Author Archives: Michael Greenwald

“Weeping Underwater Looks a Lot Like Laughter”: Strange Title, Promising Debut

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By: Sleep Sunshine

Michael J. White’s first novel begins, “On our debut night in Des Moines, Nicholas Parsons murdered a high school senior in the hotel room directly beneath us.  The following morning we received a call from the front desk receptionist announcing a cancellation of the complimentary breakfast buffet, due to the conversion of the hotel restaurant into a provisional police headquarters.”

Since I’m a writer I like to think about what made me pluck a book from the seemingly endless stacks at B&N or Borders, and fork over my dwindling cash-flow to bring it home.  Many times I don’t remember.  This time, I recall reading those first two sentences and being interested enough to continue down the page, from their George Flynn, White’s narrator did the rest.

George Flynn and his family (undeveloped, minus his older brother Zach, who is, but not far beyond the lines of jock-stereotype) move from Davenport to Des Moines, Iowa just in time to begin his junior year, in a brand new high school.  George quickly finds himself alienated from his new high school peers, who he describes as “disproportional, with oddly shaped craniums packed with perversions,” and put-off by their hazing in passing notes about him around class, one of which reads: “Please put the fire out in your crotch.”

By page twenty, though, the primary focus of the novel is revealed.  Emily Schell.  Beautiful, intelligent, unbridled…all the qualities of an excellent literary muse.  George is smitten on sight.

Mr. White, though, isn’t done.  Coupled with the “dream-girl” is her younger sister, Katie Schell, whose precocious, witty, sardonic humor really pops off the page.  Katie is also in love with George, and this element–a love triangle, but not really–is fascinating to witness developing.  George can’t help his physical attraction to Emily, while he can’t ignore his intellectual and spiritual infatuation with Katie.  And lurking under the surface is an even more compelling element, which isn’t ever raised: George’s obsession with the Schell family, as a whole.

Katie Schell suffers from MS, which flares and ebbs as the book progresses; when not sick, Katie is only mobile through the use of a crutches or a wheelchair.  While physically limited, Katie’s mental capacity is limitless.  In every scene Katie is in, she steals the spotlight, especially from her older sister, who’s not all to happy about this yet struggles with the emotions of being jealous of her handicapped younger sister when she received a genetic Power-ball relative to Katie’s losing ticket.

The narration is told from present-day George’s POV.  His life is in ruin and he looks back at these several years with the Schell sisters as the point where his life climaxed and began it’s descent.  One of the weaknesses of the book is George.  He serves as the narrator, yet his characterization is not given as much weight as the Schell sisters, or even the Schell family altogether.

The story is so focused on this dynamic it leaves out what could otherwise be a very interesting and revealing character study of George and his relationships with his parents (not even touched on after page 2) and his older brother Zach (a couple scenes with Zach near the end had great potential).  Mr. White imagined George as a red-head, which, for me, made him inherently interesting, due to the stigma red-haired men in our society deal with; yet Mr. White stopped there, as if this were enough to establish George.  Other than the passing-notes near the beginning, we do not witness George dealing with much adversity.  This can be explained with the fact that George is portrayed as kind of an easy-going fella (who wouldn’t like him), but that retards his character depth, especially in contrast to the fascinating, complicated Schells.

The book doesn’t strive too far.  All you believe is going to happen, does in fact happen, with little surprises along the way.  The hook which captured my attention on the retail floor of B&N–the Nicolas Parson’s murder–turns out to have no greater significance than a repetitive fascination for George and other Des Moines characters.  But, for some reason, neither deficiency left me wanton at the end.  Through reflection, I’ve come to commend Mr. White’s instinct to not muddy the water.  The central plot arc involves George and the Schell sisters and all the emotional highs and lows having met them bring, and that, for this reader, was enough of a meal to chew.

All in all I found this novel to be an excellent read, recommend it for those Confession-ers who enjoy coming-of-age, contemporary type literature, and look forward to Mr. White’s next effort.

Wishing, as always, great words to y’all.

–SS
Michael James Greenwald (Sleep Sunshine)
 Born a Jew, though through his fellow confession-ees, now firmly committed to this cathartic concept of confessional (at least in the agnostic literary sense), Michael James Greenwald is a student at Story Studio Chicago, applying for a Ragdale Residency in the fall, and waffling daily (sometimes hourly) on To-MFA or To-Not-To-MFA, that is the question. He’s focused on his Summer of Michael, ’10, where healing mentally and spiritually is the order of each day, and moving forward, onto The Next Step. His debut novel The Rainbow Child and short story collection Celebratory Gunfire are due to be published in the next several years. His personal blog site is sleepsunshine. Feel free to venture to his Facebook page or feel free to email him with any comments or suggestions for further topics, or if you had any interest in being a guest blogger on either one of his sites.

500 Club (6/24)

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Another Thursday, another 500 Club. The rules remain the same.

1. Write 500 words based on one of the two prompts.
2. Post it to your blog.
3. Copy the first couple of lines in the comments below with a link to the full text.

But, wait! There’s more!

If you don’t have your own blog or website, and you’re just dying to play along, now you can. In the sidebar on the right you’ll find a text box where you can paste your 500 words and submit it straight to us. So go for it!

As your fearful moderator, Sleep Sunshine, I’ve come up with something different-ish this A.M.  Part of what we do as writers is try to tap into the emotion of our lives and translate that real feeling into our fictional art.  Two writing prompts are below.  I want you to read each of them, one at a time, and following reading each one, I want you to close your eyes and for several minutes meditate with the goal of trying to physically feel in your guts the raw emotion that each moment inspires and then use that emotion to drive you to write a flash fiction piece (500 words…unless you’re rightly motivated, then go nuts…like I did a bit…oops) inspired by not the circumstance but strictly the emotion the factual memory inspired.

1)  Think of the worst moment in your life up to date.  Close your eyes and re-live this moment.  Try and re-create the raw emotional response to this moment.  Go.

2) Think of the happiest moment in your life to date.  Close your eyes and re-live this moment.  Try and re-create the raw emotional response to this moment.  Go.

Trusting the Process and Yourself

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The Poll Winner--The Handle-Bar Stache

By: Sleep Sunshine

For those of you who do not know, this summer I am performing a complete rewrite on my upcoming novel The Rainbow Child.  At the end of last summer I finished the second draft of the novel (which at that time was called Haply I May Remember), set it on the shelf for a month, and went about printing, binding, and sending manuscripts to several beta readers (thank you, once again, Amy, Deb, and Jillian), while sitting down at my patio table with my manuscript, a legal pad, and a (okay, many) bottles of Pinot.

What I learned, and what I found, was I had a lot of work to do.

I spent the next several months attempting to reconcile the issues my beta readers and I had come up with.  During this process I plotted my novel in story-board form, performed extensive characterization charts, and asked a lot of hard questions.

At the end of two or three months of scrambling I came to the conclusion that fixing that draft was not going to happen.  So after several weeks, I crawled myself out of a Knob Creek bottle and allowed the realization that had been knocking on my reality door to come inside.

I needed to start again from jump.

The official start of summer is, I believe, tomorrow (June 21, right?), and at this moment I am about halfway through my massive rewrite, so I’m ahead of schedule and feeling proud of myself for this.

But it has been a struggle, let me tell you.

Not that writing–whether you’re working on your fortieth book or fourth–will ever be an easy process.

One thing I’ve learned during this rewrite is to TRUST THE PROCESS.

I know this is hard.  And it is easy for me to say this today when I’ve had two huge break-throughs this week and I’m feeling fine (If you had asked me last week, my catch phrase would not have been TRUST THE PROCESS, but [Expletive] THE PROCESS).

One of aspects of becoming a professional writer I think we have the toughest time acclimating to is the unpredictable nature of The Process.  There will be weeks when you are absolutely locked in; when you can not type fast-enough to document this amazing language and phrasing and scene work and character development being churned out by your brain.  And there will be weeks when you feel as much energy flowing through you as an unplugged power chord lying on the carpet.  And there will be weeks when you’re somewhere in-between.

When you’re Locked In, you think, it’ll last forever and when you’re unplugged, you feel as though you’ll never get locked in again.

At this moment in the blog I’d like you to do something for me.  Don’t groan, I’m serious.  Grab a pen.  On a Post-It note (or if you want extra work on an index card or a scrap of paper and you’ll need to find some tape) write these words:

TRUST THE PROCESS

My Spot

Now, stick this note in your office in a place where when you throw your arms up in despair you’ll see this note.  TRUST THE PROCESS.

For those of you who don’t know, my book is about a midwest family dealing with the death of their young matriarch (Leu).  The process of the book involves each member of the family going through the process of healing and dealing with some major secrets which were revealed after Leu’s death; and at the same time, Leu having a problem gaining entrance into the After-Life (Heaven, The Happy Place, whatever you want to call it) because of these outstanding secrets.

One of the catalysts propelling me to perform this massive rewrite involved placing the paranormal aspect of the book, which was barely existent in the other manuscript, in a more central role in the novel.  To do this, I knew (well, Amy N. knew and she badgered me about it until she convinced me she was right–you hear that, Amy?  I’m admitting that in a public forum) Leu needed to have a POV.  I knew where Leu was (the setting) and I knew her purpose, but for me to write Leu she needed to have a voice and for the life of me I could not hear Leu’s voice.

I spent months working other parts of the book knowing that I had a huge hole at the beginning of the novel where Leu would basically set the whole book up.  But I couldn’t hear her.  So, I began to doubt my instinct (prompted by Amy N’s instinct), doubt my ability to pull this off, doubt that the world was round…doubt everything.

Just a Fantastic Book

Monday afternoon, after spending all morning literally banging my head against the wall and then contemplating a career change to a gravedigger or Jamba Juicer, I was lying on my bed reading Neil Gaiman’s American Gods and I read a section where Shadow (the main character for those of you who haven’t read this incredible book) returns to his hotel room to find his dead wife sitting on the bed.  I read two lines of their interaction and suddenly I wasn’t reading the words on the page but I was listening to another voice, not Shadow’s wife, opening my book:

Secrets will eat your soul.  I am dead and I know that much.

Not only did this opening break apart whatever barrier stood in the way of me being able to hear Leu’s voice and lead to an out-pouring of prodigious dictating of her sections, but this opening line fit smoothly into a major thread that winds through my entire piece, involving the secrets that we keep and why and how our humanity is found, many times, in those secrets.

As I look back at the last several months I realize nearly everything I had been doing was gathering data for me to eventually lock-in to Leu’s voice.  What I’d been reading, listening to (Justin Cronin Interview on NPR), what music I’d been hearing, what conversations my friends had been talking about, memories (my father’s description of how my grandmother Evelyn had died played a part), what I smelled when walking my dogs…

EVERYTHING.

And that’s the point.

If I hadn't trusted the process this could have been my future...brrrrrr.

In retrospect, on this side of this massive revelation, I can climb onto my soapbox and talk about TRUST THE PROCESS.  But last Wednesday, I was ready to give it all up.  So, I am hoping next week, when I’m ready to chuck it all for a life as a hunting-and-gathering Eskimo, I hope to see my note, remember to TRUST THE PROCESS, pop in some Monster’s of Folk and chill-ax.

George Pelecanos (in the fascinating book On Becoming a Writer), when talking about his writing process, might have said it best:

“There are also long periods of inactivity, just sitting around thinking, bouncing a rubber ball on the hearth, listening to music, mind-navigating intricacies of plot and characters, dreaming.  I’ve learned that this is my job, too.”

I send good thoughts and techno-vibes to you, wishing you good journey, in discovering wonderful words and hearing some new voices, this week.

–SS
Michael James Greenwald (Sleep Sunshine)
 Born a Jew, though through his fellow confession-ees, now firmly committed to this cathartic concept of confessional (at least in the agnostic literary sense), Michael James Greenwald is a student at Story Studio Chicago, applying for a Ragdale Residency in the fall, and waffling daily (sometimes hourly) on To-MFA or To-Not-To-MFA, that is the question. He’s focused on his Summer of Michael, ’10, where healing mentally and spiritually is the order of each day, and moving forward, onto The Next Step. His debut novel The Rainbow Child and short story collection Celebratory Gunfire are due to be published in the next several years. His personal blog site is sleepsunshine. Feel free to venture to his Facebook page or feel free to email him with any comments or suggestions for further topics, or if you had any interest in being a guest blogger on either one of his sites.

What Does A Writer Look Like? A Sleep Sunshine Contest (Part 1 of How Ever Many It Takes…)

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Mother of Sleep Sunshine; Sister of Sleep Sunshine

By: Sleep Sunshine

Image is everything.

I don’t know who I heard that from, but it’s true, especially in the Modern Marketplace.  And (fortunately or unfortunately, depending on how you look at, and possibly how much of a Control Freak you are) creating, developing, and marketing an image is left solely up to you.

Sure, actors and singers and politicians have a PR person (several PR people, in many cases) on retainer, but we’re not actors, singers, politicians; we’re writers–the ones who create the stories and characters these actors, singers, politicians embody, yet when seats on the luxury liner are doled out, we’re somehow relegated to steerage.

I’m a marketer by nature, and though I look back at my college degree and most of the edjamacation that I digested through the process of obtaining it as a colossal waste of time, I will admit to coming away with quite a few strategies to selling a product in the marketplace.

No Derek Zoolander; not THAT Look.

(The rest I gleaned from MTV).

This morning, I want to talk about The Look.

Seems as though writers, being the behind-the-scene creatures we are, don’t think about The Look.  But I think in this modern marketplace so focused on TMZing nearly everything, writers who want to sell books, plays, movies, TV shows on a large-enough scale to eat must think about…

THE.  LOOK.

One of my tenants to selling in the Modern Marketplace is getting out there and doing readings.  Not necessarily reading a chapter from your latest tome…yawn…but developing creative entertainment (yes, I said the dreaded E-word) that derive from a particular work.  For instance…

  • Writing a play based on your novel and having the production shown at a small-audience theater.
  • Writing poetry inspired by your novel and performing it at open mikes.
  • Shooting a short film based on your novel and showing it on YouTube.
  • Writing an article about issues raised in your work and publishing it as an expose in a magazine.
  • Having someone write a tell-all book about your addiction to plant food.
  • ETC.  ETC.

Writers.  We need to diversify!  Get our name and image out there, across the media spectrum.  And more importantly, we need to come out from behind the lens and show the world our metaphorically pitted faces.

Yikes!!!  I know.  For many of us, this is the reason we became writers, so we didn’t have to do this.  But let me tell you, to most of the Modern Marketplace, you are going to sell yourself first and your work second.

This weekend, I went away to one of my best friend’s father’s cottage on Fox Lake (Side-Note–Listen to Dave Matthews and DO NOT DRINK THE WATER, no matter how much you’re trying to impress a pretty girl…cough, cough, sneeze, sneeze…) and I was sporting my Playoff Beard.  For those of you not immersed in the cult sport of professional hockey, thus have no idea the significance of the Playoff Beard…

“A playoff beard is the practice of a National Hockey League player not shaving his beard during the Stanley Cup Playoffs.  The player stops shaving when his team enters the playoffs and does not shave until his team is eliminated or wins the Stanley Cup.”

My friends (the wonderful, witty, rabble-rousers they are ) began referring to me, in my snarly, ratty, bearded state, Yusef.  Or the Uni-bomber.  Or Late John Lennin.  Asked me to bury their wallet for safe-keeping in my scruff.  Asked me how much it would cost to buff their cars with my cheeks.  Wanted to know how much rent I charged the sparrow that had taken up residence near my jawline.  ETC.  ETC.

Girls I came across that weekend who I attempted to approach in my frowzy state handed me crumpled dollar bills or coins from their change purse; inquired as to the whereabouts of my shopping cart, while pointing to a pile of discarded beer cans, commenting on how in Michigan I could earn 10 cents rather than 5 a can; and the most creative line, by a buxom blond in a yellow bikini, who asked me to stick around, in case it started to rain and grew cold, due to the fact she and all her friends on their boat would be able to burrow into my beard for warmth (she really didn’t enjoy my retort, when I asked her to sit in the bow with me in case our boat capsized, in which her huge fake cans could be used as floatation devices).

All of this good natured ribbing got me thinking.

What does a writer look like?

I perform at readings around the city.  Different coffee shops, bars, at the Jackson/State Street station on the Red Line (which is rough because people don’t get the empty computer bag in front of me is where to toss their change).  My material is solid.  I project like a practiced Broadway starlet.  All I’m missing is THE LOOK.

Mmmuuaaahhhhaaaahaaaaaa... [smoker hack, smoker hack

What does an author LOOK like?

I’m committed to the fact that Stephen King has sold as many books as he has as much for the content between the pages as his photo on the back jacket.  I mean, that is a horror writer face.  Right?

"Well, Lady, my answer to that would be: are you DFW? Are you? Didn't think so. You'd get it if you were. Simple as that."

Or David Foster Wallace.  I mean, the dude looks like he knows he’s smarter than you (and has no trouble telling you he is smarter than you, either).

(Honk!  Honk!  ”Bus to HELL leaves in fifteen minutes!”  Gulp.  Guess my ride is taking off soon.)

There’s an author, who’s name escapes me at the moment, who never takes a straight picture on his jacket cover (when I say straight I don’t mean sexuality; I mean in one I think he’s turned around so you just see the back of his head and in another he’s holding up a squalling cat in front of his face).

Actors are all pretty and classy like Nicole Kidman, goofy/beautiful like Julia Roberts, or Funny/Dorky like Michael Scott, or bad-asses like Colin Farrel–who’s never without a cigarette and some candy on (or in) his arm.

What is my The Look?

I don’t have one.

I need one.

I’m going to let you VOTE.

That’s right, Confessioners.  You choose my The Look, bit-by-bit (facial hair, outfit, shoes, accessories…) and I’ll don it at my next reading.

This week, considering the interest my Playoff Beard received this Memorial Day Weekend, we’ll start with FACIAL HAIR.

Here’s six pics, six choices.  May the best Look win!

1) The Aforementioned Playoff Beard

2) House Just 'Round the Next Holler

3) The Handle-Bar Stache--Built for Power AND Speed

4) Sleazy yet Sophisticated (Oh yeah, Ladies!!)

5) Like My Book Or I Take Over World

6) If this is chosen, I'll get a dictionary tattooed on my bald skull to spice it up.

Thanks for voting.  Thanks for reading.

May great words find you this week.

–SS

Born a Jew, though through his fellow confession-ees, now firmly committed to this cathartic concept of confessional (at least in the agnostic literary sense), Michael James Greenwald (Sleep Sunshine) is a student at Story Studio Chicago, applying for a Ragdale Residency in the fall, and waffling daily (sometimes hourly) on To-MFA or To-Not-To-MFA, that is the question.

Yet again, he feels inspired at the chance for love.

His debut novel The Rainbow Child and short story collection Celebratory Gunfire are due to be published in the next several years.

His personal blog site is sleepsunshine. Feel free to venture to his Facebook page or feel free to email him with any comments or suggestions for further topics, or if you had any interest in being a guest blogger on either one of his sites.

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The Gentleman in 114, Part III

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For Part I, click HERE.

For Part II, click HERE.

“The Gentleman in 114″ Part III

By: Sleep Sunshine

She noticed the lighting right away.  But could hear the rumble of thunder and saw a flash of lightening in the windows down at the end of the corridor she was walking towards and figured the dimness had to do with a power surge of some kind.  If she’d thought about it the fixtures would have struck her as odd, but she didn’t, and they didn’t.

She shifted the files to her other arm and continued walking.

At the intersection where the nurses station sat, an African American orderly rounded the corner right in front of her, eyes cast downward, nearly clipping her with a cart overfilled with soiled linens.  Lauren could smell the blood and the excrement.

“Sorry, missus,” the orderly muttered.  He was an old man, speckled black and gray beard, bald head, and the fact she didn’t recognize him and that he wore the old uniforms, the white ones the administration had done away with in favor of the more mood-pleasing pink or blues, didn’t register; for economic times were tough, and administration plugged temps into orderly positions, especially overnight, which all the overnight nurses chirped about–having inexperienced, many times untrained, orderlies for the shift that would rationally be the safest, according to statistics compiled by the administration, but when dealing with the non-rational individual, overnight nurses knew rational thought and statistics made as much sense as ice-cream sundaes for dinner for the diabetics.

The African American man flicked the cart forward and continued onward, one wheel squeaking.

“Wait a second,” she said, and the squeaking ceased.

The man turned slowly, head still down, shoulders slumped, and the idea he might be mentally challenged came into Lauren’s head.

“What is that in your hand?”

“Missus?”

“Your hand.”  She felt like a bitch, but rules were made and inside these walls rules were followed.

The man lifted his hand upward, wrist first, as though it were broken.  Gray smoke swirled toward the ceiling.  ”A cigarette, missus.”

The way he said it shocked her, as though it were the most regular thing in the world.  ”You can’t smoke that in here.”

“What?”

“Inside the building.  It’s against the law to smoke a cigarette.”

“Missus?”

Lauren softened her tone, the man obviously retarded, which was not his fault but showed how desperate the administration had gotten in these difficult economic times.  ”Sweetheart.”  She smiled, pinning the files under her arm and raising her hands, palms out toward him, fanning the air–non-verbal comms used to calm erratic patients, something she found herself doing throughout her life; at the coffee shop, when baby-sitting her nieces and nephews or training Stooges, her puppy.  ”There are laws and laws can’t be broken.”

The man flicked his eyes to her, swallowed.  ”Yes, missus.”  He extinguished the cigarette on a metal rod on the cart, slid the butt in the breast pocket of his white shirt.

“What’s going on here?” said a female voice.

Lauren whirled.  ”He was…”

The nurse wore the old-fashioned white nurse cap with a red cross on the bill, dark hair poofed into a bob, white nurse dress down to leggings and black tennis shoes.  She smiled, no creases near her crimson lips, none near her eyes when she furrowed her brow, straight white flesh on cheek and forehead of a woman in her early twenties.

“He was…”

“Yes, Doctor…” She peered at Lauren’s chest, frowned.  ”Barstandt?”

Lauren’s mouth felt as dry as a cotton swab.  Her eyes flicked to the African American man, then to the old fashioned fixtures lining the hallway, and in the dim light they let off she noticed the pristine white newness of floors and walls.  Thunder rolled, the whole building shook, fixtures along the walls blinked out and Lauren heard a generator kick on from somewhere in the building and red emergency lights snapped on.

“Well, looks as though we’ll be doing bed checks this evening by candle-light,” the nurse said, chirpily. “Curtis, you run along now and tell the others to get all the candles and holders from storage.”

Curtis bowed.  ”Yes, Nurse Toliver.”  The cart’s wheel creaked all the way down the hallway.

Every couple seconds, lightening illuminated the window at the end of the corridor.  Behind doors, Lauren heard patients stirring and muttering.  Down the hallway a pounding began.

Miss Toliver cast her eyes on Lauren.  ”Shall we, Doctor?”  She stepped aside grandly, offered the path to the nurses station with a slender pale arm.

Lauren stared at her, feeling sweat drip down her ribcage.  Miss Toliver stared at her curiously when she didn’t respond, tilted her head, nibbled at her lower lip, a pink hue developing on her pale throat.  Lauren tried to get her mouth to work, but her tongue just flopped against her teeth.  She thought of the black-and-white photo she’d snuck and cut out of the paper the day after the accident, which she’d taped to every bathroom mirror she’d ever had: grade school, junior high, high school, college, medical school, apartment, house.  That woman was certainly not the girl standing in front of her now.

Miss Tolivar raised her hands, palms out toward Lauren, and fanned the air.  ”Doctor?  Shall we?”

Lauren swallowed; all the rules and laws she’d learned her whole life running through her head as she said the most irrational thing:  ”Well certainly, Mother.”

Check-in on Sunday for S.C. Green’s shocking conclusion to “The Gentleman in 114″…

3 Things Sleep Sunshine is Geeked Out About…

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The Prodigal Son

By: Sleep Sunshine

1) WHO DID FRAME ROGER RABBIT?

If you even have the desire to go human, Jessica...CALL ME!!!

Okay, so my first one is a throw-back, I’ll admit it.  An oldie-but-a-greatie.  Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (based on the series of novels by Gary K. Wolf) is the great-grandfather who braved the choppy waters of the Atlantic and arrived at Ellis Island with only shekels in his pocket, and an insane vision of animation and live-action co-existing on the Silver Screen.

The technology is not great.  Youtube has the whole movie available for free, so I checked it out, and found the film grainy and gray (which did add to the noire-feeling) and scenes combining live and animated characters appear off, live-action characters in one depth, live-action on another–like a novice painter who hasn’t mastered the technique of creating depth through placement and color.

But all in all the movie still kills me…

WFRR fans!  Good news!  The sequel (or prequel, depending on which script they use) is set for release in January 2012.  And though I worry, with the modern prevalence of edgy, smart animated features, WFRR will not mesmerize my kids the way the movie did for me, I look forward to seeing the sequel with the kiddies, if nothing else it’ll give them another reason, in the face of my WFRR exuberance (Pppppppllleeeeeasssssseeeeee Jakob!!!!!), to roll their eyes and say, “Daaaaaaaaad!!!!”

2) THE FORTRESS OF MY SOLITUDE

The Tome of Literary Jesus, or Genius, whichever you prefer

Okay.  This one might be obvious, due to my Superman(dare I say, Aeroman)-sized, literary, man-crush on Jonathan Lethem. For those Lethem-lovers in the audience, you might be saying: “Um dude, heello; FOS was released in ’03, where have you been?”

My only response to that would be that “The Fortress of Solitude” was the only Lethem book I hadn’t read, to date.  And WOWZER, did I finish digesting the Lethem collection with a wonderful, rich dessert!

Michael Chabon, in his blurb on the back-cover, describes the greatness of this book better than I could.

“Lethem has done a number of things here, any one of which is impossible for any but the very finest of novelists.  He has vividly and lovingly and truthfully [adjective tsunami, Jim?], through thrilling evocation of its music, its popular culture, its street games, argot, pharmacology (LOL), social mores and racial politics, re-created a world, a moment of history that I would have thought lost and irrecoverable.”  Chabon goes on to say, “He captures precisely–as only a great novelist can–how it feels to love the world that is, on a daily basis, kicking your ass.”

For me, Fortress of Solitude has introduced me to language; more precisely, has made me, to a depth I’ve never felt before, fall madly in love with language; and even more precisely, has taught me how to use language and the importance of the power of language in my own work–to a point where now after reading this book, I (as a writer, reader and an intellectual) will never quite be the same.

3) NATIONAL UNITED FRONT OF DEMOCRACY AGAINST DICTATORSHIP

Red Shirt Protesters at Work, in Thailand

Listen, I’m not taking a tough stance one way or another.  I am not cast under the spell of Bush-ology (really ironic to label anything philosophical with that prefix), and believe capitalism and democracy are the purest and best-est (there you go, W) forms of government.  In fact, I’d lunge against the chains of my brainwashed bias and go as far as to say democracy and capitalism, in their American-forms, are poisonous to the spirit and soul of Man.

That being said, I am “Geeked-Out” about the Red Shirt Protests in Thailand, due to the example set by the UDD of a sociological tenet in which I believe in whole-heartedly: The Social Contract Theories [developed by Thomas Hobbes (1651), John Locke (1689), and Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1762)], in which “Free men establish political community (civil society) through the social contract in which each gain civil rights in return for subjecting himself to civil law or political authority.  When failures are found in the contract, we renegotiate to change the terms.”

Locke expostulated further, explaining when civil measures have been exhausted, the people have the “right of rebellion” in case of the contract having led to “tyranny.”

Governments forget.  It is our job to remind them.  We are the power; they are allowed to maintain the illusion of power only through our will.

The Red Shirt protesters in Thailand are reminding the world of this contract.  My hope is that Americans are paying attention.  We, as a people, have become house cats.  Fat on provided amenities (water, power, food…), We have forgotten that We–not the government, not our Senators, Representatives, Judges, President–are the true power.  Similar to the illusion (or delusion) allowed to the power of money–dollars being nothing more than printed paper–the government is inanimate.

The Invisible Stick

Government is the paper.

We are Fort Knox.

As were workers at the Republic and Doors Factory in Chicago (also an example of juxtaposition in governmental response), the Red Shirts in Thailand are an EXAMPLE.

An example of our power.

An example of our will.

An example of our sacrifice.

An example of accountability.

An example of our Contract.

And that’s why I’m “Geeking-Out.”

HONORABLE MENTION

1) Writers Read Showcase at 42 N. Latitude in Chicago on Thursday, May 20th (self-serving?  Yessiree-Bob)

2) Chicago Summer of Michael.

Sorry, George, you had your summer.  Summer of ’10 is mine, all mine.  For self-improvement, professional-progress, and spiritual and mental growth.  For the imminent, delicious onslaught of Love.  For family.  For healing.  For the Next Step Forward, in the life of Me.

3) Ripped from the headlines: Law and Order Cancelled!

4) SEX.

5) Speaking of SEX, Re-acquainting myself with Woody Guthrie’s Spawn…

Sadie, keeping watch; Roger, ready for his close-up

6) Sister Sadie and My “Little” Man

Niemi says NOOOOO!!!!!!!

7) GO! HAWKS! GO!

(Now…we’ve done the heavy-lifting–the Amys, Stephen, and I–so we’d like to hear about 3 THINGS YOU’RE GEEKING OUT ABOUT!  Post them as comments or shoot us and email and we’ll pick out our favorite ones and post them in a future segment!!!)

Thanks for reading.

And as always, wishing you good words this week!

-SS
For those of you in the Chicago-land area, Sleep Sunshine (Michael James Greenwald) will be reading his poem “I Am Lane” at 42 Degrees North Latitude on Thursday, May 20th, at 7PM.

Click here for more details.

Thanks for supporting your local Chicago artists!

Born a Jew, though through his fellow confession-ees, now firmly committed to this cathartic concept of confessional (at least in the agnostic literary sense), Michael James Greenwald (Sleep Sunshine) is a student at Story Studio Chicago, applying for a Ragdale Residency in the fall, and waffling daily (sometimes hourly) on To-MFA or To-Not-To-MFA, that is the question.

He is excited about the potential in the near future of starting a family (“A big one, like six, eleven kids…right baby?”)

His debut novel The Rainbow Child and short story collection Celebratory Gunfire are due to be published in the next several years.

His personal blog site is sleepsunshine. Feel free to venture to his Facebook page or feel free to email him with any comments or suggestions for further topics, or if you had any interest in being a guest blogger on either one of his sites.

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500 Club (5/13/2010)

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It’s Thursday, and you know what that means…

The 500 Club!

This week Sleep Sunshine is leading y’all, and if you’re a regge to our confessional (you bad bad creative-type, you) then you know I can’t possible follow directions or do absolutely anything how I’m supposed to, which annoys everyone, including myself, most of the time.

So, below are my twist on the writing prompts. Choose one, and write 500 words based on the prompt (“wait, there are rules here?”…triple bonus if you can name that movie). Don’t get worried about editing and fussing with what you write. Just blast through 500 words and post it…then move onto your work, Lady.

Post your 500 words on your blog. Then post the first couple of sentences in the comments here and a link to the rest of your story.

You write! You mooch off our blog traffic! What’s not to love?

Ready for the prompts? Here they are:

1.

OR

2. Music Video Link

OKAY…GO!

–SS

On Therapy and Artistic Immortality…On a Tuesday, At That

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SS, in full Blackhawk "Playoff Beard" Regalia

Good morning, Confession-ees!  I’m confessing today from strange places and times.  Tuesday morning.  Not my usual day.

You might be thinking: WTF, him again, we know to avoid PLC on Sundays as to not subject our eyes to his ridiculous blabber, and now he’s tricked us; posting on a Tuesday!  Look away, Eyes!  Look away!  WTF!  WTF!

As am I.  As am I.

(Or…you might not be thinking that at all.  Who knows what we think, right?)

Yesterday, I attended my very first therapy session, with a therapist who one of my best friend’s recommended.  To be truthful, the decision to try therapy (again) wasn’t a shot from the hip, I’ve gone back and forth for a while now on it’s necessity.  I settled down many a night on my mother’s verandah, sucking on a bottle of Knob (“Knob Creek, the only bourbon Sleep Sunshine will pass-out from“…still waiting for that check, Knob Creek; remember Cheyenne Drive is spelled with 2 N‘s), staring out into a Chicago rainstorm, going back and forth:

To Therapy, or Not-To Therapy; the question.

During this debate, I recall an instance, another of my best friend’s likes to retell, about a time when I was in college, and one buddy, lets call him Goro, and another of my best friend’s, let’s call her Silvanopolis…yeah, that’s what I said: Silvanopolis.  She’s part Russian, part lost city at the bottom of the ocean.  A Russo-opolis mix.  Very sexy.

Here’s the interplay:

INT.  Living Room–College Apartment–Day

Beer bottles and fast-food containers and passed-out individuals lying around on a beer-stained carpet, top-less girl sprawled on an adjacent couch.  GORO and SILVANOPOLIS sitting next to one another engaged in a heated DOOM battle, smoking four-foot glass bong between them.

Goro: Yo, Sil, what shall we get Mike for his birthday?

Silvanopolis: I don’t know.  A psychiatrist.

GORO nods his head.

Fade to black.

My College Yearbook Photo: Gosh, I looked so much younger then!

Harkening back, I question if I’ve always been sorta crazy, and come to the conclusion I guess I have.

But now I’m doing something about it.  Kudos to me.

Really, what I seek out of therapy, what I expressed to my therapist, lets call her Fredreicka Goldenfarb (what is with me and Russian names this morning), was my desire to have the ability to de-clutter my brain to a point where I can make some Big Choices in my life.  At the moment I feel so buried, mentally, so over-extended, that it’s hard for me even to decide on what to have for lunch, much less figure out what career I want to do for the next ten years, what state I need to live (as in geographical area; not mental, IE–catatonic), who I will marry and have children with, etc.

The only part of my life which has remained relatively constant is my work, my writing, and I wonder if the roller-coaster of productivity I’ve experienced–weeks of 70,000-word-production coupled with weeks of struggling-to-write-a-decent-page-of-prose–can be aided by this de-cluttering of brain.

For her part, Fredreicka stated her confidence that we’d get there, that she’d do all the heavy-lifting (then proceeded to ask me how much I’d pay for her services; to which I wrote down the secret password to my trust fund on a slip of paper and handed it to her.  Then she mentioned how it would get worse before it got better and I snagged back the slip of paper and emptied the change out my pockets onto her nice therapy table, instead).

One of the touchstones for me has always been, can I be “normal” and still hold onto my artistic edge?

Fredreicka again seemed confident.  She said, not only would my artistic edge not be affected, but I’d be a happier person, which would allow my creatively to flow more freely, and I’d have more control over it, eliminating, or at least tempering, the frustration of never knowing which Sleep Sunshine will settle down to the keys–the Manic-uberProductive-SS, where the sentences flow like I’ve possessed Jonathan Lethem’s fingers; or the Depressive-NearIlliterate-Nicholas-Sparks-clone.

We hang onto this creativity like it’s something that will hold us to the earth when the tornado of our lives rages around us.  It’s what we have.  It’s what keeps us sane.  It’s who we are, isn’t it?  Non-artists don’t get that, do they?

Yet, our creative endeavors won’t feed us (literally and figuratively), won’t cloth us, won’t hold us when tragedy strikes, won’t love us back (not in the way our human-ness needs), won’t grab a beer with us, won’t provide us children (real children), won’t allow us to feel the great stimulations living, real living, has to offer: eternal love, friendship, family, orgasm…

Often I think of some of the greatest artists of Time, and note how many of them, outside their art, lived miserable existences–failed marriages, estranged children, friend-less, penniless, drug and alcohol addictions, shotgun chokings–and I wonder, I do, if that is the price we must pay for greatness.

And if it is, will I make this sacrifice?  Can I?  Should I?

Fredreicka seems to think not.

Me?  I hope not.  I want the love, the marriage, the baby-carriage.  I want all the gifts I bestow on my characters and with them all the pain they bring.  I want to feel, in real-life, viscerally, not just on the page, through my creations.  But mostly, I want artistic immortality.  And if I can’t have both–if we all really must choose Red Pill or Blue–I remain unsure of what choice to make.

My hope is Fredreicka will help me de-clutter my brain enough to make the best decision I can.

Thank you for reading.

As always, I wish you great words!

-SS

For those of you in the Chicago-land area, Sleep Sunshine (Michael James Greenwald) will be reading his poem “I Am Lane” at 42 Degrees North Latitude on Thursday, May 20th, at 7PM.  (I’ll have two, no three, therapy sessions under my belt by that point, so the chance you’ll witness some on-stage weeping is really good!)

Click here for more details.

Thanks for supporting your local Chicago artists!

Blessed Mother’s Day: An Excuse

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Happy Mother's Day Moms!!!

Those of you who clicked here expecting Michael James Greenwald’s usual Sunday confessional, he apologizes, but due to his obligation to Mother, he will be unable to formulate his discourse today, because Mother is more important (unless you are Mother, and in that case, you are equally–slightly–important).

Please check-in Monday for Amy McClane’s “3 Things…She’s Geeking Out On.”

Then come back Tuesday, and Michael James Greenwald (otherwise known as Sleep Sunshine) will give his full confession.  The topic will be a full-on confession, which as he was raised a Jew, should be quite interesting.

(Not to mention, he’s attending his first therapy session Monday morning, so he recommends you bring a box of Kleenex  along with you to your computer.)

Love you, Mom!!!

To all you Mother’s out there: Way to do what you did. Thank you!

Without you, there’d be no confession (some might argue that without you, there’d be no need for confession, but that’s another topic for another day).

If you have a break from your writing, I urge you to write a short quip (or a long quip, depending) for our 500 Club.  It’s a great way to draw interest to your own blogs and websites and a really cool exercise if you don’t have a blog or site.  I am going to try and break away for twenty minutes later and write my 500 words.

Enjoy your Mother’s Day Sunday.

–SS
Born a Jew, though through his fellow confession-ees, now firmly committed to this Christian concept of confessional (at least in the agnostic literary sense), Michael James Greenwald is a student at Story Studio Chicago, applying for a Ragdale Residency in the fall, and waffling daily (sometimes hourly) on To-MFA or To-Not-To-MFA, that is the question.

For now, he works in his family business of owning and operating bowling alleys in the South Suburbs of Chicago, and is excited about the potential in the near future of starting a family (“A big one, like six, eleven kids…right baby?”)

His debut novel The Rainbow Child and short story collection Celebratory Gunfire are due to be published in the next several years.

His personal blog site is sleepsunshine. Feel free to venture to his Facebook page or feel free to email him with any comments or suggestions for further topics, or if you had any interest in being a guest blogger on either one of his sites.

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It Has To Be Good; Really, Really, Really Good: An Important Point to Make About Your “Babies”

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Ithaca is gorge-ous.

By: Michael James Greenwald

Last Sunday I talked about Richard Nash and highlighted a segment he did on the Bob Edward’s Show, where he talked about the future of publishing and the limitless potential of books.

This week’s confession will not be so cheery and rosy.

This week’s confession will ignore the pure marketing part of publishing completely.

This week’s confession focuses on the product.

This week’s confession points the finger squarely at you.

Cue lightening and thunder...

Who me?

Yes.  You.

Your manuscript must be good; really, really, really good.

It’s an important point to remember.  We spend our days alone, in our worlds, playing Lord and Master over our characters, and they love us, adore us, fill our heads with the wittiest dialogue ever dictated, the most conflictory scenes ever contrived, gorgeous settings, riveting and unique character details, tantalizing plot twists, orgasmic climaxes and humanity-changing themes.

We love our stories.  We love our characters.  We love our little worlds.

We’re like children playing make-believe alone in our rooms with our dolls.  But, think back to your childhood, when you opened your bedroom door and took your dolls out to the kitchen where your mother or father was cooking dinner, grading papers, arguing with the bank on the phone, and shared the scene you’d just created alone in your room, what did she do, what did she say?

If she was arguing with the bank man on the phone or if her spaghetti was boiling to an un-al-dente like consistency, she’d smile at me and say, “Michael, that’s wonderful,” and return her attention to the task at hand.

My mother loved me and believed everything I did was magical (she still does).  You’re future readers, until proven otherwise, do not.

"It cast a spell on me." Julia, I can tell.

The actress Julia Roberts talked about her experience of reading Eat, Pray, Love, Elizabeth Gilbert’s memoir.  She said after thirty pages she put the book down.

“It cast a spell on me,” Roberts explained.  ”I immediately got on Amazon.com and ordered a copy for my best friend in Chicago.  I sent it to her with a note saying, ‘I want to be reading this while someone I love is reading it at the same time.’”

Marketing and publicity and PR and price point and B&N, I think, are looked upon as having mythical authority to drive people to purchase products.  Julia Roberts visceral reaction to Eat, Pray, Love has nothing to do with the publishing house’s marketing campaign and everything to do with the sheer quality of the manuscript.

The moment when Tommy-Boy realizes how good his manuscript must be.

Tommy Boy might have said it simpler, “I can take a dump in a box and mark it GUARANTEED–I have the time–and still all you’d have is a box of shit.”

I often forget how good my manuscript has to be.  I’m sorry; how really, really, really, good it must be.  And especially in the modern marketplace where people are drawn to forces of film and TV and magazine and countless other stimuli, to get someone to invest upwards of thirty hours of their lives in your book, it has nothing to do with the marketing; your manuscript must be even better than you thought it ever could be.

I have a writing teacher, Jill Pollack, who says, “If you’re not asking big questions, you’re not going to write big issues.”

Not to say that you need to morph your coming-of-age tale of a Jewish girl on the South Side of Chicago discovering she has a unicorn in her closet to Jodi Picoult, Law-and-Order-ripped-from-the-news, generic topical relevance (Cancer, Divorce, Stem-Cell Technology, Gay Marriage! AIDS! TERRORISM!).

That’s not what Jill’s saying.

You need to strip away the surface plot-line and find the connective tissue all great stories have with exploring humanity.  Take generic characters and strip away their epidermis and discover the swirling pool of passion found in the human soul.  Inject your setting with so many fascinating details, readers will send you emails inquiring about how they can book a flight to your fictional city or town or planet.  Push further than you ever thought possible in terms of tension and conflict, violence and sex, love and marriage, friendship.  Allow your fears, your secrets, your desire to bleed into your work.  Tear back your layers of cartilage and reveal your soul.

Maybe you’re not comfortable doing so.  Maybe you don’t really want to do this thing called writing.

It took ten years, but Andrew got it done.

In all of this, take your time.  It’s great (and necessary) to set goals, but there’s no rush.  Your manuscript might take a year.  It might take ten years.  Don’t allow other people or your own delusional ego to push you into submitting your manuscript until you’ve squeezed every little drop out of your work.

Have big dreams.  One of my dreams is to be featured as an author on the Diane Rehm Show on NPR.  If you don’t dream big, you won’t achieve your dreams.

Writers, the bar is set higher than you might even imagine.

You must make “your baby” good; really, really, really good.

–MJG

Born a Jew, though through his fellow confession-ees, now firmly committed to this Christian concept of confessional (at least in the agnostic literary sense), Michael James Greenwald is a student at Story Studio Chicago, applying for a Ragdale Residency in the fall, and waffling daily (sometimes hourly) on To-MFA or To-Not-To-MFA, that is the question.

For now, he works in his family business of owning and operating bowling alleys in the South Suburbs of Chicago, and is excited about the potential in the near future of starting a family (“A big one, like six, eleven kids…right baby?”)

His debut novel The Rainbow Child and short story collection Celebratory Gunfire are due to be published in the next several years.

His personal blog site is sleepsunshine. Feel free to venture to his Facebook page or feel free to email him with any comments or suggestions for further topics, or if you had any interest in being a guest blogger on either one of his sites.

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