Category: writing Page 10 of 11

Nanowrimo Day 3

On November 4, 2016

Making progress: 2015 words written over five sessions and in four different locations*. Never let it be said that flexibility is not key.

The story is continuing to move forward, though slower than I had envisioned, but that may be a good thing. My goal was to get Maddy to the ball and have her meet her fiance for the first time. Well, I got Maddy to the ball, but then a new character arrived (that I had not even imagined) to throw some metaphorical fireworks, and only at the end of the writing day did the fiance show up—at a most inopportune time, of course! Writing the excitable and artless mother, and her daughters’ reactions, is a lot of fun.

Three things are helping me write this novel:

A goal for each scene (e.g. “Maddy gets to the ball and meets her fiance for the first time”). This provides some direction, but leaves a lotof latitude for new ideas (and characters!) to crop up.
A word count goal for each session (e.g. “500 words in 20 minutes” and “2000 words for the day”). Having a number to work towards helps provide motivation (“just 125 more words!”). I thought I had reached 2000, then discovered I was 125 short, so I went back to the last paragraph I had written and continued writing from there. Ended up with 140 words. <happy dance>
Writemonkey. Oh, Writemonkey, I don’t know what I would do without you. Your progress bar at the top of the screen showing me how many words I’ve written (without saying the precise number, you sassy thing) combined with the blinking cursor to show how much time remains, make writing a joy.

Writing sessions today:

20″ – 512 words

20″ – 563 words

15″ – 110 words

35″ – 650 words

10″ – 180 words

Total time writing: 200 minutes (3 hours 20 minutes)

Total word count: 4180 words

*I’m reminded of Dr. Seuss: Would you, could you, on a train? Would you, could you, on a plane (well, a bus)? The answer is YES!

Nanowrimo Day 2

By Andi

On November 3, 2016

In Nanowrimo, writing

Had a good day. Finished chapter one over the course of four writing sessions (15-35 minutes each). I was surprised by how the plot has already turned from the vague idea/plan I had (from Madalene coming out swinging at the intended groom to looking at the marriage as an opportunity to achieve her dream), and that there are three sisters (I was thinking there were five, but this could change again).

There are some things to go back and add (more/better clothing descriptions since the clothing will help with having Madalene doing something while arguing with her mother and show her interests, and have Madalene know about the ball but just finding out that her intended will be there), but the foundation is set.

Off to a decent start. Can’t wait to find out how Maddy and the groom interact!

Writing sessions today:

15″ – 253 words

15″ – 318 words

20″ – 444 words

35″ – 797 words

Total time writing: 100 minutes

Total word count: 2165 words

Nanowrimo Day 1

By Andi

On November 2, 2016

In Nanowrimo, writing

Day 0:

The idea for this novel started from:

I’ve been wanting to write a steampunk novel for awhile (2 years?).
I had an image of a young woman in goggles and grease, grinning.
A Random Title Generator came up with “The Vacant Ships”.
The current Plotto contest through Tin House Publishing had a prompt: “{A}, proceeding about his business and caught in a crowd, is confronted suddenly by a strange person, {BX}, who thrusts a mysterious object, {X}, into his hand and, without a word, disappears.”
Then I had a thought: What if Jane Austen met Steampunk?

What followed was some light research (aka Wikipedia) into Regency and Victorian eras, steampunk, and Pride and Prejudice (one of my favorite novels). So combining those, the idea turned into: a young woman is faced with an arranged marriage (due to family financial difficulties) to a dashing captain (with whom she doesn’t get along), when what she really wants to do is to fly with the air corps (she likes getting greasy). All of this wrapped in an adventure/mystery/romance package of Steampunky goodness.

Yeah, not a lot of details—no names, no character backgrounds, no charts, no family histories, no worldbuilding. Just a very rough idea.

Day 1:

After much procrastination (setting up Nanowrimo account, writing thoughts and worries into a journal, writing blog post announcing the start of all this, researching Regency era names, getting more tea), I sat down and wrote 353 words in fifteen minutes about Madalene Swinhope and her confrontation with her mother about being married off without her having any say in the matter.

It took awhile to get started because starting is the hardest part when you have nothing already written to work from. Where do I begin? What is happening? Where is it happening? What action are the characters taking? Is the language too stilted or just about right for Regency-ish writing? How do I convey Madalene’s outrage and frustration? Wait, what exactly is Madalene’s personality? Is she the oldest sister? If not, who is? What is that person like? Does that person enter in this scene? What are the characters’ points of view (i.e. what is their reasoning for their opinions)? When should I introduce the nominal groom? How close is this/should this be to Pride and Prejudice?

Letting the mind play with ideas like a child plays with a blocks (puts some together, then rearranges them or knocks them down to start over) is great—it invites the Muse to visit. Getting caught up in the mechanics of writing (how to portray something, fussing about language) is not so great—it allows the Editor to muck about and shove Muse to the side because These Things Are Important, which results in no new words getting written. We wants the words!

Overall, while I didn’t get the goal of 1,667 words written, I am off to a decent start (you have to start somewhere).

Total time writing: 15 minutes

Total word count: 353 words

National Novel Writing Month begins (2016 edition)

By Andi

On November 1, 2016

In Nanowrimo, writing

Welcome to November, aka National Novel Writing Month (aka Nanowrimo—”na-no-RYE-mo”). The goal: over the next 30 days to write a 50,000 word novel from scratch.

Yup, from absolutely nothin’.

While I’ve completed six novels courtesy of Nanowrimo, this year I’ll be blogging it as I write. Naked writing/blogging, if you will. Why? To create a record of the experience that isn’t just a spreadsheet, and to show that writing a novel in 30 days is not that hard and doesn’t have to take up all of one’s life.

A novel will be a change for me because lately I’ve been writing short stories and the occasional novella (which was supposed to be a short story and, um, went longer). The last novel I wrote was during Nanowrimo 2014, and I spent 20 writing days on that from start to finish, and the only drama was in the story itself. With any luck, this year will be similar.

Follow along with me (“andipedia”), and join in the Nano fun!

Do it now

By Andi

On September 14, 2016

In life, writing

Art comes first. Or maybe exercise comes first. Or perhaps meditating comes first. Or getting work done comes first.

It doesn’t matter what the priority is, but there must be a priority. Choose one. Then do it first, before anything sabotages your day. Protect the time you need to do it like the fragile little bird that it is.

If you don’t do it, it is clearly not a priority. Excuses are boring.

Do it now.

This PSA brought to you by the “Instead of Saying ‘I Don’t Have Time,’ Say ‘It’s Not a Priority'” vanguard.

For a more fitness-oriented approach, see a related post on Nerd Fitness.

Perfection is for losers

By Andi

On August 26, 2016

In life, writing

Or so I have to remind myself.

For the past few months (egads, months), I’ve been working on putting together a flash fiction collection. It wasn’t the actual writing of the stories, or even the revising of the stories, that has taken the bulk of the time.

Getting it typeset and ready for publication has been the Time Suck Extraordinaire.

I have been learning the ins and outs of book design. Things like:

the horrors of widows and orphans and runts
why justification is a good thing (when I was convinced it was Utter Evil)
how to set up a book template, with all of the appropriate margins and master pages and paragraph styles
finding fonts that look good and do not require paying someone
the differences between title case, all caps, and small caps
drop caps look cool, but are perhaps not worth the time or effort
how to write blurbs
the true book content always starts on a right-hand page with Page 1
starting chapters on a right-hand page is classy
there really are no (or at least very few) rules WRT book design (other than that bit about always starting the true book content on right-hand page #1)

but most importantly:

I hate designing covers and writing about myself

Yeah, good times.

So a LOT of time spent mucking about with learning not only the industry standards (or close-enoughs) of book layout and design, but also the damn software to make the book layout and design happen.

I am really hoping that the time I’ve put into this will pay off later when I can just use a template I already put together, and format text quickly (since I’ve learned the little niggling bits that Scribus uses to ~~annoy~~ be different from InDesign).

Have I spent too much time on all of this for a 40 page collection of very short stories? Oh, probably. Which is why I’m having to remind myself that:

The Perfect is the enemy of the Good. Or Good Enough.

In this age of digital publishing*, there are very few things that can’t be changed. Need to modify the document? Fix it, then upload the corrected version, and get on with life. Write more, live more. Don’t get caught up in the nit-pickies of the minutest details. Yes, get the major points right, but then move on.

Recently, I read two self-published short stories in the same genre: one was beautifully formatted, but the story and writing were, shall we say, less than satisfactory; the other one was poorly formatted, but the story was engaging and well-written. Guess which author I will continue to read?**

Perfection is an ideal we will never meet. Not to mention that it’s also a stress-inducing strategy that makes a challenging activity even more difficult. It’s time we accept this, and make the most of our art/lives.

Life is short. Get over yourself and your need for perfection (aka FEAR), and do your thing with love and joy.***

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*I think this applies to most of life as well.

**The poorly formatted, well-written one, if that wasn’t obvious.

***More reminders for myself. Hopefully this helps you, too.

The joy of limits

By Andi

On August 11, 2016

In life, writing

It’s happening again. I took a break, got some sleep and relaxation in, and started feeling pretty good. Got some energy and that itch to get back into the swing of things. So of course I dove head first into the metaphorical pool because I can DO ALL THE THINGS. And then I promptly discovered that whatever energy I had was now dissipating with all of the things now needing my attention. (The same things I hadn’t been thinking about while on break, so clearly they weren’t all truly needing attention right this moment. Greedy bastards.)

So, yeah. About limits . . .

Why limits are good

Limits are Very Good Things and should be embraced, delighted in, and revered. But why should you embrace limits? Aren’t we all supposed to believe that we have limitless abilities, that “the sky’s the limit,” that anyone or thing that limits us is bad? Limits are evil, right?

Wrong. Oh, so wrong.

Limits keep you safe. There is a reason there are speed limits on roads: because the majority of people (not you, obviously) can’t drive safely at high speeds. The speed limit is there to help those drivers maintain a degree of control.
Limits make you more creative. What happens when you have all the resources you could ever need or want? When I’ve had a day to myself to just write, my Muse takes a vacation. When the fridge is stocked, I get stumped on what to put together because there are SO MANY OPTIONS. “Well, clearly, you don’t need me, darling. You have all you could need!” Muse says in a Zsa Zsa Gabor voice. But when I’ve run out of time to workout, or I don’t have the black art kraft paper I was planning to use, or I used up the last eggs in Tuesday’s dinner, or I only have space for three sentences (and not three pages), that’s when Muse comes back and says, “Oh, you need me! Here, let me help you, darling.” Can I fit in a set of pushups at my desk? What about using the art kraft paper I can find and making that work somehow? What can I bake that does not require eggs, or is there something I can substitute for them? How can I get to the heart of the matter and lose all the extra words? Limits force your mind to make connections that it wouldn’t otherwise make. Necessity is the mother of invention, after all.
Limits help keep you sane and healthy. Knowing you can push yourself is good, but even better is knowing what exactly your limits are. What is the minimum amount of sleep you need to function? How much/often do you need to create to stay happy? How many cookies can you eat and not feel sick? Determine your minimums/maximums (i.e. your limits) for staying physically, emotionally, and mentally in balance.
Limits make you more productive. When you only have X amount of time to do something, your brain will go into problem solving mode. It’s all about Parkinson’s Law: “work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.” Inversely, by limiting the amount of time to do something, you may be able to get more done. What if you only had ten minutes to work out? What if your story could only be 1000 words? What if your deadline for creating that artwork was the end of the week? How would those limits change your priorities, or the way you do your work?

How to create limits

These examples are aimed at writers, but adapt to your own art/situation. I’ve used these with cooking, working out, reading, and more.

Tick Tock. Set a deadline or allow only a certain length of time.
[Due by 5 pm this Friday.]
[As many words as possible in 15 minutes.]
Numbers. Allow only a certain number (words, tools, items, etc.)
[500 word story.]
[Use only 1 program/application.]
[Can contain only 2 characters.]
Must have. Require the inclusion of something (a phrase, an object, a genre, etc.)
[“Everybody wants one.”]
[A pocketwatch, true love, and a cave.]
[Superhero AND Noir.]

What are your limits? Have you been able to maintain them? What causes you to break them?

7 ways to write when you just don’t have the energy

By Andi

On July 21, 2016

In writing

So life has gotten a wee bit hectic around the Winter household. I really don’t want to think about this becoming the new Normal, because if I look back, life has been a constant state of “rolling with the punches” for the past, oh, 20 months. A lot of it has been good, but even good stress can still raise its scary scaled head. Is this the new Normal? Yikes.

All of which is to say that I managed to finish that story written ala “Writing into the Dark” style, and instead of being a 4,000-6,000 word short story, it ended up becoming a monster 17,000+ word novella. Technically that’s still a “short story” to some, but it is a length way beyond what I’ve been usually writing of late (which is probably kind of funny coming from a novelist).

After that mini juggernaut, my Muse said she was taking a break. I hadn’t tasked her with that constant of attention (and wordage) since Nanowrimo, so the girl deserved some time off.

But it’s been over two weeks and I’m feeling the itch* to get back into writing (it’s not the same as book formatting, which I’ve been focusing on), but my time and energy are limited (see the first paragraph).

How do you write when you want to but you don’t have the energy?

Pick up a notebook and write the first sentence. Seriously, write a single sentence. It doesn’t matter what it is or what it says. Just start.
Start an email to a fictional friend. This could be a literary character, your Invisible Friend from childhood, or a character you make up.
Write a diary entry. Bonus points if it’s from a point of view not your own.
Jot down all the reasons you don’t have the energy to write. Then laugh at yourself for having written.
Take your shopping list and add descriptions to the items. Bonus points if they get particularly effusive and purple.
Create a list of five favorite books, movies, and TV shows. Pick two. Combine those two in your mind. Now write the first sentence.
Start with a dead body. Literally. Introduce a dead body in your first sentence. Then see what happens from there.

The best way I’ve found to start writing, regardless of time/energy constraints, is to sit down with a notebook and a pen, put the pen tip on the paper and see what happens. This works for those times you are waiting in line, experiencing quiet moments at the office, on lunch breaks, sitting in a car, riding the bus, boiling water — anytime you’re in life’s margins.

How do you create when the interest is there but the energy isn’t? Do you create, or do you take a time out?

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*If I’m feeling the itch, it means Muse is making her way back. And I do NOT want to piss her off, so I’d better start writing right now. <note to self>

The difference between plot and story

By Andi

On June 15, 2016

In writing

I was reading Chuck Wendig’s blog post about “What exactly makes a damn good story” and got frustrated. While I liked Wendig’s take on The Hero’s Journey (he’s brilliant at summing up some things rather succintly, with NSFW language), and he gave the answer, he didn’t elaborate enough for a young/new writer to act on it.

Conflict.

Conflict is the building block of story. Conflict is what makes you pore through a book. Conflict is the core of any story, whether a book, a movie, a game, a song, a joke.

What is conflict? It’s simple*: somebody wants something, and something gets in their way**.

Put mathematically:
WANT + OBSTACLE = CONFLICT

Now, just having Someone Wanting Something and then Something Getting in Their Way (of getting what they want) is not a story. I may want to win the Olympics, but I don’t have the skills — oh so sad. How many times have you heard a friend say they wanted to do X, or achieve Y (lose weight, run a marathon, write a novel, get a better job), and then they did nothing? How did you feel hearing about that? Me, I tend to get frustrated or annoyed. To my mind, if you want it, then do something about it, even if it’s something small.

Which is why, for a story, that Someone Wanting Something has to take action and do something. Otherwise, the reader is thinking, “What’s the point?” and even worse, probably putting down the book (or worse yet, writing scathing reviews).

So we add action to the equation:
WANT + OBSTACLE + ACTION = a good start to story

Now we have Someone Wanting Something, then Something Getting in Their Way, and then the Someone Taking Action. How does it end? Does the Someone get what they Wanted? Does the Someone fail? Does the Someone fail and then discover something else they want?

To complete the story, there has to be resolution: what happens? Was the Someone successful? Did they get what they wanted?

Which completes the story equation:
WANT + OBSTACLE + ACTION + RESOLUTION = STORY

Want a longer story? Keep repeating the equation, generally with the resolution being “failed,” so that the Someone either continues to pursue the initial Want, or they change direction and have a new, different Want.

tl;dr: Plot is a sequence of narrative events (this happened, and then this happened). Story is a sequence of narrative events that occurs as the result of a character trying to achieve a goal despite various osbstacles.

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*Yeah, it’s simple. Doesn’t mean it’s easy.

**Special thanks and so much appreciation to Jerry Cleaver and his book Immediate Fiction. His book was the first one I found that actually defined “conflict” without getting caught up in loosey goosey airy terms.

Mini Art Month summary

By Andi

On June 8, 2016

In MAM, writing

Mini Art Month was my attempt to regain some artistic control of my life. I lost the month of April due to Life Happening*, and I needed something to bolster my artistic spirit. I tend to get caught up in the myth** that I have to have huge chunks of time to do my “art,” and I’ve discovered time and again that’s just a way to procrastinate. Why am I procrastinating, especially when art is something I want to do?

The Critic*** warns me away or offers helpful suggestions like “you should research that some more.” Occasionally I call it “Perfectionism”**** if I want to make myself feel better.

So let’s just call it what it is: Fear.

Fear of failure. Fear of embarrassment. Fear of succeeding. Fear of wasting time. Fear of what others might think. Fear of discomfort. Fear of the unknown. Fear of change.

Fear. It sucks.

With Mini Art Month, my goal was to make the making of art as easy and consistent as possible: something small, every day. Did I achieve that? Nope, not every day, but over the course of the month, I did more art (esp. writing) than I did in previous months.

The numbers:

Days of Art:
24 out of 30 (started on May 2)

Types of Art:
7 different kinds (poetry, photography, baking, planting, coloring, display making, and writing)

Takeaways:

I need to set priorities and create limits. If something is important to me, then I need to make it a priority. One way to make it a priority is to do it early in the day before the chaos ensues. As difficult as it is for me, I’ve found that I feel better (and actually write better/more) if I do my writing first thing in the morning. That gets the bare minimum done for the day, and anything else is tasty gravy. I also work better if I have tiny limits, like “Write for 15 minutes.” For some reason, using time as the work metric frees me; I don’t have to worry about having enough words or if they’re any good. I just have to sit my ass down for fifteen minutes and write. Simple and effective.
Writing is my path/practice. Writing is what I need to stay sane, and doing it every day, even in small bits, is good. While it often feels like I’m not getting anywhere, let alone fast, it all adds up. Until I reviewed my MAM posts, I thought I had only been working on one story (my current one). I didn’t realize that I finished two stories in May, and then started the current one, for a total of over 6000 words (20-ish pages). Huh.
But I need to lighten up and have fun. For some reason, I get very serious about writing. Combine that with an innate need to create schedules/plans, and I set myself up for failure (oops! missed a self-imposed deadline. i am such a loser. i should quit), which is Not Fun. Since writing is something that I choose to do, maybe it should be fun. After all, should I really be taking the writing of fantasy/sci-fi short stories and novels seriously? Come on — werewolves, robots, zombies, talking dogs, time agents . . . is this really serious content? Here’s a strange thought: PLAY.
Mini Art Month is a great way to get back into making art. Looking back at it, I can’t honestly call the baking, planting, coloring, or display making, “art” (and even the photography and poetry is a bit dodgy). However, they were helpful for jumpstarting my creativity and for getting me to try some new/different things. I’d like to keep trying my hand at photography because it’s good to actually see the world (and not just get caught up in my head), and I’m seriously considering a daily haiku exercise to get my brain thinking more lyrically and succinctly.

Was Mini Art Month worth it?

YES, because it gave me a structure to fall back on with tiny, easily achievable goals (make something small! every day!).

And most importantly, YES, because it got me back in the habit of writing every day. It feels good and I’m making regular writing progress, which feels even better.*****

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*Note the use of quasi-passive tense. It certainly didn’t feel like I had an active role in the chaos that was April.

**Which of course I wrote about earlier. Yes, it’s a lesson I keep needing to relearn.

***Call it the “Critic,” “Inner Editor,” or one I heard recently “Obnoxious Roommate” (one that lives in your head). It’s that internal voice that tells you to not bother, it’s not worth it, there’s no point to it, you’re going to fail, you’re not smart/talented enough, etc. Yeah, that voice.

****Elizabeth Gilbert’s description in Big Magic has stuck with me: “Perfectionism is just fear in fancy shoes and a mink coat.”

*****I want to give a huge thanks to David Seah for inspiring me to try new ways of creating and then analyzing them publicly. It’s nice to know there are other folks out there struggling with similar creative/productive issues.