Finish Line

Well, I did it. At approximately 5:00 on Monday, December 3, I finished the first draft of the book that I'm calling Second Chances (who knows what the publisher will decide to call it. Authors have little or no say over that). It's not really done in that I have a lot of changes I want to make, especially to the first half, but nothing major needs to change in the plot, in the characterization; just information that I want to introduce at a later time than it is now and a change to the prologue. Then there's the inevitable fleshing out of scenes that are just sketched at this point and then polishing up the language and punctuation.

Then the scary part. Getting it sold. But we won't think about that yet. When I think about the business end of the business, I get completely terrified and find myself unable to write. So we're not going to think about it. Yet.

Now that I'm taking a day or two to unwind, to catch up on my life, already in progress, I realize how much of me writing has been taking up. Not just my time, but my attention, my presence. I've spent the better part of the last year living in a world that doesn't exist. A town that is so real for me that I can show you, on the map, exactly where it would be if it did exist. Characters who are so well known and dear to me that I would pick their photos out of a group of snapshots. No wonder other people have been finding it difficult talking with me. Why my husband complains that I've not been here most of the time. It's true. I've not.

I wonder, is this how it is for other writers? Do we, as a group, leave our current surroundings when we're in the throes of creating a fictional work? I'm going to have to ask my CritGirls (tm)
when I see them later tonight.

If there are any other writers reading this blog, please feel free to comment. I truly curious.

So, now to the mundane task of folding laundry. Life is so strange that after the celebration, there is always laundry.

Running Out of Words

Most days I write until I run out words. That's how I know it's time to stop for the day. When this happens, I take a break for food or sleep or spending time with my husband. That usually does the trick and I can get working again..maybe not that day...but certainly the next.

Once in a while, though, I really run dry. I've gone to the well too many times...and there's nothing left. Frankly, this used to scare the shit of me. I would be convinced that I'd never write another word. The story would go untold....I was doomed.

Then I discovered the work of Julia Cameron, and I discovered Artist's Dates. What is an Artist's Date? It is, basically, a play-date with your Inner Artist. The most important thing is that it be fun, and that it you don't take anyone else with you. Julia recommends taking them weekly. I'm not that good about it. However, when I find that the well has run dry and I'm spending more time staring at a blank page than I am writing, more often than not, it's time to take my Inner Artist out to play.

Today, I did not try to work on the book. I woke up, drank coffee, took a shower, put on makeup (don't you always wear makeup on a date?) got dressed and asked her what she wanted to do. She wanted to play with fiber...yarn.

She wanted to pet the soft stuff, and look at all the pretty colors. These are the things that feed my Inner Artist. So that's what we did. We drove out to Eastside Weavers and talked to Pat about taking weaving lessons, and got to pet the yarn. Then we talked to her about dyeing some silk yarn I have and she showed me a bunch of hand painted (dyed) silk scarves, which she let me touch and drape around myself. We spent a good hour there.

Then we followed Pat's directions to the Lansingburgh Yarn Depot (which doesn't have a website), and spent two hours there looking at yarn, knitting and chatting with the owner, Barbara. We also showed Barbara a knitting technique that she's been curious about but never tried.

Then we came home.

We spun on our spinning wheel for and hour, and then, got the urge to post this.

Tonight there will be more knitting. I will not try to write fiction. I will let the well continue to fill and, maybe, tomorrow there will be more words to put down on the page, in order.

--Morgan

When the Characters Wander Away From the Outline

I've been re-writing. This can be a good thing. It took me years to be able to re-write. I, erroneously, used to think that every sentence that left my head was a gem. They're not. I'm good with this.

However, now I find myself in danger of endlessly re-writing, and not forwarding the story at all. I know, I know, most people would advise me not to re-write until I get to the end of the first draft. I suppose that's good advice, providing you can plot a story before you start writing....but that's not the way I work.


I create characters. I give them names, and personalities and voices of their own. Then they tell me the story they need to tell. For this most part this is fun. This is the reason why I write. It's cheaper than going to the movies. On the other hand, even when I think I know where the story is going, I'm frequently wrong.

The book I'm working on right now started out as a straight romance. Girl meets boy, they fall in love, have some hot sex, overcome a few conflicts ::brushes off hands:: and we're done. Sounds good, no?

Well....as I said, that's where I started. Then I find out my heroine hasn't gotten divorced yet. Then I found out that she doesn't want to be victim of her past, but she's much more forward thinking than that.

I set my hero up with one plot line, and it turned out that didn't work for him. So, we went in a different direction.

Of course, this all happened after I had written about 200 pages.

So, back to the dreaded words, Chapter One, Page One.

The next version was better....I like the storyline a lot more, but in doing so, in trying so hard to catch up to where I thought I was, I lost my voice. Ooops. Fortunately I have a critique group that was willing to tell me it sucked. I agreed. In fact, I realized it before they had a chance to tell me.

On to the next version.

This time, I got the voices back. But (and there's always a but), I tried a point of view device that was supposed to pick up the pace of the story, but....failed....miserably.

Chapter One, Page One.

The last week or so has been about fixing that. What I have now are 150+ manuscript pages that I really like. I have another 4 pages of notes that will turn into the next 250-300 pages. I'm pretty sure I know how this is going to get resolved.

I have promised my Crit Group that I won't go back and re-write the first 138 pages....again.

Except that I have to insert a few scenes to make a character that appears in the prologue show up before page 125. that's not too bad.

But what I have is a story that examines infidelity and romance...with a little sex thrown in. Straight romance? Not any more. But this is the book I need to write.

However, writing this isn't getting that story moved forward. So, until next time.....

Yak Shaving

Catchy title, eh? I've been doing a lot of thinking about yak shaving. Thinking about yak shaving is, in itself, yak shaving. What am I talking about? Funny you should ask.

You need to do something, in this example, write. But before you can write, you realize that you need to clean off your desk. So you make piles of paper. Now you need a place to put the piles.

You can put the piles on the chair!!!

But, the chair is broken. So you fix the chair in order to have a place to put the piles of paper that were on your desk, which needed to be cleaned off before you could write.

In fixing the chair, you realize that the fabric on the seat is torn!!

So you go shopping for new fabric to re-cover the chair which you have just fixed in order to have a place on which to put the piles of paper that were on the desk which you had to clear off in order to write.

When you take off the old fabric you realize that the stuffing is really shot, and the best chair stuffing is made from yak fur.

So you find yourself in the zoo, shaving a yak, in order to have stuffing with which to reupholster the chair that you needed to re-cover in order to have a place to put the piles of paper that you cleaned of your desk in order to write.

Yak shaving is the term used by my critique group to describe the behavior that includes (but is by no means limited to) circling the desk but not being able to land on the keyboard.

Thank you for reading. I don't know what you were supposed to be doing, but you have just shaved a yak....as did I.

More later.

Getting Back To Work

Vacation is over, and I regret to say that it's time to get cracking. The key word in the above sentence is "regret". Sigh. After taking two weeks off, I'm finding it difficult to get back into "work mode". Which may be why I'm blogging.

However, I did spend some time, on vacation, ogling the real "Jason," the man behind which my fictitious character lurks. Of course any resemblence between the character and anyone living or dead is strictly a product of the writer's over-active fantasy life. That said, I'm happy to report that Jason is still as hunky as ever, still wearing leathers where necessary, and shirtless when not. Jason sightings happened daily and I'm refueled with enough fantasy material to take me to the end of the story.

Speaking of the end of the story....the story has departed from the outline once again. Why these characters won't stay where I put them is beyond me. I wonder if that happens to other writers; they create characters that then take on a life of their own and do things that are unexpected? Is it just that I'm that good at creating characters or is it that I have an undiagnosed psychosis? Not funny.

Just checking in, dear readers, to let you know that I'm back in town and back at the keyboard. Ta for now.

Know Your Audience

A conversation on another blog got me to thinking (always a dicey area) about how important the choice of audience can be in the manuscript phase.

A number of years ago...more than I want to think about...I had asked a friend, who was himself a writer, to read a 1st-ish draft manuscript I'd written. Now, I was young and dewy-eyed and this was the very first novel length piece I'd ever actually finished. This friend, who was a mentor in a number of ways, agreed to read y book. Although this person said many things, I remember two things clearly: "Do you realize that all of your characters are sex addicts?" and "I guess it's alright, if you like that sort of thing."

Argh....

I was crushed.

I write in the midzone between Women's Contemporary Fiction with Romantic Elements, and Contemporary Romance with Erotic Elements. Depends on who you ask. I tend to go for the HEA (Happily Ever After) or Emotionally Satisfying Ending which, it was pointed out to me, defines Romance. Okay, I have no problem with either label.

But...what I found out after this person had read my book was that he despised Romance. There was no way he was going to like it, even if he assured me that he could remove his own preferences from his ability to critique. Hah!!! Not bloody likely.

After that awful critique, in which I took copious notes on what was wrong with the book, I fond myself completely unable to get past page 45 in any new venture. I went out and did some vocational training in a completely non-writing field, in which I've been successful...but I stopped writing. Rather I stopped writing as much as I could stop. Which means that from time to time I would come up with a story idea and explore it for anywhere from 10 to 45 pages, but I wouldn't actually let myself dig in to it. I was scared that I would produce more "I guess it's alright, if you like that sort of thing" critiques.

About a year ago, I asked a different friend (you must read her book...really) to give it a quick read and let me know if it was readable/salvageable. Her comments were that it read like a first draft (which it was), had a really good story idea, and it was completely up to me if I wanted to go back and rework it, or if I'd told that story and was done with it, to move on to something else.

I've been writing ever since.

What does she mean, putting words on the page in order?

I'm at the dangerous point of a manuscript. The dreaded middle. Wherein all the characters have been introduced, all the conflicts have been set up, and I know how it all ends. Part of me wants to clap my hands and say, "...and now we're done!!" and move on. But there's no book there yet. The story still only exists in my head. This could be enough if I were only creating stories for my own amusement, but I'm not. I'm creating stories for everyone else's amusement (or entertainment).

What we have now are characters and a plot and ending. So, how do we get from here to there.

As one of my mentors once said (he probably said it more than once, but you get the picture), "you write it."

To which I asked, "And just how do I go about doing that?"

"You put words on the page in order."

And that's what I do when I'm stuck. I remember that all I have to do, even when feeling terribly uninspired, is "put words on the page in order." They don't have to be well crafted sentences or witty dialog....first time through, they just have to be words on the page in order.

And so, there you have it. They answer to the mystery of how do I get from here to there....say it with me:

Put words on the page, in order