The upside of writing lots of pages at a time is feeling like a rock star. The down side is feeling repetitive. It feels like I've typed "he said/she said" a gazillion times by now, even with making an effort not to tag all the dialogue the same.
Oddly enough, though, I was reassured about it a few nights ago by none other than a dream. In the dream I came across three second-hand books by Stephen King. I have no idea what the titles were, but the fact that they were by King was crystal clear. Now, the previous owner had put sticky tabs in the books that were coordinated with each other. When I looked at a tab in one book, then a tab in another, I realized the person had marked identical sentences. In short, they had marked where King repeated himself.
Yes, I know it's just a dream, but when I woke up I felt better about the voice in my head saying I was being redundant. After all, there are only so many ways to tag a line of dialogue and even the most brilliant writers can't always say the same thing in different ways. Now I'm reminding myself I just have to use the words that get the job done and not worry about it. My readers aren't going to notice, and if they do, that's what revision is for.
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
Shiny and New
Here we go, a new month, a new year. It's all about fresh starts, right? So, this month I'm going to make my challenge about starting a new project. The type and length of the project is up to you, but it's time to take a little bit of energy you've spent on the same old thing and re-channel it.
Me, I'm making the leap to mash the Cass stuff I've written before into a novel. It's my new plan for what I'm going to do with Cass and it's made me write new words and revise old ones into a new structure, tense, and POV. It's all smelling very brand new car.
How 'bout you?
Me, I'm making the leap to mash the Cass stuff I've written before into a novel. It's my new plan for what I'm going to do with Cass and it's made me write new words and revise old ones into a new structure, tense, and POV. It's all smelling very brand new car.
How 'bout you?
Unforseen Turn
I've got a great deal of the Cass book, which I've settled on calling Crossroad's Promise, already thought out in my head - to greater or lesser degrees, depending. I've got plans for plot and characters sketched out and waiting to be fulfilled.
Generally, I'm pretty clear on where I'm going next, even if I'm only a few paragraphs ahead of myself as I'm writing. But, a few nights ago I experienced the same thing Deb talked about a while back, an unexpected turn.
I was working my way through the end of a scene and my plan was to lead the characters up the road a ways, then turn left. But, they turned right instead. They didn't follow the plan. Needless to say, I was surprised by their rebellion.
In my mind, I had thought I might bring them to this point a little later on (or I might not, I hadn't quite decided) and all off a sudden, there we were, ahead of schedule. Those unruly troublemakers gave me no choice, I had to go along with it. So, now I've moved another scene up sooner and I'm wondering how this will affect things overall. Time to make a new plan, I guess.
Generally, I'm pretty clear on where I'm going next, even if I'm only a few paragraphs ahead of myself as I'm writing. But, a few nights ago I experienced the same thing Deb talked about a while back, an unexpected turn.
I was working my way through the end of a scene and my plan was to lead the characters up the road a ways, then turn left. But, they turned right instead. They didn't follow the plan. Needless to say, I was surprised by their rebellion.
In my mind, I had thought I might bring them to this point a little later on (or I might not, I hadn't quite decided) and all off a sudden, there we were, ahead of schedule. Those unruly troublemakers gave me no choice, I had to go along with it. So, now I've moved another scene up sooner and I'm wondering how this will affect things overall. Time to make a new plan, I guess.
Sunday, January 4, 2009
Late Xmas Present for Myself
Every year after Christmas I get something for myself off my Xmas list. This year I'm adding to my sparse DVD collection. I just ordered seasons 1&2 of Supernatural online and I'm hoping they ship fast.
Last night I finished re-watching Firefly and Serenity. The flavor of Supernatural fits really well as a follow-up. If only I had a bigger budget for fun stuff, I'd go for all the released seasons right now. Two's not a bad start, though. Not bad at all.
Last night I finished re-watching Firefly and Serenity. The flavor of Supernatural fits really well as a follow-up. If only I had a bigger budget for fun stuff, I'd go for all the released seasons right now. Two's not a bad start, though. Not bad at all.
Colonial House
In general terms, I'm not a reality TV fan. The little that I've watched usually seems to be some kind of game show or a whole lot of people having petty fights and whining at the camera.
However, I've recently become fascinated with one particular variety of reality TV. I've watched two series of them so far, with more lined up in my Netflix queue. These shows skip the part about voting people off the island and cut right to the part about dumping modern people in the past.
The one I just finished, Colonial House, plopped a group of people in a recreated 1628 setting in New England and pretty much let them fend for themselves for four months. As much as possible, they recreated the technology, social structures, and pressures original colonists would have navigated. Psychologically, it's amazing how quickly people adjust. It's brilliant.
As I was watching the show, the thought kept going through my mind that it would be quite the experience to do something like that, either as part of the cast, or behind the scenes as one of the people creating different historically-based scenarios.
Between the three I've seen - the others were Manor House and Regency House - Colonial House is by far the most intense. Also, by far, the one with the harshest setting. Crazy stuff. Crazy, fascinating stuff.
However, I've recently become fascinated with one particular variety of reality TV. I've watched two series of them so far, with more lined up in my Netflix queue. These shows skip the part about voting people off the island and cut right to the part about dumping modern people in the past.
The one I just finished, Colonial House, plopped a group of people in a recreated 1628 setting in New England and pretty much let them fend for themselves for four months. As much as possible, they recreated the technology, social structures, and pressures original colonists would have navigated. Psychologically, it's amazing how quickly people adjust. It's brilliant.
As I was watching the show, the thought kept going through my mind that it would be quite the experience to do something like that, either as part of the cast, or behind the scenes as one of the people creating different historically-based scenarios.
Between the three I've seen - the others were Manor House and Regency House - Colonial House is by far the most intense. Also, by far, the one with the harshest setting. Crazy stuff. Crazy, fascinating stuff.
Friday, January 2, 2009
Thursday, January 1, 2009
Moving Along
I'm writing the Cass project different than anything else I've written. Typically, I write in the order things go in. I write the beginning, then the middle, then the end. It's different with this one.
I think working on my thesis has something to do with that. With the thesis I worked on the pieces individually, then pulled them together at the end. It was the only way I could get it done and it forced me to see the overall vision differently. It loosened me up, mostly.
With Cass, I'm doing the same thing. I started off by kind of circling it. I had a couple of story ideas and I wrote those stories down as they came to me. I knew they were all connected, and I could see a sketchy kind of timeline that connected them, but I didn't worry about the particulars. I knew I'd sort that out later.
After a few stories, I started one that felt like it had enough going on in it that it should be more than a story.
A few weeks later, after writing a couple pieces that'd fit in with the same plotline, I decided that I wanted to try and make a novel out of this. This week is when I've really started putting it all together. I've got about four stories that just don't fit, so they're tucked away to save for later. I've also got about the same number of stories/scenes I wrote out a while ago that do fit. A piece here, a piece there, and as I'm fiddling with it all, I can see that I already have a chapter 1, 3, 6(or so), one that'll be around chap. 12 or so, and a scene that'll fit into one of the last chapters.
It's like a quilt. So, I'm working my way linearly for now, stitching things together as I go and filling in what needs filling in. And, almost before I realized it, I had 30 pages. It's cool. It's exciting to see this book coming together like this.
Still need to figure out a title for it, but I've got 30 pages today and I'm not due for another CWC submission until March. I'm ahead. The novelty of it is nice.
I think working on my thesis has something to do with that. With the thesis I worked on the pieces individually, then pulled them together at the end. It was the only way I could get it done and it forced me to see the overall vision differently. It loosened me up, mostly.
With Cass, I'm doing the same thing. I started off by kind of circling it. I had a couple of story ideas and I wrote those stories down as they came to me. I knew they were all connected, and I could see a sketchy kind of timeline that connected them, but I didn't worry about the particulars. I knew I'd sort that out later.
After a few stories, I started one that felt like it had enough going on in it that it should be more than a story.
A few weeks later, after writing a couple pieces that'd fit in with the same plotline, I decided that I wanted to try and make a novel out of this. This week is when I've really started putting it all together. I've got about four stories that just don't fit, so they're tucked away to save for later. I've also got about the same number of stories/scenes I wrote out a while ago that do fit. A piece here, a piece there, and as I'm fiddling with it all, I can see that I already have a chapter 1, 3, 6(or so), one that'll be around chap. 12 or so, and a scene that'll fit into one of the last chapters.
It's like a quilt. So, I'm working my way linearly for now, stitching things together as I go and filling in what needs filling in. And, almost before I realized it, I had 30 pages. It's cool. It's exciting to see this book coming together like this.
Still need to figure out a title for it, but I've got 30 pages today and I'm not due for another CWC submission until March. I'm ahead. The novelty of it is nice.
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