The Power of Music
Hi I’m Gabrielle Wang and I'm the July writer-in-residence for Inside a Dog.
At the moment I'm working on several projects.
Another Our Australian Girl series set during World War 2.
And a fantasy novel called The Wish Bird inspired by Green Mansions a book I talked about in my previous post.
Last year I took a creative journaling workshop run by my friend and wonderful YA author Simmone Howell and Lisa D’Onofrio. I had never done an illustrative outline of a novel before so this was very exciting.
Here's the drawing I did in their workshop.
The Wish Bird is a fantasy novel about a girl called Oriole who goes on a quest to find a cure for a magical bird. Her search leads her to a strange walled city called Soulless.
I've completed the first draft, which is really about my 30th draft, and now it's with my publisher at Penguin.
First it will be sent to a Reader. Then, based on the Reader's Report, my editor will do a structural edit.
A Structural Edit is where broad changes to plot and character are suggested by her, like lengthening or shortening the story, cutting out or adding chapters, giving a character more of an arc, pacing etc.
I love this stage of the novel writing process. From now on you're not alone. Your editor is there working with you every step of the way making your story the best it can possibly be.
After the structural edit is complete next comes the Copy Edit.
Here the editor looks at your manuscript sentence by sentence, paragraph by paragraph, chapter by chapter making sure everything is clearly understood, reads well, has no grammatical errors or spelling mistakes. This part of the publishing process is time consuming. You think you've ironed out one problem and it creates a whole set of new problems. It's like smoothing out a giant bedspread. As soon as you've made one area lovely and flat more creases appear.
These are some of the illustrations that I would like to include as full-page pictures in the finished book. They're in the style of Indian folk art.
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The Wish Bird is about music and the power it holds over us and what happens if it’s taken away.
Can you imagine life without music?
If there was no music there wouldn't be dancing.
Imagine going to a movie that didn't have a musical soundtrack. How much does this add to atmosphere and eliciting of emotion?
In the City of Soulless not only is music outlawed but so are birds. Imagine a world without them and their beautiful song.
Imagine if singing or playing a musical instrument was outlawed. And all the singers and musicians were taken away.
How else does music affect our lives?
The following video clip shows just how powerful music can be. These are high school musicians from Venezuela conducted by the amazing Gustavo Dudame.
My next blog post on Monday ~ Making A Book Trailer
Also a riddle competition with a book prize.
