On Friends, Wolves, and Storytelling

     Today, I'm lucky to share a book birthday with my friend, Francisco Stork, whose amazing YA novel, DISAPPEARED, debuts alongside my MG one, THE WOLF HOUR. To celebrate, if you share this post about storytelling, wolves, and our friendship, and tag both of us, I will enter your name in a drawing for a hardcover copy of BOTH of our books. (I've got yours covered, Francisco!) Please comment, too, on your own path to finding your voice and your story---I'd love to hear it! (And buy/read/share Francisco's beautiful book---he is a wonder.)

     The Wolf Hour, in legend, is the hour between darkness and dawn; it’s the hour more people are said to be born into this world and more people leave it than any other —-and, if you are like me, you are often awake then, wondering if you are getting your Story right.

     Not long ago, in a nearly empty D.C. deli, I tried to bluff my way through my doubts as I shared a greasy cheesesteak sandwich with my dear friend, Francisco Stork. We were talking, as we usually do, of our families, and of the books we were working on, and of how to find courage and joy in our work. We were also talking about mental illness, and how to combat the forces that would hold us back. I told Francisco (somewhat blithely) that when I was unhappy with my life, with the way it was unfolding, with the choices I was making, I knew, underneath the angst and despair, that I could always tell myself a new Story. He looked at me then, smiled over the last of his shaved beef and gooey cheese sub, and said, kindly: and that is the definition of mental health.

     Yes. Yes, he was right. Maybe that’s why the task of telling myself that new Story seemed impossibly hard lately--- so difficult, in fact, that I felt stuck in that very Wolf Hour—-lost between dreaming and waking, and doing no good for anyone at all. When we feel that way, does Story really help? And what is Story made of, anyway?

     When I was a child, I discovered the Lang collection of fairy tales. Beneath their innocuous color names (The Green Fairy Book, The Violet Fairy Book, The Blue Fairy Book) were stories of iron shoes that tortured their owners, of mothers who sprouted noses an “ell” long, and of children who were loved less than coin shine and left to die. Certainly, there were no life instructions here, for casual cruelty and stunning beauty lived side by side. Animals and people fought and slept and morphed from one form to the other. Nothing made sense, and everything did. And I wanted to know why.

     Which, of course, we all do.

     Still—those tales at least confirmed that all was not rosy in the secret world of adults, and that I’d better learn fast if I wanted to grow up and survive. So I did. In fact, you could say that such books (along with lighter stories) raised me. I always looked to them first for answers, and foolishly thought that people who made mistakes…who strayed from life’s paths…had obviously not read the RIGHT BOOKS. And then one day, a fairy tale came looking for me.

     On that day, when I sat down to write, a wolf stole into the forest of words crowding my head. This wolf was educated and yet naive, bold and yet terrified. This wolf was filled with human-gathered facts, and yet he had no intimate experience of humans at all. In fact, like me, he had largely been raised by books. And like me, he didn’t know the dark role he was rumored to play in the world. (What? You think writers don’t have a dark role to play? We write about everything the world wishes to keep hidden.)

     Luckily for this wolf (and for me!) there was also a girl who lived nearby. She, too, battled rumor, secrets, and lies. She, too, rejected the role the world said she should play. And she believed her hunger for more made her alone.

     Which, of course, we all believe.

What then if the two of them—the wolf and the girl—met, smack in the middle of a REAL fairy tale? A tale with strong ideas about how each of them would fit, and what each would do, and how each would look at the other? Why, then…they would have to fight the story the world wanted to tell about them. They would have to make and re-make their tale until it rang true. They would have to grow up and into their own Story.

     Which, of course, we all must.

     I’m sure this is why Francisco didn’t laugh at me in that deli when I claimed to know how to slay the beast. He even paid for my sandwich. And sent me an encouraging email the next week.

     I still have questions about Story. About why on some days everything seems to make sense, and then the next day, nothing does. And I’m never quite sure what to do with my hunger to be more than what I am. But I do know this: That if life’s dangers are real, so are the true friends. The ones who will eat cheesesteaks with you, and tell you a Story of their own. For the best weapon against the darkness has always been not just Story—but Story told to— and with—-and for the love of— our fellow tellers.

     May we never cease the telling.

(Crossposted to Facebook: 

https://www.facebook.com/saralewisholmes/posts/10155616043211420)

Writing in the Snow with Dragons

My weekend: snow, writing, dragons (of the self-doubt variety.)

Revision is SO scary. It can feel like battling a three-headed dragon. You deal with one problem, you make two more for yourself. Everywhere, there are teeth.  But if you look for it, there is also snow. Miraculous, unpredictable snow.

See those silhouettes underneath the dragon? They're fairytale postcards I bought in Germany.  And the gypsy doll is a marionette I found in Prague one bitterly cold winter day.  (So is the dragon.)

Back to work now.

Poetry Friday: Garlic

My mom is a superb gardener. So is my daughter. Me? I confess to having killed a rubber tree plant once. And many other varieties of green things many times over.

Yet.

I bought this lovely herb planter. Walked it home in my arms from the farmer's market. Everything in it is still alive, except for the dill, which mysteriously shriveled overnight and has but one teeny leafy sprout left. I've used the basil and parsley. Admired the rosemary and marjoram and chives. And if when the nasturtiums bloom, I can even put flowers in my salads.

Why do I keep buying plants when I fear they are doomed? Because I cook. I need fresh herbs. And I'm too lazy to keep running to the store. And I like the shape the plants make as they curl down from the pot.

I'm also thinking of planting some garlic--- even more so since I found this terrific quote, which was pungent enough to inspire a poem:

"Garlic is as good as ten mothers." (from this site, no source)

Who needs admonishment
when you can plant
three or four squeaky
clean cloves of peeled
garlic between your back
molars and bite down, hard?


Who needs milk
when a steely press 
will pulp a half-moon
breast, flattening 
it to a papery empty
envelope?


Who needs love
when hours later
your breath will cleave
the world into those
who don't mind your
stink and those who do?



Yet, in the ladle of my belly
I grew you, bulbous;
sulfurous juices thick 
inside your husk of skin,
til by your tender scapes, I seized you,
now a knotted rose. Ten times over 
I will crush your enemies.

                --- Sara Lewis Holmes (all rights reserved)

Image courtesy of Fresh Off the Vine

Poetry Friday is hosted today by David Elzey at fomagrams.

Writing Mantras

I like to write while listening to yoga music. It puts me in the zone. Since I don't understand Sanskrit, the words aren't distracting. The beat, based on breath, is energizing and relaxing at the same time, like a strong cup of tea. And best of all, I've developed a Pavlovian response to it. When I hear the music, I write. 

I'm also addicted to taping mantras to my laptop.  For Letters From Rapunzel, it was this fortune cookie fortune:

For Operation Yes, it was:

SERVE THE STORY

Lately, in my continuing struggle to revise a YA manuscript, I've gone through a slew of them, and I'm toying with putting up Auden's quote about poetry, which I think perfectly describes the complexity of a YA novel:

"Clear thinking about mixed feelings" 

Or perhaps this one, which reminds me not to bother being someone I'm not:

"Cool and I have never met upon the high road of life." -- M.T. Anderson

Do you have a writing mantra?

Knowing Nothing, Feeling Everything

"I like knowing nothing, but feeling everything." ---Sharon Creech, speaking about rough drafts in "Leaping Off the Porch," from Barbara Harrison and Gregory Maguire's collection of essays, Origins of Story.

"An acting teacher used to tell us, 'The best protection is stark naked,' meaning that if you commit yourself to a role and to your character’s objectives, and open yourself completely to the moment onstage, there is no room for self-consciousness or second-guessing. It’s when you indulge in half-measures that you screw up." ---Susan O'Doherty, Ph.D., from her column, The Doctor is In

I love both these quotes, but of course, they intimidate me, too. How to be so brave? How to be so balanced that leaping and committing are both possible?

What doesn't work is looking at my own feet.  Look out and up. Breathe. 

Writers are Writers are Writers

Members of the Young Writers Café at the Arlington Public Library,

holding Little Green Army Men

A couple of weeks ago, I hung out with those dedicated writers you see in the photo above. For an hour and a half we talked about stuff like whether it was okay to start with the ending of a story (yes, definitely) and why my laptop computer keys were dirty (um, using them so much?) They were honest, funny, totally positive about writing, and eager to hash over the finer points of Operation Yes and Letters From Rapunzel.

There is nothing like talking writing with other writers. Sure, they were under 14 and I'm over 40. But it doesn't make much difference when you're talking about how to make a character live on the page or how much you love a brand-new notebook to scribble in.

Thank you, Young Writers Café! I'll be looking for your names on a book cover one day.

Flame on!

Anne Marie Pace pointed me to this piece in the Washington Post on celebrities re-recording "We are the World" as a fundraiser for Haiti ---and she mentioned how inspiring it was to read about Barbara Streisand rehearsing for 30 minutes for a 10 second solo.

What I fixated on was this line from the producer:

"This is like running through hell with gasoline underpants," Jones said.

Writing is like that sometimes too. Flame on!

A Little Merry Improv

Random joy.



Thanks to Camille Powell for the link.  You can see "behind the scenes" here.

Poetry Friday: Friends, Marrow Each to Each (A Villanelle)

I'm beginning to think that if Liz Garton Scanlon called for the moon to stay full an extra night or two, she would get it. Last year, she cajoled seven of us into writing a crown sonnet---even though the majority of us had never written a sonnet, crowned or uncrowned, before. This year, she eased up and requested but a villanelle apiece. Oh, with one rule: we had to use the words "friends" and "thanksgiving" in our repeating lines.

Again, I tumbled into the task; my first lines were atrociously weak. Again, I felt the rules of the form, the interlinking lines of the villanelle hold me up. And now? Now, I'm wishing for a lute to clutch so I could play minstrel and attempt to recite for my supper. I might be beaned with a stale roll for my trouble, but no matter. I'm a convert to villanelles, and no amount of heckling can dissuade me.

Here's my contribution to the seven villanelles posted today. You can find the links to each of them at Liz's place; it's astounding how varied and beautiful they all are.

Note: I tweaked Liz's rules and used "give thanks" rather than "thanksgiving." I did not, however, mess with "friends." That would've been foolish.


Friends, Marrow Each to Each


Friends, marrow each to each; else famine steals the feast;
Deck Brie in berries; fat the soup with heart-shaped clams;
Tho' light is gone, give thanks; in darkness, praise increase.

Gild lintels; silk-gird chairs; burn candles by the fist;
Salad greens dress in yolks and salted curls of ham;
Friends, marrow each to each; else famine steals the feast.

Honey-spike the squash; with silver eat, bright and greased;
Flood mouths with wine; potatoeswithbutter enjamb;
Tho' light is gone, give thanks; in darkness, praise increase.

Lift turkey, speckled trout and haunch of wilder beast;
From hand to hand, pass blessings with the loin of lamb;
Friends, marrow each to each; else famine steals the feast.

Cling to those beside you, crying, as for a priest;
Drench cake in cream; slather black bread with bursts of jam;
Tho' light is gone, give thanks; in darkness, praise increase.

If sing, full-throated keen; if dance, 'til dawn at least;
Hearts consumed by sorrow are hollowed gram by gram;
Friends, to all be marrow; else famine steals the feast;
Tho' light is gone, give thanks; in darkness, praise increase.


---Sara Lewis Holmes (all rights reserved)

*Marrow: 
1. A soft oleaginous substance contained in the cavities of animal bones.
2. The essence; the best part.
3. In the Scottish dialect, a companion; fellow; associate; match.
4. v.t. To fill with marrow or with fat; to glut.

Poetry Friday is hosted today by Elaine at Wild Rose Reader.

NaNoWriMo Fuel: The Battle of Resistance

For all my friends who've taken on the challenge of National Novel Writing Month, I salute you!  More than that, I'd like to scream for you until I'm hoarse, hand you Gatorade, and wave a huge banner with your name on it.

But we know the Internet has not progressed as far as that. The cupcakes laced with inspiration that I keep trying to send you through the broadband connection keep getting stuck in the transfigulator. And the assassin I dispatched to quiet your internal critic keeps missing his target and dropping his cone of silence over those random popup ads that blast techno dance music. 

So, to cheer you on in your word battle, I can only offer more words. How about a quote for you, as often as I'm able? Today's is from Steven Pressfield, the author of The War of Art. I found it via this inspiring post, The Battle of Resistance, at the blog, There Are No Rules.

Maybe it's too early in the month to talk of resistance. You're probably flying along, feeling the rush of words. But one day, this month, you're going to face a wall. All the more reason to stockpile now the encouragement you'll need to get through it.  And think about it: isn't this act of overcoming just what you're asking your characters to do?

Resistance is directly proportional to love. If you’re feeling massive Resistance, the good news is, it means there’s tremendous love there too. If you didn’t love the project that is terrifying you, you wouldn’t feel anything. The opposite of love isn’t hate; it’s indifference.

The more Resistance you experience, the more important your unmanifested art/project/enterprise is to you—and the more gratification you will feel when you finally do it.

Go, NaNoWriMo-ers! Go!

Worked Over and Messed Up

I went to hear Sherman Alexie speak this week,* and it messed me up.

During his talk, he acted out a scene in which his dad gets drunk and tells his seven-year-old self and all his gathered young friends about how women. . .  NO, can't write that here on the blog.

Okay, he talked about giving President Clinton grief for his "my grandmother was Cherokee" attempt at empathy, and then, later, he describes Clinton embracing him with "Big-Mac breath," leaning in to whisper in his ear "Alexie, you're----"  NO, can't write that here either.

Maybe, maybe, I can tell you about his description of President Obama's inauguration on TV, in which he noted the huddle of emaciated, hippie vegan white women with ugly shoes swaying arm in arm with the Aretha-sized, fur-coat-wearing, Baptist-churched and well-heeled black women, one of whom had a fox head dangling off her wrap---which kept hitting a vegan woman in the head.  Okay, I got through that one. But it was way funnier when he told it.

Alexie is as profane, achingly hilarious, and fearless in his public presentations as he is in his fiction. As a huge fan of his, I listened with alternate awe, discomfort, and glee. I bought a book of his poetry, FACE, which I hope to feature tomorrow for Poetry Friday.  I had to drag myself away from his autograph line, which was at least a hundred people long, by doing the mental math (100 people x 1 minute each = 100 minutes/over an hour-and-a-half wait.)

But when I attempted to get back to my own work the next day----THUD. I realized how badly he'd worked me over.  I'm not fearless. I'm not profane. (Sometimes, I'm funny. I give myself that.) But all I could write in my notebook was: nothing I write really matters. Why should people care? BLAH.

Has this ever happened to you? Not jealousy, but a realization of your limitations as a writer?

I got over it, first by realizing that writers have different roles. Some are here to blurt out the truth. To overwhelm you with a barrage of jabs to your prejudices and fears.  Others tread on little cat feet. They are stealthy. The potions they administer flow through your veins slowly and when you wake up a little more beautiful than you were the day before, you never trace it to their subterfuge.  Either is good. Change happens.

The other thing that helped is that I went back and re-read his poem, "Water," published in his collection, One Stick Song.  It ends with the phrase "two parts heartbreak and one part hope." I realized that is exactly what fiction is. I dove back in to my revisions, looking for both the heartbreak and the hope, but more willing to allow the heartbreak in. Thank you, Mr. Alexie.

*Mr. Alexie was accepting the Mason Award at the Fall for the Book Festival at George Mason University.

Vitamin W

Need some writing vitamins today?

HipWriterMama has a fantastic 30-day challenge going called "Mapping Out Writing Time." Videos, writing prompts, inspiring stories . . . she's got the juice.

Through the Tollbooth is always well-stocked with timely advice, but last week, they outdid themselves with a series of posts beginning with the irresistibly titled "FREE: Writing Lessons Here!" If free doesn't do it for you, they also have posts about retreats, MFAs, conferences, online classes, local writing centers . . . you have no excuse not to learn something from this power lunch.

Finally, if you need a push on the marketing end, there's Shelli's Market My Words where every Monday, she interviews a key player in the biz, and every Friday, she rounds up the best marketing advice on the web. As good as Vitamin C (I'm talking Caffeine) for jazzing you up about an often-dreaded part of the writing life.

There you go. Eat up. Be happy.

Goooooood Morning!

It may or may not be morning where you are. If it is, I'm jealous.

I love mornings more than any other part of the day. I love the cozy quiet punctuated by the purposeful sounds of people getting ready; I love the brightening sky; I love the taste of warm, sweet coffee; I love the touch of cool air when I pad out in bare feet to get the paper; I love checking my inbox for the overnight delivery of email; I love that everything is possible before the day unfolds.

The only trouble is that I cannot, no matter how hard I try, cram all my day into the morning. Every "good for me" thing competes for precious morning hours---writing, exercise, clear thinking, planning, and yes, eating, because I'm always hungry in the AM. Then, when afternoon comes, anything I haven't managed to complete has to deal with grouchy, sloppy, lazy, junk-food craving, not-morning me.

So, I've decided to have TWO mornings. (I can hear you laughing. It's okay. My husband was mightly amused when I announced this plan.)

Every day, I'm going to re-boot right after lunch. Take a mini ten-minute nap, drink a large tea latte, and pretend it's morning all over again.

I'll let you know how my manipulation of the time-space continuum goes. Any donation of morning hours from you night owls would be much appreciated.

Opposites Attract

I don't understand why people think writers are their characters. We couldn't be more different. 

Character: acts spontaneously and organically
Writer: plots like the devil

Character: is blinded by fatal flaws

Writer: begs to be critically read, edited and/or publicly discussed

Character: has lovable, endearing quirks

Writer: has sociopathic habits only she understands

Character: eats colorful, easily imagined, and highly evocative food

Writer: scrapes crumbs from the couch cushions when fridge is empty and deadline is near

Character: falls in love with the wrong person
Writer: falls in love with the right words

Character: grows, changes, is not the same

Writer: is the same ("only better") with each book

Perhaps a writer needs one of these amulets.  

 From the Etsy shop OverTheTop

Up. Down. Up.

I'm sorry about the lack of blogging. I've been on a roller coaster with my new manuscript.  I love it. I hate it. I love it again. Up. Down. Up.

Ptooey. I'm feeling nauseous. 

The only that helps is knowing that I always feel this dichotic paranoia about my work. Because some things in it are piercingly lovely. And some things in it are crap.  The secret is to trust both of my instincts, to love it and hate it, to not block those feelings, but use them to make it all better. 

If I didn't love it, I couldn't go on. 

If I didn't hate it, I couldn't change it.

So. Up. Down. Up. 

Until today, when I let it go and submitted it.

I wish I could join you for Poetry Friday tomorrow, but I'm going to enjoy a day of rest after the ride.  See you next week.

A Link to a Short Film

Via Barbara O'Connor, who cops to identifying with the letter P. I recognize myself in D for digression and doubt. But I love the way Insidious turns into Illumination. 

I also remembered that Laura Salas passed me the letter "M." I'm supposed to write a blog post about it. So far, I have nothing but this list: 

Mustard greens.

Monsters.

Moola.

Muggings. 

Mariah. 

Mwahahaaha. 

Muggles. 

Moos. 

MMMM.

How am I supposed to turn that digression into illumination? 

Poetry Quote of the Day: Madeleine L'Engle (and an early Poem in my Pocket for Poetry Friday from Julie Larios)

(This post is also my Poetry Friday contribution. Happy early PF!)

Today's quote, the last of the month, comes from Madeleine L'Engle's book, Walking On Water. Here she's talking about the creative act, and she makes it clear before this excerpt that she's talking about all artists: the painters, the dancers, the musicians, the actors, the novelists, the poets . . .

"The artist, like the child, is a good believer. The depth and strength of the belief is reflected in the the work; if the artist does not believe, then no one else will; no amount of technique will make the responder see truth in something the artist knows to be phony."

Amen to that, and thank you all for indulging me in this month-long search for poetry quotes that embodied that "depth and strength of belief."  You can find all the quotes by clicking through my April archives in the sidebar, or by searching on the tag, Quotes. 

Today is also Poem in Your Pocket day, and I'm carrying Julie Larios's poem, What Bee Did. The wordplay in it delights me, and I'm glad to have it buzzing in my pocket. As I mentioned yesterday, I picked this poem before I realized that Julie had written it.  Julie is a regular participant in Poetry Fridays and blogs at The Drift Record, one of my favorite places to be inspired. The Madeleine L'Engle quote helps me understand why this poem works --- I believe in the Bee, in all his incarnations. And it doesn't hurt that I adore the line about belief in it. (You'll have to click through to find it.) 

The poem begins like this . . .

What Bee Did

by Julie Larios

Bee not only buzzed.
When swatted at, Bee deviled,
Bee smirched. And when fuddled,
like many of us, Bee labored, Bee reaved.
He behaved as well as any Bee can have.

Read the rest here. 

This post marks the end of my Poetry Quote a Day series for National Poetry Month.

Poetry Friday is hosted by Maya Ganesan at Allegro.

Amuse moi

If you're going to get through a long draft, you have to learn how to entertain yourself.

When Laini Taylor wrote a post about "Surviving the Suck," I left a comment saying that sometimes I inserted things into my manuscript for my own amusement, even if later I had to take them out.  

What kind of things? 

Oh, for example, Random Moments of Beauty. Dang it, if I want to describe that ray of light bouncing in the window for three paragraphs, I will. Ditto for buying myself some tulips. 

Nicknames for characters. Mr. Large Knees.  Boy Runs-with-Scissors. Little Red-headed Herring. 

Theme songs for various sections.  "Staying Alive, Staying Alive!"  "You Can't Always Get What You Waa-aa-ant . . ."  

Outrageous metaphors.  I just twirl the dial and let the wild comparisons fly out, like a gumball machine. Yesterday I wrote one that involved dogs and a car sunroof. 

So that's my random writing advice for the day.  Consider it a gumball flying in your direction. Or a direct order to stop and smell the tulips.  I hereby grant you permission to amuse your own bad self, because really, if you don't, the suck's going get you. 

P.S. I loved Tanita's "One Shot Over the Fence" book recommendations today. She admits in full geek-out mode why "ancient, sexist science fiction" still has the power to make her happy.  And it was contagious. I found myself grinning through her entire post and itching to read about alien space station hospitals.  They should make an entire TV series out of these books, Tanita!  Yeah, we'll get the LOST writers to jump right on it when they wrap up the last season. (They could work out some of that sexism too.)

P.P.S.  w00t!  Just saw that Colleen's selection for the "One Shot Rec" is Connie Willis's Bellwether!  I share her "shameless adoration" for this title, as I mentioned here.  Colleen also has the full schedule of links to other "One Shot" bloggers. 

Writer Death Matches: Discipline vs. Devotion

Amy Moreno posted this quote from opera singer Luciano Pavarotti, and I love it:

"People think I'm disciplined. It is not discipline. It is devotion. There is a great difference."---Luciano Pavarotti (1935-2007)

Laini Taylor also writes about another match-up in her post today: Determination versus Confidence.

Other possible writer death matches could be:

Outlining vs. Free-wheeling it

Time in Chair vs. Word Count Goals

Professional Work Ethic vs. Artistic Leeway

And then of course, the classic:

Procrastination: Now or Later?

If it seems like writers seesaw between our right and left brains, it's because we DO.  

So far, on my Work in Progress, I have tried the timed writing approach. This worked excellently . . . until it didn't.  Then I constructed an outline, which served me beautifully . . . until it didn't.  Then I decided that I needed to write 1000 words a day until the draft was done. Which worked fabulously . . . until it didn't. Now I'm back to the timed writing approach . . . which thank you, is working marvelously. Until it doesn't.  But that's okay. I'm used to it by now.  

That determination that Laini speaks of? It's what I would call strength in flexibility.  (You might call it yoga, too, if you are also obsessed with mastering crow pose and headstand, like I am.)  That's what keeps me going. That's what keeps all writers going. We bribe ourselves. We give ourselves pep talks. We set up routines. We play and we work.  We may look unfocused at times, but in reality, we are the pit bulls of the universe. We have latched onto our heart's desire and there is no way we are letting go. 

P.S. Tanita Davis is blogging about this today, too. Must be the month of March. Winter vs. Spring. Snow vs. Sunshine. Lions vs. Lambs.

Marcelo in the Real World

How many YA novels have you read with a voice that comforts you? 

I just finished reading Marcelo in the Real World, by Francisco X. Stork, and frankly, I don't want to talk about it.  I don't want to dissect it or review it or analyze it. I just want to tell you to read it. 

But I'll try to say a tiny bit more than that, because some of you might need convincing.

In the opening chapter, Marcelo talks to his doctor about hearing "internal music" and like the doctor with his carefully worded questions, I struggled to understand what Marcelo meant, to imagine such music, because...well, because I liked Marcelo. And I wanted to believe in such a beautiful thing as music that can be "remembered" and dwelt in and that is always with us. But I didn't really get it.

Meanwhile, I fully enjoyed the story as it unfolded, not in doctor's visits or dissertations on music, but in Marcelo's matter-of-fact telling of his summer in the "real world" of his father's law firm. Nothing there happened exactly as I thought it would, and I often laughed.  Best of all, the characters were built layer by layer through Marcelo's considered observations of them and their behavior.  When he says that he doesn't know how to "read" people's reactions, and that he has to train himself to make the right responses, I knew it was his self-described Asperger's-like syndrome manifesting, but it never felt like a literary artifice. More like I was abiding with him, in the sense of "dwelling or sojourning."

Then, in almost the last chapter, Marcelo talks about the internal music again, and I suddenly realized that not only did I know what he was talking about, but I had experienced it! Not by reading this book; I don't mean that. I mean that I recognized the state of being he was describing even though our language for it was different.

Spirituality is an extraordinarily difficult thing to write about. But if a story can help you access what you already know...can help you remember...well, you should read it. 

Told you.