Shake It Off!

November 18, 2014/4 Comments/in Angelhood, Book Reviews, Spin Cycle, Writing, young adult/by AJ Cattapan

This week on the Spin Cycle, Ginny Marie is giving us free rein to discuss whatever we’d like for her linkup, so I’ve decided to share a funny, little story from last week.

On Thursday, I met with my spiritual director. (If you’ve never heard of a spiritual director, just think of it as an adviser or mentor who helps you in your spiritual life.)

During our session, we started talking about the fears I have regarding my book coming out next year. What if people hate it? What if they read something into it that I didn’t mean to be read there? Oh, I’m sure so-and-so is going to hate it. And what about this other person? Oh, I can just imagine the hate mail and the bad reviews!

My spiritual director responded by saying, “Well, you know someone’s not going to like it because that’s just how things are. There are people out there who are just haters. It’s their mission to put down other people. They’re going to hate simply because that’s what they do.”

And immediately my mind flipped to that Taylor Swift song “Shake It Off.”

‘Cause the players gonna play, play, play, play, play
And the haters gonna hate, hate, hate, hate, hate
Baby, I’m just gonna shake, shake, shake, shake, shake
Shake it off, Shake it off

After my brief pop-culture-induced ADD moment, I was able to pull myself back into listening to my spiritual director who had moved on to talking about how Jesus had his haters too. He had been scorned, ridiculed, ambushed–even betrayed by one of his closest friends! We can take comfort in knowing that he dealt with his share of haters, too.

And that’s when I burst out laughing. I held up a hand. “Wait,” I said to my spiritual director. “Wait right there. I just got the funniest picture in my head. First, you mentioned haters having to hate, and I thought of the lyrics ‘haters gonna hate’ from Taylor Swift. Then you mentioned Jesus having haters, and I thought of that passage where Jesus tells his disciples that if they enter a town where the people won’t listen to them, they should just leave and shake the dust of the town off their feet, so now I’m picturing Jesus leaving a town and shaking the dust off his feet, all while singing ‘Shake it off, shake it off.””

Moral of the story: When criticism comes your way (or even when the fear of criticism keeps you from moving forward), just remember the advice of Taylor Swift and Jesus–and shake it off.

Got a random story to share this week? Join the Spin Cycle.

November Giveaway!

November 6, 2014/1 Comment/in Angelhood, Giveaway, Travel, young adult/by AJ Cattapan

It’s time for the November giveaway!

This month I’m giving away something related to one of the main characters in my upcoming young adult novel, Angelhood. The main character’s little sister is named Cecille. I took her name from St. Cecilia because Cecille is a ballerina and St. Cecilia is the patroness of music.

While I was in Rome this past year, I visited the Basilica of St. Cecilia twice. In the gift shop, I picked up a couple St. Cecilia medals. Since November 22 is the feast day of St. Cecilia, I thought this would be a good month to giveaway one of those medals.

How can you win it? By entering the raffle on my Facebook page. Look under the tab “Giveaway” or following this link: http://tinyurl.com/lwm9vat

The giveaway will be open from November 7-21. I’ll announce the winner on the Feast of St. Cecilia on November 22. Good luck!

For more on my visit to the Basilica di Santa Cecilia in Rome, visit this blog post.

Can a NaNo novel really get published?

October 29, 2014/1 Comment/in Angelhood, Writing/by AJ Cattapan

I first heard about NaNoWriMo, National Novel Writing Month (or as it’s affectionately known NaNo) back in 2010. It sounded pretty crazy to be honest. For the month of November, writers from around the world make a commitment to write a novel (or at least the first 50,000 words of it) during the month of November.

There are a few “rules.” You can’t have started the novel before November 1. You can plan for your novel, but you can’t actually start writing. In other words, you can plot and create characters to your heart’s content, but you can’t start the story itself.

Of course, I did some research when I first heard about it.

How many words per day does that end up being? 1,667. Approximately.

Do people actually do this? Yes. As it turns out, quite a few, and not just adults but students, too.

What does it mean to “win” NaNo? Just hit your 50,000 words before midnight on November 30.

Can a book written that quickly possibly be any good? Could it actually get published? Yes.

How do I know? Because my upcoming young adult novel Angelhood was my 2011 NaNo project, and it’s being published by Vinspire Publishing in April 2015.

In 2010, when I first heard of NaNo, I decided to try my hand at writing a cozy mystery since I love those. I didn’t intend for it to go anywhere. It was just going to be a writing challenge. I got a few books on writing mysteries out of the library and spent the month of October plotting and planning. When November rolled around, I rolled up my sleeves and went to work. Long story short, I wrote a not-so-hot cozy mystery. On the bright side, I learned it is actually possible to write 50,000 words in a month.

The next year I was planning on using NaNo to motivate me for this middle grade mystery I had been researching for months. The problem was that I hadn’t finished all my research. I was totally stuck in my plotting. I couldn’t work out the kinks in the storyline.

Then on October 29, 2011, (exactly three years ago today and just three days before NaNo was going to begin) I got an idea for a totally different type of book. This one was for young adults, and it was something I was sure from the beginning wouldn’t get published at all. Too religious for the mainstream; too dark for the Christian publishers.

Nonetheless, I felt I had to write it out. At least it would give me something to work on during NaNo. So in less than three days, I hammered out character maps and an outline. November 1 arrived, and I hit the ground running.

By the end of the month, I had 53,000 words, and a young adult novel I had no idea what to do with. Eventually, I found critique partners through the American Christian Fiction Writers. With their support, advice, and encouragement, I revised Angelhood multiple times. Then I started the long process of querying.

Skip ahead to the beginning of 2014. Through another writing group, I learned about Vinspire Publishing and decided to try querying them. And now my NaNo project from 2011 is on its way to publication!

So if you’re thinking about trying NaNo, but you’ve heard too many negative things like “Nothing good can be written that fast” and “NaNo books don’t get published,” think again! I’m not the only NaNo success story. Another writing friend shared this link of 14 other NaNo projects that got published, so it definitely can be done.

Write on!

Cover Reveal of Angelhood!!!

October 2, 2014/4 Comments/in Angelhood, Speculative Fiction/by AJ Cattapan

If you’ve been following me on Facebook, you’ve seen a few sample pieces of this already, but today I’m revealing the full cover. After all, October 2 is the Feast of the Guardian Angels. What better day could there be for me to reveal the cover for my story about a reluctant guardian angel! So here it is . . .

The cover of my young adult novel, Angelhood!

What do you think? Didn’t the cover artist do an awesome job?

October (Month of the Rosary) Giveaway!

October 1, 2014/0 Comments/in Angelhood, Giveaway/by AJ Cattapan

As October is the month of the rosary, it seems like the perfect time to give away another rosary blessed by Pope Francis!

Like the first one I gave away, this one was bought while I was in Rome for the Canonization of John Paul II and John XXIII and was blessed by Pope Francis!

Here are the rules to enter:

Follow me on Facebook.
Comment on either this blog post or one of the October Facebook posts with the same image as shown above.
Live in the U.S. or Canada so that I can mail the rosary to you.

Contest is open from October 1 until October 7, 2014.

And don’t forget to check back tomorrow when I reveal the cover of my upcoming YA novel Angelhood about a reluctant guardian angel named Nanette.

Setting Reveal!

September 15, 2014/0 Comments/in Angelhood, Travel/by AJ Cattapan

As we creep closer to the release of my YA novel, Angelhood, I’ll be revealing bits and pieces of information about the book. Today, I’d like to talk about a real church in Chicago that I used for two important scenes in the book.

Back in 2011, I went on a Catholic Church Tour to do research for a middle grade novel I was working on. Little did I know that just a month later, I’d be hit with the idea for Angelhood and end up postponing work on the middle grade book in order to pursue this new endeavor.

While working on Angelhood, I needed a location for the guardian angels to meet, and the church that fit my needs perfectly was Our Lady of Sorrows Basilica, one of the churches from the tour I had taken a month earlier! Funny how God gives us things before we even know we need them!

So here are a few photos of Our Lady of Sorrows Basilica, which I’ve visited twice now.

Our Lady of Sorrows Basilica

The Tower

The front entrance

The altar

Clearly, this photo was taken during my pre-iPhone days, and doesn’t do the beauty of this church justice. I’ll need to go back to get a better photo some day!

The church has paintings that depict the seven sorrows of Mary. One important scene takes place near the back of the church and involves a character looking at one of these paintings. This particular one is Mary standing at the foot of the cross, watching her son die.

Mary at the foot of the cross

The pew from which a character gazes at the painting

Another extremely important scene in the book happens in an area behind and to the side of the main altar. In this part of the church, you’ll find a replica of Michelangelo’s Pieta. I won’t reveal what happens here, but let’s just say that a pretty powerful guardian angel can be found at this spot from time to time.

Replica of the Pieta at Our Lady of Sorrows Basilica

And then just because they’re pretty and play a minor role in the book, here are the stained glass windows over the exit.

Doors and stained glass windows inside Our Lady of Sorrows

So why am I revealing this setting today, September 15, when my book doesn’t come out for several more months?

Because today is the Feast of Our Lady of Sorrows, which makes it the “titular feast day” of the basilica! Happy Titular Feast Day, Our Lady of Sorrows Basilica!

My Writing Process: A Blog Hop

July 7, 2014/0 Comments/in Writing/by AJ Cattapan

Last Monday, Cynthia Toney tagged my in the writing process blog tour (or blog hop, if you prefer). For those of you unfamiliar with the term, a blog hop is a chance for one author to “tag” another author in order to keep a particular discussion running around the blogosphere while encouraging us to get to know other writers out there.

Cynthia Toney is the author of Bird Face, a young adult novel about bullying. She kindly tagged me to answer the four questions being passed around in this blog hop, so here goes . . .

1. What am I working on now?

Last week, I revised a short story that I had originally written in college in order to enter it into a short story contest. Now that I’m finished with that, I need to return to revising a middle grade mystery that I wrote two summers ago. I’ve got a lot of work to do on it, and quite frankly the Fourth of July activities this weekend have caused a bit of procrastination. 🙂

2. How does my work differ from others in its genre?

I guess I should first explain what it’s similar to. The mystery is sort of like The 39 Clues series in that my main character must solve a series of riddles in order to inherit a fortune. However, unlike The 39 Clues series, my main character is a selective mute. He can’t talk to adults outside his own home, which makes the scavenger-hunt-style riddle solving a bit difficult. Also, he’s not trying to inherit the money to save the world. He’s just trying to save his little Catholic school from closing.

The book is also a little like The DaVinci Code in that the clues require my protagonist to decipher clues in the artwork in Catholic churches. It is, of course, different from The DaVinci Code in that there are no church conspiracy theories. 🙂

3. Why do I write what I do?

I write middle grade and YA literature because . . . well, that’s simply my thing. I’m a middle grade reading teacher, so I’m always reading and discussing middle grade and YA books with my students. Junior high was also the time I began to dream about becoming a writer. In fact, in my eighth grade yearbook, each graduate had a page in which their responses to a series of questions were printed. For future career, I put down “author of teen novels.” I wonder how many of my classmates followed through on their eighth grade dreams.

4. How does your writing process work?

In fits and starts. Sometimes I’m consumed by an idea, and I simply have to write it out out. One spring break, I became obsessed with the idea of L.M. Montgomery’s book The Blue Castle becoming a movie. So just for fun (!) I wrote out the screenplay. I finished it in a week. It sits in a drawer.

My debut novel, Angelhood (available April 2015), was like that, too. The idea struck me on Saturday, October 29, 2011. In three days, I sketched out the main characters and the basic story arc. I had been planning on spending NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) drafting the aforementioned middle grade mystery, which I’d been researching for months. However, I was so consumed with the idea of Angelhood that I put away the notes for the middle grade mystery and wrote all of the draft for Angelhood during November as part of NaNo.

Other times my writing is exceedingly slow and laborious, or downright non-existent.

When I am writing, I definitely follow the Save the Cat strategy for basic plotting. If you’re a fiction writer and not familiar with Save the Cat, definitely check it out!

That’s it for my share of the writing process blog tour. Now it’s time to tag the next writer!

Margaret Reveira was away from the Church for 16 years, but returned, at the Lord’s directive, in September 2011. Her blog was designed to express her passion for Christ as well as to make people aware of His promises and covenant blessings. You can find her at www.exuberantcatholic.com.

Win a rosary blessed by Pope Francis!

June 27, 2014/0 Comments/in Angelhood, Giveaway/by AJ Cattapan

In celebration of my upcoming YA novel Angelhood (due out April 2015), I’ll be giving away several items purchased last April while I was in Rome for the Canonization Mass of St. John Paul II and St. John XXIII.

First up is a rosary blessed by Pope Francis during the Canonization Mass! It’s made from pressed rose petals, so it smells really nice, too!

There are three requirements to be entered to win:

Like my author Facebook page. You can do so here.
Comment on any of my Facebook posts with this picture:3. For shipping purposes, please live in the U.S. or Canada. 🙂

Hurry! You must be entered by midnight central time on Monday, June 30.

Tag Archive for: Angelhood