John P. Logsdon's Writing Adventure

First Draft Complete

2011-09-23T10:32:00.002-04:00

Finished the first draft last week of the s.f. comedy. Chris Young (who is co-authoring) is now going over it, taking notes, etc. He's going to take the next two weeks to do that and then we'll get back together and review everything.

After that, I'll start working on the second draft and finally the third draft. When the third draft is done the plan is to submit it to The Editorial Department for a full review before we move on to shooting for publication.

But while that's going on we'll be well on our way working on book #2. So far we have three book concepts in the series. The plan is to just keep writing on this series for as long as possible.

I would love to describe the series but Chris and I agreed to keep things under wraps for now. If we're unable to find publication by the end of 2012 we'll start releasing the books on our own, so one way or the other 2013 either marks the release of these titles or marks the release of the information on the titles because we'll have a publisher (crossing fingers!).

50k words on s.f. comedy

2011-09-06T16:55:00.000-04:00

Just over two months into the science fiction comedy book and we're less than 2k words away from 50k. I'm averaging about 2-4k words per day when I'm able to give it proper time. Unfortunately, there has been a lot of travel over the last couple of weeks and that's eaten into things pretty heavily.

Proposed scenes in the outline is at 65. We're currently at scene 36. We yanked a couple of scenes along the way and combined a few others, but I'm sure that a number of scene will get squished in as well.

Now, I know what you're thinking: erm...if you're at 36 scenes and already at 50k words, you're gonna have a lot of words when you're done! True, but that's where second drafts come in handy. Possibly. If it's anything like my last book I'll shave about 10k and add about 15k. OOPS. So, yeah, it may end up being a little on the large side as far as page count goes, but a story, to be told proper-like, needs as many words as it damn well needs. :)

At this rate it looks like the first draft will be done by the end of September. Of course we all know that life gets in the way more often than not, so October is more likely.

The main thing I love is that fact that this s.f. universe is just clicking so easily for me. The characters and the world just flow for some reason. I was decently comfy with the characters in my fantasy comedy too, but it's just not quite the same. One benefit of this is that I'm learning a bit more about why these characters work. That's cool because I'll use that information to ask some new questions of my characters in the fantasy book. Fun stuff!

Is he still writing?

2011-07-26T21:54:00.002-04:00

I certainly am! More than ever, actually.

Things have been moving ever so smoothly on some fronts and not so much on others. I finished up the second and third drafts of the "A Quest of Undoing" and have now set it aside for a couple of months so that I can get a fresh perspective on it before going forward.

During the downtime of that I've been working with Chris Young on a new s.f. comedy series and we're flying! The idea just clicked perfectly for us. The outline of the first book came together in a week and I've already written the first 20 scenes (first drafts). It's a fun read and we're having a blast working on it. I tend to write a full scene every night and sometimes I get two a day on the weekend.

The main things I've learned thus far is that no matter how many times you rewrite your story it's not enough. At some point I know I have to just bite the bullet and recognize that this is the best it's going to get and ship it off for rejection! haha Fortunately, I've been in the entertainment industry for the better part of my life so I'm used to taking criticism. You have to have a thick skin to be a creative type!

Anyhoo, the current plan is to finish up the first draft of the s.f. book, go back to a final once-over on the fantasy book, and then rewrite the s.f. book again...and again...and again... :)

Rewriting #1 started

2010-12-22T11:17:00.002-05:00

I'm actually a few days into the rewrite. This is probably the most challenging part for me because the goal is to make as close to a real piece of work as possible. I can write stories very fast, typically, but polishing them is a bit more challenging. I'm sure that's the case with everyone except for those lucky few.

It's a bit slow-going at the moment. I have like a page a day at this point. Hopefully when I get on a roll that will improve to 5-10 per day, but since I only have an hour each night that may be a bit much to hope for. The thing I want to avoid is flying through again. Flying through (for me) is first-draft writing. So far I've caught myself flying a couple of times and had to slam on the brakes and go back again.

It is quite nifty to see the story turning into something that looks...well...real. Lot's of work, but I'm digging it so far! :D

Writing junk

2010-12-16T10:57:00.004-05:00

Was up pretty late last night working on just marking up the story. I'm essentially finding that the majority of my descriptions are going bye-bye while the dialog is mostly untouched.

Why can't I just have a book of nothing but dialog published? :)

Actually, it's not quite that bad. There are a number of places where the description is decent. Some of it even caused that "I wrote that?" awe-based reaction. Most, though, was more of that "I wrote that?" depression-based reaction.

I'm about 50 pages of markups away from being done with that phase. Then it's off to rewrite #1.

On other fronts, the s.f. comedy bit is coming along in its first draft. I'm having fun with that one and I'm also learning to address some of the goofs I'm finding in my Whizzfiddle markups. Hopefully that will translate to fewer issues in the next story. We'll see!

Time to do first edits

2010-10-26T01:18:00.002-04:00

I know it's been a few weeks since I've posted here, but that's because I finished the first draft of the book and had to step away from that book until now. I have printed it all out and read it. I like it! There are a number of inconsistencies, typos, and a need to flesh out a lot of the areas, but it's pretty nifty.

I have also been working on the new book, and that's been eating up some of the time as well.

Either way, I've not gone away from doing this stuff. I'm still very much into it and rocking along.

Now with the edits underway on the first book, things will slow down on the progress of the second book...'tis the way it is! :D

First Draft Complete

2010-09-21T10:10:00.002-04:00

It's hard to believe, but I actually finished the first draft of the book in right around 30 days. I know that the hard work starts now, but just getting the first draft done is something to be happy about.

Now I take a few weeks away from this one so that I can return to it with a fresh set of eyes. Then the editing and second draft begins. I have to admit that I'm a little worried about this part! It's gonna be quite a challenge. Fortunately, each challenge just serves to make for better writing, so it's a good thing. :)

Tonight I'll start in on the first draft of the next book! (well, okay, plotting a blueprint first, but it's all part and parcel...)

Almost done

2010-09-18T12:18:00.003-04:00

I'm soooo close to finishing draft #1. I have roughly 10 scenes to go. Yes, I'm aware that this is only the beginning, but getting this far is a heck of an accomplishment. 50k words is a lot of words!

The cool part is that it's been fun all the way through, even when the characters disagreed with my blueprint. For the most part they were pleased with it, but now and then I had to stray from my path and join theirs. It's their story, after all. Their ideas were better than mine anyway. :)

Past the halfway mark (first draft)

2010-09-09T09:36:00.003-04:00

I'm averaging about 1,300 words per day now and that's gotten me to roughly 34,000 words now. Shocking, really. I could probably write the other 30k in a week, but I don't want to rush anything and end up with a cruddy story.

Characters are coming along nicely and the plot seems to be folding into my plans without much departure. The characters will nudge me into different directions now and then. Who am I to argue? It's their story.

One of the more interesting things with building a full word vs. just a little story is that more and more people crop up that have potential to have their own stories written about them. On the one hand this is cool because the more content possibility, the more fun; on the gripping hand (Larry Niven pull there...hehe) I have to be careful not to make things too convoluted.

So far it's a blast doing this. I have a few other story ideas that have come out of writing this and also just out of how I'm viewing the world now. The world is always full of useful content, you just have to train yourself to look for it.

Flying along now

2010-08-26T13:40:00.002-04:00

This MyNovel software is kicking. I've been writing pretty consistently anyway, but now I can see my daily progress.

I just took a quick lunch break and opened up the software to run the progress meter thingy. Says I'm averaging about 920 words per night. Not too shabby, since I've been shooting for 1,000 per night. Having this kind of feedback makes me want to keep after it on a daily basis. I guess it's akin to losing weight. As long as the scale keeps showing less with each weighing, you stay motivated to continue on.

Still writing...

2010-08-25T00:36:00.003-04:00

I know I haven't written a post here, but that's cause I've been writing the story! I picked up a couple of cool programs to work with.

One is a mind mapping software package that I used for laying out all the scenes. You can get it free at: http://freemind.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/Main_Page

The other is a writing package that I bought about a year ago and kind of forgot about it. I know that's dumb...oops. Anyway, it's a neat little word processor and character layouts and tracking stuff...etc. Snag that here: http://www.mynovel.biz/

So far I'm on pace at 880 words per day. Sometimes I can only squeeze out 500 and other times I get 2k out. At this pace the program says that I'll have my 65k words done by Oct 17. If I get a full hour each night before falling asleep, that may happen. Somehow I think it'll take a little longer.

But I'd be happy with having a first draft done by then. Of course, the re-write that follows will take another couple of months, but at least the first pass would be finished.

The Editorial Department Responds

2010-08-04T17:25:00.004-04:00

I sent in the first 10 pages of "A Quest of Undoing" so that I could get a feeling for what The Editorial Department (TED) folks would be like. Before I got back their report I spent a bit of time reading two books:

* "Thanks, But This Isn't For Us" by Morrell
* "Self Editing for Fiction Writers" by Browne and King

Essentially, I had the feeling that I was being a bit to descriptive now that I've fallen onto that side of the tracks. The books confirmed this, and the report I got back from one of the editors at the TED said the same thing.

This is quite freeing for me. It has taken me forever to spit out 10,000 words for my final assignment to the Greenleaf Workshop. I used to be able to write 10k words in a day, but I've gotten into this entire second-guessing everything I do bit that it crippled my speed. It's no fault of the workshop. I just somehow got into my head that I needed to be a "Writer" (note the capital "W"). Time to stop that and just plain write!

I'm still quite happy that my descriptions are better, but I'm even happier that I don't really need as much as I thought I did.

Back to speedy writing for me. I'll edit and fill in the blanks where needed when I'm finished with the manuscript. Slashing and cutting should be done after the writing, not during it...at least for me.

Reworking the Plot

2010-07-29T11:58:00.003-04:00

After a fair bit of thinking on "A Quest of Undoing" I decided to rework the plot. The original plot was okay, but it just didn't have enough conflict and issues to make it interesting throughout.

The new plot concept has a fair bit of twists and turns, which makes for an overall better story. Well, at least a more interesting story.

Fortunately, most of what I've written up to this point is still applicable to the new plot layout. I have to do a little fiddling with the text, but nothing major.

I've found that plotting is more fun than writing. I suppose this is logical since plotting a story doesn't require all the little details and descriptions that the actual writing does. This is likely also why everyone is a "writer" but nobody writes...they all just plot. We all have stories to tell, it's just that pesky little writing it all down bit that gets in the way.

Writing every day doesn't necessarily mean...

2010-07-26T10:22:00.004-04:00

...that you're writing every day. Huh?

I see a lot of people say that you have to sit and write something every single day if you're a writer. Writer's write! Yep, that's true. But I think that if you're seriously working on your story's elements, plot, conflicts, etc. then you are writing. No, you're not slapping down line after line of dialog or description, but you are crafting your story.

This can be an easy excuse for why you're not actually putting words to paper, of course. The only person who knows if you're practicing writing-avoidance is you. You can fool yourself if you want to be someone who is "a writer," certainly, but if you actually want to be a writer then you won't do that. In my estimation, someone who really wants to be writer will not just sit back and do nothing but design. At the same time, this person will also not just work on pen-to-paper exercises without worrying about design. It's an all-encompassing process and it's all writing.

Designing, plotting, character issues, and so on are the key points to success. You can have all the style in the world, but if your story goes nowhere or is flat then nobody will care about your style.

So, for me anyway, it's not just working on descriptions and dialog that makes up the "write every day" motif. It's the full process of what it takes to build a story from the ground up.

To thine own style be true

2010-07-22T15:32:00.007-04:00

I know that limiting character viewpoints is a wise thing, but each of my main characters has to show the world through their eyes at some point in the story or I just sit staring at the screen with my jaw slightly slack.

I was trying to keep it to just the protagonist and the antagonist. Really, I tried. Alas, I cannot. It's just too stagnating. So I'm going to open it up and let them all have their say. It flows better for me as a writer and hopefully it will feel smoother for the millions of readers that read my tomes (love that word).

This is not to say that I'm going to write in God mode. I'm not that talented. However, I see the world as protagonists and antagonists, not just one vs. one. It's the way I think and the way I most comfortably put finger-to-keyboard.

So will this harm my ability to get published? I hope not. Many writers have multiple viewpoint characters these days, especially in the humor genre.

Description, dialog, and merging

2010-07-10T13:23:00.002-04:00

I can't believe it, but I'm actually feeling a bit more confident about doing description in my writing. For the longest time I was captain dialog, always able to link line after line of dialog pretty decently. But when it came to description, I was just awful.

I still can't say that I have the complete feel of description down, but it's definitely getting better. Why though?

Well, I started making the description more action-based. The character either thinks about things or fiddle with stuff, etc. It allows me to continue "walking" through the character's viewpoint while engaging with the environment. So, I take my captain dialog hat and make it captain inner-dialog, as it were. From there I'm able to detour just enough to fill in the background details in a way that (at least in my estimation) doesn't take the reader out of the story. In the past the mix was pretty bad, but now it's just not good. :)

I keep hearing people say "Just write it and get it finished. You'll never finish if you keep rewriting it!"

I agree to a point. My purpose at the moment is not to write the book as much as it is to learn the craft a little better. I could write the book in 30 days, but it would be quite a bumpy read. Speedy writing for me is simple. I can easily slam out 1,000 words in 30 minutes. With a book being around 60,000 words, well, you do the math (I can't). But, again, it would be rough to read at best.

Some may say that it's the re-write that is going to take longer.

Agreed. However, my feeling is that if I spend the time now to get description to flow as comfortably for me as dialog does, then the rewrite will (hopefully) be far less painful. I have the entire story (many, actually) in my head. I'm not worried about forgetting it. I'm worried about having to write 15 times instead of twice.

I'm lazy, people! :)

Anyway, the description side of things is coming along much better and I'm hoping it will be as smooth as the dialog within a few more weeks. Then I can write the book and work on improving all facets of my writing as a combined unit since, with any luck, the description will no longer be the red-headed stepchild.

Writing was delayed...back to it now

2010-06-26T14:36:00.000-04:00

I've been trying to get the writing going for at least one hour a day, but it's just not happening yet.

My grandmother has been pretty ill as of late so I spent a week up north both working and visiting.

Work has been quite busy lately so I find myself working at nights and on the weekends a lot. By the time I've stepped away from the computer after working I'm too tired to start writing.

I finally finished a major milestone on my work projects, so I'm hoping that the hours get a little more normal again. I do plan on writing some this weekend to get the juices flowing again. It would be great to just jump in at any time and pick up where I left off, but this doesn't work for me. It usually takes a few days of consistent writing before I'm in the groove again.

Somehow I have to get a pattern that is largely static, even when other things vie for more attention. I'm thinking maybe mornings, but I'm so foggy in the mornings that I don't know how well that will work. Something's gotta give cause I wanna write! :)

Writing Comedy - My Observations

2010-06-03T12:24:00.000-04:00

First off, when I say "writing comedy" I'm not talking about jokes. I'm talking about a fictional tale that has either a humorous slant or comedic intent. There are different angles one can take when writing in this fashion.

For example, let's say that you have a scene with three men (I'm not being sexist here, it's just...okay, maybe I am being sexist here...sorry) that are about to rob a bank. These probably aren't funny, but that's okay. I'm just trying to get the idea across of how I'm seeing different approaches.

Option 1: Environment

They had their masks in place and their guns were at the ready. Larry, of course, had his mask on backwards so he kept bumping into Curly. After Moe got hit by Curly a third time, he spun around to knock the fat man upside the head. Then he saw Larry.
"You dimwit," Moe said, stuffing the gun in his pocket, which turned out to have a hole in it. The gun plummeted to the ground. Moe picked it up and slammed it in his other pocket and then reached out to adjust Larry's mask. "You got that on wrong."
Larry, expecting to get walloped, raised his gun and waved it about. He finally settled to pointing it toward a dim, large shadowy figure that had a bit of an odor emanating from it. This turned out to be Curly. Curly jumped back and knocked his head on a low-hanging AC unit. His eyes crossed and he cannoned into Moe. Both their guns fired as they hit the ground. This scared the crap out of Larry, whose mask was still improperly seated and he started shooting.
"Stop firing, you moron!" Moe kicked out and knocked Larry from his feet.
Larry's gun clanked on the ground, sliding to a halt at the feet of a police officer.

In this type, it's all about physical humor. There isn't much in the way of intellectual worry. You just have to get the people falling around, bumping into things, and generally using the environment as the medium of antagonism. Personally, I find this type boring.

Option 2: The boss and his dumb helpers

Jergenson moved to the edge of the building and peered around. He put out a hand so his accomplices would hold back as he swept the scene. Banner bumped into him. It was the third time in as many stops. Once, he could understand. He could even tolerate twice under most circumstances, but three times when they were about to put their lives on the line was just too much.
"Banner," Jergensen said calmly, not bothering to turn around. "It is most important that you watch your footing and keep your mind sharp."
"It's not me, boss," Banner grumbled. "I stop when you stop. Giff keeps bumpin' me."
"What's that?" Giff asked, quite loudly.
Jergensen turned about to hush Giff and found that the oaf had put his mask on incorrectly. He rolled his eyes pushed both men back into the alleyway. He motioned Banner to help fix the situation as he paced, his thoughts racing. Was it really worth spending more years in prison because of these two idiots? The answer was obvious, but one didn't just rob a bank all by oneself, right?

This methodology can be great if it's done well (unlike above, for example). The problem here is that there is only so much you can do with this. I can't see an entire novel working this way. However, I can see it work as a subplot in the novel. Maybe the antagonist has to deal with his idiotic helpers as he's trying to thwart the protagonist.

This, actually, is pretty common in movies and books. But imagine trying to go through an entire novel with nothing but this stuff.

Option 3: Monty Python

Carl got to the edge of the building and motioned his team to halt. They bumped him straight out into the open. He quickly jumped back around the corner.
"What was all that then?" He stormed.
"Wasn't my fault," Bert said, jerking his thumb back toward Herb. "He keeps bumping me."
"I can't be blamed for that," Herb argued, looking in the general direction of Carl and Bert. "These silly masks make it impossible to see anything."
"You've got it on wrong," Carl said.
"I have not."
"You most certainly have. You've got the hole in the back."
"That's where it's supposed to be," Herb was now talking to the wall. "Else where would my ponytail stick through?"
"It's not right for a man to have a ponytail anyway," Bert piped up.
"That's it," Herb turned toward a garbage can. "I have had it up to here with you and your accusations," Herb poked at the can with an angry finger. "There is nothing wrong with a man having a ponytail. My grandfather had one, my father had one, and my brother still has one."
"My grandmother had one," said Carl.
"Exactly," Bert put in. "My mother had one too, and my sister still has one. Ain't rightly a thing for a man to have is all I'm saying."
"You're saying I'm womanly then?"
The two had their fists up, albeit Herb was squaring off with a low-hanging AC unit. Carl saw their plan falling apart and thought best to attempt rescue before calling it a day.
"Stop," he barked. "Now, listen. Herb is mostly right and the Bert is right the rest of the way," he cleared his throat as he digested his own words. "But Herb, if you can't see where you're going you're not going to help much with this heist, got it?"
Herb put his hands on his hips. "It's frustrating, is all. They should have put two holes in these things."
"Maybe they have a ladies model," Bert offered.
"That's it!"
Carl removed his mask and threw it in the trashcan as Herb began pummeling the street lamp.

Most of what I've read in this type of writing shows very little in the way of description. It's a lot about dialog bouncing about. Also, there is a lot of misdirection. The characters are supposed to be focused on one aspect of the story, but they keep drifting off into things that are irrelevant. This is mostly what makes it funny to me.

One issue with writing like this is potential publishers may see it as unpolished. "Where's the description and pacing?" That's the point, though. The pacing is supposed to be erratic. That's actually what helps make it funny.

Option 4: Stressful

Jim stepped into the alley, seeing the two people that Rick had set him up with. He was promised they were professionals, but they looked pretty shoddy to him.
"You're the ones that Rick sent?"
"Yeah," the fat one answered. "Stan and Steve."
"I don't know if this is going to work," murmured Jim. He looked over Stan.
"Whaddya mean?" Stan said.
Jim grimaced a bit and motioned a bit towards the fat man. "You know, we have to be able to run and all."
"Yeah, so?"
"Well, I mean run. Not just a little fast-paced walking."
Stan looked at Steve. Steve shrugged.
"If you got something to say," Stan grumbled. "Say it."
Jim put his hands up. "I'm just saying that if the cops show up we're going to have to get away in a hurry. I know I'm capable of that and it looks like Steve is too, but one of us may be a little too...you know..."
"No," Stan said, crossing his arms. "I don't know."
"Oh, you don't know?" Jim scoffed accusingly. "How can you not know?"
"Apparently I'm not as observant as you," said Stan while cracking his knuckles. "Why don't you tell me?"
"So you're telling me that you don't know why one of us would have problems running from the cops?"
"That's what I'm saying."
Jim turned to Steve. "Can you believe this guy?"
Steve shrugged again. "Tell him what you're saying."
"What, like you don't know either?"
Another shrug.
"Fine, it's just that you're...you know..."
Stan leaned towards Jim. He didn't look all that happy.
"...you know," Jim pursed his lips and nodded compassionately. "...a bit oversized."

This is kind of like the Larry David style of writing. It's the case of having your main character struggling to say what all of us are thinking while the reader cringes going, "No...don't do it!!!" It's stressful comedy. I love the way this stuff rolls out, but I think this is harder to pull off in writing than in acting though. At least it is for me.

I'm sure there are other types of methods for writing comedy that I'm not seeing, so if anyone knows of any please lemme know so I can keep my study moving!

Workshop Progress

2010-06-01T12:43:00.000-04:00

I finished up all the core projects in the Greenleaf Writer's Workshop and am now set to write the first 10,000 words of the comedic fantasy book.

Am I ready though? Hmmm. I think so. I have read a buttload of books over the last few months to see the various methodologies that people employ. Some writers are quite funny, some are mildly humorous, and some aren't really funny at all in the actual writing but their plots and situations are humorous. It also goes from book to book. For example, I found the Pyramids book by Terry Pratchett to be funny in plot but I found little to laugh about during the actual read. However, Interesting Times has laughs throughout as did Thud. Robert Asprin's Myth Adventures series is quite humorous, but I wouldn't call it funny, and his Dragon's Luck series wasn't funny at all to me. A. Lee Martinez's In the Company of Ogres was humorous with a bunch of funny thrown in, but Monster didn't elicit a single laugh from me even though it was a cool idea, and Divine Misfortune was a very humorous idea but I didn't really laugh at much of it...Too Many Curses, though, was a great read with a humorous twitch (though, again, not funny funny). Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is certainly humorous and classic, but as I re-read the book I found myself laughing mostly at the situations and not at all at the character interactions.

I'm not putting any of these books down. I really enjoyed reading them all (okay, the Dragon's Luck ones weren't all that great), but the purpose of reading them was to see the various approaches to comedic fantasy and how successful authors accomplish it.

I seem to have more of a Terry Pratchett style sense of humor, which is interesting considering that I've been writing comedic stuff like that for the last 25 years and have just started reading his books over the past year. It feels very much like Monty Python. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying I'm anywhere near his caliber...I'm just saying that the way I have my characters interact feels a bit similar. I would be beyond pleased to learn that I even half pulled off the comedic talent that Mr. Pratchett does in most of his books.

I am going to write the Whizzfiddle Adventures story A Quest of Undoing, but I already have started plotting a comedic s.f. story that I could see turning into a series if all goes well.

At first I was concerned that writing comedic fantasy and science fiction would just get a bunch of "Oh, he's copying Pratchett" or "Oh, he's copying Adams" type of comments. But when I look at the bookshelves, I see tons of middle earth books and space adventures. There are very few unique ideas, which is why there are tons of fantasy and s.f. books out there that all seem to have the same premise (or pretty damn close to the same).

Pick up 20 fantasy books and see how many relate to a story about a royal born that has to somehow get back the kingdom (or close to it). I did this exercise yesterday and found a staggering 17 out of 20 books I picked up had this basic plot. Shocking.

I guess one could say that all s.f. writers are copying Asimov or Heinlein or (I could go on), and certainly all fantasy writers are copying Tolkien...right?

So I no longer worry about being similar to Pratchett or Martinez or Moore or Adams or Asprin or...etc. Heck, I would be beyond honored to even be remotely compared to any of these awesome writers. I'm just hopeful that I at least land at humorous while I'm attempting funny.

Book reviews are rough

2010-05-13T13:21:00.000-04:00

As I'm working my way through this writer's workshop, there are a number of really cool assignments. The one I'm currently working on is a scene-by-scene report on a comedic book that I selected ("Heroics for Beginners", by John Moore...if you're interested).

I expected that this would be a simple project, but it's actually quite rough. I'm about 60% through the review and already have 40 pages worth of scene layouts!

I thought that a scene was essentially cut-and-dry. As I'm going through this exercise, though, I'm finding that most authors merge two (or more) scenes together all the time. If I just snagged sections instead of scenes then I would be at only 15-20 pages of data. As a quick looksee, I thumbed through a few other books and found that some authors are more definitive in their scenes and don't merge very often.

One of the most interesting bits is that stories are actually quite slow. I never really noticed this because authors always push the action. But if you pick up five different books and just write down one line of description, you'll see that the flow of a story is really slow. This is for most books anyway. If the action matches the flow, the book is horrifically boring. If the flow matches the action, the reader feels too rushed.

Anyway, this is rough but it's quite an interesting assignment that is really opening my eyes to some of the methodology behind how published authors get into genre-based formulaic writing.

First assignment results

2010-04-19T17:47:00.000-04:00

I had to write up a story evaluation sheet for the workshop and I got the response back from the instructor that all was good! As he put it:

You’ve got everything you need for a good start,
and you’ve left me with nothing to whine about. I’m
looking forward to your next assignment.

That means that my next assignment will be obliterated. :)

I'm finding that doing this workshop is really forcing me to push through things that I usually don't worry about. One can only hope that at the end of all this I'll have a story that's decent, and I'll carry even more hope that the writing is decent too.

Up next is the deep dive on character creation.

Going with comedy

2010-04-07T15:14:00.000-04:00

While I have come to the conclusion that comedic writing is likely the harder than serious writing, I'm going to go for it anyway.

I spent the last couple of weeks re-reading Hitchhiker's Guide, Myth-Adventures, and a couple of Terry Pratchett books. None of them (to me) are really knock-you-off-your-feet hilarity. They have some funny little bits in them, sure, and many of the concepts are cute as well. But mostly these stories are just fun to read.

If you look at the plot for any of these you will see that if they had wanted to, the writers could have just gone the serious route. That they didn't tells me that they have more fun writing in the lighthearted manner. I seem to gravitate toward this as well.

So, while I'm by no means dumping the serious fantasy book that I've got in the works, I have decided to use the comedic concept for the writing workshop.

Wish me luck! :D

Character Interviews

2010-04-02T14:25:00.000-04:00

I got this tip from my friend, Chris Finch.

When writing a fictional piece, interview your characters. I know it sounds silly, but would you write a non-fictional piece about someone or something without interviewing people? Well, come to think of it, maybe you would. However, it would be much more credible and interesting if you interviewed people.

In fiction, though, you simply must. If you don't you will end up with one-dimensional characters.

"No," you argue, "I know my characters because they're based on people in my life!"

Fair enough. Have you interviewed those people then? Particulary, have you interviewed them in the setting that you'll be placing them?

Aunt Betty's a great character in your life, sure. How is she on the planet Vlarn? Maybe people on Vlarn don't like Aunt Betty's brand of sense of humor. How does she handle that? If she just keeps being Aunt Betty, that's cool, until she winds up dead. (Man, I hope your little planet of Vlarn is nicer than that!)

There's another, more important reason to interview your characters: you are the actor. Eh? That's right, Skipper. You see, when you write you have to constantly change perspectives from one character to the next. If you don't then all your characters will act, sound, and respond identically. That's unrealistic, boring, and one-dimensional. What do the best actors out there do when faced with a new role? Study. They study and then they become that which they are trying to portray. Same for your writing. You have to be the actor on all your characters.

Actually, you have to be the writer, the director, the producer, and the actors. You're a one-man band!

Now how are you supposed to have realistic characters if all of them act like you do? You can't. So, interview them, learn to be them, and then welcome yourself to the psychotic world of character-switching.

When you have your protagonist and antagonist facing off and you can feel the rage of the protagonist as her sword misses--YET AGAIN--your antagonist, and then you suddenly switch and can feel the elation of side-stepping yet another of that bitch's childish volleys...why, then...then you know you've got characters.

So, how?

Simple. You're you, the character is the character. You ask a question as you would, then you change into your character and answer as he would.

Simple? Well, no. Not at first anyway. But pretty soon you'll get good at this. And then soon after that you'll need therapy, all ten of you.

After doing a few of these, read them back and see where you answer as yourself and where you answer as your character. Practice this exercise and you'll get better as the interviews go on. Pretty soon you'll be able to switch from character to character so fast that you'll be unstoppable (or within a padded cell).

Back to writing

2010-04-02T12:41:00.000-04:00

After (finally) finishing college, I decided it was time to quit mucking around and actually write a couple of novels. Yes, it's a daunting job doing such. Yes, I know there is only a 1 and 8,500 chance of getting published. Yes, I know that there is only a 1 in a million chance of turning into a professional writer. But, as Terry Pratchett points out in his "Guards! Guards!" book, it's only the 1 in a million chances that actually happen.

About two months before I graduated, I started looking into various workshops so that I could better educate myself on the process. I had taken a couple of writing classes and attended workshops before, but I was looking for something with more meat to it this time. After much ado, I decided on the Greenleaf Workshop. If you read all of the workshop descriptions out there and compare them to this guy, his just makes sense. Why listen to the advice of other non-published authors when you can get some hand-holding from someone who is published and who still makes a living writing?

It's been 30 days since I started and so far I'm quite impressed with the workshop. There was a good 400+ pages in the handbook. That took me a couple of weeks to fully digest. I found it well written and devoid of fluff. In a nutshell, it made sense to me.

There is a lot of work to do in this workshop, but when all is said and done I should have the first 10,000 words of my novel written. Then I'll move onto the advanced workshop and finish up the rest (have to save a few pennies for that one anyway, so it'll be a while).

For now, at least I'm back to writing! (yay)