I was having a talk via Verizon text with a friend yesterday and after the usual catching up she told me that she was enjoying HBO's series Trueblood quite a bit. If you're not familiar with that franchise, it's based on a series of books by bestselling author Charlaine Harris, who works in the same urban fantasy genre as L.A. Banks, Tanya Huff, Jim Butcher, Rachel Caine, Kim Harrison and a host of others whose names escape me at this moment. She asked me if the books that Trueblood are based on were any good, and there followed a brief, uncomfortable texting silence where I debated whether to tell her...
"Ummmmm, well, there's better stuff you can read," I finally hedged.
Yes, that was a temporary cop-out. Hey, it was a text conversation; space is limited, even with a smart phone. Fortunately, I've got a bit more room here.
In case you're wondering who I do endorse from that list, it's Butcher and Caine. Unfortunately, they were the only ones I felt positively about, and it's not for a lack of trying their offerings. For whatever reason--
Ah, crap. Actually, that's not true. It's not "for whatever reason," it's for some very specific ones. Every genre of books has a set of built-in pitfalls that has the capacity to ruin even the best-laid plans, and while some of the more common ones will cross-pollinate, there is at least one unique trap that a well-meaning author can spring. Too much guts and gore (horror), talking too much about livestock and leather (westerns), plot twists that seem to come out of nowhere and make the reader wrinkle their brow (thriller), inherently unlikeable lead characters (romance) and so on. For the urban fantasy genre, it's the very supernatural element that can distastefully set it apart from other aisles of the bookstore... or, as I like to call it, "Attack Of The Kewl Powerz Band-Aid!"
( Warning: Meanness And Truth )
- Soundtrack:The Who - "Baba O'Reilly"
Three months of waiting blown to smithereens in three paragraphs. If nothing else, you have to admire the economy.
A quick and possibly inaccurate count of past failures shows that this is my 21st rodeo with no prize gained except an ass that feels like it was used for a punching bag by The Hulk. Or, if you prefer another tally, I started submitting in 1990 and the only tangible proof of progress I have is a Word document contract offer from e-book leviathan Chippewa Publishing, who I don't believe is in business any more due to their web site domain now being one of those slapdash search engines and the corresponding Myspace page not having been updated since November 2007. So about a year after I said that I didn't want Salvation to be an e-book because I felt that the format was not a viable one, the company who tried to make a serious go of it proved me sickeningly correct by going belly-up.
Hell's bells.
If you think you may have heard this tone before, gold star for you. Yes, that's right; I got rejected again and now I'm going to whine about it. I feel like a real heel saying this, but I think perhaps it needs to be addressed and that's the subject of pep talks. I love them, can't live without them, but please don't use the flavor that states that I'll get published someday because it's bound to/has to happen sooner or later. Once again, I feel like a real jerk saying this, but while this statement means well, it is just patently not true. In no shape, manner or fashion does this have to happen. Yes, I've bled gallons and donated enough skin from the surface of my soul to create an awning for your house, and this means exactly nothing in the grand scheme of things. I'm a good writer; this I know, and I'm certainly not going to denigrate my own chops here. However, being good is not a requirement for this gig. You really only need two things, which is:
1) Determination not to quit, and
2) Luck the likes of which a Vegas high roller would cheerfully murder his gransmother to obtain.
Really, that's it. Stephenie Meyers was turned down eight times before Twilight was given a shot, but I think that story might pale in comparison to Helen Hooven Santmyer's ...And Ladies Of The Club, which followed such a bizarre chain of events from the small press publication to national attention that I had to read it three times to get everything straight. Of particular note was the timing involved of an influential book reviewer (Grace Sindell) just happening to be at the right place to overhear somebody talking about wonderful the book was, said book then having been stored down in the basement of the library soon after. Had Sindell come in a week later, it's very possible that the 400 copies it sold when done as a small press would have been the total print run... and I haven't even touched yet that the book took 50 years between the beginning of writing and when it finally saw print.
Unless Santmyer is a glacially slow author (always a possibility), this shows pretty well just how long the road can be, and you have no idea when you begin if it will take about six months (Meyers) or fifty years (Santmyer) to cross that finish line. As a sidebar, it should also be noted that Santmyer didn't have long to enjoy her success; Ladies hit the small press in 1982, was re-released with much fanfare in 1984 following its "re-discovery," and she subsequently died in 1986 at the age of 90.
That's like the punch line to the least funny joke I ever heard.
Am I going to submit again? Of course. Like I've said before, I passed the unofficial event horizon on this journey a long time ago, so I've already got my next target in my sights. I just don't have a lot of jokes on this subject, because it's serious business.
Set controls for the heart of the sun.
- Soundtrack:Suspiria - "Tattooed Fear"
Yes, you read that correctly.
Self-publishing is an amazingly freeing idea for unknown, unpublished authors that has unfortunately resulted in some truly head-shaking moments. There are times, certainly, when after running your soul through the woodchipper in the traditional outlets for a decade or so it becomes necessary to entertain the idea of thinking outside the box. There is always the very real possibility that you are correct and the industry is the one in error, rather than the distasteful idea that is more likely the reverse. After all, Robert M. Pirsig was shot down a mind-numbing 121 times for Zen and The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, and that book went on sell over four million copies. When dealing with a subjective field, even the awful may have a place among the stars (and as stated in this blog many times, it has certainly been very unfortunately proven correct in Pirsig's case).
However, one of the unspoken benefits of dealing with the ivory tower of a publishing house is that generally they have every bit as much invested as you do in not allowing something truly horrible to slip the literary leash and run amuck at the local bookstore. For all of the typical whining by authors about how editors don't understand where they are coming from and how they are always trying to reel them back in from their personal Cloud Nine, without their guidance and occasionally forced intervention many writers would happily build their own tiger pit lined with punji sticks and dive in headfirst, all the while thinking they are being dreadfully clever and edgy. What seems like a great idea to the writer can come across to the average reader as... well, dumb.
( Serious Literary Beatings Happen Behind This Clicky )
- Soundtrack:Led Zeppelin - "Kashmir"
A while back, I read an entry by one of the f-listers who stated that while they knew what they had to do in order to jump-start their career in the arts, they had not done so yet. I can understand that. In fact, it's perfectly natural, but in no way does it get a person off the hook from checking their parachute and diving out of an airplane in full working order to begin the plunge toward their dreams.
More recently, my friend ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
vg_ford showed me a post done by a successful author who went very in-depth to the pitfall that only a very few writing grimoires will touch upon, and that boogeyman is the hideous ease with which a person might talk themselves out of their chosen field. The example given in this post was that from the POV of a writer, but one could very easily substitue actor/actress, musician, director, painter or any one of a hundred or so different discipline. For all the various obstacles that are placed in your way, the one which stands the greatest chance of putting a fork in you before you conquer even one set of gatekeepers is the person in the mirror. The old saying is true; you are indeed your own worst enemy.
The first manner in which this crops up is the deep breath one takes followed by their first attempt at their field of study. It should be pointed out that some arenas have more built-in hidden motivators than others, as long as we are telling the entire brutal truth here. If the only investment you have made in your equipment is a few spiral notebooks and a a box of really nice pens, walking away from a writing career once you've gotten your teeth busted down your throat a few times doesn't represent much of a financial loss. If on the other hand you paid a thousand bucks for a Gibson Les Paul and another half a grand for a vintage Fender tube amplifier, it really behooves you to at least learn a few chords before deciding you are not the next David Gilmour or Carlos Santana. Much like having a gym membership, the money spent may be enough in some cases to inspire you to give the old college try a few more attempts than you normally would before flunking out.
For the record, I am not for a moment suggesting that you should go whole-hog on the tools of your career path just to strap you to Wile E. Coyote's Acme rocket a little bit tighter. If you don't like what you're attempting to do, do your best to discover this unlovely truth on the cheap as much as possible, and don't upgrade your materials until after you've reached a certain basic level of competence with them. All clear?
More important than your chosen instrument of expression is your mindset, though, and this is where things take a darker turn. Likem_stiefvater said, it's important to remember that in whatever road you go down, the default answer for all scenarios is going to be no. That's no, no and N-O. It sucks to say this and I wish it wasn't the case, but no amount of devout prayer on this subject is going to change the status quo. The finish line you want to cross is designed by nature to be very difficult to cross. The Powers That Be are not in the habit of simply handing over trophies for everybody who wants them; the sheer numbers of supplicants ensure that a negative response will always be the norm. As a hopeful, burgeoning artist, it's your job to find out how best to slant the probabilities in your favor, trying to turn lottery odds into a one in a hundred shot. Proper formatting, audio production values, tone of voice, eye for detail, the exact angle to hold one's shoulders at while on the dance floor... this is how you better your chances of getting your foot in the door.
It should also be pointed out, in the spirit of full disclosure, that you can do everything right and still hit the FAIL button with your forehead over and over again. Even if you manage to weasel the parameters down to a one in fifty shot (a scenario many struggling artists would take in a New York second), that's a hell of a lot of doors being slammed in your face. As stated earlier, the default answer is no. The reasons are varied and sometimes, they have absolutely nothing to do with your ability level in your chosen field. You amy submit your gritty four chords of thunder rock and roll demo to a company, but they already have three artists coming out this year who are using that sonic blueprint so you end up being rejected. Had you submitted eight ago you might have been one of those three who are even now cutting the full-length album. Unfortunately in this case, life is a matter of timing.
You've got to be able to take that NO right in the teeth and keep on moving forward. If you can't do that, you'll never succeed.
- Soundtrack:Joe Satriani - "Summer Song"
Of last year.
That's an odd beginning to my vacation. Getting shot down without any of the usual pain and suffering due to the fact I had written them off a long time ago is definitely a new experience.
Right now I'm eating ravioli and watching Doom on Ye Olde Blu-Ray Player. I had originally intended to use this experience as a springboard to write about how God-awful the waiting game can be and how it is slanted against the author, but instead I'll just direct you to this link and go back to watching monsters slug it out with the UAC Marines.
Peace.
- Soundtrack:Doom - "Serious Carnage"
So once again I was thrown off the top of the building by the Publishing Gods, but at least this time they said that my proposal "showed merit." That's good. What's better is that it only took 18 hours to come to that conclusion. Well... I guess it's good. If it wasn't for the fact that I'm trying to get this dream realized in the middle of the worst worldwide economy the world has seen since we started keeping track of such things and that the U.S. one has taken the biggest puke-shower since 1929, I might actually be in a good mood at the moment.
Thing is, I'm not. Rejection sucks.
I had lunch with my wife today and groused to her about the fact that I feel like I shouldn't be getting affected by these turn-downs the way that I have. "After all," I said over Carl's Jr. chicken sandwiches, "I know the score on this racket. The odds are lottery to say the least and I'm not some wide-eyed neonate being thrown to the word press wolves. I've been doing this for a long time. I've gotten my teeth kicked in a lot, and you'd think I'd have learned by now how to gracefully roll with the punches, right?"
"Why should you roll gracefull with rejection?" she asked quizzically.
"Well, ah..." This was not how I envisioned this conversation going. "Well, because lots of body blows breeds a tough skin?" I hedged.
"Horseshit," was her succinct response. "It's just like a relationship. It hurts because you put yourself out there with something you believe in--be it a book or your heart--and when somebody doesn't say it's good enough to make the grade in their book, of course it hurts."
I chewed and thought about that. "You think so?"
"Honey, I know so. It's just like when you were younger and you'd see these girls you really liked dating these losers and jackasses. Only in the book world," she amended after a moment's thought, "instead of jackasses and losers you're talking about Danielle Steele, V.C. Andrews and those God-awful crappy literary books your mother tries to get you to read and write like."
"Ouch. Point taken."
"You know you're better than that, so it hurts when somebody you're trying to impress doesn't see that. I don't know if that's something you'll ever get used to. Personally, I don't see how you could."
Even if you're bleeding, you have to get back in that batter's box again.
- Soundtrack:Suspiria - "Untitled #7"
I keep coming back to writing and music being similar disciplines over and over again because, well, it's just so goshdarn true. They are at least semi-artistic disciplines (beat the drum all you like, you're not convincing me the Bee Gees or Danielle Steele create art) and they are pursuits that are, for the most part, pursued in solitude. Musicians get to rub elbows more often with their fellow practitioners out of practical necessity, but the act of bettering one's self done by a soloist in a room by themselves the majority of time is really no different than that of a writer polishing their turns of phrase on whatever they use to write with in a series of rooms.
Having said that, it's also very important to point out the vast difference between writing and storytelling. This is no different in the slightest bit (italics mine for emphasis) than the difference between a supremely talented musician and a crackerjack songwriter. These two applications of the same basic craft should never be confused for one another, because to do so is lose sight of the bigger picture and the final prize which is, to wit, getting you or your prospective audience to nod in admiration, buy a copy of your book/CD, tell their friends about you or just the simple act of one person touching a chord (literally, in this case) in another.
- Soundtrack:Joe Satriani - "Rubina's Blue Sky Happiness"
In a nutshell, this shows what one of the primary hurdles facing the publishing industry is; much like professional sports, they are in danger of pricing themselves right out of the game. The average reader in a bookstore spends five seconds looking at the cover art and then ten seconds at the summary on the back before deciding whether or not to buy. With the prices of paperbacks being what they are these days (usually about $7.99), I can't tell you how many times I've checked out something that sounded promising only to blanch at the eight and a half dollar tag attached, sliding it back into the shelf and feeling absurdly guilty about not supporting a fellow writer.
Although this isn't really a Writing 101 lesson post, I wanted to use the example in the first paragraph of why it is that half the books published every year never earn back the two grand or so given out as an advance to the author. For an unheralded, unknown writer, asking somebody to put down nearly a ten-spot based on a cover blurb and a neat picture is a tremendous leap of faith. One, sadly, that many people (even those who regularly go to bookstores) are more and more unwilling to make, particularly given how crappy the economy is going these days.
As long as we're telling the whole brutal truth here, I may as well go ahead and say that I was initially opposed to the idea of making the switch to hardcover in the case of Mr. Butcher. Don't get me wrong, his books are literary crack and he is the most compulsively readable author I have discovered since Stephen King so it's not a question of quality... far from it, kids. It's simple economics. I have a difficult time in my head paying upwards of thirty dollars (in hardcover) for something that I am going to be done with in three days if you leave me alone that has less replay value than Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4. I am not saying at all that Hawk 4 is better than Butcher; what I'm saying is that I'm going to get more aggregate replay value over the life of the purchase from the game than I will the book. I will love the book like nobody's business while I am reading. Like all good things, however, it will come to an end and the second read-through is never even close to being as good as the first. By contrast, Hawk 4 still gets spins in the PS2 every now and then, and I still thoroughly enjoy that game.
Bear in mind, folks, this is a writer saying this, and one who makes pretty decent coin from his day job. Now you see the essential problem of the publishing industry. In addition to not coming out with enough good new blood to keep the public satiated, the product itself has increased in cost so much that taking a chance on a new writer is a gamble that many could-be readers usually don't take. Sure, you can research some possibilities at the local library... but once you find somebody good, you generally go to the local used bookstore to get their back catalog at savings of about sixty percent rather than shelling out for the new editions.
So with all that in mind, question time. What's the author you last bought in hardcover form, and who will you keep coming back to on Opening Day, price be damned? You know what it is here in the Cairns household; we're Butcher folk. How about you?
- Soundtrack:Judas Priest - "Hard As Iron"
nanci_raygun's request to hear my screed on fanfic, Internet lulz and a bizarre, fucked-up horse trough of insanity known as Nicky The Goth. This isn't meant to offend any of the f-listers who do fanfic, as you know how I feel about your efforts. This is meant for the general pool at large. Charge!When it comes to fanfic, I am of two minds. First, as I have stated in the past, this was the arena that I got my start in. For every writer out there getting published and making lives brighter throughout the world, there was a moment when they were inspired to pick up whatever tool they use and start writing. Usually, this was a book, movie or whatever that really rang their bell and as a result, they most likely produced at least a few stories set down in that 'verse as a form of starting to pay their literary dues.
That's fine. In fact, that's better than fine. The old saying goes that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery and as the original author, if you come up with something that stokes somebody's furnace so hard that they voluntarily want to spend a large part of the rest of their lives sequestered away from humanity with a laptop, you may have just written a winner. Buy yourself a beer and toast your own coolness.
- Soundtrack:The Bangles - "In Your Room"
- Soundtrack:Elvis Hitler - "Crush Your Skull"
I know, I know. I'm not as entertaining as I used to be. I don't tell bus stories any more, or nuggets about that deathless harridan the Enemy Of Fun. Seems like all I do these days is write about writing, and give updates on what I'm writing, and then... well, I talk about my guitar, too. Not too exciting, eh?
Sorry about that. I've noticed the comment totals to my posts have gone wayyyyyyyy downhill ever since I got seriously back into a writing frame of mind, as opposed to when I was drifting about during the seemingly endless writing of Underworld and spieling off drinking tales, car chases and other deteritus of my life. Hey, them's the breaks. You post about what you're interested about, and for me these days, that involves how words are put together and the process by which you shepherd them into print. My space, my rules.
I did recently finish White Night by Jim Butcher, so in addition to my own writing, there's a little of someone else's for you. If you haven't gotten with Harry Dresden yet, you are missing out.
Oh, and ten days and counting until Living After Midnight hits the pavement. Now that I've finished Mr. Butcher's latest offering, I can finally get back to work on that.
Um... I like cheese?
- Soundtrack:Metallica - "The Small Hours"
What has been occupying my attention these days is music. I got an excellent piece of guitar equipment on Christmas, the Zoom 9002 signal processor, and have been ramping up to get the trusty RG550 back into a fighting shape the likes of which it has never seen with new turbocharged equipment and some TLC. I'm also helping Mad Evil Chris do a little preliminary guitar shopping of his own, and it looks like my man is going to join the likes of Stevie Ray Vaughn, Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton by getting himself a Fender Stratocaster which if I'm not mistaken, will most likely look much like this:
That's a beautiful piece of equipment right there. Remember, kids; real guitar heroes play real guitars.
In doing this search for the combination of the right axe and the right amp to produce just the right tone, it started me thinking about how very similar writing and guitar playing truly are. I think that's part of the reason I responded so enthusiastically to both disciplines. In both fields, you have a basic piece of equipment; in the music world it's 22 or 24 frets and six strings, maybe a whammy bar, maybe not. In the writing world it's 104 keys on a QWERTY keyboard. You sit down with the same basic tools at your disposal as Satriani, Skolnick and Vai (or King, Barker and Herbert, on the flip side). Once you figure out how to hold the damn thing correctly, whatever comes next is your own extrapolation.
Of course, there are some fundamentals that will get you a long way toward your goal. Dialogue, characterization, plot, style, motivation, dynamics and intro/endings should sound very familiar if you're a Writing 101 post reader. Or, if you prefer, chords, scales, modes, root notes, tremolo picking, pinch harmonics, legato, vibrato, sweep arpeggios, string-skipping, tapping and dive-bombs in the six-string world.
I love the freedom both disciplines give you in what is essentially a closed universe. If you say to myself and Tom Petty, "Write a song in the key of A," we're going to come up with completely different takes on his Fender Telecaster and my Ibanez RG550. The sounds will not be the same, the chord progressions will be completely different, we'll have wildly different harmony lines... but they will both be guitar songs written in the key of A. Using that same 104-key setup that Nora Roberts uses, my own take on a dark night in Atlanta will be completely different than hers... and heck, even the contrasts between Roberts' work on that subject and a riff from her noir pen name J.D. Robb will be completely different, and that's being done by the same person.
Style is what you have when you've been doing it for long enough to know the difference between good structure and bad structure. The flat notes you hit early in your six-string career will smooth out, and your dreadful plotting will come around to a more natural flow once you've cut your literary teeth.
I don't know what I'm more excited about; getting the EMG's installed in the Ibanez, or the March 1st countdown to starting Living After Midnight.
It's a good time to be alive. Happy V-Day, one and all.
EDIT: For those of you who actively hate Valentine's Day, or aren't interested in it in the slightest or are hoping that an ex of yours had a crappy holiday because the motherfucker deserves it, I offer this link to give you wonderful e-card ideas.
I also thought of the Enemy Of Fun when I saw this image, so I thieved it away.
- Soundtrack:Joe Satriani - "Motorcycle Driver"
I promise this annoying autobiographical pause won't be too long. This story has, with the exception of a sci-fi tale still whirling in the back of my head, has been rattling around inside the bone prison for almost twenty years now. Twenty years, man. I don't know whether to laugh of cry. As you may remember from one of my sleep-deprived screeds a few weeks back, I have taken no less than four full-length whacks at this story, with a couple aborted runs thrown in for good measure.
As such, there is a real sense of raising the bar here that I am struggling with. I know, I know, one of the surest ways to fail is to make something out to be the Super Bowl when... well, let's face facts, kids. I'm an unpublished (in terms of novels, at least) writer who has been doing this for quite a long time so, if I should righteously screw the pooch and make Living After Midnight a shot "right in the lumberyard" as Ty Webb from Caddyshack would say, chances are the world will never know. I mean, my literary failures aren't out there for everyone to see like Laurell Hamilton's latest flailings, right? For all intents and purposes, this is just another practice run on the Great Bobsled Run From Hell that is my literary world, so what's the harm if I face-plant into the ice. Right?
Wrong. I want this to be good. To this end I have been spending a great deal of time on the pre-plotting (eight and a half chapters socked away, go me) because I have discovered this helps out a whole lot when it comes time to put fingers to keyboard and actually knock the story out. Living After Midnight is essentially a pretty simple story, as most romance tales are, so the devil is in the details. Giving enough information to keep the reader strung along while not giving away the whole kit and kaboodle all at once is a pretty line to walk, and I think now at age thirty-four I've got the chops to be able to pull this off with a less-is-more plot. Salvation, Covenant and the rest of the Ring Of Fire novels are all fairly complex; this one should be a breeze.
It's not, though. I keep wanting to start. To scream "Fuck it!" and dive in to Chapter One, because damn, I can see that scene so clearly, it's like I upgraded from an old black-and-white TV with a crack in the molding to my dad's 50" plasma HD model. So I'm forcing myself not to. I'm not giving in because when the time is right, I want to knock it out in one fast run and keep that high-definition look all the way through because this time, the devil isn't a guy in a four thousand-dollar suit. It's in the details.
So the promised posting of the first section is going to have to wait a little while. maybe I can get to it by next weekend, but I don't want to make any commitments my ass can't handle, so we'll see.
Oh, and I'm still winning my bid for my kickass guitar equipment. Nine hours to go.
EDIT: Yay, I won a shiny thing! Two EMG 81 humbucking pickups and a single-coil EMG SA-1 pickup as well, which perfectly replaces my existing DiMarzios. Sometimes, it's good to be me.
- Soundtrack:The Donnas - "I Don't Care"
In general, there are three schools of thoughts when it comes to the all-important first draft of a novel. They are, in no particular order:
1) The "Bahhhh, Who Gives A Shit For Now As Long As It's Done?" Method. As gross as this name is, is also at least somewhat accurate. As long as the author makes it to the finish the line, horrible gaffes, bad characterization, impossible plot leaps and large amounts of white space with the words INSERT 5,000 WORD FIGHT SCENE HERE are all forgivable in the grand scheme of things. Rewrites are where these problems get fixed. After all, you can't make a Frankenstein monster without a skeleton and this school of thought is all about getting those bones in place, by any means necessary. Not surprisingly, this method of attack usually results in the shortest amount of completion time, cutting down signifigantly on the "OMG what the hell am I doing?" thoughts that always creep in about halfway through.
2) The "Hem, Haw, Okay, Not Bad, Guess It'll Do For Now" Method. Getting to the finish line is important, sure, but so is a little quality. At least, a earnest stab at it, right? You can screw things up somewhat along the way, but in addition to making it to THE END, you also want to have some kick to what you've thrown down as well. While resulting in a more full-fledged, well-rounded manuscript, this approach will also give more than its fair share of chin-scratching moments where you are searching for just the right combination of words before finally heaving a sigh and going with your gut. Most of the time, you'll get it right. Other times, you won't and occasionally the fuckups will be big enough to send you running for the hills. The time it takes on this approach, along with the moments of uncertainty, result in the largest amount of aborted manuscripts.
3) The "Fuck You, I Am A Perfection Nazi" Method. This approach requires the greatest amount of pre-planning, confidence and determination of the three, and is not recommended for rookies or the literary faint of heart. By doing this, you are committing yourself to agonizing over every fifth sentence, chanting "Damnit, I do know what I'm doing" each and every day and running the biggest risk of throwing up your hands in frustrated disgust and walking away, never to write a book again. You will end up making love to your thesauras, and you will question over and over again just how good you really are as you wallow night and day in this project. There is no rest for the wicked when getting on this road, kids. The potential rewards are staggering, though; you may actually crank that Roger Clemens fastball for at least a stout double, and doing so does a world of good in the confidence department.
Which one is the best? In the end, like so many other things in this discipline, that's up the individual and their own set of checks and balances as they mull over their latest idea. My personal take is that whichever one works the best at getting you to that finish line with at least most of your sanity and confidence still intact is the one you should use, but then again, I've been doing this for a while and have wallowed in all three extensively.
In the beginning, it's good enough to commit to a starting point. After that, just have fun and climb all your favorite soapboxes when you feel the urge to until you get to the end.
(Okay, I say go with #2. Really. Now get to it.)
- Soundtrack:Battlestar Galactica - "Main Theme"
I know, I know. You were going to hit the ball out of the park on the first try. After all, isn't that why you spent so much time in your pre-plotting, laying out your chapters so they could build to a natural-seeming and satisfying conclusion? I know it's definitely why you spent so much time agonizing on the turn of this phrase or that, because you wanted the words to flow naturally while at the same time showing the world that you've got the chops to make the preening literary editors sit up straight in their seats. When you got this idea, it hit you like a nova burst and really, how can we help but be pulled in by your sublime turns of phrase?
You didn't hit that home run, but that's okay. Now we start the real work.
"But Jesse," you may be saying, "haven't I already done the work? I mean, did what you said. I pre-plotted, boned up on dialogue and made sure that my plot didn't get bogged down with too many visits from the Exposition Fairy. Did I not do what I was supposed to?"
You did, and at the same time, you didn't. Don't worry, though. We're going to fix all that.
- Soundtrack:Dinosaur Jr. - "Freak Scene"
A little history lesson is probably in order here. Like so many other aspiring writers, I cut my combat teeth by starting off in the land of fanfic... although back when I was getting started, reprehensible terms like "slash" had yet to make their odious presence known. The rules were pretty simple; there really weren't any. You could be as explicit or G-rated as you liked, you could do two pages or two thousand, but most of all, as long as you remained true to the subject matter, anything was a go.
Oh, I should probably mention one other thing that was different back then. There were no communities where you shared your works, because there was no such thing as the Internet. This was a project done purely out of love (or obsession, whichever label you think is more accurate) and the reward in the end was nothing more than the glow of accomplishment. In this arena, I was par for the course by picking out my favorite series at the time (which was V) and doing stories within that universe.
It should be stated for the record that my efforts were not very good. In fact, if I had an example of them before me (which thankfully for my ego I do not) I am sure that the sands of time would reveal that those stories I spent so much effort and hope on in fact actually sucked on dry ice. I broke most, if not all, the rules about writing fanfic and turned out Mary-Sue characters by the boatload. My list of sins, in retrospect, was seemingly endless. Bad characterization, kewl powerz (the less said about that the better), self-insertion (ditto and double on that taboo subject) and breaking the rules of genre and decorum left and right with little regard for how a professional would have approached things.
I'm very glad I went about this in such a clusterfuck manner, though. I'm now getting ready to go back and re-visit a story that has held at least part of my attention for almost two decades now, and I'm really hoping that this time I am the equal of the task before me. I want Living After Midnight to succeed the way that Survivors, Falling From Grace, Lottery Odds and The Long Weekend did and possibly could not, because of where I was in my life when I wrote those stories.
What am I trying to say? At this moment, I'm not sure. Rambling bullcrap, thy name is blog. Maybe tomorrow I'll start posting some baseball stuff. Until then, my devoted peeps, have the best day you can. Be well.
- Soundtrack:Stephen Lynch - "Beelz"
Stop laughing.
I've been reading some more contemporary examples of the genre lately, and it's interesting to note that not all romance novels are flowing dresses, languid eyes and calf-eyed furtive looks. In fact, some of them are downright gritty; serial killers, arsonists, deviants, rape, beatings and so on, with a love story serving as the sometimes secondary/sometimes primary plot. You don't have to be a complete fucking pansy or wear frilly things to write a romance novel, and remember, this is coming from the guy who takes bubble baths with sports talk radio, so I definitely know where I am coming from on this one.
You can write a romance novel with teeth, and they can be filed just as sharp as you like as long as there's some love along the way. Interesting idea, eh? The tentative title is Living After Midnight (yes, like the old Judas Priest song); that, like many other things, may change as time goes on.
I say this because I have had a romance story in the back of my head since high school, and I have taken no less than four full-length whacks at this particular literary pinata. I have also changed elements along the way (locations, ages, jobs, etcetera), so that the stories serve as alternate universe versions of each other when compared. I'm thinking it may be time to give it another whack, considering the story is getting pretty hot in my head. Also, I think I'm going to do my one-shot novels (as opposed to longer story arcs involving multiple volumes) in the National Novel Writing Month style, since that has worked pretty well for em the last two years. Tons of prep, first of the month, hit the gas and burn through that outline.
Then again, I reserve the right to change everything at a moment's notice. They're my toys, and I'll break them however I wish.
- Soundtrack:The Donnas - "Take It Off"
My dad is about halfway through The Final Nine and is completely loving it. He seems to be sort of surprised that I am actually decent as a writer (or "thisfuckin'good!" as I like to say in a vaguely cheesy New York accent) and has found many things to be complementary about concerning this book. I laughed when he told me this, then said, "Well, it's a good thing you're just getting into my stuff now because back in the day... hoo boy, you'd have thought I was crazy for staying on this hope train."
He laughed, I laughed. It's how our family copes with uncomfortable truths. I'll bet yours does as well.
- Soundtrack:R.E.M. - "Wall Of Death"
What didn't feel good was the letter I got in my email box today. See, as a NaNo participant, I get messages from the NaNo team, published authors offering words of inspiration and the like. It's all well and good, and sometimes there are some genuine words of wisdom in there. Not so with this morning's treatise by my personal nominess for World's Most Overrated And Asinine Author, Tom Robbins. Yes, the same Tom Robbins who I lambaste and lampoon on such a regular basis around here. His message was:
Dear NaNoWriMo participant,
When you sit down to begin that novel of yours, the first thing you might want to do is toss a handful of powdered napalm over both shoulders---so as to dispense with any and all of your old writing teachers, the ones whose ghosts surely will be hovering there, saying such things as, "Adverbs should never be...", or "A novel is supposed to convey...", et cetera. Enough! Ye literary bureaucrats, vamoose!
Rules such as "Write what you know," and "Show, don't tell," while doubtlessly grounded in good sense, can be ignored with impunity by any novelist nimble enough to get away with it. There is, in fact, only one rule in writing fiction: Whatever works, works.
Ah, but how can you know if it's working? The truth is, you can't always know (I nearly burned my first novel a dozen times, and it's still in print after 35 years), you just have to sense it, feel it, trust it. It's intu itive, and that peculiar brand of intuition is a gift from the gods. Obviously, most people have received a different package altogether, but until you undo the ribbons you can never be sure.
As the great Nelson Algren once said, “Any writer who knows what he's doing isn't doing very much.” Most really good fiction is compelled into being. It comes from a kind of uncalculated innocence. You need not have your ending in mind before you commence. Indeed, you need not be certain of exactly what's going to transpire on page 2. If you know the whole story in advance, your novel is probably dead before you begin it. Give it some room to breathe, to change direction, to surprise you. Writing a novel is not so much a project as a journey, a voyage, an adventure.
A topic is necessary, of course; a theme, a general sense of the nexus of effects you'd like your narrative to ultimately produce. Beyond that, you simply pack your imagination, your sense of humor, a character or two, and your personal world view into a little canoe, push it out onto the vast dark river, and see where the currents take you. And should you ever think you hear the sound of dangerous rapids around the next bend, hey, hang on, tighten your focus, and keep paddling---because now you're really writing, baby! This is the best part.
It's a bit like being out of control and totally in charge, simultaneously. If that seems tricky, well, it's a tricky business. Try it. It'll drive you crazy. And you'll love it.
Tom Robbins
Without a doubt, that is some of the worst advice I have ever heard in the writing field and goes a long ways toward explaining exactly why I hate his literary guts. In other words, DO NOT WANT.
- Soundtrack:Green Day - "At The Library"
The last word count I had on this seemingly endless novel was 79,478 words. Today, after some furious keyboard pounding and stream-of-consciousness writing (giving the middle finger to Writer's Fear/Block), the word count total stands at a rather impressive 84,751.
In other words, I did 5,273 words today.
I'm going to knock The Final Nine out of the park, folks. Unlike most NaNo participants who plan on getting good and wired on caffeine (or whatever) and then hitting the ground running at 12:01 AM on November 1st, I plan on actually getting a good night's sleep after passing out the candy to the trick-or-treaters in our neighborhood, having a leisurely cup of coffee and a toaster strudel (strawberry and cream cheese) and then getting to work on the book. Heresy, I know.
I'm not going to have Underworld finished before I start this project like I wanted to and said I would, and for that, I suck. However, I'm glad to have dusted it off and found quite a bit of life in the book, as evidenced by the the word total I got today. It felt very good to be doing Kyle and Angelique again, even if only for an afternoon.
This will probably be the last entry for a while that isn't NaNo stuff, but then again, you're not really surprised by that, are you? Good thoughts to you and yours, and for those of you about to novel... happy hunting.
- Soundtrack:Eve 6 - "Promise"
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