The current burning project, besides rewriting Crow Boy to be longer and include more info, is a short story I call “My Favorite War Stories.” Five guys in a legion hall telling some stories, one is real, one is really off the dark cliff. The story came out in a rush and I spent this past weekend putting phrases and paragraphs in order so that it makes sense. I killed a couple of darlings (those phrases that as a writer you just love) and rewrote part of it. I hit an interesting block where the characters wanted me to say something and I didn’t. Well, the characters win. It’s their story after all. Now to keep molding and rewriting to get it to work. I know I have to turn the heat in some parts. Where the characters should be in jeopardy, there’s no tension. Time to cook with gas.
Probably will be about 6000 words, horror, Cthulu genre. Not sure where and how I’ll sell it, but first I need to get it finished.
Monday, April 3, 2006
Friday, March 17, 2006
Dude, Run!
For any writer, the TV is a big time sink. With my schedule I barely get to see more than the rerun of the Daily Show while I’m shoveling my dinner down as quick as I can. There was a little show that caught my attention last year called Ghost Hunters. I’d catch pieces of it while doing other things, the TV being on for background noise. It’s only the second “reality show” I’ve really watched a whole episode before attempting to save my intelligence by switching the channel (the other show was a cowboy dude ranch thing). Anyway, March 29 starts a new season of Ghost Hunters on the SciFi Channel. “Dude. Run!” Ah, fun times.
Saturday, March 4, 2006
Story Bone - Cell Phones
The phone looked ridiculously small in his hand. He seemed to be yelling into a child’s toy, pinched between thumb and index finger, held gingerly away from his ear like a particularly disgusting piece of lint.
Sunday, February 26, 2006
Story Bone - Revenant Going the Final Mile
While a Revenant can seem a worn subject in fiction, even having movies and comics made of the idea (The Crow and Spawn), most of these returned to avenge their own brutal killings. What if, to avenge some other wrong, someone made them self a Revenant? Say, their wife was killed horribly, and the legal system was unable to help them. They don’t have the contacts to track down the perpetrators in normal life. But as a Revenant, they’d have access to supernatural powers to track and punish those responsible. A Revenant spured and formed by agape.
Saturday, February 25, 2006
Story Bone - Border Crossings
Listening to a Fresh Air story on NPR when I had an interesting idea. The story was on children illegal aliens trying to reach their mothers in the US. The trials, tribulations, everything they have to go through to get across the border and then the problems that arise after they’re over the border. So I got to thinking, would there be such a border crossing between Heaven and Hell (of the Christian variety)? Would people be able to get over the border? What would they do for or in Heaven (the chores, the same type of jobs that our illegals take)? What would they get from it? Grace? Can you transfer Grace from one person to another, could they bundle Grace back with them across the border?
Many illegals send money back to their families. Many come to take jobs that US citizens don’t really want, or don’t want to pay a lot for. Many are migrant/seasonal passing back and forth across the border every year.
A further complication for the Heaven/Hell scenario is what if people meet those they loved or knew? Would the other person turn them in?
Many illegals send money back to their families. Many come to take jobs that US citizens don’t really want, or don’t want to pay a lot for. Many are migrant/seasonal passing back and forth across the border every year.
A further complication for the Heaven/Hell scenario is what if people meet those they loved or knew? Would the other person turn them in?
Saturday, February 18, 2006
The Muse Sings
Here’s another link I recommend, Tobias Buckell “Getting Past Being Joe Blow Neopro,” as a podcast. I have to admit, I have sinned. I’ve wasted time when I should be writing, I’ve been rude to people at conventions, and I’ve let uncomfortable silences slip into conversations with editors. I hereby apologize for all of them.
So, now, how does one find time. That seems to be a common question. So let me go through my thing. I work a full-time job, I have a one-hour commute, so if I work an 8-hour day, that translates to ten hours. I get no lunch hour (union contractual thing). I have been working 11 to 12 hour days lately. Overtime is shiny, but deadly. Okay, add to that I am an elected official of my village. That means that at least one, more than likely two, nights a week I have meetings. I also have other work that needs to be completed at home. Most recently I spent an afternoon going through a manual for NIMS (National Incident Management System) and taking a test. That’s an afternoon I wont get back. I also do freelance design work. That’s a job that’ll wack out a few hours in the evening and is slightly unpredictable. I also attend a writer’s workshop every other week.
When do I find time to write? Whenever and where ever I can. I have a notebook with me at all times. When there’s a line bothering me I write it down. DO IT NOW, before you forget. Always have something to write with. And if you don’t and a line comes to you, find something, a napkin, the back of a receipt, anything. And then transfer it to your notebook when you can. Then write the story when you find yourself with a spare hour or two. You don’t have to write it all in one sitting, and try not to edit yourself when your writing the first draft, there’ll be time for that later. When you have some time and don’t feel inspired, well, that’s what you’ve been waiting for to do the rewrites.
So, now, how does one find time. That seems to be a common question. So let me go through my thing. I work a full-time job, I have a one-hour commute, so if I work an 8-hour day, that translates to ten hours. I get no lunch hour (union contractual thing). I have been working 11 to 12 hour days lately. Overtime is shiny, but deadly. Okay, add to that I am an elected official of my village. That means that at least one, more than likely two, nights a week I have meetings. I also have other work that needs to be completed at home. Most recently I spent an afternoon going through a manual for NIMS (National Incident Management System) and taking a test. That’s an afternoon I wont get back. I also do freelance design work. That’s a job that’ll wack out a few hours in the evening and is slightly unpredictable. I also attend a writer’s workshop every other week.
When do I find time to write? Whenever and where ever I can. I have a notebook with me at all times. When there’s a line bothering me I write it down. DO IT NOW, before you forget. Always have something to write with. And if you don’t and a line comes to you, find something, a napkin, the back of a receipt, anything. And then transfer it to your notebook when you can. Then write the story when you find yourself with a spare hour or two. You don’t have to write it all in one sitting, and try not to edit yourself when your writing the first draft, there’ll be time for that later. When you have some time and don’t feel inspired, well, that’s what you’ve been waiting for to do the rewrites.
Saturday, February 11, 2006
Kilgore Trout Redux
Whenever I read Mark Twain, I hear Kurt Vonengaut speaking. And when I hear Kurt speaking, I read Twain. So it goes.
Exercise February
Okay, so here's another assignment for my writer's group.
Flesh out this character - Juliana Reade, age 52; she is an extrovert, but gets easily depressed.
And here's my solution:
Jewels stationed herself on the green leather and chrome stool closest to the door. It was her stool, her favorite place. Jackson, the bartender, made her Long Island Ice Tea before coming over to say, “hi,” and then retreated to the darker end of the bar to talk with another regular. Jewels didn’t understand why Jackson didn’t want to talk anymore. She had been his favorite. She liked talking to people.
“Juliana Reade,” her momma would say. “Stop talking and get your ass in this house.”
Her momma was long dead now, smoked herself into an early grave when Jewels was only 38. She raised her glass, “Fourteen years, momma, and I haven’t smoked another one since we buried you.”
Someone came in the bar behind her and Jewels automatically said, “Hiya, sit a spell.” She had become the unofficial greeter of the bar. The shadow that had come in mumbled something back and headed for one of the booths on the other wall. The bar was only a small one, they hadn’t gone far away, but Jewels felt adrift at the end of the bar, cast away by the regulars and the newcomers. She had always felt welcome before, but just like the other familiar places, welcome eventual wears thin. Her positive attitude veneer melted away and her shoulder pads slumped. She felt enormously tired at having to find another place as her home other than home.
Show, don't tell.
Flesh out this character - Juliana Reade, age 52; she is an extrovert, but gets easily depressed.
And here's my solution:
Jewels stationed herself on the green leather and chrome stool closest to the door. It was her stool, her favorite place. Jackson, the bartender, made her Long Island Ice Tea before coming over to say, “hi,” and then retreated to the darker end of the bar to talk with another regular. Jewels didn’t understand why Jackson didn’t want to talk anymore. She had been his favorite. She liked talking to people.
“Juliana Reade,” her momma would say. “Stop talking and get your ass in this house.”
Her momma was long dead now, smoked herself into an early grave when Jewels was only 38. She raised her glass, “Fourteen years, momma, and I haven’t smoked another one since we buried you.”
Someone came in the bar behind her and Jewels automatically said, “Hiya, sit a spell.” She had become the unofficial greeter of the bar. The shadow that had come in mumbled something back and headed for one of the booths on the other wall. The bar was only a small one, they hadn’t gone far away, but Jewels felt adrift at the end of the bar, cast away by the regulars and the newcomers. She had always felt welcome before, but just like the other familiar places, welcome eventual wears thin. Her positive attitude veneer melted away and her shoulder pads slumped. She felt enormously tired at having to find another place as her home other than home.
Show, don't tell.
Tuesday, January 31, 2006
Monday, January 30, 2006
Story Bone
If God does have a voice it would sound more like Pee Wee Herman’s laugh than James Earl Jones telling us he’s our father and we should forget whatever Obi Wan told us.
Thursday, January 12, 2006
Story Bone
"The moon got herself caught in the naked branches of a young maple tree this morning. She was moving across the northern sky, and was only partially full, so she couldn’t see where she was going when the tree stretched up in the night and snared her in his bare branches.
"He was just yawning and waking up from the warm weather when he found the moon caught in his arms. She was coppery and round, warm and brilliant, so he didn’t want to let her go."
"He was just yawning and waking up from the warm weather when he found the moon caught in his arms. She was coppery and round, warm and brilliant, so he didn’t want to let her go."
Tuesday, January 10, 2006
Happy New Year
Hope you all had a great Christmas/Holiday Season and that the gift bearing entities were generous. They were to me.
Other than the Craftsman tool cabinet, I also received an iPod 60gig so I now can listen to all those books on tape at the day job. And many, many books. The guilt stack now teeters on the verge of burying me in my sleep. I now have enough Katharine Briggs to feed my research needs into the next decade, including scoring a copy of the Dictionary of Fairies (real title is much longer) at Half-Price for $5. Yes, you may be envious. It’s okay, I’ll understand. If you don’t understand I’ll let you check the used prices on Amazon for it. This was the paperback copy, so it’s a little less.
In other news I received the rejection letter from Asimov’s for my short-story “The Dead Are Busy” yesterday. They must have wanted to avoid the postage increase so just spiked it. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. I talked with an editor at another magazine at the World Fantasy Convention this past November, they had passed on the story before because of being oversold. He asked me to send it back to them for consideration, so by this weekend it’ll be winging it way there.
Also, I did another walk through of “The Wild Hunt.” I think it’s close to ready. Maybe another full scale re-write will do it (this will make the fourth). Then it’ll be off to the Writer’s of the Future Contest, like it should have been back in December.
Other than the Craftsman tool cabinet, I also received an iPod 60gig so I now can listen to all those books on tape at the day job. And many, many books. The guilt stack now teeters on the verge of burying me in my sleep. I now have enough Katharine Briggs to feed my research needs into the next decade, including scoring a copy of the Dictionary of Fairies (real title is much longer) at Half-Price for $5. Yes, you may be envious. It’s okay, I’ll understand. If you don’t understand I’ll let you check the used prices on Amazon for it. This was the paperback copy, so it’s a little less.
In other news I received the rejection letter from Asimov’s for my short-story “The Dead Are Busy” yesterday. They must have wanted to avoid the postage increase so just spiked it. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. I talked with an editor at another magazine at the World Fantasy Convention this past November, they had passed on the story before because of being oversold. He asked me to send it back to them for consideration, so by this weekend it’ll be winging it way there.
Also, I did another walk through of “The Wild Hunt.” I think it’s close to ready. Maybe another full scale re-write will do it (this will make the fourth). Then it’ll be off to the Writer’s of the Future Contest, like it should have been back in December.
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