The cons of having a famous series

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.
I stumbled upon the preview for this movie because when I'm looking for inspiration, I watch movie trailers. It's set in the Harry Potter universe, some seventy odd years before Harry Potter happened.
It sounds interesting. It tickled my curiosity, but only to the extent of sharing the news on my FB status. I'm not much of a Harry Potter fan. I am a fan of J.K. Rowling, though, simply because she's a really good writer (something that seems to be lacking in the literary world lately). I may not be a fan of her stories, but I am a fan of her writing. Does that make sense?

Of course, that also means I'm not a fan of the Harry Potter movies. Yes, I've gone to see just about every single one of them in cinemas when they came out, but that's another story that has an 18+ rating. Then again, I'm not really a fan of books being thrown onto the big screen. I hadn't read the books prior to the movies, and yet it bugged me that Harry actually has green eyes and really treats his friends like dirt at times. That, I guess, wouldn't look good on the big screen, but I digress.

My post is not to nit-pick HP or to slander it, and would never have been mentioned in my blog at all if it weren't for the trailer I watched.
Are HP fans excited to see this movie? There will be no trace, no mention, of HP in the movie. All new characters. All new drama. All brand spankin' new. Have any HP read the book at all? I haven't seen any of my HP fan friends explode all over the internet about it, so my guess is, no.

Which is sad. J.K. is a good writer. She has an easy style and an engaging voice that sucks you in and makes you forget that you're reading a book.

HP shares some similarities to Tolkien's Lord of the Rings series. In the fact that it is a series made popular through the big screen. Certainly it has had the royalties flooding in with more people aware of it, more people wanting to read the books because they're fans of the movies - coining it 'big' time.

There are other books gone big screen, too. The Hunger Games, for example.

Some writers (and non-writers) who aren't fans bristle at the fact that these authors have received major publicity and sales because of the movie franchises. They got lucky. They have it good. They have been immortalised in the literature world. Look at the houses they live in.

But people generally don't pick up on the cons. Most of the other books these authors have written are guides to, or new stories and characters within the same universe that have reached popularity. You could say that they're milking it, and they are, with good cause. Ever heard about The Casual Vacancy or The Cuckoo's Calling? Or maybe The Underland Chronicles? The Adventures of Tom Bombadil?

It's a different game when you hit the jackpot with a series. That's your career. You're rich and famous for that franchise. That other series you put more work and hours into? Nobody cares about that. Nobody wants to read further than the series that lured them in with a movie trailer, if they read the books at all. If they're more the visual type than the wordy type, graphic novels are a good compromise. But that other book with an unfamiliar title but a well known name? Nah. Nobody is interested in that. Unless, of course, you do what J.K. Rowling did and write it under a pseudonym, and even then you're likely to get caught out - whatnot with book signings and interviews and such.

Which makes me think pseudonyms are a waste of time and paperwork.

Then you get authors like Stephen King. He's had so many of his books turned into movies. People still read his work today, and have favourites, but you're guaranteed that fans will buy whatever new horror he's brewed for the readers. He got lucky. He has it good. He's been immortalised in the literature world. Look at the house he lives in! The difference is that he became published, and popular, and famous, for the film adaptation of Carrie. Sure, people have read his work in magazines before (then forgot who wrote it), and his novels and short stories, but a film drags in a whole new fandom. Everyone watches movies. Everyone sees the trailers in the cinemas. The name becomes familiar, and after the second or third movie based off his work, his name sticks. It becomes a household name. You've got to live under a rock to not know or have heard of Stephen King. But it was the single, standalone novel Carrie that wedged his foot (and writing career) into the spotlight.

Not a series. When it's the end of a series, it's basically the end of your writing career in the limelight or so it would seem to me. But if you can churn out novel after novel and have Hollywood knocking to turn them into films like King, then you've got it made. You can live comfortably, I think. Feed your family and keep a roof over your heads. And you're basically guaranteed your new novel will sell when it hits the shelves, not because of the title of it, but because of your name on it and the fan base you've garnered over the years.

I guess that's where Tolkien is a bit better off than others. He's not around to try and publish another book, or to watch his work on the big screen and cringe at how it's unlike the story he'd had in his mind and heart. As a personal preference, I'd sign a contract that stipulates that no matter how long I've been dead or how popular a work of mine may become, no film or TV show will be made of it. I cringe at the thought of someone like Hayden Christensen or Kristen Stewart or Charlize Theron playing the role of one of my main characters.



Or you could do what George Lucas did and become a film maker instead of a writer.

There are 365 days in a year....

...you can write one sentence every day. Two if you really really have to get it down right then and there. More, if you have the time to do so.
Next year this time you'll have 365 sentences on paper.
How many pages does that equate to? No idea!
The point is that you write, a little bit, a lot, every single day. Make it a habit if you don't have time.
Make it routine if you're not inspired. Make it part of your day, your life, like eating or drinking.
Stop writing in your head and start writing on paper.
May the savior be with you on your journey.
May the force be with you.
And all that.

Happy writing and reading.

Writing Tip #1

[The first scene should]
Establish voice and tone, orient readers in time and space, either start conflict or hint at conflict to come, and - above all - offer the reader something interesting: an intriguing character, a tense situation, a fascinating question, or gorgeous prose.

Quote by Nancy Kress

All the Bright Places Contest entry

 (Photo credit: freedigitalphotos.net)

So the prompt is writing about the place that inspires you most in 555 words.

I don't think I'm going to send my entry in, since I don't live in the US and therefore would forfeit the award IF I had won because they don't post to outside the US yet.

There’s nothing all that flash about it. The bungalows are white, square, flat-roofed; fairly unpretentious.  Each bungalow has an arched, terracotta tiled balcony with rounded, steel railings in reds, blues and yellows. A plain, creaky old plastic chair and a small round glass table is the only company on the balcony. 

It doesn’t sound fantastic, or look all that lush, but you can melt into that chair and stare at the view just beyond the railing for hours. The Atlantic licks at the white, sandy crescent of beach, and you can watch dolphins play closer to the horizon. Sometimes, you’d spot a seal or two – and sometimes, one of them will waddle up onto the rocks and bake in the heat of the sun. It’s always best to stray clear of them, and probably of the water, too, since Great White Sharks aren’t shy about coming close to shore here.

 Fortunately, just beyond the rocks where the seals have a rest, is a clear blue swimming pool for everyone to enjoy. It’s probably better, in my opinion, since the water is bound to be warmer than that of the ocean.  That’s just me. There are plenty of people out in the water on body-boards and jet-skis. If it’s a windy day, it’s the best place to fly a kite – or maybe not, considering some of the gale force winds that randomly attack the enclosed area from time to time. 

You can go for a walk on the pier and take shelter under the white canopies of the seafood cafés that line the small promenade, but I prefer the balcony. It gives shade at just the right time of the day, and it gives sun and heat at just the right length of the time, too. You can sit there and relax, let your mind wander across the deep blue surface before you, and write to your hearts’ content. The only interruptions are the occasional shrieks of enjoyment from the other patrons on the beach, or a small flock of seagulls fighting over a chip. 

The sun comes up early and it goes down late. You’d be surprised how late. Chances are you’d miss your regular bedtime because the sun will just be starting to tint the horizon in orange and grey, when you’d suddenly wake up and realize that the day should have ended an hour or two ago – and still, you’d sit there, waiting to make sure the sun is really going to sleep before you let the shadows chase you into the golden warmth of the bungalow. 

You’d wake up the next morning with a refreshed ‘ah’, and do it all over again. It’s a modest little piece of paradise, and the best place to write.

If you're in the US and want to enter the contest, the deadline is 20th Feb. Go to Figment.com and sign up.

Happy writing!

Setting Up Some Writerly Things

I think I need a break from my novel, despite not having really written anything for a week.

One of the local writer's groups that I'm part of on Facebook shared a writing contest for a magazine from our neighbours across the ditch. I had a look at it, being the curious person I am, but decided I'm probably not cut out for what they're looking for (political and cultural themes - things that only apply in my fantasy world but that I don't dabble in much otherwise).

It got me thinking, however.

So I scrolled down the group page some more and found that someone had shared a link to another writing group called 'Aerogramme Writers' Studio'. I hopped on over and opened Pandora's Box.

I've signed myself up for a few writing competitions:

~ Becoming a Teacher article for In Fact Books (creative non-fiction)
Deadline: 9th March 2015

[Note: I'm an Education Support Worker for children with special/extra needs]

~ Fables and Folklore Short Story for Papercuts

Max: 3-3.5k

Deadline: 15 March 2015

~ New, unpublished stories only for the Bristol Short Story Prize ( £8.00 per entry)

Max: 4k

Prize: Get published in the Bristol Short Story Prize Anthology Volume 8 (and a lot of pounds and some vouchers)

Deadline: 30 April 2015

~ Short story for Zoetrope: All-Story Short Fiction Contest

Prize: $

Submissions Open: 1 July 2015

More details to come.

And once I've got my Nano 2014 draft complete, rewritten, scrutinized on Scribophile, revised and proofread and edited to my best ability, I'll be submitting it for digital publishing to Momentum.

I figured that since it's a kids' writing contest that got me into writing in the first place, I should pick up the habit again and start sending my work in. Maybe I'll get lucky and get published, maybe I won't, either way, at least I'll be doing something productive.

Happy writing, my friends!

Listening to: BF4 replays

Mood: Curious and hungry

Reading: Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin

Writing: Chronicles of Derenvere - Black & White (Book 1)

I thought I'd write a quick update on what's happened (and not happened) since December.

I haven't finished my Nano novel. I've only barely scraped the surface of chapter seven at the moment. Not that it's a case of writers' block or anything like that, but things have been going on that have kept me from knuckling down and writing. You know, things like LIFE, in all its unexpected glory. 

That doesn't mean I've run dry on ideas, though. I've done a very rough edit of what I've got so far and uploaded it online for friends and family (and possibly total strangers) to have a read through. I can go into the excuses of it's just the first draft, I haven't put much editorial work into it yet, yadiyada, but at this stage since I'm still in the throes of writing the whole story down, it's more the ideas and concepts' feedback that I'm curious to hear, rather than the nitty-gritty like pacing and voice and grammar. Thus far the feedback has been positive and motivating.

I've dotted down the outline for chapter seven (for the second time) and will be merging it with the original outline I've got in my notes, which I didn't have handy at the time. You know how it goes: you plot and bullet-point outline what needs to happen in this chapter, until you actually get to that chapter and stop to reconsider because x, y and z has spontaneously occurred in the previous chapter and you need to keep unwinding those little threads into the next chapters, to keep the story intact. The outline changes, maybe only slightly, maybe a lot, and you go with it until the next chapter.

I'm a natural pantser, ie. I follow the story rather than having the story follow me. So I prefer to write without notes; I always saw them as unnecessary since I could easily plunge back into the different stories and worlds I'd created and remember the details as I went along. Now I feel lost without my notes; I have to comb through my work at least twice just to make sure I haven't mixed up some detail like names or eye colours. Notes are very handy things to have. I need them, for this novel anyway, to help me lay out the stepping stones for what's to come.

I am, actually, just rambling. There's no real point to this post other than saying 'hey, I haven't made my deadline but I'm still working on it!' I've got all my books and notes (books full of notes?) spread out around me and all I've been doing for the past hour is staring at the outline for chapter seven and writing this blog post, just to be writing SOMETHING. It's not a case of not being able to write. I could, quite easily.

The problem comes when I have to call it a night. I know it would be like I blink and it'll be 2am in the morning. Unfortunately that won't do, not with three kids who get up way too early to demand their breakfast and a full on day ahead. So I could write, I could pull an all-nighter if I really wanted to. But this time, the fact that I'd be a zombie and terrible company and have an hour's (or two) drive waiting for me tomorrow, on top of already struggling to find energy during the day (like I said, life things happen), far outweighs my need for sleep than my inspired muse trying to suck me back into writing.

After five years...

Listening to: Fall Out Boy - Centuries

Mood: Still reeling emotionally

Writing: Chronicles of Derenvere - Black & White (Book 1)

So after five years of participating in Nanowrimo and only barely scraping past the mid-20k, I've finally done it. I won my first Nano with a strutting 50,234 words.

I say strutting because I've just gone past the halfway point in my novel and have another 5 chapters to write to get to the end, and the muse is still running ahead.

I'd really like to join in the What Now months coming up (January and February 2015) so my goal is to complete this novel by the end of December. As it stands, Tuesdays and Fridays are the best days for me to write because the kids are all at school. I also want to continue the writing routine I've adapted during Nanowrimo and write every night. 

I know my family have been asking to read this book. I know the version I have up on my Fiction Press is old and incomplete. But I do have my standards, and since this was NANO, the majority of what I've written needs to either be hammered into shape or cut out completely. Until it's in decent enough shape, I'm not sharing it with anyone.

Congratulations to everyone who won Nanowrimo 2014. 

To those who didn't win: it took me years and I finally got there. Just don't throw in the towel!

Happy writing and reading :)

Taking the Plunge

I wasn't going to do it this year. I wasn't planning on joining in, anyway.

Yet here I am, 6 days left to go and scheduling in my Nano calendar.

So I guess it's safe to say that I have not gone sane yet. 

The One-shot habit

Listening to: The Pretty Reckless - Heaven Knows

Mood: dipping my toes back in the water

Writing: One-shots/cut scenes for Chronicles of Derenvere

I don't know if any other writers out there do this, too. 

I picked up this habit on fanfiction sites such as Twilight Tales and Fanfiction.net. 

Whenever I try to get into, or back into, a fandom, I start off with one-shots. 

One-shots according to the online dictionary:

1. Occurring, appearing, done, etc, only once.

2. Achieved or accomplished with a single try.

Or, in more defined writing terms as explained by JustPeachy on Yahoo Answers:

~A different meaning of "one-shot" is often used by authors who write series of stories, generally in their own alternate universe of a given fandom. Often an author will write several disjoint series, but additionally, single stories (of any length, but generally comparatively shorter) which are standalone, not tying into any of the writer's other continuity; these are called one-shots, as the author doesn't plan to extend or revisit them.~

A note for readers on FF.net - please go reread that last sentence there, and spare one-shot-addicted authors the pain of gritting their teeth and ramming their heads into their desks and lamenting about people not understanding what it means when a story is listed as 'complete'. Thank you kindly.

Where was I....

So I start off with one-shots, both to test the water and see if I can write the characters in-character (which is not always an easy feat), but mostly to test the water. To see whether I'll be burned with fire or welcomed with chuckles and head shaking by the fandom. Thus, I write humour as my introduction to a new fandom. Son of Sparda Mode is a prime example (and also my most liked one-shot with 33 people having added it to their favourites, whoo-hoo!)

Once I've got my foot in the door, I dish up some more one-shots of differing genres. Sometimes it's to try my hand at something new such as cropping an adventure into a one-chapter story, but most of the time it's to get to know the characters better. Test them in various situations, put them in other genres, and see how they tick. 

Which is why the habit of one-shots has stuck and follows me into both fandoms and original projects.

So!

In short, I'm starting work on one-shots for Chronicles of Derenvere to get back into my character's mind. Here, have a read. Be warned, it's not a funny one to start off with.

Happy writing and reading! :)

Write, burn-out, beta-read, rewrite, repeat.

Listening to: Avril Lavigne ft OneRepublic - Remember When

Mood: Meh.

Writing: The Chronicles of Derenvere

I'd like to start this post off with: No, I am not participating in Nano next month. It would be the first time since discovering Nanowrimo that I don't join in the chaos.

But I am getting back into the swing of writing again. Not to imply that I haven't been writing, but I am mentally gearing myself up to make this my 8-6 job, 5 days a week. I think that I have reached the point that I just want to polish off the manuscripts I have, whilst working on those still sprouting stories, and send them into an agent.

See what happens.

I wouldn't send my work in anywhere if I didn't think it stood a chance.

But hey, it's 2014, and considering the smut selling like hotcakes in the literary world these days, I'm confident that I can feed the readers and satisfy everyone.  Especially (or rather hopefully) the other writers out there who are discouraged and outraged at what is being put forward to readers.

Respect the readers.

Respect the writers.

Respect the craft.

Write on, my friends.

That blank stare...

Listening to: Annabel Fae - Already Home

Mood: tired from this cold...who gets a cold in summer anyway?

Plotting: my hubby gave me an awesome bunny ^_^

Welcome to the blog of randomness!

And that's the opening line I came up with after staring at the screen for several minutes. Writer's block, maybe? Or it could be that I just have too many things I want to blog about and can't decide on which.

It's four days to Christmas and I've put a couple of decorations in the house and let the kids make a few decorations for the tree. Which is very little if you consider the long list I have to complete: sowing a tablecloth for our Christmas feast, painting the table decorations with the kids, making Christmas crackers, baking gingerbread men and christmas trees, creating my awesometastic gingerbread house as the center piece for our table (the sweets I bought have all but perished in the week since I bought them - sweets don't last in this house), wrapping the presents, and getting the kids to sit down and finish the Christmas cards so I can get it all sent off to family and friends.

Busy, busy, busy. Bzzzzzzzzzz.

Let's not forget the plotbunnies nibbling at the back of my mind the whole way. I've also decided that there is no excuse not to be going to church anymore, so I went last week with two little monkeys, and I'll be going again on Christmas Eve.

I keep telling my kids that Santa isn't real. Of course they think I'm bonkers because they took photos with Santa and Santa seems to be in every mall we walk into. But I want my kids to understand the meaning of Christmas, and how easier to do that than to discourage the Santa smut and reinforce the reality that we're celebrating Jesus's birthday with CAKE!

CAKE. No. The cake is not a lie.

Okay, it is.

But there will be cake.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Something I learned this Year

Listening to: Love the Way you Lie - Eminem ft Rihanna

Writing: Nanowrimo 2011 Novel

Mood: disappointed



First off: CONGRATULATIONS to all the passionate writers out there who made it to the golden 50k words!

Nanowrimo officially ended for me yesterday. I got to a whooping 26 000 (and some other numbers) words. So another year gone by where the goal line is just out of my reach, but I gave it my best shot with the little time I had. I'm not giving up on my story either, I'm still trudging onward like a good little soldier. If anyone else out there didn't make it either, KEEP GOING! Good stories never end, they live on in our minds and if your muse is anything like mine( he likes to keep dumping everything in my head onto paper) you'll finish writing your novel yet! Just... not in November. Maybe December, but realistically I'll probably complete my Nano next year March.

And then start planning for Nanowrimo 2012.

A friend of mine recently lost a family member of hers. It was strange because only a week prior we were talking about funeral songs and how her father wanted them to play Frank Sinatra's I did it my way at his funeral. In that one simple request, I could tell that this man had a lot of character. He must have been one of the most stubborn, most self-motivated people to walk the earth. He must have accomplished his life's goals because, as you'd imagine, the song wasn't referring to the way he passed but to how he'd lived his life.

This December I'm going to be blogging every day (yea, EVERY day!)(-edit- well, no, not every day) listing things I learned this year. Maybe you'll find some of it useful in some way or another, and if you do, please do share your thoughts and experiences with me in the comments section.

The one thing I learned this year is to never give up on yourself.  Do your best and give it your all, put up your best effort. Even if you trip over your own feet, even if you come last, even if you're voted out, even if you've got a low wordcount, even if other people have a negative opinion, even if you think you're not worth it, none of that matters as long as you don't give up on yourself.

Pick yourself back up, keep running, keep playing, keep writing, keep trying, keep going. Never give up. Believe in yourself. Give yourself a break. This will become my motto for the new year, I think. Never give up.

Because, one day, wouldn't you also want to be able to say I did it my way?

Catch you guys tomorrow!

At this rate you will finish on December 8,2011.

I have a prologue and I have my first two chapters down. I'm on chapter 3 at the moment and it feels like I've only started picking up momentum now.

I met my MC, Haley, where she was leaving the principal's office after some incident (earlier that day she slipped and smacked her head into the floor and her sisters' friends laughed at her - Haley didn't appreciate that much so there was some teenage slapping going on), that had her suspended from school. On the drive home, her parents inform her that they're sending her to a special summer school a.k.a. Christian Bootcamp. Haley will have none of it and runs away. She decides to take the 'short cut' through their local reserve to avoid running into the authorities (or her parents) on the main road, but she stumbles upon a tunnel that seems to have appeared out of nowhere. Curiosity gets the better of her and she goes inside for a looksee, wacks her head against a rock wall (again, poor girl) but then the dark starts to make her paranoid (or maybe she's just smacked all the marbles out of her mind?) and she's 'chased' by whispers (yes I was listening to Skillet while writing that part).

She makes it out the other side of the tunnel, and follows a lonely road to a creepy house in the woods, where she steps into something that might have come out of Alice in Wonderland. Or not. It's pretty weird anyway. A blind boy tells her where she needs to go, and Haley, wondering if she is in Wonderland, follows his directions. She gets snatched into this underworld by a witch who wanted to use her for a spell to keep the cold from her house/hut/cave (there's clearly confusion between myself and my characters about what to call it), but then just as suddenly and inexplicably the witch lets her go again. Haley doesn't wonder why because nothing is making much sense to her, and she believes she'd knocked her head one too many times that day (whether she has or not I haven't decided yet). So Haley is let lose in this underworld but then! She's chased by a ginormous worm. And I mean this thing is huge, and I did not enjoy writing it because worms are just... ick and make my toes curl in disgust. Like frogs - with those soft, squishy bodies that only needs a little squeeze to make them.... Wait. I'm digressing. Where was I?

Oh, the ginormous worm chasing Haley. Right, so she runs off with this worm chasing her and suddenly this wolf comes out of nowhere (or I might have written about the wolf before, my memory's already foggy on the details) and starts chasing her, too. She manages to lose the worm, but the wolf keeps on her heels the whole time until she accidentally falls into a river of blood.

Of course she doesn't know right away that it's blood. Haley wiggles her way out of this river and tries to outrun this persistent wolf. She stumbles upon this small little town and goes into what appears to be a bar. The people in there are pretty creepy, in varying degrees. That's also when she realises she's covered in blood, whatnot with the light on her and all. So she goes to this tiny bathroom to try clean up, but this weirdo follows her. She dodges him but then the whole bar seems to have turned against her - and then she kind of really does lose her marbles.

Haley believes that she's in a coma of sorts and this is all just in her head.

I think I'm going to go with the first idea, but not the second. I'm contemplating bringing astral projection into the mix to explain some things. She's reincarnated at the end of the novel so I might as well.

So, Haley believes that this is all imaginary and that she's really in control, and she starts spewing some crazy smut at these people. But then, just as this weirdo guy grabs her, her hero arrives! Tararum!

But he's nothing what she had expected and she's disappointed. However, I'm pretty happy with how he's turned out, appearance wise anyway.

At the moment, he and Haley are having a bit of an argument. He's trying to explain to her that everything is real, and Haley is being very difficult. Not exactly how I'd pictured the first meeting between girl and guardian angel would go down, but hey, it beats cliche.

I have 22 days left to get 38,383 words written.

And aren't those numbers just funny? Like tomorrow is the 11th of the 11th of 2011. I'm going to make a wish at 11:11:11am tomorrow morning. And then again at 11:11:11pm, just for good measure.

Nope, not wishing to win the lotto.

I wish I can win Nanowrimo this year.

Good luck everyone! ^_^

Day 1 - Hello Nano, meet my Life!

I'm fairly sure that since midnight last night, just about everyone in my region has a word count higher than 0. Everyone except for me. It's lunchtime and that 0 is still there.

But you know what, I'm not going to sweat it this year. There's no pressure. It'd be nice if I could finally make the 50k, of course, but I'm not going to lose sleep, weight and a social life because of it. So on my agenda for the day - shopping!

I might write something when I get back home. We'll see.

The muse & plot bunny vs reality

I'm going to write a little story so that my friends and family (who are not writers) will have a much better idea what it means when a writer says 'The muse is calling my name!', or 'I'm inspired', or 'I NEED TO SIT DOWN AND WRITE, NOW!'

Your child/younger sibling/best friend (muse) has been very good with keeping themselves occupied while you deal with the daily tasks of work/school/whatever it is that is consuming your time (aka. life). You're always aware that they're waiting on you to spend time with them, until you finally get to a point where you start to feel guilty that they're so quietly patient. You get this great idea (plot bunny) on how to repay them/reward them for their good behaviour and you say 'you know what, I will put everything else on hold and we will go have some quality one-on-one time, if not today then definitely in 8 days' time'.

Sounds good, right?

Your child/sibling/friend is SO excited that you haven't forgotten they exist and that you're going to be doing something fun together, like the good old times, that their excitement becomes infectious and before you know it, you are swept up by it and geared and ready to go. So you grab them by the hand, practically skip to the door as you drag them behind you, and with great joy you fling the door open.

But instead of feeling the warm sunshine on your face, you get pelted with hail stones; instead of meeting up with all your other friends, they're unavailable and don't answer when you call them; instead of stepping into an exciting, bold world ready for you to come play in, you step into the real world where chores and work require your immediate attention. You turn to your child/sibling/friend and you want to explain to them, but their excitement has morphed into stubborn determination (which can be a very bad thing when the timing is not right) and you just know that if you bail out on them now, it will take a lot of grovelling and coaxing and promising and, did I mention grovelling?, for them to do anything with you willingly thereafter.

This is what it's like when you introduce Plot Bunny to Muse (and vice versa), and reality becomes an obstacle in your path. The muse will always be there somewhere in the depths of your subconscious, but when you neglect it for too long, it starts chipping tunnels to the deeper and more unreachable part of your mind. Sometimes it will take a long time before you venture down the right tunnel and find them sulking in a little corner. Sometimes it's a really tough battle to drag them kicking and screaming from their sulky-corner and it might take a while for them to warm up to you again. The muse, I've found, can be stubborn to the point of being unhealthly. They can be your worst enemy or your best friend, depending on how you scrabble your words.

Personally, I've had to fight my muse out of hiding, and then poke him with a hot iron until he submitted to my demands, at least twice in the past five years. Reality has a way of scaring the muse away.

This time, however, I've got my muse chained to me. If he was to break through the chains, I've got his shoes superglued to the ground. If he was to struggle out of his shoes, I have a minefield of sinkholes that will suck him straight back to me. If he was to fly, I'll shoot him down and clip his wings. If he was to teleport...well, let's just say that I have another no-nonsense muse lying in wait to chase my carefree muse back to where he belongs.

So, I'm going to be dotting down some stuff on a plot bunny that's been pestering me for a while now. I might write it for Nano, but as it stands, I'm still going to be writing the first part of my completed manuscript.

8 DAYS TO NANO!!!

*Please refrain from pointing out the fact that a muse is female. I know this. So does my muse. I also have imagination and don't let cliches box me in. My muse is quite content being male.

Of Genres and Nanowrimo

Listening to: The Devil's Trill by Vanessa Mae

Reading/revising: Shadow Legacy (w/t)

I had a scout around to familiarise myself (again) with the different genres and sub-genres out there. I've never slotted my work into a genre before. I've labelled myself a horror writer, because that's what I tend to read, watch, and breathe, but the horror in my mind translated onto paper oddly enough doesn't fit in the literary horror genre. Funny that.

The reason I struggle to define what my novels are, in essence, is because some genres bleed into others. For example, my Chronicles of Derenvere series starts the first book off where my MC is abducted, tortured (mentally, physically and emotionally) and mutilated to a degree. On top of that, he's being starved to death very slowly. There are some nasty, gory scenes, but they become less and less the further away my MC escapes his nemesis. Now those elements should, by all means, shift the story into the Horror genre.

But here's the thing: my MC is an aspiring powerful sorcerer, coincidentally also the heir to the magical kingdom Derenvere, and they have things like unicorns and dragons and elves running around the show. There's runes, and levitation, and the setting isn't in the real world - it's all a manifestation of my imagination. This would make the story a fantasy - anything with dragons and princes and magic class as Fantasy.

And to put the cherry on the cake, it is also a very spiritual journey my MC goes on. Going from being a blind believer to a non-believer to having doubts, he's spiritually tormented for a long time. I don't write about God and Satan and angels, per say, but there are beings in the series that are derived from them. So, what does it make my novel? Is it Literary fiction, because it focusses mostly on my MC's inner and outer journey, or is it Inspirational, because it involves spiritual growth?

You see why it's hard for me to decide on a genre. I could just slot it into the General genre, but I'm reluctant to do that. So far I've claimed this to be a Dark Fantasy, whatnot with all the fantasy and the horror. But maybe the final decision on which genre is more befitting will be at my agent's discretion.

One novel I'm not confused about is my current manuscript titled Shadow Legacy. It's definitely a YA Paranormal novel. It does start off with my MC being trapped in an alternate world (which would make it a Fantasy) but she eventually finds her way back to the 'real' world where she has to deal with the paranormal that has followed her there.

I'm not fussing over this one. It's Paranormal.

I'm also going to be rewriting/revising this novel for Nanowrimo. Yes it's 30k words or something at this stage, but it's not like I'm cheating. I'm still  going to be working just as hard at this as everyone else who will be starting a new project from scratch. I'm still going to be putting in the hours, same as everyone else. This is one manuscript I need to get done, chop-chop, so I can start searching for representation by the New Year. Or should I say, the Last Year? It is 2012, after all.

I'm looking forward to meetups with writers in my region, if I can make it. I want to say that I will go to every meetup and be one of the last people still sitting there writing my little heart out. I want to say that I will get to go chill out with a few cups of coffee and with like-minded people. I want to say that I will be a regular visitor to my library every day and get at least an hour of writing done. 'Tis but a dream!

But look, I doubt  the library staff are going to be very tolerant of my little monkey messing up their computers or unpacking all their DVDs and books in the kids section, and let's not forget how he absolutely loves to run around screaming like a monkey going to war. Maybe for the first day or two they'll look past it. After that they're likely to ban me from setting foot in the library unless my monkey is gagged and tied down, y'know?

Anyway.

18 days to Nano!!!

Beta Reader vs Alpha Reader

Listening to: Unbreakable - Fireflight

Revising: Shadow Legacy (w/t)

Back in the day, when I had the luxury of morning and afternoon two-hour-duration naps to do my writing in, I was very much addicted to writing fanfiction(FF). The first writers I ever encountered and befriended were reviewers and authors on fanfiction.net. That was the allure of it - the reason why I opted to spend more time writing something I couldn't make a dollar off of rather than working on my originals - it was the people. The sense of community and belonging.

And let's not forget the reviews. They are evil.

I knew my writing needed some serious work, but no one seemed willing or able to point out my flaws and help me through it. They had other obligations, other responsibilities, like focussing on their own FF's lest they incur the wrath of their fanbase for taking too long to update. Then I heard about this mythical creature - a beta reader.

I found a few and queried with them if they'd be interested in helping me with my work. Only one of them ever got back to me. I was nervous but elated - I've found someone who was going to genuinely critique my writing! So I happily sent my first draft of my first chapter to this beta-reader and... nothing.

Not a peep. Not a whisper. It's like they dropped off the face of the world. I ended up plaguing them with emails, first because I was worried my writing was so terrible that it was taking them weeks to go through it, then later because I just wanted to annoy the hell out of them until I got some kind of response from them. I got nothing.

There's nothing more discouraging or infuriating than sending your baby to someone and never hearing from them again. I'm just glad it wasn't any of my original work that I sent to them, else I really might have lost my mind. This is also the reason why I have issues sharing my work with anybody other than my close family and friends.

So I went and thought about what had happened to me, and noticed that quite a few writers leaving reviews for others stating that they ought to find themselves a beta-reader. One in particular referred a young writer to one of the very beta-readers who had never bothered to reply to me. I contacted the writer personally and warned them about what had happened to me, just to give them a heads-up. The writer got back to me a week later and asked if I would mind critiquing her work because the same thing that happened to me had happened to her. Somewhere along the lines of my email to her, we had gotten lost in translation, and she assumed that I was another beta-reader.

I wasn't then, but I told her I'd help her out as best I could, and a few months later I got a heartwarming thank you from her, a dedication and referral to me as a beta-reader on her profile - and the rest is history. If there is one thing I love more than writing and reading, it's helping other writers.

I'm no guru at writing, don't get me wrong. You can never know everything there is to know about the craft since it's a on-the-job-learning kind of experience. I've always shamelessly declared this, but a couple of young writers have taken this statement the wrong way before. False accusations and observations were made, it became a personal matter - it was pretty ugly. I followed up on it with this writer and we made our peace, but I'd be lying if I said it didn't knock down the little confidence I had in my writing skills.

That was only one unhappy writer I ever had to deal with. For the most part, all the other writers I've beta'd for have either given me genuine thanks for my input, or we've become friends and keep in touch ever so often via MSN chats or Facebook.

Different writers are at different stages of developing their talents. Some need more work than others, like the ones who have English as a second language (like me); others just need someone to help them fight a two-man battle with things like characterisation; some have just started out and need to be guided and made aware of the rules.

Some have been writing for years and, very similar to someone who has been driving for years, have picked up naughty little habits that they don't even notice until you point it out to them (overuse of the comma or fragmented sentences, as a couple of examples).



The thing is, every writer has talent, whether their talent is in their vast knowledge of their subject matter, or their particular voice, or their imagination. And like every writer has talent, every writer has one single thing in common - we all need to hone our craft.

I've done beta work for some of my favourite writers on FF.net. My nerves were dancing with excitement and terror, though. My beta abilities have also extended from FF to rough original manuscripts of others. I feel I'm qualified enough, after three years of being a beta-reader, to offer my input to 'real' writers.

This has become extremely handy for me because I now have experience with what to look out for in my own manuscript. Not that I'll ever stop wanting a critique partner. My hubby offered to crit my work for me, so once I'm done with chapter one, I'll be getting that feedback I crave so much.

Oh. I also recently learned that I'm actually not a beta-reader. I'm an alpha-reader: that other person who sits patiently waiting for you to finish writing the next chapter so they can read it and critique it for you. A beta-reader, according to definition, is someone who critiques your work when you have finished writing the whole manuscript.

Like I said, you can never know everything.

Though I always used the term 'writing buddy', I never knew it was called an alpha-reader. So I did know what everyone else was talking about on that forum after all!



Revision: And so it begins.

Listening to: Hero - Skillet

Mood: Can't-think-straight-tired

Reading: Demon in my View by... can't remember author name.

Writing: Shadow Legacy


I have, at long last, taken the actual plunge into revision.
I'm on page 7 of my 112 page novel. My previous attempt at 'revising' it was a complete bugger because I had started to rewrite it from scratch.
Without a solid plot outline drafted up to guide me along a rewrite, a rewrite is not going to happen. I'm supposed to be revising it, anyway, not rewriting the whole manuscript.

So! Let me tell you a little bit about Shadow Legacy.
I first wrote it back in 2005-2006. I'm not entirely sure which year I wrote it, but I did write it within a week. I think I might have blogged about it before. If you're a writer, you can imagine what I've got on my hands here. Revising a first draft of 38, 500 words is not an easy feat.

It's a young adult supernatural romance, starring a set of eighteen year old twins, Haley and Amber. Haley was lured into a different realm where she fell prey to creatures of the dark. She was first going to lose a few toes, an ear, and some other body parts after a witch snatched her up, but she caught the eye of a vampire (yes, I'm aware that I stated before that I will never write vampires, but there is also a first time for everything) who 'rescued' her from the witch. Why she caught the eye of the vampire, I'm not too sure yet. Another creature of the dark in one of my scenes laughs at her when she demands to know why specifically she was targetted, and tells her 'Such arrogance. You don't really think there's any special reason why we chose you, do you? Any other human would have been good enough. You just happened to be in the right place at the right time.'

But I'm not sure whether this creature was bluffing and purposely trying to play with her head, or whether it was speaking the truth, since I haven't elaborated on the scene or know when or where exactly it will fit into the story.

The only reason why Haley survives in their world is because of her guardian. I'm not putting a label to it other than guardian, so it can be a familiar or a shade or an angel, whatever the reader choses to believe. Her guardian has the ability to shift from human form into wolf form. No, he's not a werewolf; he's invisible in her world, but in the dark realm he can manifest in these forms. I chose a wolf for his other form because I'm a dog person, dog is man's best friend, they're loyal to their owners, they're guardians of sorts (guard dogs, get it?) and wolves are territorial by nature. All these qualities factor into his character. I might have thought a name up for him before, I'm not sure because I haven't actually written him yet.

This is all backstory, though. Whether I'll incorporate it into the actual book remains to be seen. As it is, the story starts off with Haley wanting to go to sleep as soon as the sun is up. It introduces her and Amber, their relationship with one another, and the initial conflict that exists between them.

I will need to make a note to get that conflict resolved by the end of the story.

Nothing much has really happened in the first 7 pages. Aside from a phonecall for Amber, an argument between the sisters, and Haley reflecting vaguely on her past for the purpose of informing the reader, there's not much else going on. I've already revised certain details, like turning the sixteen year olds into eighteen year olds, giving them more dialogue, and changing the matter of Haley lounging in her backyard for the day to her sleeping instead. The part where she reflects on past events might get cut, if I decide to start the story off where she's lured to this dark realm, because then there would be no point in mentioning it.

There is a lot of work ahead of me. The story is written in third person narrative from Haley's point of view, yet later on, if I recall, the point of view jumps to Jeremy (the male lead) when Haley gets sucked back into the dark realm, to Amber, and back and forth like that until Haley comes back onto the scene. I haven't actually written the parts where Haley is in this dark realm. It's a concept I still need to explore and flesh out a bit. I wrote the story, believe it or not, without my female lead. Amber is more of a secondary character than a lead, so I'll be putting her in her place and following Haley all over the show.

I prefer to stick to one character's point of view. Sure, as a writer, it's really easy to jump from character to character, and I can make it work. But as a reader, I've always preferred to stick to a single character throughout a story. Consistency is key to prevent confusion.

Besides, I've always said that I want to write that book that I haven't found yet.

My first task of revision is to pick places where my writing can be clearer, more interesting, more informative and more convincing. Yep. I'm leaving the descriptive part of my writing for the final draft.

Note: some of what I've said in this blog might actually turn out to be nul in void since I'm simply revising the novel from page 1 without having read through the entire manuscript again.

Shadow Legacy (working title) and goal setting

Listening to: Evanescence - Lose Control

Reading: The Forbidden Game - L.J. Smith

I have a completed manuscript of 39,692 words with an actual beginning, middle, and end, that has been nagging me for a revision for a long time now. The versions I have of it on my computer say that it was created in 2007, but I'm pretty certain that I wrote it sometime between 2005-2006. The original draft on my computer back in South Africa will probably have the more accurate date for when I finished it.

It took me an entire week to write it from the first to the last word. Can I write a book in a week again now? Heck no! I was young, I had no job, I wasn't going to college, I was going through an anti-social stage (what writer doesn't?) and I had no other responsibilities to contend with. Well... I probably did but I can't remember what.

What I do remember is having my muse chain me to my computer until I was done. I really did live in my room for that week. I was up at 6am, typing away the entire day, taking only the necessary breaks to the bathroom when I absolutely had to. I think I even ate my food with one hand and typed with the other that week. And sleep? Sleep was non-existent. I would force myself to turn in at midnight, and I'd be lying in bed with my eyes closed, going over the plot and the characters in my mind, and 'dreaming' about what was going to happen next and how that would affect the course of the story. I'm sure I drifted, but when I was awake, I was plotting. That's where my saying 'I don't sleep, I plot' stems from. And I'd be up again at 6am, typing like a mamba.

I had that urge of intrigue; I was so wrapped up in this world I've created, even when I wasn't writing it I was definitely thinking about it, and I had that insatiable compulsion to get back to it. Nothing else mattered. Everything else was insignificant in comparison. I just wanted to stay lost in the story. It was kind of like the feeling you have when you pick up one of those books that you just can not put down until you've finished it, only it was coming from the writer side of things.

I also remember how completely bushed I was on Sunday afternoon, when I finished writing the ending. I had lunch with my family, I washed the dishes and thought about how well the story had run, and then I passed out on my bed. I felt very much accomplished.

I still do, in a sense. The upside is: I have a completed manuscript!!!

The reality is: I have a completed manuscript. I have a story that's too short to be a novel, that needs to become a novel. The reality is that I have a lot of work ahead of me.

My ultimate goal is to polish it as best I can before starting the query process. But I'm taking it in baby steps. So my first goal is to schedule writing into my daily routine and then to maintain that routine.

Once I can achieve that, I can worry about the next goal.





Blogpost 27 March 2010/Bayonetta review and some writerly rambles

Reposting this because I'm no longer using the other blog.

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So, due to over-abundance of boredom and nothingness, I decided to play some more Bayonetta. I completed Route 666 - and that bike is killer. Although the game smacks of facepalm-worthy moments (the cherub statue with the tallywanker episode;the nutty babyfaced thing in Paradiso that falls in love with Cereza, to name a couple) it is ridiculously fun to play. I love Bayonetta, I love Cereza even more (I want to adopt her!) and I completely HATE Jeanne and Luka. Talk about annoying! Especially Luka whom likes to repeat one word over and over and over again and again in each and every sentence he splutters out. *Major facepalms Luka* Guh!

But those are just the characters you encounter. The actual gameplay - phenomenal, once you get the hang of it. I'm a sword girl by nature, I very much abuse Rebellion and swordmaster style, Red Queen and Yamato Dark Slayer style in Devil May Cry, so you betcha I'm going to overuse Asura in Bayonetta. It's got Rebellion and Yamato moves wrapped in one - can you get any better? (The answer is NO)

That aside, Bayonetta truly is the female version of Dante. I want to BE Bayonetta - and then I want to team up with Dante and torture Nero some. And once I'm done with Nero, I'll torture Dante some too ;) Seriously though, their personality type is one and the same, and it is awesome!

All right, Game-Gush over (for now). I've managed to write two little scenes last night, including an analogy shared by a mother with her son. I am very happy with it, but at the same time I'm quite frustrated, too. They are good scenes and vital to the plot - but not the current plot I'm working on. None of it fits into my novel that I'm writing right now.

This of course means that I'm going to be sitting with pen locked to paper until midnight tonight trying to get some order going. I'll be rewriting the first chapter from scratch, and moving the original chapter 1 to become chapter 2, which means all other chapters will need to be kicked one number up. Up until chapter 9, that is, or should I say the new chapter 10? I'm rewriting that whole chapter, and relocating the original chapter 10 to chapter-much-later, which is where my secondary character, Sebastien (tarumtarumtarum!!!)enters the novel, and most of the character development for my main character, poor liddle Galen, takes place from that point onward. Not that Galen's not going through some changes prior to that meeting, because he most certainly is going through drastic, frightening changes, but Sebastien will be the one to help shape Galen into the uber-cool king he will one day become. I should probably tell you what the novel is about, and of course I will once I've got the summary strung together.

And damn fanfiction. Receiving alerts for 'favourite author' and 'favourite story' is detrimental to my health. It makes me want to drop my originals and go back to my addiction. Though that would be pathetic of me - no one is going to write this novel except for me, and it won't get done just because I keep thinking 'I need to get this done'.

Sit down.
Take the pen.
Put tip to paper.
WRITE.

Discipline, discipline, discipline.

Quote of the day:
Choose a job you love and you will never have to work a day in your life - Confucius.