Whenever I have a project, I always go into “research mode.”  For the not-finished celebrity script I wrote, I read countless books and watched several movies about actresses.  For SecretHistoricalYA, I have a book and podcasts.  I’ve yet to write a single word for that.

And now, for FUNNY GIRL, I am in research mode.  Which is a problem.  Because I get really into research and convince myself that I can’t write a single word until the research is done or at least half done.  But here’s where it gets hard:

FUNNY GIRL is about a girl comedian who has a ridiculous road trip to New York City. I love NYC!  I heart it. And so, of course, I figured why I should do some research of the city!   Not only did I do some in-person travel research, but I downloaded podcasts of NYC history.

But most of my research focusing on really one place. Rockefeller Center.  Why? I’m obsessed with it. I think it’s beautiful and has a fascinating history. I love how it has a million tourists on it all of the time. I love it at Christmas. (Listen to the Bowery Boys’ podcast for it!) and even though maybe 10 pages of my novel take place in/somewhere around that group of buildings, I felt it suit to listen to multiple podcasts about it, borrow a friend’s copy of Great Fortune: The Epic of Rockefeller Center.

Okay, fine, I did a little research on a building and maybe that would flavor my writing to make it “come alive” for the reader. But then like Alice falling down that proverbial hole.. it got deeper.

Since my MC is a comedian, and I’m always thinking I’m not funny, I decided I must research comedy!  And that’s a big pretty spectrum. Because there’s a thousand types of comedy it would seem and why did I need to go into all of this detail of research for a YA novel?

So I’ve got comedy routine cds, and I’ve read interviews with humor writers, I’ve got countless podcasts on sketch comedy and humor downloaded.  I’ve watched hours of TV comedy.  I have a book that’s essays on the best comedic moments of all time.

But what don’t I have? Much written. Why? Because I’m letting fear transform into “research” and it’s overwhelming me.

So I better quit before this continues to be a blog all about how to go about NOT WRITING your novel.  If that’s what I was going for, then A+ Bri!

But I have yet to research cows!  So that part remains a mystery in my YA.  Despite the fact there are cows.

Dear book,

I love you. I do.  But you have so many problems. I understand, we all do.

First, Hilary. I know you really love and admire Izzy Tyler, but why do you insist on quoting her made-up book a lot. Why can’t you choose a real book,  like Wuthering Heights or 7 Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, or even Twilight? I’m open-minded. If you want to quote from Sophie’s Choice as much as I do Rilke, that’s fine!  But really, Izzy’s book?  I’m not Izzy and therefore it’s hard to write the text that Izzy would write and you would quote like it was your Bible.  Because let’s face it, it is.  Also, you’re a little selfish.

Izzy, you need to be in the book more. Make it happen.

Keisha, quit melting into the background. You are based on somebody I adore and admire in real life very much and I know you’re a volcano of awesome, just on the precipice of exploding into my favorite character.

Weirdly named town in my WIP, please help me find the “real” you. Because although you have cows, you are kinda boring.

I had to get Izzy’s voice really across so she would seem real to the reader and most importantly, to me.  So I knew how to write her.

I started blogging as her in a secret journal.

Then I decided her coworker (Keisha), also a big part of the book, needed a journal too. Therefore they could comment on each other’s entries.  THEN I decided since my MC (Hilary) would absolutely be a fan of this blogging as well, because she’s young and has a lot to say about absolutely nothing*.   Thus she must blog!

Crazy stew is simmering nicely..

* Like me.

I imagine that the life is a writer is somewhat liked a recreation of the children’s book If You Give a Mouse a Cookie.  Or at least it is for me.  I have discovered the root of my previous fear of writing (who needs Dr. Phil?).

Perfection.

I’m not a perfectionist by any means.  But when it comes to writing..I’m a big perfectionist. Even in college, papers were written “in my head”..my excuse was that’s how I liked to frame them (I never outline)  but let’s face facts.  I was scared to put the words on the page. I grew out of that, but the habits can trickle in your creative pursuits.

Back to the mouse cookie.

Ask a college student when they usually clean their room.  Chances are it is when a project or paper is due. There’s a right frame of mind with their efforts.. I need a clean place to work. I should clean.  Also..I will put off doing this thing (because I don’t want to/it’s hard/I won’t do well/etc)

And so it begins.  The mouse cookie way of writing, for me.

If you give a writer an idea.. she’ll wanna work on it.

When she starts to write it down, she’ll wanna clean her desk, so she can write in the best conditions.

When she cleans her desk, and sits down to write, she’ll wanna get a snack, for “brain food” or so she can really think.

But first she better let the dogs out, so they don’t bug her while she writes.

But there’s a squirrel and now the dogs won’t come inside.

Now she’s got the dogs inside, and she’s going to write!

But first, she better get some water after running around with the dogs.

She should take that water to the desk with her while she writes.

But first she’s gotta find a good mug. And they’re all dirty.So she washes them..so she can get her snack, drink the water and write.

And so it goes. That’s how the cookie crumbles.  (Oh bad pun! Yes!)

And it’s not like I don’t have ideas. I have way too many ideas. I’ve never understood how writers get the question “Where do you get your ideas?”  …How can you NOT get ideas?

Here are the YA idea-cookies that are plaguing my mind, and dwelling in the Someday. Sometime. Somehow.

• Road trip comedy about small town girl with big city dreams – currently working on!
• Girl who knows more about cars than the boys, then finds herself crushing on newest member of auto class.
• My imagined inner world of a notorious historical figure (villain)
• YA set in the time of Roanoke
• Time travel romance melee mixed up crazy
• Teen gangsters
• Young girl deals with death of her family
• High school election drama
• Novel encompassing my love of forensic and crime shows

And I’ll get to these.   ..After I let the dogs out. And clean my desk.

I am laying on the back seat of our green minivan, my two stepbrothers are in the seat ahead of me, cracking jokes with my stepmother.  They are doing the typical kid humor, you’re so old, etc.  David Sedaris it is not. They move on to how she’s so old, she must remember what it was like to crank her car to get it to start .  She replies, “That joke’s so old and tired!”

Silence.

I yell out, “Like you!”

And thus.. I find my funny.  Looking back, it wasn’t particularly that funny, but it was my first foray into comedy. Or whatever..this..thing I do is called. I was a shy kid.  I imagine if I had cracked jokes more, I would’ve given myself an edge, but I didn’t when I was in middle school.

But I had an absurd sense of humor.  At age six, my favorite thing to do was stick my hand under my shirt, wiggle it out the neckhole, and yell, “IT’S THE DISEMBODIED HAND! PART 1!”

A beat.

Things would return to normal.  Five minutes later.. new hand, same position. “THE DISEMBODIED HAND PART 2!”

Cut to: Me, dying, laughing till I fell on the sofa.

I loved Erma Bombeck.  I was in sixth grade when I discovered her writing.  Bored I suppose of all the tween novels, I wandered into the non-fiction section of my library.  There I discovered The Grass is Always Greener Over the Septic Tank.  I checked out and read it, laughing at how she dissected her life in a planned community, musing on model homes and the troubles of raising children without losing your sanity.

She was a suburban housewife.  I was a middle schooler.  What did I know about septic tanks, and mortgages and Tupperware parties?  Nothing.  But it didn’t matter.  I still laughed, at the wit, at the sentences.  Humor connects us all.

I bought all of her books, then moved on to Dave Barry.  I read Jean Kerr, who you never hear about anymore, then Seinlanguage. I watched the whole Must See TV lineup.   I read the hilarious Raising Demons by Shirley Jackson. Struck by the allure of observational humor, I wrote a series of (what were then to me) humorous observations about life as a middle schooler.  Sitting at a table, writing during lunch, I was happy. Until it was lost in a milkshake spill.  No home PC back in those days. No email. No back up copy.

God bless my parents for raising me on movies such as Young Frankenstein, Raising Arizona, Monty Python.  I received a decent education in comedy.  There were no comedy clubs here, we didn’t have cable, Comedy Central didn’t arrive until I was in high school.   I kept on reading.  I watched old reruns of I Love Lucy, admired Lucille Ball to pieces.

While at FSU (Go Noles!), I was struck by the notion I wanted to write for Saturday Night Live. I watched it when it was in reruns and live. Every generation will always count the episodes they grew up watching as “the best years,” but I preferred a mix of the 90s and the early episodes, such as the Mommie Dearest themed one with Gilda Radner.  I joined a sketch comedy news show staff, wrote a couple pieces.  And it happened. Here were people, who didn’t know me, and thought I was funny!

What an amazing thing.

I wrote some silly things for a portfolio in the hopes that one day I’d write for SNL and then as I said before, Nanowrimo happened.

I did improv comedy, where we performed one of the hardest forms of improv: The Harold. We did a year worth of shows. I portrayed some ridiculous things in improv, including photosynthesis. Do you know how hard it to perform photosynthesis? Or when a hostile audience member gives you “almonds” as a prompt?

I began a novel about a girl who wants to be a comedian, but she’s stuck in a small town, and that dream seems so far away.  It wasn’t a Mary Sue, but I could relate.  New York City was miles away and she was just her, waiting to leave.

They say write what you know.  At first, it was set in Oklahoma, then I realized, wait, I know Florida. I know how it has small towns that offer odd characters. I know what’s it like to have an unique coffee shop customer base. I know what it’s like to want and wish and hope.

So I wrote.  And now I’m 3000 words in, and she’s living and breathing on the page…and that’s awesome.

Because I doubt I’ll ever write for SNL.

Or be a standup comedian.

Or do anything besides what I want to do now – marketing/publicity – and that’s okay.

When I started, I worried, Wait, I’m not funny!! and that still vexes me every now and then.  I asked authors what they found funny, but that didn’t help.  Humor is subjective.

I thought about what was funny in my own life, and about Erma Bombeck, writing about her brood.  I thought about six year old me, and the disemboided hand.   I thought about the off-the-wall customers I’ve had throughout nine years in retail, and the odd things that just happen in your life.    I watched Christopher Guest movies, and how even the slightest nuance, a word, a sentence, can striek me.

So now I sit here, years later, older than the girl who thought a disembodied hand was funny, but still laughing.  I’m googling “cow bite” for a ridiculous scene in my novel, and I’m laughing.

And that’s what I always wanted!

Because here is the beauty of humor and comedy and improv.  There is the quintessential “Yes, and?”  and that will always keep you going.

This was in…2005-2006.. I was in the midst of the 6th year of my two year college.  Oh yes!  I read all the books.  Story. Syd Field. William Goldman, who claimed “Nobody in Hollywood knows anything.”  Neither did I!  So it must’ve been a perfect marriage.  I started a script I called Celebrity Drama. It was about…celebrities.  It still lingers, maybe 20 pages away from being finished.  I’ll finish it one day.

Once again, I was told, “You need to write fiction!”   My dad stepped in to help with that, with “You read so many children’s books..write one!”

I refused, no, I wanted to be a screenwriter.  I wanted to write sitcom.  If you’re ever at a dinner party in the middle of an awkward conversation, just drop that bon mot in.  It’ll save you in no time. You’ll get some funny looks. They’ll look at the ground, and then slowly say, “But..you aren’t funny.”  Or if you happen to be funny, “Why?”

Here’s the irony.

I said, “I can’t tell a story in only a few pages, so I can’t write short stories!” A screenplay is 120 pages or so.

I took a creative writing class and eeked out a short story about pickles and vampires. They were somewhat related, I assure you. Then I channeled my inner Sylvia Plath and wrote a story about a suicidal mermaid.  Didn’t give writing  anything beyond films a second thought.   Then I wrote some awful poetry.

I went to university.  I read Lorrie Moore, who wrote the amazingly brilliant and funny “How to be a Writer.”  I read Mary Gaitskill and Joyce Carol Oates and a lot of YA fiction. I started my blog, met some wonderful authors and other people in the business online.

And then I still didn’t write. Except papers, because I was an English major.  But there was always that attempt having fun even with those, with long titles such as “Take These Broken Wings and Learn to the Fly Again:  Song and Flight in Toni Morrison’s Song of Solomon.”   We were required to keep a blog on various computer topics for our Computer Literacy class, and I wrote about the invention of the internet, dinosaurs, Jem and the Holograms.

Then Nanowrimo came around, and my mentor again said, “You should write.”

Write? Me?  What about my magical world of celebrities waiting on my harddrive? What about that vague film idea I had about a girl running away called Highway Girl? Wasn’t my Oscar waiting in the wings?

No.

I said, “Okay, I’ll write the book I want to see on the shelves.”   A girl with a dream. To be somebody, to be on top of the world! (I apologize to White Heat here*).  A girl who wanted to not get the boy or go to the prom, but had a dream that was a little more out there, not supported fully by her family, but it had to get her out of her small town.

And what do you know? I like doing it.

So Funny Girl is maybe 2 chapters long now, because I finished my Bachelors degree, than my Masters degree, and now I finally have time to write.

But the problem when you’re writing humor..about a girl who wants to be a comedian…is you have to be funny.

Damn.

I’ll address that next post.

* Told you. Film minor.