Science fiction, fantasy, mystery and what-not
He finished reading an article on a Tampa Bay news site. At the end of the article was something he’d never before seen: a button to report typos.
Impressed, he nodded. Many sites would benefit from such a button. They could also use a button to report grammar and punctuation errors.
Hell, his own modest site would do with those buttons.
Coffee in hand, he was ready to write like crazy one more time. That initial moment when he was about to begin to write was the best for him. The session could be great or mediocre. (Is there such a thing as a horrible writing session?) In that way, his sessions were something out of Schrödinger’s thinking: it might be good, it might be bad. Its dual state existed until the session was done.
Execflooftive (floofinition) – Animal is who part of management or shares in the decision-making process.”
In use: “Quite often, people will include their pets in their decision making, asking the animals, ‘What do you think I should do’, for example. But that often leads to the animals assuming they have execflooftive privileges to eat what they want, sleep wherever desired, and do whatever impulse seizes them.”
Writing a novel is always a separate and personal journey. I’m getting better at recognizing what’s successful for me. This article captures the essence of the drift and bounce experienced while riding the writing currents.
On a recent episode of Litopia’s Pop-Up Submissions, we intended to talk about writer confidence, then the show went in another direction. But it’s worth a proper discussion.
Litopia founder Peter Cox, who is also a literary agent, told me confidence is a major issue for his members. ‘Either it never gets a chance to develop, or gets fatally knocked by so much conflicting advice (thank you, internet). But without a sense of self-confidence, I don’t believe a writer can develop their own true voice.’
Voice
First, let’s define voice. It’s what makes you unmistakably you. Your style. Your thematic signature. The distinctive hue of your world. As Peter says, this comes from confidence.
Here’s my take.
I remember when I wasn’t secure about my voice and other distinctive whatnots. I regularly rebooted myself, to be like the authors I was reading, or to act on feedback from critique groups…
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Monday muscled into the morning, declaring, “Ready or not, I am here.”
It’s October 17, 2022. Half of October has fled under the bridge and over the horizon of the past. But they tell us the past doesn’t really exist once it’s done; really, all the previous days have evaporated, except for what we hold in our minds.
After reaching 95 F yesterday, half a dozen degrees higher than prepared for, today will drop into the upper seventies, maybe striking 80 (26 C). It’s a clear enough sky for it. Nothing but blue from my vantage. Trees have at last begun shifting colors here. Local leaves are mostly going gold or yellow.
Monday’s sunrise tiptoed in at 7:26 this morning like it had a hangover. Sunset will come at 6:26 this evening, just eleven hours later. Next Sunday, we ‘fall back’ in most of the U.S., resetting our clocks to be an hour later, part of a hugely debated bi-annual ritual adopted as law last century.
The Neurons were spying on me this morning. No surprise, right? The tiny peckerheads often do. Going about the usuals needed to void my body and begin to re-assume form and manners for being among humans, I found myself examining a memory about meeting a man. After carefully checking it to see where it came from, I realized it was from a dream – ‘we’d met each other in a dream.’ Case closed, I decided, but the dream was suddenly so vivid.
Well, The Neurons heard ‘we’d me each other in a dream’ and called up Heart and “Magic Man” (1976) for the morning mental music stream. It’s been going over and over in an endless loop, kind of like how phone calls and meetings take place on Monday. Chuckle, chuckle.
So that’s the theme music for this October Monday. Stay positively oriented and negatively tested when it comes to COVID and its variants and the flu. It is definitely coffee time for me. I’m positive about it. Here’s Ann and Nancy and the band with their song. Cheers
Michael Seidel, writer 