Lately I’ve been going around the island with my husband and trying to play tourist. There’s a line in my second novel, SWEET LIFE, where my protagonist, Marissa Price, is waiting to board her plane in New York to head back to the Big Island. She looks around and realizes that while everyone else is going on vacation, she’s going home. It’s a huge ah-ha moment for her. She stops complaining and starts appreciating, and then—surprise, surprise—lots of good things start to happen for her. Appreciation does that. It makes room for more good things to come into your life.

We moved to Hawaii by choice—no complaining here. But there’s no question that it’s been a wild and crazy ride, harder in the beginning for sure, until somewhere midway through we just shifted. We gave up the struggle and just enjoyed what was working rather than what wasn’t. For a couple of years we were a one-car family. One year our food budget was so tight that if we ran out of grocery money before the end of the month, our rule was that we had to eat whatever was left in the pantry. I’ll bet you have no idea how much food you have in there (granted, canned pineapple and pinto beans are an odd mix) and how creative you can be with it. That was us. And those were some good, really great years.

Some of you already know this story, and I’ve blogged about it before. We’re coming up on eleven years now, three kids later, a business and a few books between us. We don’t own a home yet—that will hopefully happen this year or next, when the right one shows up—and our two cars (we bought a used minivan last year for $2,000) are hanging in there. Which is a good thing, because we’re putting on the miles to drive around and see more of this wonderful place we get to call home.

This image is inspiring a character in my next novel and reminds me of a women I met while ziplining the other day!

I know life keeps us busy, and I know our plates are full. But don’t miss the opportunity to explore and appreciate what’s around you, in your own neighborhood, in your own town. I’ve lived all over the world, and I can say that as much fun (and tiring and expensive) traveling can be, there is no place like home. Choose one day out of the month, or a couple weekends even, where you go someplace new or try something different. Who knows, you might get inspired. It might even change your life. It’s changing mine all of the time.

Enjoy these last days of summer—fall is just around the corner!

warmly,

Mia

So, in honor of this news, I am hosting a contest to bring a little world music into our lives. For each of the four foreign deals that have been done so far, I am giving away one CD to four lucky winners. I’ve listened to all of these CD’s and they’re fabulous — they put you right in the spirit of the country, the language and the people.

To qualify, all you have to do is tell me if you’ve ever had or heard of Amish friendship bread, and if so, what happened (did you bake it? Share it? Toss it? Run screaming in the other direction? Would you do it again? How many loaves have you made? Favorite recipes? The possibilities, like friendship bread, are endless!). That’s it! I’ll draw four names next Tuesday, April 13, by noon HST (that’s 6 hours behind NY, 3 hours behind CA). Good luck and have a wonderful week, everyone!

• Hear clips from Australian Aboriginal Music (these links will take you to Amazon):
• Hear clips from Brazilian Lounge:
• Hear clips from German Favorites:
• Hear clips from Italia:

Australian Aboriginal Music

Brazilian Lounge

German Favorites

Italia

But I have an excuse! (I know, I’m a writer — we don’t get excuses! At least that’s what I tell my students.) You may have heard the news about my next novel, FRIENDSHIP BREAD. It sold at auction in mid-March to Ballantine Books for hard cover publication in 2011 and foreign rights have already been sold to Italy, Brazil, and Australia.

I wrote this book last year after my own daughter brought home a bag of Amish friendship bread starter. The truth? If she hadn’t been the one to give it to me, it would have gone straight into the trash! What a shame that would have been because days after receiving this fateful bag of starter, Julia Evarts, my protagonist, appeared.

Tracking my word count ...

I started writing and soon both the story and the words started to flow. “Gush” was more like it. And six weeks later, I had a new novel.

Do I normally write this fast? Yes and no. I don’t have a writing schedule or routine beyond grabbing whatever time I can between the kids and other family responsibilities. But the story started demanding more than the little snippets of time I could give so my husband offered to take the kids as much as possible until the book could be written (note that he was running his own business at the same time). I wrote like crazy and didn’t stop until I finished.

Between my agent’s client load (apparently she has other authors to represent — imagine that!) and more edits (if you heard teeth gnashing in the middle of the Pacific, that was me), it was almost a year before the manuscript went to auction. Talk about a lesson in patience! I dug up this image to share with you and realized that the day I started writing was one year to the week that we sold FRIENDSHIP BREAD to Ballantine! How crazy and wonderful is that?!

So what happens between now and the release of FRIENDSHIP BREAD? Lots of baking and recipe adapting, for starters. Meeting new readers and foodies, too. And of course, more edits. Instead of creating a book page I decided a kitchen was more up my alley, so behold the Friendship Bread Kitchen (www.friendshipbreadkitchen.com). We’re parked at Facebook for now but will be moving to our own home mid-year and I’d love for you to join the wonderful community that’s growing there.

I’m happy to share the synopsis of the novel with you:

Julia Evarts is still healing from the loss of her son when she and her five-year old daughter receive the equivalent of a culinary chain letter: a plate of Amish friendship bread along with a Ziploc filled with the gooey yeast starter. They’re instructed to feed the starter over a ten-day period then bake two loaves of bread and share the remaining starter with three other people. As the bread and its starter make its way through Julia’s small town (including into the home of her estranged sister whom Julia holds responsible for her son’s death), the residents of Avalon, IL find their lives inexplicably changed. Friendship Bread is a novel about life and loss, friendship and community, and what endures even when the unthinkable happens.

Will there be recipes in the book? Of course! The novel will include loads of Amish friendship bread recipes and tips. I’m amazed by how many variations there are to this otherwise simple recipe. This week we even came up with a vegan, gluten-free version at the Friendship Bread Kitchen: Pineapple-Papaya-Coconut Macaroon Friendship Bread Mini Muffins (Vegan) (Gluten-Free). Yum!

So I hope you’ll come and find me in one of the many places I tend to linger online. In the meantime, now that my blog post is done, I think it’s time to call my hairdresser. Aloha, everyone!

hugs,

Mia

PS. I’ll be in Honolulu next weekend, April 9-11, teaching a workshop on writing the memoir. The fabulous YA author, Lisa Yee, is the keynote. For information, please visit the National League of American Pen Women’s Biennial Writers Conference. I’ll also be stopping in to offer my congrats to fellow author Jane Porter and sweetie Ty Gurney as they celebrate the opening of Ty’s new surf shop in the Imperial of Waikiki Resort!

Farm fresh eggs from a neighbor.

Which brings me to shirred eggs.

Now, some of you may be wondering what on earth I’m talking about. Book revisions and shirred eggs? And what the heck is a shirred egg?

A shirred egg is basically a baked egg. This method of egg preparation is also known as oeufs en cocotte. The eggs can either be nestled in foods (like a casserole—use the back of a serving spoon to make an indentation before adding the egg) or prepared individually in a ramekin. You add a tablespoon of cream or milk to the top and that’s basically it. The end result is a firm egg white with a soft or runny yolk.

Sound easy enough?

Shirred eggs .. a work in progress ...

That’s what I thought. Turns out it’s easy to overcook these guys, which I did with the first two batches which were still delicious but the yolks were cooked through and dry. Third time was the charm, though, and I think I’ll do even better next time, which will probably be tomorrow morning.

Which brings me back to first drafts.

Here’s the thing about first drafts: you have to finish a draft to have a first draft. There are so many good writers that show me their manuscript in progress and ask me if I think it can be published. My answer is always, “Maybe, but you’re going to have to finish it first.” It’s pointless to talk about it until the work is done, because you just don’t know what you’re going to get until you’re finished. That’s the hard truth about writing a novel—you may think you know how it’s going to end, but until you actually write it and see how well it works, you just don’t know. And let me tell you, crossing that finish line isn’t easy. But you’ve got to do it if you want to get published, because until you do, you can’t get an agent who in turn can’t get you a publisher who in turn can’t get your book onto the shelves in your local bookstore. You have to have a manuscript first.

And even once you finish the manuscript, your work is far from done. Celebrate, then get back to work. First drafts are exactly that: first drafts. They are rarely ready to be seen by anyone, and this is coming from someone who writes very smooth, tight first drafts. Your drafts will need work. How much work? Until it doesn’t read like a draft anymore, but a polished manuscript that could go straight to the printers if need be. The publishing industry is looking for writers who know how to write, who know how to self-edit, who know how to find strong, critical readers to help them get their work ready for their agent and publisher. If you want to get published, this is the path. There are always exceptions, yes, but for the other 99% of us, this is how it’s done.

If I had to give you one tip for finishing your first draft, this would be it: don’t go backwards. Don’t go back and fix things unless it can be done via “Search and Replace” or will take you less than 10 minutes a day to address whatever it is that’s really bugging you. DON’T GO BACK. Go forward, people. Finish it.

Okay, it turns out I have a second tip: don’t show it to anybody yet. This is not the stage for feedback, however kind or well-intentioned. Finish your first draft, clean it up, and then clean it up again. Then show it to your reading group or designated readers. Writing groups are wonderful but if your goal is to get it done as quickly as possible (because, let’s face it, this can take as long as you want it to take), then just get it done. Over-massaging and re-working elements of an incomplete first draft is premature, especially if it’s holding you back from moving forward it. Trust that your story is there, and go with it.

Here is a basic recipe for shirred eggs—it certainly gave me sustenance to finish this leg of the relay:

Ingredients

• 2 eggs
• 2 tablespoons cream (whipping cream or heavy cream; half and half also works) or milk
• salt and pepper

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Prepare two ramekins by spraying with cooking spray or butter.
2. Crack an egg into each ramekin.
3. Add 1 tablespoon of cream or milk to the tops of the eggs. Season with salt and pepper.
4. Bake in a preheated oven for 10-12 minutes or until the whites have set. Remove and let rest for 1 minute. Serve immediately.

Once you get the hang of it, you can add cheese, cooked spinach, chives, green onions (that’s what I used in the picture above) in the last couple of minutes or garnish once it’s removed from the oven.

Shirred Eggs Recipe Links:

• Shirred Eggs | Food Network | Recipe by Emeril Lagasse | http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/emeril-lagasse/shirred-eggs-recipe/index.html
• Shirred Eggs with Sorrel | Food and Wine | Recipe by Chantal Leroux | http://www.foodandwine.com/recipes/shirred-eggs-with-sorrel
• Shirred Eggs | Sunset Magazine | http://find.myrecipes.com/recipes/recipefinder.dyn?action=displayRecipe&recipe_id=1598614
• Shirred Eggs | Real Simple | http://find.myrecipes.com/recipes/recipefinder.dyn?action=displayRecipe&recipe_id=524080
• Shirred Eggs | Group Recipes | Recipe by Vainwi | http://www.grouprecipes.com/35458/shirred-eggs.html

Writing First Draft Links:

• Shitty First Drafts: An Excerpt from Bird by Bird (though I highly recommend and reading the book in its entirety—it’s absolutely excellent) | by Anne Lamott | http://tiny.cc/wS5qJ
• From First Draft to Finished Novel | Writer’s Digest | by Karen S. Weisner | http://www.writersdigest.com/article/first-draft-finish-novel
• Tips and Links for Writing a First Draft | http://www.helium.com/knowledge/187801-how-to-write-a-first-draft
• Writing the Novel: Approaching the First Draft | SF Gate | by Pia Chatterjee http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/chatterjee/detail?blogid=118&entry_id=45214

Not so anymore.

In the Friendship Bread Kitchen I’m not trying to be all things to all people. In other words, I’m not making soufflés or braised lamb shanks or roasted brussels sprouts drizzled in lemon juice (wait, I actually did make that tonight). In the Friendship Bread Kitchen, it’s all about—you guessed it—Amish Friendship Bread.

Now doesn't that look appetizing?

Now chances are you or someone you know has had Amish Friendship Bread or received its ubiquitous starter. The friendship bread itself is a sweet bread or quick bread, similar to banana bread (or, as one news reporter put it, a pound cake inside of a pound cake in terms of its moist richness—it definitely isn’t for people watching their cholesterol!). The starter is a sourdough starter though I’ve never been able to discern the sourness in any of the friendship breads I’ve made.

Amish Friendship Bread is essentially a culinary chain letter. You receive a baggie of starter from a friend, mash it for ten days (adding more flour, sugar, and milk on day six), then feed it again before splitting it into four portions of 1 cup each (by the way, my yield has always been more than 4 cups by the time I’m ready to start baking). You bake with one portion and give the other three to friends with instructions on how to care and feed the starter so they can bake and share theirs in 10 days. If you’re wondering whether or not the recipe is actually Amish (which, to my knowledge, no one has been able to confirm nor deny), I will say that the “1-2 boxes of instant pudding” in the list of ingredients is somewhat suspect.

A running joke is that “friends don’t give friends Amish Friendship Bread”—it’s a needy kind of recipe that most people don’t have time for. Because the recipes use so much sugar (and instant pudding), the fact that it’s made from a starter seems a bit irrelevant.

Things that make your oven go Mmmmmm!

But it IS fun, and it is delicious, and passing it on has its charm. People either love it or hate it (see this recent post on About.com by Carroll Pellegrinelli: Friendship Bread – A Blessing or a Curse?) but I will tell you that if you were to walk into my kitchen on a day while I was baking friendship bread, you would swoon. My kitchen smells AMAZING when there’s friendship bread in the oven.

And you don’t have to pass it on—it’s just as easy to refrigerate or freeze the starter (or the loaves), or to feed it less so it doesn’t proliferate as quickly. You don’t even need to make the starter to end up with a similar result, but people will argue that it’s not the same. There’s a lot of TLC that goes into a bag of friendship bread starter which, if you believe it (and I kind of do), finds its way into the bread. You can make loaves, muffins, pancakes—the choices are endless. Even Martha Stewart gave it a whirl. See the video here.

So what is Friendship Bread Kitchen about and why am I doing it instead of cranking out my next book? Honestly, it was a small idea that blew up into a big idea, really really fast (kind of like the starter itself). I want Friendship Bread Kitchen to be a gathering place for people who love Amish Friendship Bread or who want to find new recipes or tips. I have over 50 GORGEOUS (did you get that? GORGEOUS!) photographs from food bloggers who have put their own style and stamp on the bread. There’s also vegan and gluten-free variations—I’m experimenting with two starters right now at the request of a couple of people (see? Join the page and you can actually get me to bake for you! Though you will have to come to Hawaii to get the bread).

While the Friendship Bread Kitchen has been taking on a life of its own, I have been writing like crazy in between uploading said gorgeous photos and hanging out with my three kids and husband. Book four is currently with my very cool and super smart rock star agent, Dorian Karchmar of William Morris Endeavor (and did I mention that she’s really, really nice? She is!). I’m revising and editing and smoothing and all that fun stuff (it’s actually not that fun, but I do truly love it). So I hope I’ll have some news for you soon but in the meantime, please swing by and say hi if you’re on Facebook. I have a giveaway going on right now at the Kitchen for an Emile Henry loaf pan from Williams-Sonoma. Even I don’t own one yet!

Lemon poppy seed friendship bread goodness.

If you want to know more, here are a few links. And while the basic recipe rocked (we added raisins and walnuts), I am leaving you with a parting shot of the lemon poppy seed friendship bread muffins we made with our second batch of starter. It brought the kitchen down.

• Friendship Bread Kitchen on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/fbkitchen
• Mia on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/authormiaking
• No friends to give you starter? Make your own.
• Looking for instructions? Take a look at this.
• Sweet tweets! Follow us on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/fbkitchen

I have no explanation as to why this is the case, or what this even means. Nothing of significance could happen and I would still feel this way. On the home front, I’ll be 42. Nothing particularly jazzy about that (other than the fact that I’ll be FORTY … TWO … when did that happen? Really? We’ll save that for another post). I’m not pregnant (knock on wood), my three kids are growing up (one turns four on Sunday), there are a few exciting things in the hopper but nothing’s come out of the chute and there’s not even a guarantee that anything will. The country is still in a recession. So why the optimism?

As somebody who tends to occupy both sides — thinking and feeling, left brain and right — I can say that sometimes you just have to go with it. Even if you COULD explain it, what difference would it make? You’re still going to feel the way you feel, and that’s the important thing. 2010 is just a detail, a specific that gives you another piece of information but at the end of the day, that’s all it is. 2010 in itself is not going to do anything for me. As a concept, as a year, as a time in place it’s not going to change my life. That part is up to me.

So yes, I’m feeling expansive at the moment, which is not always the case if you’ve read any of my past posts. But it’s where I am now, and let’s face it — it’s so much better here than on the other side when you just want to keep rolling around in the mud. Expansive is a good thing. Wanting is a good thing. Wanting tells us what kind of experiences we want — you don’t necessarily want your neighbor’s house, you want the feeling you get when you are in that neighbor’s house or when you think of that neighbor’s house. Wanting points us in the right direction, in the direction of our heart’s desire. And of course it may change tomorrow — we’re human, after all — but for now let’s go with it.

So 2010, here you are. I’ve been waiting for you. We’re 14 days into the new year, two weeks to be precise, and all I can say is, welcome.

I’m a fan of doing it the old fashioned way — grabbing a bunch of old magazines, scissors and glue, then finding a piece of sturdy cardboard or card stock (I use a 5″ x 7″ inch mat board). When I first starting doing this back in the 1990’s, I didn’t use the term vision board. I knew it as a neter card, or soul collage, which I believe first came from Seena Frost. It’s tied into the work of C.J. Jung, James Hillman, and Roberto Assigioli. There’s something about doing it by hand, some kind of wiring that goes from the brain to the hand and vice versa as you’re flipping through the magazines and tearing out pages of whatever catches your eye. You’re not going for “pretty” or deciding on a “theme” or trying to create anything specific. You’re going through and pulling out whatever calls to you. You collect all your images and phrases first, without thinking or judging. Hmmm…you know, that’s a lot like getting ready to write a novel!

Technically I am supposed to be in very heavy edits for book 4 right now. I suppose the term “heavy” is relative, but it feels overwhelming and unwieldy. I know everything will be just fine in the end, but getting there … yowza. Yesterday was supposed to be spent writing (I paid for a babysitter and everything!) but instead I visited with a friend for HOURS. I didn’t get home until almost midnight. I felt completely guilty but was having such a great time I couldn’t stop. And thank goodness.

Now everything is starting to flow. I look at yesterday (and the past 41 years) as my gathering time, when I gathered what I needed to visualize my future as an author, noticing people and relationships, words spoken and unspoken. When you go through magazines and see images, it’s the same thing. Who knows why you like a picture — it actually doesn’t matter. Just tear it out and keep going. Don’t stop, don’t trim, don’t reconsider. Go until you’re tired of doing that, then spread the pictures out in front of you and let your eyes lightly skim over everything.

Pull the ones that are calling to you strongly, and begin to cut and piece them together on your board. What I like about the 5″ x 7″ size is that you have to really think about what’s going to go on and what’s not. If you love a big image, do you love it enough not to have enough room for something else? You have to make some decisions about what will fit, just like you have to make some decisions about what kinds of goals you want to achieve in 2010. How will everything fit together? This clarity will serve not just now but in the year to come.

As you cull through everything — phrases as well as images — it will become apparent what is supposed to stay. You’ll feel it, too, when you choose something you think you should choose, but it really isn’t working for you. We’re looking for connection here, for resonance. Trust it.

2010 is almost here and I cannot wait to see what it holds. If you want a hand in creating your future, think about making a neter card or vision board (do an image search on Google to see what other people have done–it’s inspiring!). My very best to you and yours as we move into the new year — I look forward to sharing some exciting book news with you in the months to come!

hugs,

Mia

PS. Remember my first novel, Good Things? It was on my neter card for 2005. I made it in March and envisioned that I would sell it by December. I got my offer from Berkley Books (Penguin USA) in October 2005, two months ahead of schedule!

I’m not talking about fluffy or cotton-candy-pink kind of happy (though I’ve read some of those, too). I’m talking about books with a hero or heroine we find ourselves rooting for, watching in both horror and fascination as they navigate the unwieldy circumstances of their lives. Will they make it? God, I hope so. I find it difficult to believe that we’re all put here on this earth just to fall flat on our faces and fail, over and over again. What kind of life experience is that?

I was perusing reader comments on amazon.com the other day in search of some new titles and I saw that there is always the reader that detests happy endings (and yes, I confess, I read the comments for my books too—how can you resist?). This kind of reader hates it if things get “tied up too neatly” or “issues are too easily resolved.” I get it: life’s not always like that. In fact, I’m sure he/she could regale me with stories (most likely personal in nature) of things that have gone wrong. Repeatedly. Sometimes with disastrous results. And, of course, with no happy ending.

Happiness is a good thing!

But here’s why I write what I do: I write fiction that’s fun and entertaining, but also full of mishaps because I want my heroine to grow. I want her to figure it out, I want her to be pushed to really question what matters most. She won’t always, at least not right away, but eventually she finds her way. This does not mean that everything goes the way she wants it—it just means  recognizes the value of her ordeal. It is all not for naught. In coming through the other side, she opens herself to all the good things that come when we appreciate what life throws at us. It helps us appreciate what we have and refine what we really want.

I loved Thelma and Louise. That’s hardly the kind of happy ending you’d expect, but it worked for me on so many levels for all of the reasons I’ve stated above. Happily ever after doesn’t mean the prince and the castle (though it can, there’s nothing wrong with that) but in my mind that’s all gravy. It’s actually all about the heroine and, by extension, the reader. In real life we root for the underdog, the most deserving, the most passionate, those who have overcome all odds. So why not in fiction?

I think it’s great when we fall in love with the characters in a book and hope that things work out for the best, especially when things are looking pretty bleak. I think it’s okay to be thrilled, happy, relieved, when things do work out, because don’t we want that in our own lives?

I know I certainly do. Have a great November, everyone!

hugs,
Mia