Today is a good day. I’ve only been up for an hour, and already I’ve read some insanity from a person I used to speak with on Facebook, a person I would best describe as ignorant and crazy. They’re the sort of person who believes the characters she creates tells her how to write her stories–when she is writing, that is, as it has always appeared she’s one of these “writers” who can only write when she is sprinting with others–and that she is probably, likely, most definitely had arguments with her characters and, at times, lost. Like I said, she’s crazy. If you’re having arguments with your characters, and losing, you need to get your ass into therapy and up your meds. But since she’s more of a poseur and not much of a writer, maybe those voices will help keep her warm . . .
Enough of crazy people, as I have enough crazy to keep entire subdivisions happy. Was out last night, was driving in the dark, was talking out my own scenes as I flew through the darkness. The sky looked strange with the low clouds reflecting lights that, around here, never go out. When I was heading to my friend’s earlier in the evening, before the sun had fully set, I thought of what the sky would have looked like next to Hudson Bay, close to the Arctic Circle, with the stark yet beautiful desolation of the tundra all around. I tried to imagine it as I drove, and could see it all around me as the cold fields of Northwest Indiana faded into the past.
I started Chapter Fourteen yesterday, and what I thought was going to be a very quick thousand words turned into a bit of a slough though the literary mud. I’m back on Keith, getting ready to bring Elektra into his life and turn up the strangeness in a way that should be interesting. At the moment, at the start of the chapter, he’s thinking about the two women in his live, how one is developing a relationship with him, but he’d not certain how long it might last–and how one is already there, but he knows that as soon as he types “The End” at the bottom of his manuscript, she’s gonna pull a Tara and be gone with the wind.
But getting those thoughts onto the page–or Scrivener text file, take your pick–became a bit of a pain in my ass, because whatever I’d type simply didn’t seem right.
This is happened a few times with this story, which is probably why I’m just now clearing fifty thousand words after two months, and probably won’t finished Suggestive Amusements before the end of March. I know Stephen King says ninety days is about right to do a first draft of a novel, but I’m used to being faster. I’m used to cranking it out, and yesterday was like crawling along the pavement when you have to be somewhere in twenty minutes.
My Muse, who would never leave me, says my problem with writing this story is I’m not as connected to the characters here as I am in other works I’ve produced. That may very well be true; I don’t know. There could be issues with me writing this while working some long hours, but then I did the same thing at The Undisclosed Location, and cranked out some wordage.
Or maybe I’m ready to go beyond writing, and into publishing.
I know my characters would like that–because I would like that.
March 3, 2013 at 4:15 pm
I love to publish….it is a different type of work…the marketing is an unreal world…but like, you know (give me the valley girl lilt please) there are SOOO MANY unthought-of-ly righteous ways to capture people’s attention.
I have self- published all of my books under my own label. It is as easy as I thought I would be and more work than I anticipated. However, when you get a sales report from createspace.com, even if it is for $0.48, it is an affirmation that your work was interesting enough in the VAST array of choices, someone that you do not know picked that story. Which means…it was worth the paper it was written on fo’ sho’! I just love that slurry slang people use now-a-days!
)
March 4, 2013 at 7:23 am
Remember, fiction = biography.
Sprinting is writing , right? Isn’t it?? Once a week sprinting? Or spending two day to design a cover? A cover that looks like it was thrown together in fifteen minutes? I”m not helping am I? While some of us are plugging away, writing and spending less time talking about writing, day in and day out, there will always be those that are still claiming writer while we are authors. ;P
March 4, 2013 at 7:26 am
You’re helping a lot. Because a lot of what you mention are things that happen for some people. Is it right? I don’t know; I would say it’s the difference between playing a quick game of flag football in the part, and stepping onto the pitch for a professional Australian Rules game in Sydney, In other words, there’s a quantum leap of difference between on and the other.