Ang Shaef Writes

What do you like to do when you are not writing?  I exercise every day--road bike or hike three or four times a week and Barre or Pilates on two other days. My husband and I travel a lot–either to visit our children who live away, to our cabin in the San Juan Mountains, or to see a new place in the world. Within the last two years we took a cruise to Antarctica; toured Croatia and Prague; and spent a week in the Cotswalds and London.  When I’m home I always have some volunteer responsibility or organization project to keep me busy. It’s protecting my writing time that’s more of the challenge.  What's your favorite food? My husband grills the most delicious salmon. And I make the yummiest salads.

Two days in San Diego with one of my best friends culminating in joining her book club to talk about The Things They Didn't See!   We started the morning hiking the beautiful sandstone cliffs at Torrey Pines State Reserve. We didn't get a picture of the landscape, but here's a stock image. Meanwhile, I got a text from my mom in Portugal.  Look how similar our two vistas are on either side of the planet! After our hike we went to Coronado Island and rode bikes, then had lunch at the Hotel Del. Dinner at scrumptious Din Tai Fung, and I can't wait to take my family in New York! It was so good! Book club was the perfect end to a beautiful day.

How did you come up with the title, The Things They Didn't See ?  My first chapter was an assignment for a Novel Writing class. I dashed off a title: Finding Paradise (it couldn’t be Paradise Lost, obviously), never thinking it would be permanent for the next six years. I liked the idea of alluding to a broken family finding happiness again.  Years later, the first time I thought my novel was finished, I hired a developmental editor who (among so many very helpful critiques) said she didn’t think the title fit the story. By then the theme of misunderstandings was clear and everything I brainstormed was about not seeing or saying.  The Things They Didn’t See came pretty quickly. I love that it encapsulates all they didn't physically see: Jill and her dad can't see each other on either side of the boat; Connor disappears from Roger's view in the water; Jill and Matt both in anguish over what they physically didn't see at the accident. And also the emotional turmoil ...

  Do you have a favorite morning spot? With the addition of new bookshelves, my sunroom is now complete.   What had been missing, was a place to put all of my  sunroom  books.  While the world outside the windows is just becoming light, I start my day with a blanket, a cup of ginger honey tea, and a stack of books that are inspiring, hopeful, or thought-provoking.  Books that are so uplifting, you need to keep them close, even after the last page.

What made you write a book about grief?  Two reasons... When I started writing The Things They Didn't See , my dad had recently passed away and the different ways everyone grieved impacted me. (He had adult children, young teenage children from a second marriage, a youngish wife and many, many close friends and we have a large extended family.)  I was putting myself in everyone's shoes which made for a very compelling narrative. Additionally, two of my four children were in college and my two other children were young teens at home. I had already learned a thing or two about how important it was to give teenagers independence and respect, but I'd made some mistakes along the way where I focused on worries about misbehaving rather than enjoying who they were. Focusing on the wrong things can quickly turn into regrets, and I wanted to explore the lessons I’d learned. What is your writing schedule? Oh boy, nothing consistent. But my favorite time to write was from 3:00 - 7:00 ...

In the last couple of weeks I went to Portland with two of my four sisters to see Benson Boone. One of my children is a "flipper" which made Benny B's numerous back flips off the pianos even more endearing. He's a fantastic performer! We spent a day shopping and window shopping in Burnside's furniture district, but really it was late afternoon because we spent the entire morning  in our hotel room talking and talking and talking. Do you have sisters? The end of the week my husband and I and our friends closed our Colorado ranch for the winter. I even tossed in a line for the first time in years. The next morning we woke up to this big guy bugling, herding over 80 elk in our yard! After a non-stop spring and summer, I'm organizing drawers, which clears out my brain and getting ready to write again!

It's been a dream come true hosting and "guesting" at book clubs this summer and fall!   Jill, Jake, Matt, Henry and Grandpa are now out in the world and  known and loved by friends, family and even friends I've never met.  Thank you! I didn't get a photo with my church book club  or with the Zoom book club with my dear friends' family book club. But I adore hearing about scenes that resonated with you and  sharing about my writing experience and influences!!

Ten minutes from home and I'm in the mountains. Every red tree is a treasure, every colored leaf a jewel. Just as I put my camera away, I'm pulling it out again. For ninety days we partake of a spectacle, a wonder that never grows old year after year. When the last leaf falls, and the skies flatten to gray, a white flake whispers, drops, and a new feast begins.  

Over the last six weeks I've been enjoying a vacation from social media and have focused on my family!  I've spent time at our cabin with friends, discussed The Things They Didn't See at four book clubs, spent a wonderful week back at the cabin with my daughter, son-in-law, their baby, a few of their friends and a surprise arrival of another son and his girlfriend! And topping it all off, I was in New York for ten days holding my newest granddaughter  and playing with her big sister. Each night I made dinner and the kids wandered "home" at varying times after work and school just like the old days when they were children and teenagers and you never knew when someone would arrive and another would have to leave. It was a dream come true to once again have my children around my table multiple nights in a row, juggling babies, parents eating with one hand, a preschooler running from one room to the next to help, to show us something, to go potty. A jumble of conversa...

Friday Author Q & A! Did your story change much from when you first started writing until the final draft? Originally, my opening sentence was the four short sentences of everyone “needing Jill” all at once: “Mom, did you pack my hat?”  “Jill, where should we store the extra drinks?”  “Babe, can you hand me the sunscreen?”  “Mommy, sit by me!”   I loved starting off showing how a mother wears so many different hats and needs to be everything to everyone all at once.   But in workshops, because readers didn’t know anything about the family or even where they were when the scene begins, nothing made sense. Learning the problems starting off this way was all part of the process of me learning to write well.  In a master class I spent days reworking a better opening sentence. Literal days—hour after hour working on one sentence! Even a single word can change a meaning or the cadence of how its read. At one point it sounded like the lyrics to a bad country...

Friday Q & A on writing and publishing! How do you handle writer’s block? Skip the scene that’s holding you back and start somewhere completely new—a much, much later part of your story. Don’t worry about what happens during or after the scene that’s stumping you and write something completely different. I pants’d my novel for this very reason. I was stuck for days (months?) with what happened the day after the accident. So I moved forward to what I did know. Jake and his mom were bugged by each other and what did that look like. That’s something I could envision and I started writing those scenes instead. How did you design the cover for The Things They Didn’t See ? I worked with Damonza, a company that specializes in quality covers for self-published books. They’d made some mock-ups with wind chimes, a lake, mountains, etc.  We’d had a little back and forth, but then I saw an Instagram post about a local artist showing in an upcoming show near me. The painting was a car drivi...

Last Wednesday I was the guest author at my sister's book club in Chicago and had such a great time meeting her friends and neighbors! Meeting people who have read my book and want to talk about my book? Yes, please! For years when asked, "What's your book about?" I wished I could start from the beginning explaining each character--  what makes them special and what makes them challenging--share my favorite scenes and explore the family and human psychology that was so interesting and relatable. But instead, I had to summarize my 350 page passion project into a one sentence generic tagline: After a tragic boating accident, a young family is drowning in grief and blame  and misunderstandings threaten to tear them apart. But now, no need to summarize!  Discussing the book with people who have read my novel is literally a dream come true. I love hearing how they connected with the story. What scenes resonated with them, which characters they loved  and who they found fr...

 My library and office are finally finished!  The rooms are so beautiful and colorful, warm and inviting,  stepping inside is like getting a hug from a rainbow. This afternoon I anticipated starting to shelve books. But first, I needed to organize the storage room.  But when I put an errant costume in the costume closet, I got distracted by how messy the costume closet was. So I reorganized the costume closet hanging like things together, finding items that didn't belong and sorting things in drawers until it was clean again.   Then I started on the storage room. But I needed boxes to store some of my kids' college stuff that had been tossed in willy nilly. My books were in boxes, so I went back to my office and unpacked a few boxes of books. Then I worked on the storage room, boxing college kid odds and ends, making space on shelves, stacking piles of things to donate, and sorted through toys to make them more accessible when our granddaughter visits. (At Chri...

 Questions & Answers Do you have another profession besides writing? I’m fifty-four years old and have been a stay-at-home mom to one daughter and three boys from when my oldest was born when I was twenty-five, until my youngest went to college in 2023. Alongside raising my kids, I had an unintentional career as a person who said yes to every volunteer request.   I loved being involved in my kids’ schools, sports and at our church, and forged many friendships and thrived as I love organizing people, events and things. Then one year I didn’t love it anymore. I needed a change and that was when I remembered my dream to write a book and I enrolled in writing classes. Favorite Recent Books: Heartwood , by Amity Gaige. I loved it so much I also read another of her books, Sea Wife , which I also loved. Broken Country , by Clare Leslie Hall; Fredrik Backman is one of my favorite authors and I saved  My Friends  until I had a few quiet days to completely immerse myself ...

  Six weeks ago I applied to have   The Things They Didn't See   added to our County library system. The application asked for professional reviews and links to Google and Goodreads for reader reviews and the librarian I talked to said they were choosy.  I hadn't heard back and intended to follow up last week. At my book signing, I was so delighted to see an old friend from my old neighborhood.  She'd seen the newspaper article, read my book and loved it!  When I asked if she'd brought her copy for me to sign,  she said she'd checked it out from the  library !!  I hadn't known they'd acquired it! I am thrilled!  I went to the library to get more information (and both librarians were thrilled right along with me!)  Three copies are in three different branches, and all three were checked out with one hold! I have a book in the library!! (Since all three books were checked out, I had to bring my own for the photo shoot!)  

 As promised, Friday is Q & A day! How long did it take you to write The Things They Didn’t See? I enrolled in writing classes almost ten years ago (2018) and started this book a few months later when I got the courage to enroll in the novel writing series. But progressing through the series and my novel came in fits and starts. After writing the first chapter, I had a son returning home after being away on a church mission for two years. His brother was also preparing to graduate then leave for two years, so I took a break to focus on my family. I didn't get back to my book for another year when I wrote 50,000 words during NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month in November.)  Now I had a first draft, but still my book sat on the shelf. I had two children get engaged in the beginning of 2020 so I was focused on wedding planning over writing classes. And then the pandemic started. Instead of classes, I enrolled in two virtual writing workshops and discovered how broad the ...

Vacationing this week in Pagosa Springs, Colorado. For years while we were in the thick of child-raising,  my husband and I dreamed of getaways and time to ourselves. Now, most of the time we love being empty nesters. But Pagosa is where we always had our family vacation. A week every summer for all of our married years. When our children were young, we bonded over campfires, shooting bb guns,  hiking to the falls, fishing in the pond, trips to the general store, yard games and kite flying. As they got older, they invited friends to join us and we kept the old traditions but added fishing in the river, card games, Spike Ball, ATV excursions, more challenging hikes,  river tubing, and trips to the hot springs. Not to mention several trips to the hospital for (thankfully!) relatively minor accidents. Now we're alone and its every bit as beautiful.  But a little too quiet. We miss our kids.  

Did you know that the new book you're writing has a word limit? Each genre has an industry standard word count. Of course, if you're self-publishing, you don't have to stick with these numbers, but it makes sense to do so because you're not Brandon Sanderson or JK Rowling (yet!) and you don't have built-in readers clamoring for your book. While there are several reasons to stick within range for your genre, the most compelling is reader expectation.  You're trying to attract readers and you don't want anyone turned off  simply because the page limit (or font size) is daunting. I took this graphic from Reedsy and you can click here to read more about it. By the way, I found my developmental editor from Reedsy.com and  had a fantastic experience. I highly recommend their marketplace for all things novel writing.