publication, I’ve done at least ten drafts. A few of them have been read by siblings, close friends, and my agent. I just polish and polish until I can’t take it anymore. My goal – to make the book as good as I can.

Last Sunday I appeared on Press:Here, a Silicon Valley Meet-the-Press that runs on the NBC affiliate here in the Bay Area and on cable in a bunch of other markets. Scott McGrew, the quick-witted and business-savvy host, reminded me just before the cameras started rolling that the show is taped in one run-through. And of course that was the problem. I couldn’t rephrase my answers or sit up straighter on the second take. Watching the video, I’m struck by a sense of esprit d’escalier – a French phrase for coming up with inspiration when it's too late to use it. The interview was real life where’s there’s no editing – where you’re stuck with what you’ve said, what you’ve done, and what you look like. Yuck. Not like writing fiction at all. When novel-writing I have control. Everything works just like I want it to. Not necessarily smoothly – where would the conflict be if it did? – but after ten drafts, the action, what the characters say, even the weather are all just what I want.

Anyway, here’s the eight minutes on Press:Here I spent talking about the ebook revolution, my novel Drop By Drop, and my checkered past – unedited.

TV OR NOT TV?

Recently I was discussing TV watching habits with a group of fellow authors. Some never watch TV, some seldom watch, some occasionally watch, and others are so addicted that they watch even while writing. Those of us who park ourselves in front of the TV do so for a variety of reasons: relaxation, escapism, addiction (Dancing with the Stars fell into that category for many,) and research.

I heard that groan! Yes, I know authors should never use TV for research because TV is notorious for playing footloose and fancy-free with facts. Just ask anyone who works in a forensics lab. What happens on CSI is about as far from the truth as it gets. However, there’s definitive research that deals with facts, and then there’s structural research that deals with the art of plot and characterization. TV is bad for the first, great for the second.

I’ll admit, when it comes to certain shows, I’m a Tvholic. I get hooked on one or two new shows each season. Right now my DVR is set to record the following in no particular order of importance:

· Lost

· House

· Bones

· Castle

· Desperate Housewives

· Law & Order SVU

· The Good Wife

· In Plain Sight

· Burn Notice

When I looked at this list, I noticed it was quite telling for not only what was included but what wasn’t. Not a single sit-com or reality show. I find that sit-coms are mostly stale jokes and predictable situations. Or the premise is a one-trick pony that starts out great but after a few episodes, the show brings yawns of boredom and finds me reaching for the remote.

As for reality TV shows, I find them exploitative, voyeuristic, an insult to my intelligence, and yet another way writers get the shaft.

About a year or two ago, I read about a new reality TV show in production. All the contestants were terminally ill. Even though the story appeared in a major daily newspaper and not The Onion, I hope the information was someone’s idea of a sick joke and not an actual show in production. I never heard anything more about it, so if it was an actual show, someone had the good sense to cancel it before it aired.

Did you know that the reason there are so many reality programs on TV is because they’re so cheap to produce? No Writers Guild members to pay for quality scripts. No Actors Guild members to pay for performances. I boycott shows that prevent hardworking, talented professionals from making a decent living. It’s my small way of sticking it to “the man.”

But getting back to my list of favorite programs, even though they include everything from evening soap operas to fantasies to cop shows, they all have one or more elements in common. They are, not surprisingly, the same elements that make for good books: great hooks, intricately structured plot arcs, engaging voices, and complex characters.

Many people believe TV watching is a waste of time, that it stifles creativity and kills brain cells. I rationalize my TV habit by studying the shows I watch in much the same way I study how my favorite authors write page-turning novels. That’s the cool thing about being an author. Watching TV helps me do my job better. At least, that’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.

Brothers and Sisters

by Felicia Donovan

I rarely (and I do mean rarely) watch TV. It's not that I'm in anyway morally opposed to TV, I just don't have the time. If I watch an hour a day, that's about it. On weekends, I try to catch up on a few shows I've digitally recorded, but there's one show I never, ever miss.

It's Brothers and Sisters on ABC starring Sally Field and Calista Flockhart. I don't know what compelled me to start watching this show, but two episodes into the ongoing saga of the Walker clan and I was completely hooked. My fascination with the characters and storyline keeps me glued to the TV every weekend as I replay the previous week's show. And now here I am blogging about it.

What makes the show so intriguing? The characters are well-acted and the scripts are tremendous - a blend of drama and comedy that can only manifest itself in an extremely dysfunctional family with love at the core. My beloved show may now languish with no new episodes due to the writer's strike, but that's okay. I'll hang in there and not complain in support of the writers.

But in the meantime...I can't stop thinking up new plots in my head. What if Nora and Holly fell for the same man yet again? What if Nora had a cancer scare and needed to not be so strong for once? It goes on and on and I can't seem to shut it off.

I'm attributing this near-obsession to an overactive imagination. Trouble is, I've got the next book in THE BLACK WIDOW AGENCY series to finish and somehow the characters on-screen are getting in the way of the characters in my head.

Am I the only one out there that has television episodes floating around in her head? Does anyone else rewrite episodes? Would I be cured by forcing myself to sit down in front of the screen for hours on end subjecting myself to the painful medicoracy known as prime time? Do my fellow authors even watch TV? If so, what shows are "must sees?" I remember reading one author's interview in which she declared that most of her inspiration for her books came from TV. Maybe I'd better watch more...