Write Talk

Having Written O’Clock

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Pick101

I've never been a morning person, and though I have dabbled with writing early in the day over the years, only in the last six months or so have I actually been able to execute it on a regular basis. This morning I went back to my morning writing schedule (up at or before 6 a.m.), which I plan to stick to for the duration of this revision.

I think the switch is a combination of factors:

  • The knowledge that things are just too busy many days to delay it and still have writing happen and knowing the angst cycle that results when the writing doesn't get done.
  • The loss of regular lunchtime writing time (again: see busy).
  • My journey away from the perils of procrastination.
  • The fact that I'm really and truly in love with the world and story I'm working on right now, so it actually ranks above that extra 45 minutes of sleep.

I have always been one of those people who can write through hurricane or hailstorm, and not a diva at all about the specific conditions necessary to get to work. But I do really like my sleep. And I do really hate getting up early. So it's no small thing to be able to pry my eyes open these days and do the thinking and typing. There is something to be said for the hidden quality of time before the world intrudes. And, as expected, I feel a lot better about the State of the World once some production time has been done. I actually don't hate writing, but don't we all have a smidgen of the Dorothy Parker Disease*? Having written is even nicer.

The thing I'm most addicted to now though, is an unanticipated side effect of this schedule. I tend to make more overall progress, because any writing session later in the day is icing on a pragmatic cupcake. Also, because the early morning never feels fully real, writing later in the day doesn't necessarily feel like the second hour. It feels like another first one. Perhaps that means the real lesson is that achieving things is all about mental trickery–or good scheduling habits.

*Offered without comment. Dan Brown cannot be destroyed.

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In Which I Am ALIVE

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Deadly Bouquet
Originally uploaded by gwenda

It's true, I've returned from the land of the incredibly-grouchy, cold-beleaguered, fatigue-ahoy types. At least, it seems likely that I have. It rains here all the time now, and so these giant mushrooms grew in our front yard. Aren't they pretty?

I don't want to skip over a little chatter about Blue Heaven though. I managed only a handful of photos, but Holly McDowell and Bill Shunn have lots more in their sets (note: do not ask why I have a napkin on my head). I'd like to thank all my fellow workshoppers–Holly, Bill, Toby Buckell, Chance Morrison, Sandra McDonald, Greg van Eekhout, Rae Carson Finlay, Paolo Bacigalupi, Heather Shaw, and most especially Charles Coleman Finlay for inviting me in the first place. It was an incredibly generous and insanely talented bunch, and you'll be seeing lots more from all of them and I recommend you seek out their work. Also, they were nice to me, even though I was the lone BH newbie this year. I feel really lucky to have been there, and so much more set to dive into the revision of the new book. Now that I'm not dying of plague.

Anyway, I keep meaning to do a larger post about the workshop process and not getting around to it. One thing I've learned is that workshopping can give you different things at different points in the process (and, yes, of course just as important the feedback you get is listening to what other people have to say about a piece of work and thinking about the work of others and how it can be better) on any given project. I don't think this could have come at a better time for the new book, a new title for which I haven't quite settled on yet. This was the first time I've ever workshopped a whole novel–at least in such a formal way–and now I think I will want to try and formulate some version of this forever on. My first drafts are very much raw materials, at least in some sense (although I did choose the right story this time, more or less = progress), and being able to sit in a room with incredibly smart people bringing a fresh eye to those materials and bounce around new ideas and refined ideas and then come up with even better ideas about how to make the book, well, better… It was awesome. That's what I'm saying. It didn't hurt that I already had some really great notes from generous people to start the rethinking process, either.

So I guess I'd better get to work then, and finish a more presentable version of this sucker. I will try not to anger the handless guardian of the mainland.

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Attack of the Dust Bunnies

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I feel like I'm fighting tumbleweeds of sparse content around here lately*, and this may be crazy, but I'm off for a week to hang out with a bunch of other writers and focus on improving our books and assorted hijinks and although I still have lots of reading to do: I will post something here every day. 

Assuming there's wireless. 

What's life without daring yourself to fail?

*For generous values of lately.

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Smells Like Teen Angst

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Or, rather, a playlist for the new revision I'm working on for the Medea book (well, really more of an experimental rebirth than a revision, but it still falls under that heading). The new approach is really getting me in touch with my inner angsty teen, and if I'm going to stick with it I have to have a playlist*. Thank god, this does not mean including the Jim Morrison poetry songs. This angst is more interesting than the type I possessed.

Playlist

I also used this as an excuse for a little iTunes slurge, although the Bowerbirds was the only thing newly purchased that was tonally right. We'll see how this experiment progresses. I make no promises, and after Blue Heaven I'll dive back in to the new book armed with notes aplenty and make it presentable. (And hopefully this will be–or nearly–a new book by then, too.) 

*Why so short? This is the portable version, as I am currently iPodless, since mine exploded in the car awhile back. It was very exciting.

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Graphic Draft

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I just finished the first draft of a new book, currently called The Secret History*. Ben apparently just finished one too, and reminded me about Wordle with his post. Anyway, I'm not all fancy and can't figure out how to screen grab to embiggen, so you'll have to click the link if you wanna see more detail.

Wordle: secrethistory

But, honestly, aren't these mostly fun for the person making them? Yeah, I thought so.

*Yes, yes, I know this will almost certainly change. I, too, love the Donna Tartt novel of the same name. But it is a good title for the book.

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The Written Word

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1. In almost all cases, we want the reader to be wondering what happens next, not what is happening.

2. You ever get one of those vertigo moments when you're working, the sudden realization that, "Holy s$#*, now there is a story where before there was nothing"? That's a nice feeling, with side helpings of dizzying and scary.

(C leaves for a different set of mountains for another week of workshopping tomorrow morning. My intent is to bang and bash away on the new book, and get as close to finishing the current draft as I can. And to watch lots of bad television, of course. I suspect there will also be a slew of forlorn tweets. And you never know, I might starve to death.)

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Killer Serials

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As y'all know, there's nothing I like more than a good process discussion. So for the past few days I've been reading with great interest the posts at the Fangs, Fur, & Fey livejournal community, where a bunch of authors have been posting their responses to the question of the month, "How did you plan the last novel you wrote (and successfully finished)? Outline? Synopsis? Summary? Divination Rod? Nuthin' at all?" (Here's links to a few, and you can seek them all out using the link above: Laura Anne Gilman's, Maggie Stiefvater's, Janni Simner's, and Megan Crewe's.)

This all falls under the category of when you're thinking about something, suddenly you see it everywhere. One thing I'm trying to do as I approach my next book (or what I'm fairly certain is my next book) is give it a little more cooking on the front end. My process seems to be shifting over time to allow more planning, with the caveat that the story still sometimes manages to jump tracks and end up somewhere completely different. I have no expectation that I'll ever completely eliminate that track-jumping, at least not in the smaller sense, and I don't really want to. What I do want to try to do is get more of a feel for the story, the world, and the characters before I start actually constructing them on the page.

So I've been thinking about that–stopping myself from actually starting the book, as is my usual modus operandi–and slowing down and letting the pieces come together a bit more first. I'm sure this won't actually turn out to be that slow a process, since I also believe that too much planning can be useless or, worse, detrimental. Witness all the research I did on Aztecs and the Romani in the earliest of early drafts of what was to eventually become a book that uses only Greek mythology (the book I just finished). Now, that stuff will come in handy–in fact, I expect some of it will come in handy on the project I'm doing all the thinking about. But I certainly didn't end up needing it for the last book, so I'll be doing my researching as I go this time. Because despite all this front-end work, I still thoroughly expect that I won't know exactly what I might need to research until I get into the placing of one word after another.

Which brings me to the second thing I've been thinking about–what are the elements that seem to be common to successful series? By series here I mean both open-ended series with lots of books and the more traditional trilogy; for my purposes, the key elements would likely be the same. I'm thinking the next thing I write might be such a trilogy, and that also necessitates more planning up front, at least in theory. Here's what I've come up with so far, and then you smartypants can (hopefully) add or comment on things I missed.

…

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New Year Agent News

34 Comments / Children's Lit Fabulosity, Write Talk / By /

Wow, so this post is going to be kind of insane and nutty happy–sort of like my week. I can't imagine how this year could have gotten off to a better start, and if I don't post this here immediately, I might die!

Late yesterday/early today, I gleefully accepted an offer of representation from Jennifer Laughran of the Andrea Brown Literary Agency.

Jenn is a brilliant force of nature and I couldn't be more thrilled, thrilled, thrilled. There were many excellent agents on my list of possibilities, but I just knew Jenn was the right one as soon as we talked.

I'm sure there are probably writers who enjoy the uncertainty and excitement of agent searching, but it made me feel like throwing up–for three days. Christopher and I went out to the grocery store last night after I'd talked to Jenn and I was all whining about how I just wanted to go ahead and say yes, and not wait for anyone else, and that doing otherwise made me feel like my hair would fall out. He told me to go for it. By the time we got home, one of Jenn's clients (one who I'm an insanely huge fan of) had sent a charming, hilarious, glowing recommendation for her. I said, Screw waiting, and called the Melissas over to celebrate. Just before bed, another glowing recommendation came in from a different client, and a follow-up with yet more glow from the first one. I woke up in the middle of the night knowing exactly what changes I wanted to make to the manuscript before it goes out, and e-mailed Jenn (who had already sent me notes! because she is that awesome!).

This morning, I e-mailed the other agents I needed to and let them know I'd made a decision. I should also give a shout out of thanks to one of the best friends (and best writer friends) a girl could ever have, Justine Larbalestier, who has gone above and beyond this week, offering advice and endless support of the moral variety. And the rest of you who kept me from levitating and answered my plaintive e-mails–Kate, Micol, Kelly. Christopher, of course. And I could probably go on. But I won't.

Yes, I realize I don't get to whine about the stress of this too much. Starting an agent search on Tuesday and finishing it in the Best Possible Way by the end of the week OVER A HOLIDAY is a blessing. What can I say? I'm insanely lucky, and beyond insanely happy.

And now I should really go work on revisions For My Agent. Such beautiful words. This is going to be a very fine year.

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Meet Alexa: She Kicks Ass

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Well, actually she’s not all that great at the literal ass-kicking, though willing to give it an old college try in a pinch. Anyway, one of my JoNo compatriots posted a link to a hero image generator, and I spent awhile yesterday creating one of my book’s Alexa. I can’t figure out how to actually save the image in a way I can just quickly paste it in here in its full glory, but I did print a copy and scan it and the result will appear below. (Complete with lines in the background from the crappy printer!)

The main thing you can’t see as well in the scan is the dark olive tone of her skin. ANYWAY, it’s not as if we go around in our novels talking about what our characters look like all the time (at least, I don’t), but I have a pretty good image of them all as I’m working. And it actually felt useful (not to mention fun) to have to figure out her warddrobe and al the other million details. And now she’s watching me…

So, without further ado, Alexa Johnson, aka Medea’s daughter, aka the heroine of Saving the Witch.

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