Ute Carbone
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Inside the Writer's Garret

On writing and life, with a little chocolate thrown in from time to time.

The Flying Cloud

11/21/2014

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The Flying Cloud Under Full Sail by Antonio Jacobsen
As I've mentioned, I'm currently working on a final full length novel that will complete the Sweet Lenora series. The book's title, Sweet Auralie, comes from the name of the fictional ship that Anton and Lenora build and sail from Salem, Massachusetts to San Francisco in hope of breaking the record for fastest sail.. The ship and the adventures Anton and Lenora encounter are, of course,the product of my imagination. As with most historical fiction, though, there is a real history upon which Sweet Auralie and her travels are based..

While researching the clippers of the mid-eighteenth century, I came upon the story of Flying Cloud, a super clipper built in East Boston in 1851.  In 1854, she set the world record for fastest sailing ship, making the journey from Boston to San Francisco, around the horn of South America, in eighty nine days. This record is all the more remarkable when you consider that the passage, a distance of over fifteen thousand miles, usually took a full six months to complete and that she held this record for over a hundred years, until 1989 when it was broken by Thursday’s Child.  The most astounding fact though, was that the ship’s navigator was a woman,

Eleanor Creesy, called Ellen, was the wife of Captain Josiah Creesy. That a captain’s wife would go to sea with her husband was not that unusual at the time. It was highly unusual that Ellen served as navigator for her husband, a skill she’d learned from her father, who had been captain of a coastal trading schooner.

The trip aboard the Flying Cloud was, as you might imagine, much smoother than the one I'm making up for the Sweet Auralie. It’s my job as a novelist to add an extra level of tension or two to the narrative. This though, doesn’t make the Flying Cloud, her record, or her female navigator any less extraordinary. 

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More about the Sweet Lenora Series
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The okay-maybe-not-so-bad American Novel #Amwriting

11/6/2014

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My friend Lana Hechtman Ayers posted this quote on Facebook the other day. It's a thought for keeping as I gear up to finish Sweet Auralie, the final, full length novel that will conclude the Sweet Lenora Series.

There is, every time I pick up the pen or fire up the computer, the hope that this book will be the One. The Prince Charming of a book that will bring complete and utter happiness. The one so well put together it could make angels, or at the very least my editor, weep with joy upon reading it.  It will become the new Great American Novel, put into the cannon, filed next to the works of luminaries like Fitzgerald and Cather. 


And, as the writing continues I come to realize--well, okay, truly I've realized it all along--that the book will not reach those soaring heights. Sure, it's a good story and sometimes I can actually open the file and say, "Hey, this isn't too bad."  Make no mistake, I love these characters and am very invested in them, I love the twists and turns that happen as I write the draft. I just wonder if it's good enough. That's not a productive place to be. Trying for greatness is fine, but perfectionism isn't. Trying to make it perfect stops me in my tracks, it keeps me from writing anything at all. And, besides, beyond making the book the best I can make it, I have little control over how it will be received by readers, how well it will sell or what reviewers will say about it.


Perfection is a myth, at any rate. At best, it creates hesitation and misgiving. At worst, it destroys the story. So, as I sail again with Anton and Lenora, I'm going to remind myself I'm writing the okay-hey-it's-not-too-bad American novel. Maybe, that way, I'll be able to write 'the end' on my draft before too long. 

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More on the Sweet Lenora Series
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A peek into the pages: The Fall Line   #Amwriting

11/3/2014

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Buy Dancing at TMP
Dancing in the White Room, a contemporary women's fiction set in ski world, was released last February. I love writing about skiing, and the world created in this story, so much so that I decided to give Creech, one of the characters in Dancing his own story. The Fall Line is about Creech in his new job as ski coach to the US ski team and ski superstar Mia Whitmeyer,, who is hoping to win her seventh world cup victory. 
The story is humming along, though it's not done yet--and I have to leave it be for a while so I can finish another love story, that of Anton and Lenora, as I wrap up the Sweet Lenora historical series.


Here, uncut and as yet unedited, is a little taste of Fall Line. I hope you like it!

                                                                    The Fall Line
Mia

I tried to get into it. I told myself I wanted this, I needed this; a romantic fling with a passionate young Italian man who smelled of expensive cologne and who would mean nothing in my life. I tried, but as I stood there and kissed him back for all I was worth, all I could think was it would be over soon. And soon, I’d feel worse for having done this. And then Creech waltzed back in to my brain and my next thought was that this guy’s kisses weren’t the ones I wanted.

I pulled back. “I’m sorry. This is a terrible idea.”

He looked at me with questions in his eyes.  “I’m sorry,” I repeated. “I can’t.” And I turned and walked away, before he could say anything, hoping he didn’t take it into his head to do something stupid or romantic like follow me and call my name.

He didn’t follow and I turned the corner and he was gone. I nearly ran back to our hotel, my heart hammering as my head asked what I had been thinking.  I went into the lobby. A hot bath, alone, seemed like a good idea. A dark room and a bed to myself seemed an even better idea.

Creech stood at the bank of elevators, his back to me; we were the only people besides the concierge in the lobby. The elevator dinged, the door opened and he stepped inside. I ran to get into the car with him before the door shut. “Mia,” he said, sounding surprised.

I grabbed his jacket and kissed him as though my life depended on it.

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    This writing journey, this life,  is a long road full of pitfalls and wrong turns. Also, incredible beauty, kindness and friendship with those I've met along the way.I'm so glad you're here to share the road..


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