At least it's a happy day in the world of writing

Irritation and bad mood aside, I've been excited and nearly giddy at the prospect of writing today.

1. In a post a few posts down I mentioned working through a character issue in chapter 7 of the urban fantasy I'm editing. Writtenwyrdd commented with some advice that was quite helpful, and led me down into the fun world of "what if I try it this way, no this way, how about if we add this other twist here..." in order to see which solution would work best.

I get a kick out of that.

Specifically, she brought up the prospect of using a red herring to make my main character think she'd been wrong in her suspicions, only to find out she was right later on, that this guy is not a good guy, though perhaps for a totally different reason than she suspected of him.

I have heard of red herrings, know what they are and all that good stuf, but that's one of those instances that I don't think of its proper name even as I use it. Although, I occasionally notice, "Hey that right there is a handy bit of foreshadowing," after writing something. But yes, so it jogged my memory and now I can go back and really play with that character and the interaction between him and the protagonist.

2. Earlier today I began an AIM conversation with a friend, still ongoing, where she invited me to go clubbing this Saturday. Now to look at me you wouldn't think I'd be much of a dance club-attender. You would be right. I could probably count on one hand the number of times I've been in any club, and still have a finger or two left over. And the occasions that I've danced n club even less so.

But I am trying to fight the ever-present urge to give in to my hermitude, and she's my friend and I don't get to hang out with her as much as I'd like (frankly the only people I do spend a lot of time with are my immediate family and my coworkers--all those hours at work, goodness--perhaps a bit too much on both accounts). So I said sure. A couple of minutes later, the exciting prospect came to me.

Even if the night is a bust--too hot and sweaty, expensive drinks, don't want to dance, don't like the music, etc.--I can still use that night as research.

I'm working on a new story which centers around the proprietor of a dance club, now in disrepair, both Harry and his bar. But it was once quite popular, and I feel scenes within a couple of clubs may appear throughout the story. Even if everything that happens saturday night doesn't make it into this story (and I think we all know it won't), the experience will, through little details that add realism to scenes.

...yay!

Write what you know, right? Well, I don't know much about clubs, due to my lack of going to them. But I've been to a few over the years, and I'll go to this one and it wil all come together as knowledge and information I can pluck out of my consciousness for a particular aspect. Like the smells, or the sounds. Finding the right words to describe that kind of din or the lighting (strobe lights, anyone? we'll find out).

Would it be rude to wander absently over the club, jotting down notes into my little pad of paper.

You never know, even my short discussion with my friend about the possbile dangers of me wearing my glasses onto the dance floor may make it into this story, or some other one.

In any case, I can't predict what the weekend will bring, but the prospect of widening my knowledge base thrills me, and sends me into spirals of writing nirvana.

I love learning new things. I really do.

In other news, although I've been reading her blog for months, if not over a year, I finally read Magic or Madness by Justine Larbalestier. I've borrowed and reborrowed it from the library, but never got around to reading it. Now I have. I enjoyed it. And I appreciate her use of the multiple viewpoints. Perhaps a more detailed review will be forthcoming, but now I've got to get ready for work. Alas.

A few ideas to ponder

For some reason, I find it easier to continue editing one story if i'm working on another. wel, I say 'for some reason,' but this makes sense to me. In editing, I can get bogged down in the smaller details. If I'm working on new pages then I feel as if I'm still utilizing my creative talents (oh, I don't like that word, sounds sort of arrogant, but you know what I mean). I think, without doing any new writing, I'd end up really not enjoying the times I edit, and I wouldn't want to do it. The result being that it either takes forever to finish editing a piece, or I do a less careful job of it because I just want to finish.

Also, this new story I'm working on, I feel this urge to share the idea with people. Usually I don't. I might give the basics to a writerly friend, if it happens to come up in conversation, but this one I keep wanting to tell people. "Hey I have this new story, what do you think of the premise, or this characters, or these other guys?" Often enough I don't even like to describe my stories evenwhen they're well on their to being complete. Go figure.

Ah well. Job calls, so I'm off.

Happy writing.

Totally about writing process, can you believe it?

So after a week, I am halfway through my first round of converting hard copy edits to computer file. I'm struggling through a brambly bit at the moment, which has had me stuck for a few days.

I'm trying to insert more hints about a character's suspicious behavior early one without overdoing it. It was one of those issues where, I knew he'd pop up from time, not too terribly often, and my protagonist doesn't like him, just as a clash of personalities. But the further I got into fixing the story in my mind and discovering just where it was all going, his motives became murkier, tied up in centuries of tradition mingling with politics and clouding emotion. And because he doesn't like the protagonist. So two-thirds of the way through the book and I realize his behavior is more suspicious than just being a jerk. And now I'm editing the early chapters to reflect that, bit by bit.

Once again, it's that matter of balance. She thinks he's just being an ass at first, but the next tme she sees him, something strikes her as a little wonky. The next time, suspicious.

Chapter 7, where I am right now, is where this character first comes in. I think the reason I've been stuck is just because this scene will set up the future scenes with this character, particular those where he's interacting with the protagonist, and I want to get it right. That means allowing myself to take my time with it. I feel like I know where I'm going, though, so maybe the rest of this will move more smoothly.

We'll just have to write and see.



(And I don't even like puns. Oi.)

Stepping Away from the Writer's Group

Okay, still gonna go to the group each week, but I probably won't be bringing more than a page or two of one-shots or poetry, if I bring anything at all. As of the Wednesday before last, I have brought the last chapter of my urban fantasy to the group and received their critiques and feedback. Last night I finished taking all of their handwritten notes and compiled those onto my hard copies of the chapters.

I now have two copies of the manuscript, one with my own edits, the other this compilation of edits. My next step (which I began a bit earlier today) is to take those handwritten notes and transcribe them onto the computer file copy. I'm doing this with my personal copy first, because I think its first few chapters are older (I had printed it out but then made changes to the computer file version before even editing the printed hard copy), then I'll do the writing group edits.

It's time-consuming and I am tempted to do what my friend is doing, rewriting the whole thing while incorporating the edits in order to get a cleaner flow of narrative between the old and the new. But right now, considering the amount of editing needed, I'll think I'll just input them and reread it afterwards, doing my best to read it for flow and pace (better than I did in the first editing round trying to see how it flowed and whether the pace worked).

Still reading the Neil Gaiman anthology, Smoke and Mirrors, which I am greatly enjoying, and trying to go to sleep Friday night, I ended up forming this neat description of a bar in the midst of a dump (not quite literaly speaking, quite), which I actually remembered Saturday. I wrote it down while driving from Mililani to Kapolei (I wasn't driving, I was in the passenger seat, shotgun). I was pleasantly surprised that I remembered as much as I did in terms of word to word recollection. I don't know if it would be better served in poem form, or just adjust it for prose, though I do know I couldn't use it as the beginning of a story. But I do like it and I like the inkling of a story forming out of it. We'll see where that leads.

The rest of this Saturday was less than pleasant, but it has been good for my writing, if not my sleep habits. (Two nights of taking forever to fall asleep, only to wake in the middle of the night, but dozing in come morning--not quite sleeping in, as I was partially conscious).

My typing on this laptop is still atrocious--you are all lucky I find as many of my typos as I do. I blame it on a combination of never getting the hang of the home keys, long fingernails, and being unaccustomed to the flatter keys of a laptop/notebook. (Actually, I rather need to cut my nails, I am far too concerned about them breaking under the skin--screwing chipping them, that's pansy talk--while I'm packing and moving large, heavy boxes at work.) Right-o, off to edit some more.

A belated, 'we'll miss you'

As is often the case, I am behind the times. (I still haven't switched over my Favorites list from the old computer to the new and have fallen abysmally behind on all my favorite blogs.)

Alas, today I learned that Miss Snark is retiring. I was a novice Snarkling, reading and enjoying her blog, but rarely commenting, but she will be missed. By me, and countless other bloggers and writers.

The Snarkives are still up, for those who are curious and in need of her snarky guidance (who isn't?).

I, for one, wish her all the best. May those who query you be writers who've read the snarkives and don't make your trigger finger itch for the clue gun.

Sabrina, updating? ~hand to cheek~ How novel!

You never know, maybe one day, I'll get closer to the one-post-a-day goal I had originally.

But I digress (never a good sign when it occurs in the first sentence, or the second).

So my first draft of the urban fantasy story is done, and I have technically completed the edits on my hard copy. I have brought all but the last chapter to share with my writer's group, but as I was editing chapter 15 and 16, my question became this: was chapter 16 even necessary?

It basically acts as a resolution chapter. Everyone who makes their living in the mortal world, returns to the mortal world, with a few extra people in tow, the reader sees what happens immediately after they return and then a short scene a few months later.

It's one of those chapters where I think it isn't really strong enough (as is) to end a novel, but it answers enough questions that it might be needed anyway. I wonder if hinting a little more at what's to come in a planned book 2 might help, but I don't always like that 'hand rising from the grave so you know there'll be a sequel' motif. and in this case, assuming I get an agent and get the book published--well, much as I'd like to say, "Of course it'll be popular enough to warrant a trilogy or series" I am also conservative, read: self-deprecatingly realistic, enough to know that it might be my only one, or at least, it might take a while before I get a second book published. So the first book should be self-contained, satisfying enough that readers enjoy and want to read more, but not cryptic at the end to the point where the reader is left frustrated as they wait to read book 2.

Anyway, since this is meant to be a writing blog, I hav now blogged about writing. Reading Neil Gaiman stuff always helps. I'm finally starting to read actual books again, not just manga, although I'm starting small, with a Gaiman short story anthology.

Um...that is all.



(I really am bad at endings, I'm surprised I've ever finished a story because that always requires an ending. Maybe all my endings are really bad. Gah! No I can't think like that. Maybe they need work, but they aren't bad. There. That sounds encouraging, right? Heh. Okay, I'm done now. It's been a long day.)

My meme-cherry popped

I do believe this is the first time I've been tagged for a meme. Keen!

(Everything is prettier on a new computer. Is that true or it is just me?)

So here're the rules:

1. Each player starts with eight random facts/habits about themselves.

2. People who are tagged need to write their own blog about their eight things and post these rules.

3. At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.

4. Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged, and to read your blog.

I don't know about the tagging others part--I still feel new to the blogger community and a bit like I don't know enough people to do that, but if you read this and someone else hasn't tagged you, feel free to claim I did and play along. Then let me know, I'm a sucker for learning random things about other people.

So me...

1. I just got a new computer and that gives everything a pearly rose-colored glow, much like sunglasses of the same ilk. This is actually the first new computer I've ever had--the other two were throw-aways, one from my high school that originally ran on DOS (but it was already 1999 or 2000), the other my dad got somewhere, about to be trashed. The HS one I got first, and it lasted longer than the newer one I got later.

2. I've been to the Ice Palace, the lone ice rink on Oahu, a handful of times. I have yet to learn how to ice skate. Although, this last time I had a fall that left me sore for two days, which seems like sme kind f progress.

3. If I wanted to, I could adopt the local kine pidgin talk, yeah? Cuz I been living in Hawaii since I was one keiki, so I one local. But even typing sounds odd, and saying it out loud sounds even funnier.

4. Sort of a corollary to 3--I am a miliary brat, but my dad retired after I finished 4th grade, and I never really considered myself a "military brat." I just use the term because when people ask how long I've lived in Hawaii that reply seems to come with greater, quicker understanding. But I've been out of the military, so to speak, or lnger than I've been a "military brat."

5. I am a creature of cravings. I like fruit and water, but since I don't feel like eating or drinking that, I tend to not have them as much as I should. I am trying to change that. It helps to have fruit like mangoes, green apples and korean pears, which my mom will offer me half of. She loves fruit. Lately, I've been craving pomegranate fru-tea ice blended drinks from the Starbucks-like 'Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf,' Pepsi, and dark chocolate.

6. When I was in kindergarten, my favorite color was pink and I wanted to wear skirts and dresses to school every single day. By first grade, I hated pink and dresses and never wanted to wear either. Now I am okay with both, but only under specific circumstances (the right pink must be punk).

7. I can never pick a favorite anything, be it books, manga, music or movies, colors, food or v shows. There's always a long list of very general things because the things I like, I like a lot (Neil Gaiman can do no wrong in my book, same with Charles de Lint, and even out of the many Valdemar books Mercedes Lackey wrote, I couldn't pick just one). Although I will say that Belle from the Disney version holds a special place for me out of the Disney princesses. I think it's because she likes books, kinda looks like me (ah yes, we both wear our brown har in a ponytail, we must have been separated at birth) and isn't passive.

8. (I feel like the last one should be the best, but how do you choose a 'best random fact'?) I usually find it pretty easy to start something--here I'm specifically thinking of stories, but it can be applied to other hobby-projects as well--but it's always difficult for me to finish something. Now I've finished the first draft of this fae story, but I'm getting stuck on the edits, and I want to rewrite the ending because it reads like 'oh, here's the end, wait, we haven't resolved X, add a scene/chapter. tere's teh end, oh wait, what about Y?' But I am editing in a big way, better than I did for the first quest-fantasy story, so I feel like I'm making progress. Maybe with the next story I'll do an even better job of ending it. Let's hear it for practice.

Okay, so what does everybody else have to say? Random facts abound!

Haven't had a writing group post in a while

That's what you get when I go on teh computer the morning after my writing group meets. Some vague thing irked me last night. And this morning it felt like I wanted to say, "Gods forbid I include any details for the sake of description and giving the readers a fuller image of the scene," which I think was the problem. Of the pages I brought last night, the trend seemed to be that there were details that didn't add anything to the narrative/plot and in other places, there needed to be more details to make the story clearer.

My reaction (in my head) was a peculiar combination of, "I see what you mean, that makes sense and I should change it," with, "What's wrong with including the fact that this immature guy has to stand still and not move his hand, and now his knuckles itch?" I kept the latter purely mental, while verbally responding with the former. That's why they make written comments as wll, so I can go through it afterward, when I've set the emotions aside, and see if those details really are unnecessary, or if there's something missing to make them pertinent.

Even after the worst meeting (which this was not, not even close), I am grateful for the writer's group. Because these areas they pointed out were parts I glanced over, that I didn't see the problem, or maybe I saw the problem but didn't know how to fix it, and they came in with a suggestion to fix it. Beta readers in almost any form are helpful, regardless of the strength of one's "You're killing my baby!" feelings, because there will always be aspects of an author's writing that needs work, which they can't see on their own.

My personal worry is that I have too many aspects like that which I can't see, and should I ever stop bringing the major works to my group, I'd miss out on some big editing that needs to take place, which then makes me feel like I'm relying on others, and I don't much care for that.

Or maybe I'm degernerating into paranoid rants, but I want to my work to be written by me. Thus, I try very hard not to give in to too many of their changes, particularly when it's along the lines of 'change this sentence to this.' Most of them aren't fantasy or sci fi-oriented, and some of their opinions on point of view, pace and voice are influenced by that. Basically, I just don't want to lose my own voice in my writing by trying to fix everything that point to as a problem, even if they are, technically, correct.

I think that point ends differently from how it began, but overall: writing groups are good, if you find one that suits you, be careful if you're in one that doesn't fully suit you, don't give in to all their changes, nor ignore all their suggestions, and try to listen with the emotion set aside.

It's too late now, fulfillment just adds fuel to the flame

*No Doubt, "Too Late" from the album, Return to Saturn

The title has nothing to do with this post. I just like it and it seems like it suits the business of writing, for some. That perhaps a writer who is published once, ill then be motivated to write even more, thus fueling the fire of success.

That's not the point though. No actually, I hd a curious realization the other day. Now lately I have been reading a lot of manga, and by a lot I would guess in the hundreds since getting on this kick with Christmas 2005 (I'd read some before, but that's when I really started devouring them). I've run across some stories that were simpler, but had lovely artwork, others with better stories and slightly less desireable art, some with high quality story and art and other with less quality of both. Assume what I'm about to say speaks of the good ones, and basicall every statement ends with IMHO.

I happen to think manga can have well-developed characters and strong plots. The best ones have some sort of character development, for at least the small handful of major players (actually I'm reading one right now that has that, "Ouran High School Host Club"). But it occurred to me that reading a manga versus reading a novel is a very different type of reading. Comic book-style/art aside, I read the story differently.

I used to think it was mostly a matter of, "They're shorter and more visual, so I can read them in half an hour to an hour." But the other day I sat down to begin reading Kate Elliott's Spirit Gate (I'm being a bad reader--I got side-tracked away from The Burning Stone and thus haven't finished the Crown of Stars series yet, but I do want to read this one, which I got for my birthday), and even only reading the first few pages before heading off to work, I was struck by how calm the activity made me feel. Even when reading tense or action-packed sequence, there's still part of me that tranquilly content, "I can't wait to see where this goes." My emotional state with manga is more grin-y, "this is fun, what's gonna happen next, I want to know now." Essentially the same thoughts, just phrased differently and with a more active sound to the latter. Perhaps it's a matter of the ID and ego.

(I did say I'd get into pulling out some of that psychology stuff, didn't I? Just didn't expect it to be today.)

So Freud had a lot of silly ideas, but people still cling to a few. Wait a moment, I'll give you a chance to get out all the Oedipal Complex jokes you know. Better? Okay, here we go.

So Freud had this idea about the unconscious and conscious mind (the iceberg imagery, of which only a small piece of ice above the sea level is really conscious thought), and within this was the Id, Ego and superego. Let's ignore the moral high ground of the superego, he's boring anyway. The ego as I always thought about it, was the practical sort, sying okay, we can do that, but not ight now. A harried mother of toddlers, perhaps. The id is the toddler, worse twins, and then both want A/B now. No! They want C, too!

Manga seems to fulfill that innate and mostly unconscious id desire to read, because there are (usually) plenty of manga at hand that I can read. Be it from the bookstore, a recent purchase, or the library, or rereading ones I've already bought (I think I found a couple of good series that lend themselves well to rereading). Reading novels seems more of an ego compromise, "wait until the summer (I've been in the school system so long that I associate summers with reading for a slew of entire days), and then you can read all of these books, and these over here, and a couple of those too." They were the reward for finishing the semester, finishing the year, finishing high school or college.

Now that I'm working, it's all a bit screwy for the novels. I want to read during my free time, time not taken up by work, eating, sleeping, or working on writing and editing my novel (I've caught up with the edits for my group. I'm on the cusp of chapter 14). All of that takes up a lot of time, though, and sometimes I must admit, I just don't feel like reading. So when I do, it's usually a small window and it's much easier to read a short manga than risk getting sucked into a novel only to have to put it down at the most inopportune moment because of other stuff.

You're just reaching an awesome chapter, the big fight scene, whichever, but it's so late you have to go to bed or you'll be groggy all day at work tomorrow.

There's still hope for novels, though, don't get me wrong. I read all those Thursday Next and the Nursery crime books in a fairly short amount of time (I found The Erye Affair as well at the library), and it was such a nice feeling to start a novel.

As easy as it is to say each reader reads differently, I think it may be just as true to say every reader reads each book differently, too. And by book, I mean manga, novels, nonfiction, all of it, even breaking it down to genres or even authors. I bet if I read Spirit Gate and then Neil Gaiman's American Gods, I'd notice a distinct difference in how I approached each of those books as well.

Just a neat little thing I noticed about myself I guess.

Bad writer, ignoring your readers

Hello readers. I'm sorry for ignoring you. Blame stress at work. I always do. heh.

So I have an older sister who writes. She sent me an email with some new writing the other day and only today did I get around to checking my email in order to reply. It was an interesting start to a story and it made me think of Book #1 (or was it Book A?). Anyhoo.

It's my questy/classic high fantasy story that I dare not look at for fear of keeling over from the horror of the writing. It got me highest honors in English, but I have this image of it still reading as very young. I began it in high school, reworked, finished and revised it in college, and I know it isn't as good as my current stuff is. But then, that's not surprising. I'm still learning, so it makes sense the earlier, less skilled work reads younger and doesn't have as much depth.

But that story was the sort where I started writing without little more than an opening scene and a couple of characters. 50-80 pages in, I had to stop and completely rework those first pages as I figured out what the plot was now that I had a firmer grasp on the characters and what they wanted. Her story read like that. In my opinion, it's perfectly fine to start a story with only a vague idea of what's going on. It can take longer, but eventually you get a feel for the chcracters and the plot and can rewrite the earlier stuff to match the story after you figured it out.

In my writer's group a few women always seem to ask the new members whether they have an outline for the plot. But they ask in a way that seems, to me (I could be totally wrong in my assumption, but for the sake of this post and point) like they expect every writer to know exactly how the story ends right from the get-go. I don't necessarily agree with that. Just as every writer has a different process for writing, they have different processes for planning a story as well. It may make it harder for them to critique because they don't know where it's going, but a lot of these stories coming in now, they still don't, even if the first draft is done or the writer herself knows exactly how the story goes.

No one else needs to know how you write a book. But you should know your own methods. Know your weaknesses, be it dialogue or plotting or too many flashbacks. Know how you edit and what you tend to miss (which you can find out by seeing what a consensus of readers point out for improvement that you consistently don't see until they point it out), and know your strengths.

I noticed this a few times with our new members that had also attended another group. That "well, they said to take X out, now you're telling me to put X back in." You can't always listen to writing groups. You have to look at what others say and then decide for yourself what works best. If you can conceivably look at every comment a critiquer gives and explain why you need to leave it as is (a real reason, not, 'but it's my baby,' remember dears, "Murder Your Darlings"), then leave it as is. If their suggestion makes sense to you keep it and make the change, but you're the writer and it's your story and your method of writing. they aren't writing your story for you and...

You will always know more about your story and the characters than the reader does. As much as we sometimes want to put in all the cool little quirks and tiny details that create this beautiful image in our heads, we can't always. We have to pick and choose for the single or small handful of details that create the image in the readers' heads. Alas, if I get published, my readers may never know that my protagonist's best friend used to be quite bulked up (not obscenely so, but a lot) and he lost a lot of muscle mass after a long illness. He's crazy tall and still muscular but very lean, a few shades short of skeleton at times, if you'll allow me the exaggerated imagery.

...

...Heh. I have no idea how to wrap this up. Yay for distractions and losing one's train of thought.

Happy writing.