{"id":1782,"date":"2012-02-24T10:51:48","date_gmt":"2012-02-24T14:51:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.megancrewe.com\/blog\/?p=1782"},"modified":"2012-02-24T10:54:21","modified_gmt":"2012-02-24T14:54:21","slug":"the-ways-we-struggle-tara-kelly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.megancrewe.com\/blog\/2012\/02\/24\/the-ways-we-struggle-tara-kelly\/","title":{"rendered":"The Ways We Struggle – Tara Kelly"},"content":{"rendered":"

Click here for an explanation of the The Ways We Struggle guest post series<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Joining us today is Tara Kelly<\/a>, author of the contemporary YA novels Harmonic Feedback<\/i><\/a> and Amplified<\/i><\/a>. As well as being an author, Tara is a one-girl-band, web designer, video editor, digital photographer, and literary agent intern. She lives in Portland with her ten guitars, supercool boyfriend, and a fluffy cat named Maestro. Here she talks about feeling different, and how that affects her writing.<\/p>\n

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The Way I Struggle by Tara Kelly<\/font><\/center><\/p>\n

This is where I talk about feelings. I don\u2019t like talking about feelings much. Oh, I can vent with the best of them. I\u2019m always complaining about the injustices of life… I have a thing about fairness. I get remarkably upset when things aren\u2019t fair, despite knowing life isn\u2019t fair and will never<\/i> be fair. But when it comes down to digging deep and discussing my \u2018feelings\u2019, I\u2019d rather not.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve always thought of myself as an emotional person. But… maybe I\u2019m not. Maybe I’m just sensitive. I\u2019m blunt and I share disturbing events from my past in a matter-of-fact way (sometimes with humor), but I\u2019m not one to cry or share my gushy feelings. See, I learned a long time ago that the things I went through growing up aren\u2019t things a lot of people go through. They can\u2019t relate. Hearing about it makes them uncomfortable. So, somewhere along the line, I buried those intense feelings. For better or worse.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve always felt different. I know, I know. We all think that, right? Maybe I really am just like everyone else and don\u2019t realize it. <\/p>\n

Here\u2019s what I do know… I don\u2019t keep pictures of my loved ones on my desk or in my wallet or in my house. Not because I don\u2019t love them. I\u2019ve just never felt the need. I don\u2019t hold onto old pictures either, not of loved ones, loved ones from my past, dead relatives, or even myself. I don\u2019t decorate my office or my home with personal items (pictures, special\/meaningful objects, posters, etc). I don\u2019t find meaning in objects, never have. I haven\u2019t seen my family in years, and this is normal for me. I prefer shy and independent cats to super friendly\/needy cats. I guess the same can be said for my taste in guys, too. I don\u2019t brood for months when I break up with someone, even if we were together for years. I don\u2019t like to dwell. I don\u2019t like to hold grudges. I don\u2019t even like to live in one place too long. I\u2019m always on the go. To say I\u2019m not sentimental is an understatement, I guess. People find all of the above weird… and they\u2019ve said so, many times. I resent being told I\u2019m cold or that there\u2019s something \u2018wrong\u2019 with me because I don\u2019t express myself the way — perhaps — others would like me to. I\u2019m certainly not devoid of emotion (I feel plenty, believe me), and I have a whole lot of love to give. If you\u2019ve proven you\u2019re worthy of it.<\/p>\n

So what does this have to do with my writing? Well, everything. The one thing I hear a lot is… more emotion. We want more emotion. Many YA books I read are packed with emotional narrative — teen girls sharing their every feeling about a situation. And I\u2019m not knocking this style — if that\u2019s what does it for you as a reader, more power to you. But it doesn\u2019t do it for me. I don\u2019t want to be told what a character feels all the time — sometimes I want to figure it out. I want mystery. Sometimes I think there\u2019s more power in what a character doesn\u2019t say. I feel like there\u2019s still this expectation out there — that female characters need to be emotional to be sympathetic. They need to angst over aloof boys, cry over their dead sisters, and wax poetic in their spare time. Here\u2019s the thing, though. Some girls just aren\u2019t in touch with their feelings. Some girls laugh at funerals. Some girls don\u2019t give a crap about guys. Some girls are raunchy and crass. Some girls use fists instead of words. As a reader, I want to see more of those girls represented in YA. The ones who are different. Misunderstood. Broken. Unpredictable. Mercurial. So those are the characters I tend to write. And I will continue to write them.<\/p>\n

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But I need to step out of my comfort zone, too. I need to learn how to better express and write emotion. One of my WIPs features a very emotional character, a very broken girl full of anger and hurt. She has the weight of the world on her shoulders, and she\u2019s ready to explode from it all. I need to dig deep — get back in touch with those intense feelings I buried in a safe place. I need to give her the voice she deserves\u2026the voice I wished I had as a teen. No holding back. No censoring. Just raw, unedited feelings. We\u2019ll see if it ever becomes a story…<\/p>\n

View all the The Ways We Struggle posts so far<\/a>.<\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Click here for an explanation of the The Ways We Struggle guest post series. Joining us today is Tara Kelly, author of the contemporary YA novels Harmonic Feedback and Amplified. As well as being an author, Tara is a one-girl-band, … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[14],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.megancrewe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1782"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.megancrewe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.megancrewe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.megancrewe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.megancrewe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1782"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.megancrewe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1782\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1786,"href":"http:\/\/www.megancrewe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1782\/revisions\/1786"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.megancrewe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1782"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.megancrewe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1782"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.megancrewe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1782"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}