Yes, Now to Focus and…

I’m at the end of a project. I’m trying to slog through my word count, bit by bit, paragraph by paragraph, so I can finally get a draft of Ivre done. I know where everything goes, I know how to end it.

Now, it’s just a matter of getting there. And not getting distracted.

And I don’t mean the usual distractions of life and such.  I mean by a new project.

I have something in mind – I added it to my projects page – which I’m developing for the November Madness. But it’s starting to seep into my head while I’m trying to focus on finishing Ivre.

So, do I indulge the distraction a bit? Leave aside some time for chasing this squirrel?

Or do I just forge on and pretend the tasty little squirrel is not there, taunting me?

Thoughts from the Neon Boneyard

Vegas, baby!

Or what’s left of the Vegas of dreams, where the Rat Pack ruled and the strip was a wash of neon. The word LED was barely recognized and to get hundreds of lights rolling all at once, you needed colored light bulbs and a lot of people on very rickety supports.

It’s also the home of Amber Unicorn Books.  Some go to Vegas and lose money at the tables. I go to Vegas and come back with a first edition copy of Tanith Lee’s Dreams of Dark and Light, as well as a many vintage short story collections by C.L. Moore, Henry Kuttner and C.M. Kornbluth.

I also came back with a vintage paperback edition of Norstrilla. Because you can’t have enough Cordwainer Smith in your life.

I also got a bit of writing done on the plane ride.  This is not an easy task – I’m a wide guy and the seats are very, very narrow. I have to scrunch my arms together and pretend I’m tiny.

With the outline done, getting words down on the page is proving quite a bit easier. It is now the great battle with time and exhaustion.

And at some point, I need to spend a weekend and crank out a short story. I’m hoping to have three available to shop around to the writer’s group.

Life doesn’t stop and wait for you to catch a break. It keeps rolling along. And if you don’t roll with it, you’ll find a spot in the neon boneyard waiting for you.

How much for a last act?

Twenty one pages. If it was a screenplay, it’d be about right. But no, it’s the ‘scriptment’ outline for the end of Ivre. It’s before my March 31st deadline, which is a good thing. Now I have to buckle down and finish the story.

No, not correct. The story is finished. I just have to get it from the outline onto the page. Then draft zero is done. I wonder how this will feel after I’m done with it. Elemental Metal left me feeling high. I’d finished it. Running Black left me feeling a little low. I felt I hadn’t done it, or the characters, justice.

How will I feel after I leave Ivre?

You’re Joking, Right? Or Goals for 2013

Goals are important. They help one forge through the year ahead with some sense of purpose. This year, aside from surviving the miseries and privations placed upon me by the day job, I have a few other things I want to try.

Note, my photography goals are very slim. I haven’t focused as much as I should on that side of my creative half, but I’m hoping some forthcoming trips change this.

2013 goals –
– Complete first draft of 2012 novel
– Complete outline for 2013 novels
– Win NaNoWriMo
– Complete three short stories within the course of the year.
– Revise at least 2 short stories
– Submit at least one short story to fiction items

3 Month Goal (end of March):
– Complete 2012 novel outline by end of March
– Revise at least one short story from 2012
– Begin first short story.

6 Month Goal (End of June)
– Finish last 30K on Ivre by end of June (Hopefully book itself)
– Complete first short story
– Begin second short story
– Begin outline of new book

9 Month Goals (End of Sept)
– Finish Ivre novel
– Complete second short story
– Revise first short story
– Complete outline of new book
– Begin third short story

12 Month Goals
– Win NaNoWriMo (Novel from the outline)
– Complete third short story
– Revise second short story
– Submit first short story

Edit: Book PR0n – really an in joke for the folks in my writer’s group.

Reflections and the forthcoming year

For notes of a more personal nature, I would suggest visiting my LiveJournal.  But this is for my writing , so I will stay relatively focused.

In terms of my goals, this year has been a mixed bag. I have written three short stories, and have begun subscribing to and supporting two very good SF/Fantasy magazines via eReader, Clarkesworld and Lightspeed,  and am continuing to expand my reading background. I attended two literary cons for the first time in nearly a decade and enjoyed them terribly. I’ve joined a writer’s group, though it is more of a “Let’s keep each other motivated” type group than a “Here’s a hundred red-lines on this story” style. But I think I need that. And I’ve also found a new community through the local F/SF book club. Which lead to… well, read my LJ entry.

As for the novels, Metaphysical Graffiti took a back seat to Ivre. I’ve gotten over 70k words into it and am in the last act, but I’m finding the “seat of the pants” style of writing, where I plan a bit, then write, then plan a bit more hasn’t given me any more spontaneity. If anything, I find myself stopping, rethinking and reworking things far more. I need to have some form of happy medium.

In future, I’ll need to think of my treatments as the initial ‘script’ for my novels.  The writing process is where I film the action in the script, and make room for improvisation by the actors, a.k.a. the characters. I honestly don’t know how literary authors just write and see where characters take them. I suppose in literary works there’s an expected level of meandering which takes place, wherein the tropes of an unhappy marriage, or a person going through a middle aged crisis, or some reflection on the lost promise of youth set against a recognizable background are explored.

The year has also given me a clearer view of my limitations in terms of writing. I work, on average, nearly 10 hours a day, not counting work done via the Blackberry on my trips into and out of the city while riding the Virginia Railway Express.  I spent myself writing email after email, burning creative fuel to keep the work lights glowing. Cranking out even a few paragraphs when I get home is a feat. Yet, somehow, I still do it.  Not to the level of a professional. The pulp writers of old would snicker at my lack of work ethic.  But I still have to have these moments. The writing keeps me sane.

So what are my goals for next year? Well, first, finish Ivre and let it rest  just a bit. Add to my short story count, get them revised, and see if they spark any interest. But get out more, live a bit more, and add to my life resume a bit. Not living and exploring chokes my creativity the way kudzu kills trees.  So I need to keep living.

When the new year hits, I’ll post a fuller list of ambitions regarding my writing. But for now, I need to look back at the lessons learned and see what I can bring into the forthcoming year.

The Madness Ends?

Yes, I have failed. Failed completely and utterly. It’s time to put on some Radiohead and walk into traffic. I did not win at NaNoWriMo. I only generated 28K or so words in my novel. At my last count, it would have taken me until mid december to finally reach 50k.

But, does this mean I’ll be taking a butter knife to my wrists? (Remember, down the road, not across). No. The whole experience taught me a lot of things. And it gave me a great gift.

First, it taught me the value of writing time. My work follows me home, rubs its muddy boots in my couch and does its best Rick James impersonation. It makes writing time very precious. When I was thankful for two hour flights to and from Minneapolis as a way to get more writing in, I knew times was tight.

The writing group’s write-ins were a great help. Having a nice meeting room in the library where everyone could write, keep each other encouraged, and share baked goods gave me a great, on-calendar reason to write away from the distractions of home.

Second, it showed me why I needed to outline beforehand. I found scenes where I’d written at least a few lines worth of outlining vs “X finds out Y did Z” were far easier to write. I’d mapped out beforehand. And I knew where other scenes would need to go. So one of the next steps for me is to get back to my outline and map out the last sections of the book.

Finally, it brought me a lot closer to the folks at the book club and my writer’s group. In some ways, the times afterward, discussing writing and the latest books, was as precious as the writing time itself. It refills the soul and gives us more energy to write.

And the writing continues. I’ll keep going and seeing where this takes me.

Madness Updates

(As a quick aside, if anyone wants to suggest good typewriter based writing images, please let me know. Otherwise, might have to convince someone to pose with the typewriter.)

First day of the great madness is complete. If anyone wishes to see my stats, check my NaNoWriMo site. Aside from a few hand written items beforehand (thank you, strange week), today’s writing was the first focuses push in conjunction with my writer’s group. Despite a drafty meeting room (our usual spot was being used by election monitors), I got quite a bit written. I was forced to remind myself, over and over, to just write. This is a zeroth draft; the initial hose hitting the crowd of rioters. No accuracy is needed.

I managed to squeeze out my 5K, and I will need 1.5 k per day to keep up with completion, but I think I could have produced more if I was not so damned exhausted. One night in the city, with the Washington DC Metro Transit Authority deciding to shut down and re-route trains, and I found myself being dragged home far to late. What was to be a pleasant night of dreams involving Tesla coils and technomancers became an endless chase through orange brick Metro tunnels. Every train was cancelled and re-routed, dragging me further from home and a good night’s sleep.

Tomorrow, I have the day to get in my 1.5k, and do other things such as dishes, laundry, and a movie. The evening features speed dating for SF geeks. Which will be interesting and fun and weird. I very much expect the following conversations:

“Oh, I think Phillip K. Dick is such an overrated author.  E.L. James is far better with conflicted characters.”

“I looked up Giger after seeing Alien vs Predator and it weirded me out. I didn’t expect it to be so scary and sexual.”

“Babylon what? Wasn’t The Prisoner that thing on AMC? Anyway, my favorite show was Star Trek: Voyager. I loved how well thought out it was.”

Hope for the best, expect the worst.