Patricia Reilly Giff - Writing with Rosie: You Can Write a Story Too

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You Can Write a Story Too

Holiday House New York

Copyright 2016 by Patricia Reilly Giff

All Rights Reserved

HOLIDAY HOUSE is registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

www.holidayhouse.com

ISBN 978-0-8234-3750-4 (ebook)w

ISBN 978-0-8234-3751-1 (ebook)r

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Giff, Patricia Reilly, author.

Title: Writing with Rosie : you can write a story too / Patricia Reilly Giff.

Description: First edition. | New York : Holiday House, [2016]

Identifiers: LCCN 2015041844 | ISBN 9780823436569 (hardcover)

Subjects: LCSH: FictionTechniqueJuvenile literature. | Giff, Patricia ReillyTechniqueJuvenile literature.

Classification: LCC PN3355 .G54 2016 | DDC 808.3dc23 LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015041844

To Winifred Clark Curry,
with admiration and love.

I come from a family of storytellers. My grandmother loved to talk about her trip down the Delaware River. Eyes flashing, arms waving, Nana told me about her escape from alligators, barracudas and a parrot that stole her red scarf.

Then shed wink so Id know shed made it all up. Fiction, shed say. Such fun!

On Sundays, my mother and her sisters, Marjorie and Jeanne, told stories too. Sometimes theyd tell them at the same time, laughing as they interrupted each other.

Id have to choose which one to listen to... and sometimes Id go back and forth to create a new story from what theyd said.

I loved telling stories too.

Nana listened seriously as I told her about the kidnapper hiding in the garage, the next-door cat who knew sign language and the pony who lived in my closet and chewed on my winter jacket.

I wanted to scribble down those stories. I wanted to be a writer! I collected pens and pointy pencils, fresh lined paper and pink erasers that smelled like rubber.

Can you imagine how I would have loved a laptop? But those days hadnt come yet.

It was hard to know where to start. And when I began to put my thoughts on paper, I was embarrassed to show them to anyone. Suppose someone laughed at the sad parts, or didnt laugh when I was trying to be funny?

Eventually I stopped trying; I didnt begin again until I was grown up.

Im sorry about that. If I could live my life over, Id write from the time I could put two words together, even though I had no idea how to spell them.

Writing is a joyous part of my life. I want that joy for you too, because we all have stories to tell.

So this book is for you, to help you on your way, to show you that anyone can write a story.

Ive tried to think of exactly how I do it. Each chapter tells you the steps I take. Its not very hard... if you keep at it.

I hope youll try.

Wouldnt you like to see your name in print?

Heres what I do. I sink down on the living room rug and close my eyes.

Do you think its peaceful? I wish!

Next to me, my dog, Rosie, seventy pounds, with flapping ears and wildly wagging tail, shreds the newspaper into bite-sized pieces. She scatters them over my face, my arms and legs. She thinks peaceful is boring.

I could tiptoe into the bedroom and shut the door behind me, but there isnt much room in there. Rosies pulled all my shoes out of the closet. Shes yanked the quilt off the bed and the clock off the table.

I close my eyes tighter. Never mind Rosie, or the newspapers, or the messed up bedroom. I have to think of all the bits and pieces and snippets Ive saved in my mind for a story person.

It reminds me of the day I began to write a book called Lilys Crossing. I had to pick a person, or two. I wanted readers to see them clearly, to know what they were like.

What about me, the summer I was eleven?

It was wartime, and I liked to spy on possible enemies.

At the beach I wore a sailor hat and sunglasses, so no one would recognize me. I slathered on lipstick, thick and red, samples Id gotten from a department store. Some of the lipstick landed on my teeth, but I thought I looked terrific.

I didnt want this book to be all about me, though. I had to have a boy in there.

What about the kid who lived down the street when I was growing up? My best friend, with his serious face, his mop of dark hair and knobby knees.

What would I call each of them?

I have scraps of paper with names all over them. Names of people Ive met, like Ariana Turnipseed and Charlie Nightingale. Names from mailboxes, like Tracy Matson, or from gravestones, like Gideon Gregory.

My handwriting is pathetic. Its too much trouble to figure it all out. So I think of my great-aunt, Lily. I think of my grandmother, whose last name was Mollahan.

So I choose Lily Mollahan for the almost-me girl whod tell the story. (I call her the story person, or viewpoint character.)

And the boy? Ill use his real first name, Albert. Ill change his last name though, in case he wouldnt want to be in a book.

One more thing. I always give the viewpoint character something to make her a little different, a little unusual. Sometimes I choose a skill like singing, or drawing, or even a love of night stars. I made Lily a writer.

I begin to write about Albert and me. But as the story goes on, something happens. My characters change and grow.

After a while Lily isnt me; Albert isnt my best friend down the block.

Theyve become themselves.

Thats the way a story starts.

It begins with a person or two...

Their names and what theyre like...

And something that makes them stand out.

Thats all I know.

You can begin that way too.

My dog, Rosie, is trying to climb on my lap.

She does that when she wants something: a bowl of vanilla ice cream, or a run outside to chase after her enemies, the gray squirrel and the striped cat, or maybe just to let me know shes around. What about me? she wants to say.

Yes, what about Rosie?

Shes not a person, although she thinks she is.

But could she be a book person?

Why not?

I can think of a dozen books where the story person, the viewpoint character, is an animal. A dog. A cat. Even a rabbit.

How about Rosie? Rosie with her great dark eyes, her sweeping tail, her love of shoes and bits of paper.

Now youre talking, she wants to say.

This is the way I showed my persons in Lilys Crossing.

Heres Lily:

It was Monday afternoon. Lily put on her sunglasses, her Eddie Dillon sailor hat, stuck a Gertz lipstick in each pocket of her shorts, and her notebook under one arm. It was a beautiful day, a perfect day, and she had something perfect to do.

Spy.

And Albert:

... the skinniest kid she had ever seen in her life. His hair was curly and thick, but it looked as if he hadnt combed it in a hundred years. She stared at him, his face down in the shadows. A nice face, she thought, even though he didnt want to be friends.