Category: writing

September Greetings

Hi writers. Yeah, it’s me. Yeah, again. Like a bad penny, right? Most people assume that the old chestnut about a bad penny refers to coin. It doesn’t. Bad Penney (correct spelling) was a murderer who terrorized several towns in England in the late eighteenth century. *

Chestnut, by the way, was a man known for his pithy sayings. That led to him being associated with sayings, and a saying about the man who created sayings, “That old Chestnut.”*

* Both of these are things I made up.

September has arrived, full of promise. Don’t know about you, but I’ve discovered that I’ve met my enemy and he is me. Identifying your enemy is always excellent progress. As humans we dislike the unknown. Making the enemy known helps establish concrete steps to address your differences of opinions and work to a healthy mutual understanding. Once my enemy and I are friends, I feel like I can make much more progress.

Who is your enemy in this September of 2018?

While you contemplate that, it’s time to write edit like crazy, at least one more time.

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Monday’s Theme Music

It’s September. What are you doing, surfing the net? Aren’t you a writer? Then shouldn’t you be writing something, editing, or some other activity associated with your writing dream?

Come on, get busy. “No Excuses”. 1994. Alice In Chains.

 

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Going On

Have you ever seen a movie or read a book about a prisoner who uses a spoon or other small implement to chip away their rock or cement prison and eventually escape? I was thinking about that the other day as I was editing Entangled LEREs and realized, that’s not how it feels editing the second book in the Incomplete States series.

It also doesn’t feel like I’m struggling to move the needle. Nor does it feel like I’m climbing a mountain or swimming an ocean.

It feels pretty damn good.

I miss writing like crazy each day, truly. I resent, too, that it’ll take sooooo looong before these novels will be published. By ‘sooooo looong’, I mean like months or more. Yes, I’m indulging in some hyperbole to expose my natural impatience.

I’m not good at this persistent, slow stuff. I eat fast, drive fast, think fast, and talk fast. I like doing things fast. I like being intense and immersed.

But, I’m enjoying this leisurely editing and revising. I’m reading other books as I edit, novels that are best sellers or prize winners, prizes like the Man Booker, Peabody, and Pulitzer, or books by authors who won a Nobel Prize for Literature. I used to avoid reading such lofty others while I’m writing or editing. Correcting myself, I used to avoid reading most published literature while I was reading and writing because I often felt that my writing could never achieve such heights, and it depressed and demoralized me.

I’m more confident about it now. While I still enjoy and admire the aforementioned sort of books, I’m not cringing from my efforts when I go back and forth between the two. More often, when I find something special by someone else that I’m reading, I pause to understand the passage’s impact on me and explore what the author did and how they did it, hoping that I can learn how to do it.

The process has helped. I can see improvement in my writing. I sometimes find beauty or insights in my work that startles me.

Like many writers, I’ve found that writing is a progression. With a little talent and heavy loads of persistence and determination, we can improve what we’re revealing and how it’s revealed as we tell the stories that flow through us. This progression shines in the editing process. Further away from the fiery crucible of creativity where the flow is so intense, I can apply the lessons that I perceive. I’m more mindful. While I’m doing this, my appreciation for the diverse processes of writing/creativity and writing/editing/revising increases. As with many facets of our existence, it’s a spectrum.

Of course, on the obverse of this coin, when I read portions of my earlier published works, I cringe. There’s a plan afoot to edit and revise some of that stuff stirring in my head. What’s that? Don’t look back? You might have a point.

Time to resume editing like crazy.

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The Family Dream

IN THE DREAM’S BEGINNING —

I’m in a dim corridor with dusty, wooden floors, walls, and a ceiling. It’s not overly narrow, about wide enough for two people, but it’s rickety, uneven, and crooked. It’s also familiar in a way, as though I’ve been in here before. I’m walking slowly and carefully. Although the light is dim, I don’t know it’s source and I’m not certain where I’m at or what’s going on, so I’m being cautious.

I reach a juncture. The way is blocked by what I determine to be a paper wall. After some experimenting, I push the wall aside and advance. Another paper wall is encountered. This happens three or four times. By that point, I decide that I’ll attempt to smash through the wall instead of moving it. After doing that three or four times, I exit.

I discover myself exiting off a bus. I’ve arrived at my destination, and I’m happy. The destination is an old wooden building built on the side of a grassy slope. Others are there, as I’d hoped and expected, because I’m here for a family reunion.

Walking around, I meet others. I’m carrying a large orange doll of uncertain sex. The doll is precious to me and to the others. They’re impressed that I have the doll. I’m proud of it.

Arrangements and suggestions are made. I want to shower and clean up. Before I do, I want to bath the doll. Finding a wash basin, I fill it with warm, soapy water and gingerly lower the doll into the water until just the top of its head is visible. Beaming, I think and say, “Perfect.” Others come over to admire what I’ve done.

I don’t recognize any of the family from my current family, that is the people I know in this life. Five ideas come to me in this order.

  1. I’m in a movie.
  2. Or a book.
  3. Or another dimension.
  4. Or a past — or future — life.
  5. The people I’m meeting are all me.

The last idea seizes me. I like it. That they can all be me excites me. I think, I’m exploring myself. Walking around, I look at them more carefully for clues that they’re me. I don’t find any, but I’m undaunted.

Returning to the wash basin, I gently scrub the doll, and then rinse it off. This done, I show it to the others. They’re all impressed, clapping and making supportive and encouraging comments. With the doll clean, I’m free to clean myself. After some wandering around and talking to others, I’m pointed toward the showers. Other family members are present. As I strip down, shower, and shave, we talk about what to wear. My choice (which I can’t remember now) surprises some, concerns a few, but pleases the rest. I’m pleased and proud that most are pleased, and satisfied, that is what I’ll wear.

The dream ends.

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“Four On Kyrios”

I’m feeling breathless, worried, and giddy today. You probably suspect that it’s the smoky air because I’ve been complaining about the wildfire smoke so often in July and August. Well, you’d be wrong, suckah. We have good air today.

I’m breathless and giddy because I completed the first draft of Four On Kyrios today. The novel has officially made the transition from beta to first draft. At the same time, I received feedback from two friends who volunteered to read the beta version as a second pair of eyes. They’d finished reading the manuscript and offered their comments. Both were enthusiastic and are ready to read the next book in the series. That pleases me, but I’m worried because, as a writer, I’m unique among writers, and worry whether others who read what I wrote will describe it as gilded garbage.

That was decent sarcasm, wasn’t it?

Four On Kyrios is the first book of the Incomplete States series. It didn’t take me long to read, edit, and revise it. I attribute that speed to several points.

One, it was the third book in the series to be written. That advantage means that a great deal of thinking about the concept, plot, background, and setting was already completed.

Two, I edit and revise as I write. My organic writing process drives this pattern. Writing what’s already written helps me connect with the muses and continue discovering and telling the story. It shouldn’t surprise anyone that I fix grammar, punctuation, pacing, and continuity issues when they’re discovered. (Are you surprised?)

Three, Four On Kyrios is the smallest of the four novels in the Incomplete States series. MS Word clocks it at ninety thousand words and three hundred seventy-five pages.

Four, of the four novels, it has the simplest plot and the fewest characters. Those factors keep it easy to read and edit.

As this is the first novel in a series of four, it’ll stay in first draft status while I read, edit, and revise the others.  The four books were written to tell one larger tale, so they’re interconnected. I came out of the editing and revising process with one page of notes. Some are reminders, a few are continuity questions, and the rest were issues. All of the issues except two were resolved. They’ll remain open until I complete the other three books.

Most of the changes in the novel were more about expanding some scenes to slow down and let the characters breathe. I’ve been reading a lot since I finished the beta draft of the four books. Reading others’ published novels impact my ‘sense’ of the book. To me, this is the instinct we develop as writers because we read. It’s a feel for what seems right and correct about something we’re reading. It’s about flow and story-telling.

Just for the record, I’ve read Lincoln in the Bardo, A Visit from the Goon Squad, Godless, The Midnight Line, Time’s Eye, and Diary in the past few weeks after finishing the first three books of the Dire Earth Cycle. I’m now reading The Pagan Lord and The Order of Time and searching for The Triggerman’s Dance. I think La Rose might be up next on my reading, though. The Order of Time is a fascinating book about time, physics, and quantum mechanics by Carlos Rovelli. I don’t agree with all of his points, but it’s fun thinking about them.

Now, on to the next novel in the Incomplete States series, Entangled LEREs. I’ll begin editing and revising it tomorrow. Right now, though, my stomach is posting orders for something to eat.

I think I shall comply.

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