"Advice About Writing From My Mom": Guest Post & Giveaway with Sandy Nathan

ADVICE ABOUT WRITING FROM MY MOM

Sandy Nathan  © 8/28/2012

My mother & her beloved poodle. Aren't they adorable?

Quite by accident, my mom gave me some excellent writing advice. We were visiting one day, just a regular visit, except that I had something important to tell her. We sat in her pretty living room with its high ceiling and matching everything. Like all women of her age group, my mom had “signature colors.” We were the only things in the room that weren’t pink or green. Or sort of French.

“Mom, I’m writing a book,” I said expectantly.

“Oh, no!” Her anguish was real.

I didn’t know if she was upset because I was writing a book and she didn’t think I could pull it off. Or because, according to our family by-laws, no one was allowed to even think about doing anything in the arts. Or crafts. Or maybe she was upset about both.

“Uhhh . . .” I said, eloquently, devastated. My mom didn’t approve of a project I’d been working on secretly for years.

Further conversation revealed that she had a friend who was an author. She knew how much work and mental stress he went through writing his books. She didn’t want me to have to go though it. The endless drafts, rewrites, and editing needed to get a manuscript in publishable condition.She didn’t want me to endure the trips to Lourdes and other holy sites that I would need to get an agent. Or publisher. The ruthless competition I’d face as an author if I managed to get published. The pain, humiliation, rejection . . .

But I was born and raised in Silicon Valley, that’s what we do.

Having fleshed out her initial objections, mom changed her tune. She sat up straight and beamed. “Sandy, I want the first copy!” Delighted, she kept smiling. “What’s the book about?”

Ohh. I had a draft of the book written. While it was serious and even profound literature and had no explicit sex, the book had a definite erotic/sensual/dark tone to it. To deny those elements would be like denying that Lady Chatterley’s Lover was a hot book. I stumbled around, trying to figure out ways to tell her I didn’t want her to read it, ever.

This was a woman I’d never heard swear. Not even “gosh darn.” I’d never heard her say the word “sex.” I had never heard her mention anything about the reproductive process, even during the famous mother/daughter talk when she allegedly told me all about it. (She remembered this talk. I don’t.)

“Uh . . .  Mom . . . Well, some of it is kinda . . . You know . . .”

My mother was always a beautiful woman, but I think she reached her greatest beauty in her later years. Her face rounded and became softer. She had those adorable, shining eyes. Which were fastened on me.

“Why, Sandy, you have to have sex in it. No one will buy it otherwise.”

* * *

I learned something about my mom that day. She wasn’t the prude I thought she was. I also learned about writing. That was good advice. If she’d been able to read my books, I think she would have felt gratified. In one area of my life at least, I’d taken her advice and utilized it to its fullest extent.

Unfortunately, my mom passed on before any of my books came out, so she never was able to read it in the flesh, so to speak.

But I must say, “Thanks for the tip, Mom. You gave me permission to write what I do.”

Title: The Angel & The Brown-Eyed Boy

Series:  Tales from Earth's End #1 

Author:  Sandy Nathan
Reading level:  Adult

Size: 308 pages

Release Date: January 1st 2011

Publisher: Vilasa Press

Find It: Goodreads | Amazon  | Barnes & Noble

Tomorrow morning, a nuclear holocaust will destroy the planet. Two people carry the keys to survival: A teenage boy and an intergalactic traveler.

By the late 22nd century, the Great Recession of the early 2000s has lead to a worldwide police state. A ruined United States barely functions. Government control masks chaos, dissenters are sent to camps, and technology is outlawed. War rages while the authorities proclaim the Great Peace.

Finally it all breaks down. We’re in New York City on the eve of nuclear Armageddon. In the morning, ultimate destructive forces will wipe out all life on earth. Only Jeremy Edgarton, a 16-year-old, tech genius and revolutionary; and Eliana, the angelic, off-world traveler sent to Earth on a mission to prevent her planet’s death, can save the world.  

Join Eliana and Jeremy as they begin a quest to save two doomed planets … and find each other.

Winner of Four National Awards:

●        2011 IPPY (Independent Press) Award Gold Medal in Visionary Fiction.

●        2011 Indie Excellence Award in Visionary Fiction (Winner of Catergory)

●        Best Books of 2011, USA Book News:

1. Winner, New Age Fiction
2. Finalist Fantasy/Sci-Fi

When the girl appeared on the sidewalk, the edges of her body and clothing were fuzzy, as though all of her hadn’t arrived. She looked up and down the street, the way a person would if she’d forgotten an address or lost her way.

Her hair was frizzed and matted, sticking out akimbo. She was thin, had a dirty face, and wore a scratchy coat that was far too big. Its sleeves were rounded little capes; her arms stuck out of them like chopsticks protruding from a napkin. The coat slipped off her shoulders, first to one side, then the other. She hitched it up and kept walking. When she walked, the coat opened to reveal her feet and lower legs.

Her thin socks, trimmed with grayed lace, were pulled up to make a ruffle below her knees. Pink satin laces held up the socks, their Xs snaking up her shins from her shoes. She looked pretty much like everyone she saw, except for her shoes. Long pink ballet slippers stuck out from beneath her coat, as improbable as roses sprouting from the cement.

Eliana made her way along the sidewalk, knowing that she was dirty, feeling the grit in her hair and on her skin. When she had reached the planet’s atmosphere, clothes and all sorts of things had rushed at her with great force, tossing her over and over. Dirt had come, too. She had found the clothes she needed and put them on the way her teachers had shown her. Then her people had put her where she was.

Humans passed, but no one stopped or said anything to her. A paper blew against her leg. More dirty papers blew and piled up everywhere. Streaked and grimy buildings rose near her. Writing in different colors covered their walls. She looked carefully, but couldn’t make out the words. She’d learned to read and write English, but those words mystified her.

“Hey, you!” a person said loudly.

“Yes?” She spoke to a human for the first time, politely bowing. The human was dirty like Eliana, with torn clothes and matted hair. She couldn’t tell if it was a he or a she.

“Get out of here!” the ragged person shouted. “You don’t belong here.” Eliana cowered, but the stranger rushed past her, clawing at something Eliana couldn’t see. “Stay away,” the human said, and then stood with feet braced, shouting, “Get out of here, all of you. Stay away!” The human hadn’t seen Eliana at all.

The girl realized that her people were right; they had put her where no one would notice her. Now she needed to tell them that she had arrived. She raised one foot, turning it gracefully and resting it easily on the other knee. She flicked the shoe with her finger, listening. A trill of clear notes deep within her brought the hint of a smile. She held the coat closed and stood still. She was where she was supposed to be. It had begun.

She fingered the piece of paper in her pocket. Her map. Beneath it, in the pocket’s depths, was the notebook. What was written on it would get her where she needed to go. She had all she needed.

She walked a long way along the hard path. More humans passed her. To her left, gray, inert structures rose high in the sky, blocking the sun. She touched the see-through parts of their lower levels, looking at the humans inside. They looked at each other with darting eyes, speaking rapidly. Everyone outside rushed frantically, noticing nothing. They didn’t see her, just as her people had said.

Eliana choked when a very large carrier passed, spewing a foul odor. The carrier floated above the hard surface where the vehicles moved. Her teachers had told her about the floating. Though she couldn’t see it, a force lived under the machines that made them go. It would kill her if it touched her. She didn’t know what kill meant; kill did not exist in her world. Her mother had explained that she would be like a dead pet. She had seen dead pets before they whisked them away. Motionless husks. She moved away quickly. Better get on with her purpose. She didn’t have much time.

A man with a round stomach and a gray hat walked out of an opening in the ground with many others. He walked like he had a mission. His coat was the same scratchy stuff as hers, but it was buttoned up and looked new. He looked new; his face was ruddy and clean. His shoes reflected the pale sunlight. The trill of notes resounded in her mind once again.

He was the one! She stood in front of him to make him stop. She hoped he could comprehend her speech.
“Will you help me?” she said, working to form the strange words.

Sandy Nathan writes to amaze and delight, uplift and inspire, as well as thrill and occasionally terrify. She is known for creating unforgettable characters and putting them in do or die situations. She writes in genres ranging from science fiction, fantasy, and visionary fiction to juvenile nonfiction to spirituality and memoir.

“I write for people who like challenging, original work. My reader isn’t satisfied by a worn-out story or predictable plot. I do my best to give my readers what they want.”

Mrs. Nathan’s books have won twenty-two national awards, including multiple awards from oldest, largest, and most prestigious contests for independent publishers. Her books have earned rave critical reviews and customer reviews of close to five-star averages on Amazon. Most are Amazon bestsellers.

Sandy was born in San Francisco, California. She grew up in the hard-driving, achievement orientated corporate culture of Silicon Valley. Sandy holds Master’s Degrees in Economics and Marriage, Family, and Child Counseling. She was a doctoral student at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business and has been an economic analyst, businesswoman, and negotiation coach, as well as author.

Mrs. Nathan lives with her husband on their California ranch. They bred Peruvian Paso horses for almost twenty years. She has three grown children and two grandchildren.

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