Science fiction, fantasy, mystery and what-not
I’ve been pursuing another novel’s completion. Been writing that puppy as I can while navigating the usual life interruptions. They don’t need counted down on two hands for you to understand all the life junk happening, right? Employ memory and imagination, and you’ll probably get it.
I’ve been sort of stymied. I’m not a plotter. I don’t outline a jot. I’m a solid pantser, leaping from slippery point to slippery point, following whims and impulses like they’re magic winds carrying me toward my destination. Except, suddenly the winds dropped me into a place I didn’t recognize. Not sure where to go, I did some editing, revising, and rewriting while muttering darkly to myself about being misled by mean muses and wondering what the hell had happened to the Writing Neurons. Besides those activities, I made some assumptions and conclusions about what I thought was wrong, how some things lacked enough substance and understanding to build upon, and conducted some writing exercises to stimulate me, myself, and I. I refer to these exercises as snapshots. They’re all just focus exercises to help me have greater understanding of whatever needs more understanding: setting, history, concept, characters, motivations, relationships, whatever you might find in a novel.
After four days of that, grappling with where I was, unsure where I was to go, I said to myself, “Come on, man. Pitter patter. Get ‘er at ‘er.” And miraculously, the muses and the Writing Neurons emerged today and ordered, “Start typing.” And then they guided me through story twists which I never saw. Well, I partly saw some of ’em. But some of the twists involved twists I’d come up with but didn’t know how to put into the story. Suddenly, click, yea! All came together.
Most satisfying writing day, it was. Sometimes it does pay just to sit down and write like crazy. Who do I need to bribe to get more of these?
The pinks and white blossoms in my view offset the clouds’ wind and wuthering suggestions. Nothing can unburdened the wind’s effect. Lowing through the sky, it randomly shakes bushes and trees, giving an impression that one big creature is chasing a herd of other creatures through the foliage. I’m thinking, a T-Rex is after a swarm of smaller things and the smaller things are frantically ripping away.
This is Sunda, March 30, 2025. Just one more day of March after this, then April arrives to try to lift our spirits in ‘Merica.
I’ve again done the tango with my cat to give him his medicine. Knowing when it’s time to be administered, he alertly avoids me and asks for permission to leave the house. Usually takes five minutes of steps and talking back and forth before the med is delivered. I try to sound cajoling and calming; he responds with disappointment and distrust. Finally done, it’s feeding time, followed by his second med. I have the system down for the second one, amlodipine. It’s a powder. I mix it in with chumley and hot water. Then out the door he goes.
And back in, because wind. Papi the ginger blade has no patience for wind. I’ve been out there, though, and agree with his assessment, as that wind carries some winter on it. Now Papi is visiting me, paws on my leg as I sit here, requesting that I pet him. I take time out of typing and reading to do that, sipping coffee as he closes his eyes and purrs. Then, enough! He trots away.
Had a chuckle this morning. I was alone, which gave it a little crazy spin: The Observer view on JD Vance: spurned in Greenland and humiliated at home, the vice-president should resign. Right. Not holding my breath on that.
Rain tats awoke me from a swell dream today. A woman visited me to return my manuscript to me. After foisting a warm hug on me, she told me that she’d read it, and it thrilled her. Thrilled me to hear her say that. As we talk, the woman is gently stroking my arm or patting my shoulder. Her two teenage daughters were with her. She turned to leave and told her daughters to go ahead, she’d catch up. The girls went out the front door. Then the woman hugged me again and kissed me. She suggested she was interested in getting more intimate right then and there. I rejected her; she insisted and kissed me again. I was kind of, why not? But her daughters, I added. She smiled; “They won’t care.” Well…okay…
The little monkeys I call The Neurons kicked consciousness off with Laura Brannigan singing her cover of “Self Control” in my morning mental music stream.
You take my self, you take my self control
You got me livin’ only for the night
Before the morning comes, the story’s told
You take my self, you take my self control
h/t to AZLyrics.com
Oh, they’re funny. The song came out in 1984 and was a hit for Brannigan. She passed away just twenty years later, only 52. I realize in retrospect that the woman in my dream looked much like Brannigan.
Papi is asleep in his malabar chair. Coffee is selling its magic in my system. The wind is singing like a lonely cat. Hope you have a good one, wherever you are. Here we go. Cheers
A cat came knocking on the bedroom’s slider.
Papi the ginger blade was demanding entry back into the house.
I let him in and returned to bed. The time was 4 AM. I told myself to go back to sleep. My brain wouldn’t cooperate. Instead, I thought about going into surgery on Wednesday. I felt I was close to finishing the novel in progress. It could be done before the surgery if I have three good writing days. I wanted that. Then I ended up staying awake, writing the story in my head.
When I sat down at the coffee shop, I put those words down into the document and realized, the end.
I was inspired by the book, “Gravity’s Rainbow”. I’d read the book in the past and was just browsing, and came across some reference to it. Then I had an idea, and “Gravity’s Emotions” was begun.
Word can tell you some things about a doc. Tells me that this one was started July 19, 2024. 432 pages, 117,480 words. 9218 minutes of editing. Anyone who knows that a day has 1440 minutes knows that’s not a huge amount of time. Just 6.4 days if you do the math. 6.4 days if I’d worked 24/7.
As always, it feels a little weird to be finished. Bit sad. “Like a death in the family” a writer of fame once said.
I worry about it. Don’t know if the plot makes sense or if people will buy into the character. I fret over the ending is too pat.
I told myself when I began writing this thing, just get out of your own way and stay out of the way.
Now, with it ‘done’, at least in this phase of novel writing, I need to remind myself again: just get out of your own way.
It’s a bumpy writing ride right now.
The novel in editing, Memories of Why, fishtailed and went sideways. On page 550 of 580. Realizing that it needed work brought me down. This is the manuscript’s rev 6.
Fact is, it’s sloppy at that section and the thinking behind it needs tightened up. A few inconsistencies are evident. I gloss over them, but I hear my reading side saying, “That’s weak. I don’t buy it.” Grumbling about it to myself, I thought, look, put it off, ignore it, the first five hundred pages are good. But I can’t. I know it needs work. I can’t look away from that. I’ll need to mask up, get up the scalpels, and go in there. It’s for the patient’s own good. Yes, I’m mixing things there, aren’t I? LOL. More coffee, stat.
Reflecting on it and my writing process, I realized that this section was written late. I’m a writer who likes writing and editing a great deal. I overwrite, then retreat and revise, smoothing and polishing. As this was written in the late stages, it’s not been subjected to as much revising, smoothing, and polishing. I also suspect that the rest of the ms reads and feels better because of the process, so this section comes off as shabby.
The new novel, Gravity’s Emotions, is going fast. Or so I thought. Started on July 19, I’m on page 120. I thought, that’s pretty fast progress for me. But when I actually crunched the numbers, it’s average.
Thinking about why it seems or feels like it’s going faster, I realize that I’m thinking about it less. Attempting to write in a different manner than usual and utilize a different approach, I told myself to get out of the way, don’t overthink it, and just let the words go. It often feels edgy and terrifying. But I’m pleased with how it’s going, knock on wood.
Writing yesterday, I was so caught up that I realized that I’d gone into overtime. See, we had this thing planned and I was to be home at a certain time, which means, naturally, leaving the coffee shop by a certain time, and there I was, still hammering away when I was supposed to have been gone ten minutes before. But the scene, the scene, I had to finish it. Type faster, I mentally exhorted my fingers. Be more nimble.
It all worked out. The scene was finished and I made it home with time to spare. I’d already begun writing the next scene in my head before finishing that scene, so I now have a firm jumping off point for this morning.
More coffee! Here we go. Rock and write. Cheers
One important matter that many new writers overlook is, what does their muse want?
The muse can fill a critical function in the fiction writin’ process, so identifying them and learning what they like — and DISLIKE — can be a significant component of your personal process. Sometimes, as it is for me, it’s more than one muse, so the aspiring writer must pay attention to who the muses are and what they do. Fer ‘nstance, my muses love coffee. Don’t try to pawn tea or chai off on ‘em; they’ll inform you with seething disgust that they’re not the same. However, some of the muses are more impatient and arrogant than the others. Some of them read someone else’s fiction and immediately scream into my ear, “Write something like that!” I’m always coping with them doing that. The way I do so, with more patience and caution that touching a sleeping cat’s belly, is to gently promise I will write something like that after I finish this (whatever this is) and hope they accept and quiet down.
BTW, don’t try to overlook the grammar and punctuation muses. They can be wrong but they will push and push for a decision about a comma, period, tense, noun, verb, and so on, until they’re satisfied (at least for the moment).
My muses are not fond of writing at home, cuz cats, spouse, phone – well, environmental distractions. (Yeah, we still have a home phone, althought it’s VOIP.) My muses like it in a noisy coffee shop where nobody pays attention to them and they can write in peace surrounded by people bustling around on their business. As I have multiple muses (sometimes called musi in the more traditional plural spelling) (yeah, just kiddin’ ‘bout that), I need to ensure the right one shows up on time. Little is worse for me than entering a revision session only to have a ‘new project’ muse enter to help, suggesting the concept for a new novel, novella, short story, movie, song, play, or essay.
Last, my musi demand time and focus on them everyday. If they don’t get it, they spoon crankiness, exasperation, and irritation into my mood. So, every day, no matter what’s happenin’, they want me to sit and write or edit. They don’t care if zombies are overrunning the neighborhood, a blizzard is underway, or nukes are falling. Nor is being hungry, sick, or social engagements a concern for ’em. They want their writing or editing time. And don’t think that research is good enough for the muse. I’ve tried mollifying them with research; my muses don’t buy it and will sometimes go off and sulk, leaving me without a muse to write. I can do it, but it’s a bit like having problems with a bowel movement.
Now, back to writing. So sayeth the muse what’s in charge.
Yea, verily, I’m struggling.
I’m dissatisfied with an aspect of my novel in progress, “Incomplete States.” I love its sprawling sweep, but it sprawls too much. The sprawl dilutes focus on the characters, and I don’t think the typically reader will care about them.
Which, in thinking about writing this novel’s first draft, is understandable. Its concept consumed me, as did trying to understand and convey the concept to readers through the story. Thinking about it during the last several days was at first depressing. Then, I thought I began to more fully see the issue. I let my imagination off its leash. Ideas about what to do began streaming in.
Still not satisfied with the process, I pulled out a pen and notebook. I’ve done that several times while writing this novel, so the notebook is already in place. It’s a rawer and simpler way to process information for me, and that makes it faster.
I’m, of course, partially just disappointed. I wanted to be done with the damn book so I can move onto other projects. Yes, I’ve entered the stage when my beloved novel has become the damn book, a thorn in my side as much as a joy of creation. This is like that D.I.Y. project, like putting down new floor tile, that is progressing well until, halfway through, you realized you made a major error. You know it must be fixed, but first, a little venting and stewing is in order. Those who are more stoic would probably just begin fixing it immediately, but that’s not how I roll. I must simmer in emotions first.
But, issue thought out, choices considered, and decisions made, I’ve bounced back up. Here I go again.
A caterruption broke my sleep. I’d been dreaming of watching a high school play. I was part of a large audience in a small cafetorium. Most of the dream attendees weren’t watching the play but chatting as the play went on. It was a light comedy and I was watching and chuckling.
But now, awake, I thought about the dream’s meaning. I found nothing but dream strands returned me to high school. I’d been the lead in our junior year play, ‘Brother Goose’. At one point I was supposed to enthuse about winning a contest and a year’s supply of cereal. I always broke character in rehearsals when I said the detestable, corny line, and then, in the action’s climax, I kissed the female lead.
In rehearsal, I was aware I was breaking character. I didn’t during the performances. My ex-girlfriend was in the audience during the production for the school student body. She said that when I kissed the other girl on stage, she looked down at the floor. She could feel others in the audience looking at her. They knew we were broken up. It was a small school, with a few hundred students.
I had lunch with her yesterday after our protest against Trump’s budget outline. We’ve been married since 1975.
Meanwhile, dream threads pulled me along from the play to a creative writing class in Germany. The teacher wanted us to do a 1940s radio script. I was selected as the narrator and decided to channel Gary Owens. That surprised and delighted the class but it was a natural choice, given the exposure to him from my years of watching ‘Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In’.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3hViXAvD2g
I learned a great deal about creativity and active writing in that class. I consider it a breakthrough class for me. Yet, I can’t remember the teacher’s name.
That’s going to distract me all day.
I blame it on the dream.
Michael Seidel, writer 