Adventures in Los Angeles

Setting Your Baby Free

Published on September 19, 2022September 18, 2022 by Noreen Lace1 Comment

I was in conversation with someone who works for… let’s say… a certain network about Our Gentle Sins. How Exciting!

But, she warned, “Once they get their fingers into your story, it will no longer be under your control.” She went on to intimate that they would twist and change and do what they wanted with it.

I’ve heard many writers get upset about this. Some writers in my own circle were offended for me when an editor from the Chicago Tribune’s Printers’ Row Journal asked if they could change a name in my story. The editor felt the nickname would confuse the readers. I responded – please change what you feel is confusing. My writer acquaintances took me to task on that – how dare I give them permission. I should fight for my story.

There are things I would fight for, things I have fought for. When the editor publishing West End wanted to change a slang Midwestern term, I didn’t agree. I argued that it made it more authentic and we had to trust the reader to figure it out in context. But small things like a nickname or a comma, I have no problem with those. Some writers do, however.

One publisher asked me to take one of my short stories and turn it into a long style poem. My first response, no, no, it can’t be done – but then, I was intrigued by the task! Picasso was once challenged to change one of his paintings to a negative – black and white inverse – he took that challenge and ran with it, changing the colors in multiple ways! The results of which line the halls of his museum in Spain. Sometimes change is not the enemy.

However, I do know what producers, directors, movie studios, and television does to novels and stories. They interpret into their own little idea. They change things for dramatic purposes, for comedy, for whatever reason may suit their purposes at that point in time. But – isn’t that what they’re paying you for? They are taking your characters, your setting, and they’re bringing new life to it. This may be a very different life that the writer intended. But that happens anyway.

Many people have misunderstood “The Ghost in her Room.” However, it didn’t stop them from enjoying the story. They just had their own interpretation of it. It brought something to their lives that I hadn’t intended. It didn’t make it wrong. I think that means I did something right!

When a reader engages in your story, identifies with your character or event, aren’t they changing it into their story or their idea of your story? Once we set the baby free in the world – that baby becomes something else and we have no control over it. It takes on a life of its own. It affects the world and the world affects it.

There are certain things I hope Our Gentle Sins will carry forth – the message of hope, of recovery, of leaving the mistakes of the past in the past, and building the strength as an individual to move forward in this world. We can only wait and see!

I like words…

Published on September 12, 2022September 11, 2022 by Noreen LaceLeave a comment

I like sentences. Big, beautiful sentences so long and thick you can wrap them around yourself and keep yourself warm in the winter. Yeah, those. But I like words too. They go together, you know, words and sentences. I like to make them move with rhythm, sing and dance in a way that you fall into them as if you’re hypnotized by them and you never want to leave them, you just want to sway back and forth and keep reading until you slip off of your seat.

It takes time to create those. They start small, like these. Then you have to let them sit, like yeasty bread, and let them rise. You leave, come back, lift the towel, pinch and poke at them, and leave them again thinking, “I know it can be better than that.”

Then you have to sit down with them, you have to get to know them, talk to them, talk through them, try them on, and break them then mend them, try this and try that. It’s frustrating too, I know. You fight with them, want to give up on them, want to trash the whole thing and sometimes you might leave in tears with hopelessness tearing at your soul, but then you come back on another day, maybe an overcast day that holds the threat of rain, and you sit down and talk it all out once again. Maybe this time, this time, it works. Someday it will.

Then you’ll move on to the next sentence.

This is writing. It hurts. It cuts giant gashes filled with jagged edges through you. It scars. It gives you nightmares and makes you curl up in a ball and rock not so gently back and forth.

But it’s also the only thing that pushes you forward, fills the empty spaces, gives you purpose. It keeps the dark shadows at bay and protects you from the harsh world.

A Journey of Souls

Published on May 16, 2022May 13, 2022 by Noreen LaceLeave a comment

Sometimes it’s challenging to tell your story in just a few short words – but Our Gentle Sins is the journey of two souls who are recovering from past mistakes. Aren’t we all?

Halloween Horror Date # 1

Published on October 18, 2021October 17, 2021 by Noreen LaceLeave a comment

I’m a fan of All Hallows Eve. Scary Stories are music to my ears. Horry movies are my jam! Halloween Horror nights at local parks and haunted houses are favorite past time during the month of October.

Some years ago, I went to Knotts Halloween Nights. We went with friends and family. I arrived hungry for the scares in the mazes. The guy I’m with is a big guy – nearly six feet, but soft around the middle, cuddly – like a teddy bear.

Once inside the mazes, he gripped my hand, walking slightly in front of me, nearly pulling me along behind him. Every time a ghoul, ghost, or themed monster jumped out – he raised his fist to them. After the first few attempted scares, no more monsters spooked us. And my excited energy turned to boredom with the simple walk through set.

My family and friends deserted us, went their own way. I suggested he not raise his fist or hand, assuring him that the workers wouldn’t touch us or hurt us, and warning we could get thrown out. He brushed it off.

I assumed, and it was later confirmed by one of the workers, they had walkie-talkies or cameras and after he jumped back at the scarer with a flabby balled hand, the characters are to no longer interact. The actors are not paid to be punched. They are not there to be hit.

This ruined the fun of night. Why would a teddy bear turn into terror teddy, pulling me a long behind him, and threatening the very reason we came to the park? I assume he was afraid, more afraid than he wanted me to know. He’d never acted tough or aggressive before that night.

As far as after that night – I made like Halloween and ghosted him.

Blast from the Past: Read A True Halloween Creeper Story

Scary Fiction: $1.00 Stories and Eddy

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B075ZGHGZS/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i7

The Importance of Running Away

Published on August 30, 2021August 29, 2021 by Noreen LaceLeave a comment

Getting away, even if for a day or a weekend, is so important to refresh the creative spirit. Whether or not you actually work or write on this get away isn’t the valuable moment – it’s a temporary respite from the usual.

Research shows “blue space” and “green space” (the beach and the woods) do our minds and bodies good.

Having not taken a trip in the last 18 months has left my spirit in a state of desolation.

Therefore, I took a drive up the coast and landed in Cambria. Cambria is known, I think, as a beach town, but I stayed tucked away in a little cabin in the woods – I got my green space and my blue space. I didn’t write so much as I walked, explored, meandered – but it was enough. It was a gift to my pandemic weary spirit, a reset. Ending the old, beginning anew. It felt nearly normal again.

I returned refreshed, ready for the school year to begin, ready to finish another story.

Runaway. Runaway often. Near or far. Explore. Unplug.

I Love this “Weird” Review!

Published on August 9, 2021August 9, 2021 by Noreen Lace1 Comment

Gosh, it’s hard to get people to review a book. I get so many nice emails and notes, yet the same people have not written reviews.

This review, however, is hilarious!

After reading Harvey Levin Can’t Die, Alex K wrote:

Thank you, Alex K. I can agree, on some level, some of my stories are strange. It’s the way my mind works – just a little different than your average person. That’s probably why I’m a writer.

Harvey Levin Can’t Die tells the story of a how a slight change can affect society. Could we live without reality tv? What better time to read this story, when reality seems so harsh!

New Release Coming….

Published on June 28, 2021 by Noreen Lace1 Comment

I have a new book coming out…..

Here’s a hint….

More info to come!

HEAT

Published on January 25, 2021 by Noreen Lace1 Comment

Many years ago, when I was young and my children were younger, my husband left. I continued to go to school, certain it was the only thing keeping me from the nightmares of my youth. I had two kids, I entered two Master’s programs, and I worked two jobs (two part time jobs) fitting them in between the small spaces of my life.

One of those many years, I supported us on a total of twenty thousand dollars. I worried a lot. About bills. About the future. About my kids.

In my youth, with five children and two adults split between a three bedroom apartment, my mother had to occasionally pawn things in order to buy milk and cereal. My father nearly always had his thumb on the heat. I’m literally talking about the thermostat. The gas bills of an Ohio winter could wipe out whole paychecks.

There were stories of people freezing to death during those cold winters. That was before they passed the law that the Gas Company couldn’t cut people off for non-payment during freezing winter storms.

I woke up some mornings, my breath condensing before my eyes. My hamster went into hibernation. My father bought us sleeping bags, a cheaper alternative to turning up the heat.

Maybe that alone is what brought me to California (not really.) But there’s an incontrovertible trauma to spending your life shivering. And there’s an indisputable pleasure to being warm.

In the chilled California winters where it rarely drops below 32 degrees, I refused to deny my daughters heat. In the meager college years of single motherhood, I could not begrudge them food or space or gifts.

But I did cringe when the pink lined bill of the Southern California Gas Company came or the blue hem of the Water and Power warnings peeked over the rim of the mail box.

The one thing my father taught me was how to work hard and harder. I got through the tenuous times by believing hard work would pay off and we would, one day, be safe.

Fast forward to the Pandemic Years: I put my thumb on the heat tonight, having spent the day chilled, and nearly turned it down. Here in So Cal we don’t have the Ohio winters nor do we have the heating bills that could hinder a trip to the market for food. But every little bit will count – again.