Back out of the Blocks

53,500 words (pedal to the metal once again...)

Dylan and I've been friends for years now. When my last book stalled last year (seemed like forever but actually a couple-three weeks or so), he was surprised to find out I get writer's block the same as anybody. I just try to nip it in the bud.

This one wasn't the Inner Critic. I wasn't worried my words weren't good enough, though if I'd let the situation continue, I might have started.

It wasn't What-Happens-Next. I've got a good sense now of where I'm going, even if I don't know how I'll get there.

Problem was, I was trying to write forward while my mind was writing back. That is, I sat there asking for the rest of the current scene, and what started playing was an earlier scene I knew I would need but hadn't written yet.

So last night I sat down and made a start. Fifteen hundred words and a couple of hours later, I had my earlier scene and a lot of surprising revelations that streamlined the plot and made stuff I didn't understand make sense.

Now I've got to sit down and do it all over again today...

Strangle Your Darlings... Slowly

51,500 (not every day is a good one)

Murder your darlings. We've all heard the advice, but oh, nobody told us how very hard it can be. They are, after all, our darlings.

I'd say I'm a confident writer,but it's an odd kind of confidence. I can be as insecure as the next guy day to day, but I have enormous faith that I will get better with practice. When I look at my first (and now thankfully out-of-print) book, I can see it's true. I write better than that in my sleep...

And as you might have gathered from other blog entries, I'm not of the Dean Koontz/Kurt Vonnegut/Tom Robbins stripe. I don't do multiple drafts of each page as I go, until that page shines and sparkles like the gem that it is. I sketch in my first drafts, loose lines that gradually solidify, then passes and new drafts until the lines are clean.

becomes....

But sometimes a wildly wrong line needs to go. It just doesn't fit in with the rest of the picture. But, even when I know it's got to go, I look at it and think, "But it's soooo pretty..." It's hard to cut a scene or exchange or bit of description that really doesn't belong when it's well-written.

It's just a silly bit of insecurity way down at the heart of it. I wrote my darlings, and I'll write some more. In fact, every damn thing I write should be well-written. That's what I'm trying to do, after all. But we've all seen it: some of what we write is just a little... better. And those are always the bits we don't really know where they came from.

But knowing all this doesn't make the cutting any easier.

What I do is, rather than the mercy-killing of a straight razor to the carotid, I lock my darlings in a cupboard and wait for the thumping to stop.

That is to say, when something has to go and I'm still in first-pass stage, I stick it in a side file where I can retrieve it later. You know, just in case it turns out to be a mistake. I'm not sure I ever have, but I could. My latest (Poison Door: shopping at major US publishers right now!) is 90,ooo words long, but those cupboards contain 40,000 words. That's one heck of a lot of tiny fists pounding at those doors. I haven't gone back for any of them.

Leaving the possibility of opening that door makes those cuts less painful.

Writing, a Tale told in Allegory

39,400 words (with good reason)

Today was the Tiny Dynamo's birthday. By ancient and venerable tradition, she got to pick the Honored Activity.

Being both Tiny, and Dynamic, she chose to haul our asses up the side of a damn mountain.

I'm not out of shape (certainly not for someone who remembers steam-powered zeppelins), but when my most recent brithday rolled around, my choice of Honored Activity involved a well-made coffee and a big slab of cheesecake. A visit to a bookstore followed.

There were inducements. At the top of the ridge sat a volcanic-stone camping shelter abandoned in the 1920's and only recently renovated. It sits in a desolate place, and no roads reach it.

Damn it, I wanted to see that hut.

It started out sweet and lovely. A pleasant lark on a summer's day. We passed over sunlit pastures and sparkling streams. It was a little bit uphill, but then, I knew it would be a climb, right?

Then the climb began in earnest. The land slanted up, and further up. The wind stopped, and the sun beat down on the land. Everywhere I stepped, I hit sheep shit.

I slogged on.

Here and there we came across a tree. Those lovely bits of shade, those chances to look out over what I'd done kept me going. Sometimes, the view up the trail ahead made me despair.

A couple times, I gave serious thought to giving up. Just turn and go back down. But, one does not draw so beguiling and wondrous a creature as the Tiny Dynamo to one's side by being faint-hearted, cowardly, or giving anything less than one's best. Giving up simply was not an option.

Besides, I wanted to see that damn shelter. I wanted to see how the walk ended.

And just when I was thoroughly shattered and wondering if I really could walk until I collapsed (again), a roofline came into view. A surge of energy ran through me, and the pack I carried didn't seem so heavy.

The surge to the end was quick. The view from the top was incredible. I was up in the clouds, on top of the world.

It was totally worth it. And on the trip back down, the walk up didn't seem like it'd been that bad.

It struck me then. This was *so* like writing a novel.

***

Except now I can't quit thinking about the axe on the chain...

Midnight in Gethsemane

status: 16,200 words (lost time made up for)

Doubt seems to be the topic going around. No wonder. The work is mentally and emotionally grueling, the rewards scant or nonexistent, and to friends and loved ones it looks like we're just sitting on our asses. On a bad day, this path can look long and cold and lonely and hard: forever uphill under a stormy sky, paved with the bones of seekers who failed before you and the painful knowledge that you were a fool to even try.

When it gets that bad, read the last two words of my blog title. Then sit down and write.

To keep it from getting that bad, here are a few mental tricks I've used to keep the demons from my door. Just little things I tell myself when doubt wants to nibble at the edges.

1. Doubt is a liar. One thing I notice reading biographies is how many truly great people went through periods of intense doubt and self-examination. Sometimes while in the middle of their best work.

2. Doubt is part of any process. It's the flip side of ambition. Everyone hoping to achieve anything worthwhile will spend a few long dark nights in Gethsemane.

3. Doubt might be right. This is a great way to keep it from gnawing deeper until it hits bone. Admit your doubts might (*might*) be valid. I do this to ways. One is almost a mantra for me, has been since I was a little shaver with a sketchbook and a dream.

I may not be the most talented, but no one will work harder.

Because the fact is, hard work will often take you places where lazy talents will never reach. And hard work *with* talent. Sky's the limit. I can't control my talent (and don't always believe I have any), but I can control my work.

The other tool is my deadline. I'm going to write ten novels. (This one is number four.) If I can't get published in ten novels, I'm out. I'll write for fun, and keep up the good work with the graphic novels (where my scribbling makes up for any soft spots in the words), but that's it.

Of course, I got the fantastic Agent Anne with number three, and she's pretty sure POISON DOOR has what it takes. But if she's wrong, the new book's coming.

And lastly...

4. Can you come back later? I'm busy writing just now.

That one's my favorite.

Back in the Saddle Again

So I'm writing again.

After five graphic novels and three novels, you'd think I'd be prepared for all that a new book involves. And maybe I am, enough to blog about the process while I'm going through it, anyway.

Writing a book is an emotional rollercoaster. I know I'm in for at least a few long dark nights of the soul, and a moment or two where I ring the sweetest bell in the universe. I've done it often enough to know that the only real changes are the insecurities involved.

The good days, it's like being master of the universe. The bad, well, nobody likes the bad ones.

My first book (an out-of-print graphic novel called Leather Tales), I had to deal with can-I-even-finish-something-so-long. Then for a while, it was about refining the process. Then I turned to novels and had to face what-if-it's-only-my-drawing, what-if-my-writing's-no-good.

That first 'real' novel wasn't bad. Wasn't great, either, and the sad fact is that not bad isn't good enough for a new writer to break in. So in the drawer it went and back through the long ride I went with the second novel.

It was worse than the first. There were bits and pieces that sang, but that's a bit like Frankenstein pointing out the good job he did with the monster's ears. So in the drawer it went, and all through the third novel I had to wrestle with maybe-I'm-really-not-cut-out-for-this.

Well, that one was good. At least, I thought so. My brand new agent, Anne Hawkins at JHA Literary, thinks so too. I'll let you know how things go with that one on this blog too.

So here I am, back in the saddle again, this time with what-is-that-one-was-a-one-off.

My most effective technique for beating down those insecurities is something I call 'maybe, come back later.'

For instance, back in the beginning when I worried about even finishing the first book, I'd tell those worrying voices, "Maybe you're right, but I'm doing this page now. Come back later." When I was doing my first novel and worrying that I was an art guy getting ahead of himself I'd say, "Maybe, but if nothing else this'll be a good script for another graphic novel."

Now when I'm tempted to waste time worrying about making lightning strike twice I say, "Maybe this one won't be up to snuff, but in that case I'll write another one."

One advantage of experience is knowing that I'll look back on the finished work and have no idea which days were good ones, and which bad.

And the more I do, the better I'll get.