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...
Showing posts with label doubt. Show all posts
Showing posts with label doubt. Show all posts
Sunday, March 4, 2007
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
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.
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...
Sunday, February 11, 2007
Shock and Awe
Status: 30,000 words
Some writers don't read while they're in the middle of a book. Some writers read, but not in their genre. I can understand why. A couple years ago, all it took was one good book to shift my narrative voice. Suddenly, I was piling on the adjectives like Michael Connelly, or waxing poetic like John Connolly. Or trying to reel out the laconic, time-stretched action sequences of Sarah Gran, UPSIDE DOWN by John Katzenbach. Truly fine books, one and all. DOPE was the most intimidating for me, though. It's closest to my own writing style, and she's intimate with the same world I write in. If we weren't on the same bus ride through Hell, we definitely booked with the same tour company.
I'm glad I read it now, while I'm full of enthusiasm for my new work, and not in another month or two, when I'm lost and lonely and not at all certain this thing I'm doing will come together at all.
It will, of course, but a sleepless night or two is a part of that process.
Anybody out there have books/authors they avoid while writing? Or ones they seek out for inspiration?
Some writers don't read while they're in the middle of a book. Some writers read, but not in their genre. I can understand why. A couple years ago, all it took was one good book to shift my narrative voice. Suddenly, I was piling on the adjectives like Michael Connelly, or waxing poetic like John Connolly. Or trying to reel out the laconic, time-stretched action sequences of Sarah Gran, UPSIDE DOWN by John Katzenbach. Truly fine books, one and all. DOPE was the most intimidating for me, though. It's closest to my own writing style, and she's intimate with the same world I write in. If we weren't on the same bus ride through Hell, we definitely booked with the same tour company.
I'm glad I read it now, while I'm full of enthusiasm for my new work, and not in another month or two, when I'm lost and lonely and not at all certain this thing I'm doing will come together at all.
It will, of course, but a sleepless night or two is a part of that process.
Anybody out there have books/authors they avoid while writing? Or ones they seek out for inspiration?
Wednesday, February 7, 2007
Feeling Pregnant
26,500 words
Not a bad day's work, but there's a lot of flailing in there. In fact, if I look at the last book, I wrote 140,000 words and pared down to 85,000. Agent Anne wanted to see more of the soft side of my protagonists, so that brought the count back up to 90,000. In a way, I could still be twenty-odd thousand words away from anything usable!
Except it doesn't work that way. Not exactly. We'll see how much of these early days makes it in, though...
Feeling pregnant. Yes, indeed. Heavy. Full. Like something big's about to come out of an opening too small. And like I'm going to get more and more uncomfortable until this whatever-it-is comes out.
It's that feeling I get when the story's about to take one of its sudden left turns. And I think it might have to do with my villain. Right now, he's just too nice a guy. And there's stuff missing. What stuff? I don't know.... stuff!
John Ramsey Miller hates this seat-of-the-pants way of working. Elmore Leonard likes it. All I can say is, I've tried to work with outlines. Really, I have.
An outline is part of the reason Poison Door took 140,000 words. I had an outline, character sketches, all that stuff. But all the fun of discovery got used up in the outline. Sitting down to write the book, I got thirty thousand words in before everyone turned wooden. Then balky. Characters kept doing things I didn't want them to do. I started feeling heavy. Full. Uncomfortable.
I threw everything out and started over. Same names, close to the same premise. Totally different story. It flew.
Until the next time I started to feel heavy. And full. And really, really uncomfortable.
I pity the Tiny Dynamo at these times. I'm not the best company, whether or not I've got the keyboard in my lap. BUt I've learned to recognize the signals. The story is about to tell me something exciting...
Not a bad day's work, but there's a lot of flailing in there. In fact, if I look at the last book, I wrote 140,000 words and pared down to 85,000. Agent Anne wanted to see more of the soft side of my protagonists, so that brought the count back up to 90,000. In a way, I could still be twenty-odd thousand words away from anything usable!
Except it doesn't work that way. Not exactly. We'll see how much of these early days makes it in, though...
Feeling pregnant. Yes, indeed. Heavy. Full. Like something big's about to come out of an opening too small. And like I'm going to get more and more uncomfortable until this whatever-it-is comes out.
It's that feeling I get when the story's about to take one of its sudden left turns. And I think it might have to do with my villain. Right now, he's just too nice a guy. And there's stuff missing. What stuff? I don't know.... stuff!
John Ramsey Miller hates this seat-of-the-pants way of working. Elmore Leonard likes it. All I can say is, I've tried to work with outlines. Really, I have.
An outline is part of the reason Poison Door took 140,000 words. I had an outline, character sketches, all that stuff. But all the fun of discovery got used up in the outline. Sitting down to write the book, I got thirty thousand words in before everyone turned wooden. Then balky. Characters kept doing things I didn't want them to do. I started feeling heavy. Full. Uncomfortable.
I threw everything out and started over. Same names, close to the same premise. Totally different story. It flew.
Until the next time I started to feel heavy. And full. And really, really uncomfortable.
I pity the Tiny Dynamo at these times. I'm not the best company, whether or not I've got the keyboard in my lap. BUt I've learned to recognize the signals. The story is about to tell me something exciting...
Saturday, January 27, 2007
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.
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.
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