So, I had hoped to spend November doing revisions and writing a draft of another novel idea. After all, November is NationalNovelWritingMonth or NaNoWriMo. 50,000 words in 30 days. And I got some good writing done.
Then my muse went on strike. Well, not exactly strike. She was more like a child who, when expected to do the dishes will instead repaint the living room. Let me tell you a little bit about my muse.
Instead of writing about politics and fairy godmothers and a prince named William who is NOT marrying a girl named Kate, I found myself compelled to look into quite different matters. The most side-tracked I got was actually because a friend, after being hit by a car, needed 300 stitches. Because someone referred to her injuries with a particular term, I looked up a Glasgow smile, which linked me to a Japanese urban legend, which linked me to black widows, which linked me to Celtic mythology, which linked me to banshees, which made me think about another plot bunny that's been bothering me. Basically my theory was that if there were a Narnia-type situation, a Daughter of Eve or a Son of Adam under different circumstances might just give rise to ghost stories or odd mythology.
Then that plot bunny kept gnawing on my brain and I had an epiphany on that plot. Because the epiphany happened at work, I spent four hours at home looking up vintage postcards. I even found one from 1906 that depicts the Golden Ball Tavern in my hometown of Weston, MA. That was fun.
In the meantime, the aforementioned stitched-up friend is actually the sister of one of my beta-readers, so I am definitely giving her a break in terms of proofreading. I have another friend who has many of the same opinions about pacing and she will be taking up the slack for a while. My best wishes go to that family. It was an unfortunate Sunday when that beta landed for Thanksgiving break in Salt Lake City only to find out that she should fly home the same day because her sister was in Intensive Care. We are so relieved that her sister is doing very well.
So, writing on my completed novel? Not so much this month. I have the entire first conversation between two main characters of the next book stuck in my head. I even know the religion of Ella's college roommate, as well as her name, her parents' literary hobbies and the color of her bedspread.
On the other hand, I still haven't gotten responses back other than those first two. I'm anxiously looking forward to any comments and am meanwhile looking for more people to submit to and looking forward to getting a new edition of Writer's Market.
And last Friday, I turned 30! When I turned 20, I didn't have a job, I spoke only one language and I didn't know most of the people who show up in my acknowledgments posts. So I think this will be a good decade.
Monday, November 29, 2010
Saturday, November 20, 2010
The Lull
So, no new rejections. I haven't had the energy to do revisions in weeks because of the new job. It'll be my 30th birthday on Friday of this week. There's not much going on right now!
Saturday, November 6, 2010
Revisisons
Aaaah, Saturdays. They are now my one day a week in which I can get anything done, since I finally got a new job and that's 8-4:30. I have to wake up early to get to work on time and my revisions have suffered.
But I do have three chapters of revisions to get through, thanks to my sister-in-law's betaing efforts. I have to figure out things like how to take smaller steps in the Ella/Alex relationship without stalemating it and how to make Mr. Mack NOT look like a pedophile, apparently! :)
But I do have three chapters of revisions to get through, thanks to my sister-in-law's betaing efforts. I have to figure out things like how to take smaller steps in the Ella/Alex relationship without stalemating it and how to make Mr. Mack NOT look like a pedophile, apparently! :)
Saturday, October 23, 2010
Epiphanies
I love writing, in spite of some of things I occasionally express here. I hate revisions when a document is finished to my satisfaction, but I really love the process of getting the document constructed.
A friend of mine who was also a writer at the time once got annoyed with me for the fact that I seem to "whip off" writing. The fact is that before anyone sees a chapter, it goes through a lot of permutations.
Case in point #1: In Lest Ye Be Judged, the central storyline is a war crimes trial. When it came time to write the verdict, I couldn't tell whose perspective to tell it from. I tried from the defense attorney's perspective, the defendant's, the judge's or the defendant's wife. In the end, I did something that really worked for me but I wouldn't have thought of it at first. I wrote the entire scene leading up to the verdict from the defense attorney's husband's perspective, then halted it, wrote the judge's perspective and closed the scene on the actual verdict.
Case in point #2: One of the weirder projects I've ever undertaken is what is called the PU. A few years ago, I wrote 100 vignettes in 100 days. Vignette #64 (counting down, not up) was a farcical Jedi Spaghetti Western. For #63, I was still in a silly mood, so I turned my muse loose on my favorite fanfilm: Pink 5. I wrote the main character applying for a job in Rogue Squadron. It was utter crack but in the midst of the reviews were two comments from the co-writer and the director. Eventually, the director offered me a 'job' as the first official backstory writer of the series. I've written several stories in that universe, all with his editorial help and extreme kindness, but one that I remember most clearly writing is Stacey convincing Han Solo to go to the awards ceremony. It took me four different complete drafts that I hated before I tried to write the whole thing from Chewbacca's point of view. That was the one I needed.
I love finding the exact approach to a scene that I have been blind to up to that point. In a way, I'm reminded of a project I had to do for my 12th-grade European Civilization class. For whatever reason, my teacher Mr. Watts assigned all of us to draw a complete map of the world. It had to have all countries, oceans, major topographical features such as rivers and mountain ranges. And it had to be done by memory. We had several weeks to complete the project, but it had to be done in the classroom. The only "studying" we could do was when we got home and could see our atlases. Then we would get back to class the next day and try to remember if we had mismatched anything. At one point, I discovered that I'd gotten my latitude lines mixed up and had to redraw the entire Western half of Europe and most of Africa. Over that minor detail, I walked into choir rehearsal, got through three songs for an upcoming tour and then started sobbing uncontrollably at my inability to do anything right on that project. The reason the project makes me laugh when I think about it is that I came up with a very clever mnemonic device to remember the names of the African countries in counter-clockwise inward spiral order. Well, I got done with Chad, sat back to review my work and discovered that I had a small section of the continent that had no name and I had no countries left to assign to a space. I was so frustrated by that stupid project that I colored it in blue and left it unlabeled and my teacher still gave me a B+ on the project.
So, at the end of that long story, the thing that reminds me of writing is that trying to get the story from my head to the Microsoft Word document feels a lot like trying to draw that map. I know exactly how it's supposed to turn out overall, but I'm inadequate to the task of getting it right the first few times I have to put it down. No matter what, I'm always going to have to figuratively redraw Western Europe. I might have a blue spot that's not assigned to any country. No matter how many permutations it goes through, it really will never turn out as picture-perfect as it did in my head.
But I can still try. I can still find ways to let the Wookiee be the narrator and I can leave that one blank space in Africa. I can get it as perfect as possible and the fun part is getting to that point.
A friend of mine who was also a writer at the time once got annoyed with me for the fact that I seem to "whip off" writing. The fact is that before anyone sees a chapter, it goes through a lot of permutations.
Case in point #1: In Lest Ye Be Judged, the central storyline is a war crimes trial. When it came time to write the verdict, I couldn't tell whose perspective to tell it from. I tried from the defense attorney's perspective, the defendant's, the judge's or the defendant's wife. In the end, I did something that really worked for me but I wouldn't have thought of it at first. I wrote the entire scene leading up to the verdict from the defense attorney's husband's perspective, then halted it, wrote the judge's perspective and closed the scene on the actual verdict.
Case in point #2: One of the weirder projects I've ever undertaken is what is called the PU. A few years ago, I wrote 100 vignettes in 100 days. Vignette #64 (counting down, not up) was a farcical Jedi Spaghetti Western. For #63, I was still in a silly mood, so I turned my muse loose on my favorite fanfilm: Pink 5. I wrote the main character applying for a job in Rogue Squadron. It was utter crack but in the midst of the reviews were two comments from the co-writer and the director. Eventually, the director offered me a 'job' as the first official backstory writer of the series. I've written several stories in that universe, all with his editorial help and extreme kindness, but one that I remember most clearly writing is Stacey convincing Han Solo to go to the awards ceremony. It took me four different complete drafts that I hated before I tried to write the whole thing from Chewbacca's point of view. That was the one I needed.
I love finding the exact approach to a scene that I have been blind to up to that point. In a way, I'm reminded of a project I had to do for my 12th-grade European Civilization class. For whatever reason, my teacher Mr. Watts assigned all of us to draw a complete map of the world. It had to have all countries, oceans, major topographical features such as rivers and mountain ranges. And it had to be done by memory. We had several weeks to complete the project, but it had to be done in the classroom. The only "studying" we could do was when we got home and could see our atlases. Then we would get back to class the next day and try to remember if we had mismatched anything. At one point, I discovered that I'd gotten my latitude lines mixed up and had to redraw the entire Western half of Europe and most of Africa. Over that minor detail, I walked into choir rehearsal, got through three songs for an upcoming tour and then started sobbing uncontrollably at my inability to do anything right on that project. The reason the project makes me laugh when I think about it is that I came up with a very clever mnemonic device to remember the names of the African countries in counter-clockwise inward spiral order. Well, I got done with Chad, sat back to review my work and discovered that I had a small section of the continent that had no name and I had no countries left to assign to a space. I was so frustrated by that stupid project that I colored it in blue and left it unlabeled and my teacher still gave me a B+ on the project.
So, at the end of that long story, the thing that reminds me of writing is that trying to get the story from my head to the Microsoft Word document feels a lot like trying to draw that map. I know exactly how it's supposed to turn out overall, but I'm inadequate to the task of getting it right the first few times I have to put it down. No matter what, I'm always going to have to figuratively redraw Western Europe. I might have a blue spot that's not assigned to any country. No matter how many permutations it goes through, it really will never turn out as picture-perfect as it did in my head.
But I can still try. I can still find ways to let the Wookiee be the narrator and I can leave that one blank space in Africa. I can get it as perfect as possible and the fun part is getting to that point.
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
"Declining with my regrets"
My first actual rejection arrived in the email box, very nicely worded from KT Literary Agency. I feel like a real author now. And if people wonder where I was when I first got dissed, I can say "sitting on the floor of the TV lounge in the Wilkinson Center, checking my mail on Katey's laptop."
Saturday, October 9, 2010
Revision neuroticism
So, I'm taking this one chapter at a time. Making notes to myself about what things need to be expanded. Surprisingly, most times I think of something I need to write in, I realize that I've already done it.
The only stuff that's really giving me hang-ups right now has to do with characterization. By and large, I've been staying away from some of the more emotionally volatile thoughts in the stream-of-consciousness narrative. Problem is, without them, it seems less than realistic. I don't want to put too much in and make a character an emotional cripple, but I don't want to skimp and make that character apathetic.
I have the bad habit that I take inability to write emotions personally. I don't deal very well with emotions, which is part of why I have a therapist, and I'm especially gunshy about exposing myself, even in fiction.
I have to wonder, when JK Rowling was creating the dementors based on her experience with depression, if she had this kind of problem.
The only stuff that's really giving me hang-ups right now has to do with characterization. By and large, I've been staying away from some of the more emotionally volatile thoughts in the stream-of-consciousness narrative. Problem is, without them, it seems less than realistic. I don't want to put too much in and make a character an emotional cripple, but I don't want to skimp and make that character apathetic.
I have the bad habit that I take inability to write emotions personally. I don't deal very well with emotions, which is part of why I have a therapist, and I'm especially gunshy about exposing myself, even in fiction.
I have to wonder, when JK Rowling was creating the dementors based on her experience with depression, if she had this kind of problem.
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Update on schedule
So, I promised myself that I would start revising on Saturday. Here's how my week went:
Tuesday/Wednesday: Received and appreciated congrats from a lot of friends who knew I was trying to get this done around this time of year.
Wednesday night: Burned said novel onto a CD, put it in a CD sleeve, marked it "To: Megan, Love: Kaki, Copy #1" and autographed the back. So when my brother showed up to visit from California, I had a present for his absent wife.
Thursday: I decided to take this day to catch up on some reading. While reading some actually not-spectacular fanfic on fanfiction.net, I heard a crack and the monitor started falling sideways. I caught it, figuring my table leg had given out and then noticed that the tower was on the floor. 1/4 of the glass had cracked off. I set the computer very carefully on the ground and reached around the table to unplug the tower, get it out of the way, etc. I then stood up and noticed that my arm was hurting. Upon further inspection, I discovered that my noble act of saving my beloved monitor had resulted in a gash in my arm. I knocked on my roommate's door since I lacked bandaids and alarmed her a bit with the gruesome scene. She kept pointing out that blood was running down my arm. But between her and the apartment's first aid kit, I got patched up. Very lightheaded, nauseated, etc. afterwards. While I was out getting hamburger for the purposes of not fainting, I called my brother and verified that he had, in fact, delivered my CD to his wife.
Friday: I slept a lot, still felt nauseated and lightheaded and had a really bad headache. Kept up the efforts of making myself feel better, then went for a hair trim where my friend cut herself with her shears and needed to go to the ER. Went home once she was safely with her parents and found that I couldn't use my computer because my roommate had people over. Went to bed at 11.
Saturday: Too tired and cranky from two days of pain and insomnia to do anything. Nearly finished the rest of Lost, Season 5 and posted a lot on Facebook.
Now it's Sunday and I'm going to write on the fanfictions that I've been neglecting. So it'll be Monday before I get to revision.
Did I mention that Monday I'm seeing a new therapist? "So, Kathryn, what brings you in here today?" "Well, um, clinical depression and problems with revising my novel."
Tuesday/Wednesday: Received and appreciated congrats from a lot of friends who knew I was trying to get this done around this time of year.
Wednesday night: Burned said novel onto a CD, put it in a CD sleeve, marked it "To: Megan, Love: Kaki, Copy #1" and autographed the back. So when my brother showed up to visit from California, I had a present for his absent wife.
Thursday: I decided to take this day to catch up on some reading. While reading some actually not-spectacular fanfic on fanfiction.net, I heard a crack and the monitor started falling sideways. I caught it, figuring my table leg had given out and then noticed that the tower was on the floor. 1/4 of the glass had cracked off. I set the computer very carefully on the ground and reached around the table to unplug the tower, get it out of the way, etc. I then stood up and noticed that my arm was hurting. Upon further inspection, I discovered that my noble act of saving my beloved monitor had resulted in a gash in my arm. I knocked on my roommate's door since I lacked bandaids and alarmed her a bit with the gruesome scene. She kept pointing out that blood was running down my arm. But between her and the apartment's first aid kit, I got patched up. Very lightheaded, nauseated, etc. afterwards. While I was out getting hamburger for the purposes of not fainting, I called my brother and verified that he had, in fact, delivered my CD to his wife.
Friday: I slept a lot, still felt nauseated and lightheaded and had a really bad headache. Kept up the efforts of making myself feel better, then went for a hair trim where my friend cut herself with her shears and needed to go to the ER. Went home once she was safely with her parents and found that I couldn't use my computer because my roommate had people over. Went to bed at 11.
Saturday: Too tired and cranky from two days of pain and insomnia to do anything. Nearly finished the rest of Lost, Season 5 and posted a lot on Facebook.
Now it's Sunday and I'm going to write on the fanfictions that I've been neglecting. So it'll be Monday before I get to revision.
Did I mention that Monday I'm seeing a new therapist? "So, Kathryn, what brings you in here today?" "Well, um, clinical depression and problems with revising my novel."
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