Tag: organic writing

Snow Camping, Horses, Volcanoes and Crossbows

Once again, I find myself writing three chapters in parallel. I’m self-trained about fiction writing (shows, right?), so I’ve drawn my own insights. In this instance, my insistence on writing chapters in threes reflects my thinking. I begin with an introduction to the situation and expand on it. That’s chapter one. The next chapter is the buildup and climax, while the third chapter is the activity afterward and the denouement.

It’s not always this way, but this is what typically happens with the main chapters or sections. Other chapter types I call bridges and pivots. A bridge chapter links previously written chapters or sections, while the pivot lets me change direction. No, I don’t always write from the beginning to the end, but in scenes and sections. I read the other day that some writers begin with the ending, and work backward. They don’t begin writing until they’ve figured out that ending.

This week’s writing is slow but steady, hampered by research requirements. I am visual (hear me roar) in my nature, so I like visualizing things. If I know too little to visualize them, my writer calls, “Road trip!”, and off we go.

This road trip lasted a week. Can you I tell you how much I knew about horses when I started?

 

 

Exactly. Jumping on the information superhighway, we sought information about horses. Fortunately, another blogger posted a link to “How to Write Horses Wrong: 8 Red Flags” by Rachel Chaney, on Dan Koboldt’s site, which was a helpful starting point. Next, we hunted information on crossbows. Let me tell you, I know more about horses than crossbows, which should confirm how little I know.

Onward to more familiar and safer subjects, but which I required deeper and broader knowledge, snow camping and volcanoes. These were more of a refresher nature but also provided opportunity to remember important details.

I’m beginning the third chapter today. Besides being slowed by research, I wrote notes in parallel, and updated the bible. At one point, I also outlined these three chapters. I’m an organic writer by nature. I like the spontaneity organic writing provides. When things become complicated, I stop and write an outline. The outline is not deep, but a series of points to tie together. This outline was less than one page. It helped me firm what I’d visualized and permitted me to track and develop the action while adding the verisimilitude my research provided. Although I consider myself an organic writer, I’ve come to evolve into a hybrid writer, outlining pieces when needed, and following the lights through the dark the rest of the time.

Hybrid, organic, outliner, and pantser are convenient conversation and reference labels. They don’t tie me to anything. During the course of cultivating myself as a writer, I learned that I needed to develop a process that works for me. I’m not static. I hope that I continue to learn and improve. I expect it my process to change as I do. That is absolutely cool. What works for this novel may not work for the next one.

Doesn’t matter. I’ll do what it takes. The key to progress is putting words on paper, getting it to flow, keeping it coherent, logical, and true to itself, with a grammar and style that others will read, and finishing, with the caveat that finishing the novel’s writing process means just that; it still ain’t a book, and it’s probably not ready for publication. That was another lesson learned.

As an aside, because I became curious, the first two chapters in this section are fifteen pages and forty-eight hundred words. According to Word and the properties section, I started it on November tenth, spent five hundred forty-eight minutes on it, and last modified it yesterday at two oh three in the afternoon. Looking at the word count, over five days, I’ve written less than a thousand words per day. Like I said, slow writing, but necessary – and satisfying.

Time to write like crazy, at least one more time.

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And I’m Writing, And I’m Writing —

And I think of things that I’ve overlooked that need to be added, and events that would surprise the reader, and recognize that I want to add it to the story, but it doesn’t go in this book, but actually, OMG, the end of the second book, so it leads into the third book. I’m halfway – only halfway – through writing the first book. The second book is written but needs some wiring changes. The third book – I hadn’t thought about a third book before, but it started blooming like a volunteer posy. Am I supposed to uproot the thing?

No, because my writing excitement gets the better of me. But the series’ evolution forces more work upon me. The excitement becomes almost paralyzing, because I stop to let the evolution flow in. Sitting still in a sea of external noise and activity, I can look down the long tunnel through the rest of the first book, past the second book, and into the third book.

Now, here’s the tricky part. I can see and hear these events. They must be captured in words. More than that, I need to navigate unseen scenes that bridge now and then, and find the words, pacing, nuances, etc., to bring it all home. I love this part of thinking and writing. I feel all those wires connecting and gears turning. Illumination falls on new aspects and spreads. This is the essence of art, writing, music, and physics, for me, to think, to see, to think more to understand, and see more. It’s an unwinding coil without beginning or end, a Möbius strip of existence.

Time to write like crazy, at least one more time.

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The Frustrated Writer

I’m not a fast or organized writer. I have more ideas and concepts than I can keep up with it.

It’s pretty damn frustrating. Just now, working on the novel-in-progress and starting a new section and chapter, I’m struggling to keep up with the writing. Meanwhile, I want this novel done so I can resume writing the rest of the series, and get on with writing other things. Being disorganized, though, I recognize a need to stop to organize.

I don’t want to do that. This is specifically about what volunteers, soldiers, platoons, and squads are in what scenes when things go down, and what happens to each. Who died, lived, went missing, set off the alarm? Who was on-planet, off-planet, on sentry, and on patrol?

Going through this reinforces my admiration and respect for writers like J.R.R. Tolkien, George R.R. Martin and J.K. Rowling and their respective series, or even Andy Weir, with The Martian. Once again, looking for secrets and magic formulas, I recognize, what must be done must be accepted and done. No way around it, except to have less characters. Unless most of my writing process, this is work, but the work has to be done. The conundrum is whether to carve out more time specifically to do this work, or use the writing time. Shortcomings exist for both solutions.

It’s a *shrug* matter. It must be done, just as bricklayers must lay the bricks one by one, and building a house requires each drawing and every nail. I’m petulant and whining, because that’s my personality. I think about the problem, realize there’s an issue, and then complain about it. Once that’s out of me, I put my head down and do what I must do.

For today, I’m going to write like crazy, one more time. Meanwhile, I’ll let my mind stew about my problem, and then address it later.

Procrastination is a good friend of mine.

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My Character & Me

It’s apparently spring in my novel, because I’m experiencing a revolt. No blood has yet spread across anything. I don’t think it will. We’re pretty civilized here. Civilized people don’t kill one another to get their way, except in fiction…right…?

The main character and I are wresting with what’s going on in the novel. He’s moving into this new direction. Heavily dependent on technology, he insists on exploring how the loss of personal technology influences his behavior. He has become mentally, physically, and emotionally weaker. Although he’s staying fit and slender, he’s aging, and his energy level is drooping. He does not have the level of control with which he’s accustomed to living.

But he’s not seeing that in his people. Without technology, individuality is sprouting. His people see and hear better than him. Many have higher energy levels. Some are becoming bullies. While bullying had been psychologically and socially influenced over the course of time from now until the future, and diminished through socializing, technology in their recent history, those safeguards and safeties were removed when their nanotechnologies were removed.

Other emerging trends among his force are disturbing him. Binge drinking is becoming a problem. Without their sexes and free of their technology, people are becoming sexually active. Promiscuity is flowering. That’s causing jealousies and attachments that can affect discipline, good order, and the chain of command.

These changes, and how this unit copes with it, is the story, he insists. That’s what he believes should be written. I disagree; I sought more of an adventure story. I add elements of adventure, threats, and conflicts to increase that sense of adventure, but he keeps dragging me into psycho-analysis.

I dreamed about this problem last night. In the dream I was a military member on shift again. I’d been lazy and hadn’t completed the shift checklist. Hell, I didn’t know where to find it. I hadn’t inventoried the COMSEC materials, read the log, closed out the last log for the Zulu day, nor started another one, and shift change was coming on fast.

Anxiety suffused me; WTF was I going to do? 

Well, I started scrambling to make it right. But I was quickly sidetracked with my environment. It was disorganized, and poorly planned. I was appalled. Although I knew I was running out of time, organizing that place developed into my primary priority. Of course, once I did that, I developed a focus. Having a focus revitalized my energy level and determination, and wiped out my anxiety.

Pondering the dream this morning, I developed understanding that it wasn’t about my life, but the novel in progress. That bifurcation I experienced was causing anxiety because I didn’t know what the character was coming up with next. And, I’d developed him as a strong individual. I didn’t like seeing him losing his way.

Ah, hah, I understood, oh, there we go. This is about writing the novel in progress. My conflict with my character  —

Let’s put this more correctly. The change of direction in the novel from my original intention bothers me. With that, I’ve lost focus and energy. Thinking about this – because I write to help me think – I think my character is correct.

I know from reading others that many writers wrestle with characters taking over. Some dismiss it; they’re the writer, they’re in control, and they decree what gets onto the pages. I live and work through my characters on the pages. We’re partners more than master and puppet. Perhaps it’s due to my organic writing style, which, on reflection, can look as complicated as layers of spider and cobwebs. And it’s not like I haven’t been down this path before. I often begin with an idea that grows into something else.

Although it makes me uncomfortable, I’ll probably write what the character wants. Then I’ll edit it down to find a compromise we can live with.

Characters; they can be the worse.

Time to write like crazy, at least one more time.

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A Pivotal Moment

Chapters finished, scenes drained out of me, I come to the next piece, the what happens next part of our show. This, for me, involves sipping coffee, reviewing notes, and staring fixedly at inanimate objects as I draw down the world, shut it out, and tune myself to the writers inside, waiting for one of them to clear their throat and begin telling me what happens next.

After review, I know where I stand, and where the novel stands, and where I’m next heading. I’m now pivoting to essentially part two of this section. This section begins with the genesis of this entire aspect of this volume. I’d created it August 4. I’d last modified it on August 8. It was a piece that came out of the darkness and rolled over me. As these things do, the piece created multiple questions about the setting, characters, plot, and situation.

To answer those questions, I began writing, and finished writing twenty-four chapters, one hundred eighty pages. Now, a little over two months later, I’m ready to pivot back to that first scene, and continue writing the story.

Of interest probably only to me, that first scene that I wrote has been deleted. It’s saved in another document. It was deleted because, within four days, I realized I was writing from the wrong character’s point of view. Another character had been created after that one, and they took over, demoting the original character to a minor role in the background. The original character didn’t put up a fight, but accepted the reduced role without a problem.

This is how I often work, not just in writing, but in almost every activity. My organization is strangely chaotic. Solutions and ideas leap at me, and I embrace them. But they usually reflect the end result desired, or some epiphany about what needs to happen within the project to enable the rest. Fortunately, generally, my mind works amazingly fast, especially when dealing with abstract matters. Yes, I’m being immodest, but it’s one of my favorite, and most dependable, traits. On the other end, it’s not unusual for people to write me off as a little crazy. I accept that, because I work with what I have, and what’s proven successful for me.

This is a pivotal moment. Action is moving the ship, the Epitome, and everything set up, down to the planet, Kyrios. The Kyrios action is grittier and darker. It’s complex. I’m intimidated with what’s planned for this section. As far as I know, it’s the second third of this volume. Parts of the end have already been written, serving as a light at the tunnel’s end.

Deep breath, and another gulp of coffee, and it’s time to write like crazy, at least one more time.

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The Writing Day

Yesterday was one of those ass-kicking writing sessions that probably released a liter of dopamine in me, reinforcing my addiction to my writing practices.

I began by writing summaries of my dark writing episode’s reveals. I then wove them into the two documents I keep to track of the novel. For this novel, the two documents are “Incomplete States Thinking” and “Epiphanies.”

The first is basically a compendium that includes the characters’ names and sexes, and other materials that I add to the novel. It’s the bible I refer back to for reminders about locations and relationships. It summarizes the concept and various arcs, and includes reminders about what I’ve decided at certain plot points. This novel is science-fiction, so a dictionary of terms, species, ships, and planets is also included.

“Epiphanies” is a much briefer summary of realizations that come to me. As an organic writer, I’ll often have no fucking idea where I’m going. I’m following paths through dark woods, at night, with a candle, during a storm, asking, “Okay, why did that happen? What happens next? Where the hell am I?”

I’ll go off to do other things that divert energy and attention from writing. Without warning, ideas answering those queries will sledgehammer me. They’re generally broader and more ‘strategic’ than where I’m at in the novel’s writing process. So, to capture them, I add them into a document. I later address them in the thinking document at a ‘tactical’ level, and then develop them into events, scenes, and chapters. Many times, I’ll write these, and determine where they go in the novel, and then add a bridge to get from where I am to where I’ve gone and where I’m going.

To give more insight into the two documents and their relationships, the thinking document is thirty-four pages, and just under twelve thousand words. Nothing is ever deleted from it; I’ll line through something that changes, and then add an elaborating note.

The other document, “Epiphanies,” is three pages and six hundred words. It has twelve bullets in it, with sub-bullets. I add to it to capture the gist. More detail is added to these ideas in the thinking document.

It probably all seems over-organized and tedious to others. It’s not a process that I planned, but a method that I learned to keep me on track and moving forward. I accept the process, with all its encumbrances, because it does let me finish novels. In theory, instead of creating an outline and writing the novel, I begin writing the novel, and create the outline as I go.

Additionally, when I write those events, scenes, and chapters, I generally create them in their own document. At the beginning of the document, I include a prelude to explain the document’s genesis, and how it’s fit with everything else. Once I complete its first draft, it’s put into the document. The prelude is not put into the novel, and its not deleted, but highlighted and marked so I know, at a glance, that it’s not meant as part of the novel. I write to capture the critical elements initially, so the original document is typically fifteen hundred to twenty-five hundred words. Once it’s added into the novel-in-progress, further editing, refinement, and expansion is conducted to improve its coherency, logic, details, pacing, language, and style. I generally have several main characters, with one prime main character. While the novel has an over-arching tone, each character has their own tone, which is conveyed by ‘their’ style.

Yesterday’s session ended with twenty-five hundred new words added to the novel. Most of these were in one chapter, of three scenes. It was a two hour session, and included summarizing the thinking and epiphany documents. I’m pleased when I reach over two thousand words in a session; I’m not a fast writer.

I don’t pursue word counts. I did when I first began the effort to establish a disciplined approach to writing. Since then, I don’t need word counts, but tend to stop after a certain number. Part of this, I think, is conditioning from the early days, but some of it can be attributed to how writing fits into my life. I like writing in the late morning to early afternoon, but then I need to do things outside of writing.

I could have continued writing yesterday. More material was available from the dark writing session. Time wasn’t on my side. I had other obligations. That’s life. I wasn’t worried, though, because I knew I would come back today, pick it up again, and continue. My writing output and processes tend to follow their own cycles of waves and troughs. Understanding that helps me cope with the rise and fall inherent in my process.

Time to write like crazy, at least one more time.

 

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Slow Progress

I’m having fun with this novel. It’s grown into an epic. I’m trying to divide it into tasty volumes.

“Incomplete States” is science fiction. It features time travel, galactic alliances, others sentient life forms, and advanced Human cultures and technology. There’s lots of space travel on ships that sometimes carry several million people. New planets have been terra-formed. (It’s terraformed in the future; they’ve dropped the hyphen.)

Many diseases have been mastered. They’re not a threat. Aging isn’t a threat. Choose your age. Keep it as long as desired. Change it when you desire.

Death is not much of a threat. Resuscitation, regeneration, and resurrection (depending on the marketing and technology involved) have made it a side topic. One side-effect is that Humanity is dropping toward zero population growth. Children who are born are often incubated in artificial wombs. Nanosystems help the mother and child stay connected and develop that special bond.

Communication nets are introduced into their bodies at young ages. Phones are internal bio-devices; they’re constantly in touch with others, listening, filtering information, and contributing.

As noted, I have fun writing this, but I’m easily side-tracked, and my progress is slow. I barely write one thousand words a day. Editing and reviews for accuracy are extensive — and intensive. A large quantity of moving parts must be synchronized. For example, against this showcase of technology, Humans are faced with going to a planet where their technology not only fails, but is actively attacked. They don’t know why, but are going to live there without technology. Their mission is to track down four people who are believed to be on this planet.

That’s required a lot of brainstorming. What do you do, and how do you live, without technology, when technology is deeply embedded in all aspects of society? Aside from a few small fundamentalist sects, nobody knows what they’re doing or how to do it. They’re researching how to cook on stoves, burn wood, grow food, and process it. Their energy weapons won’t work; what about gunpowder? They’re learning to ride horses, exist without their augmented memories, and fight with swords, bows and arrows, and other more primitive weapons and methods.

This is where I become side-tracked: I research and write about much of their process of coping with these changes and their new needs. I put it all in the novel. I enjoy writing and reading about these things, but I suspect I’ll lose a lot of readers who don’t enjoy these sort of details. I’ve been thinking about it, though, debating whether it’s too much in that vein before concluding, screw those readers. I rationalize the easy way out: I’m writing for me, and for those who enjoy books like these.

Had to write this out, to think it out. Time to write like crazy, at least one more time.

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Kick-ass Writing

I’ve been writing well. When I say that, I mean that word counts are okay, and I’m satisfied with the general flow and output.

But I’ve been feeling my way through the dark. I’m at a pivot point. Exciting stuff has happened. Tension has been created. Now I’m pivoting to a new part of the arc to bridge what has happened with what’s going to happen. I was forced to pause to come up with minor characters’ names, define them, and address a few plot issues. So it was slow writing, like traffic out of L.A. on Labor Day weekend slow.

Then there is today. Walking along, thinking about where I’d stopped writing, and where I wanted to resume, the writing issues I’ve been working on all broke free. My writing exploded with a geyser of words that would make Old Faithful proud. I had to rush into the coffee shop, set up and get going with mind-blowing intensity. As always, my typing speed and thinking speed struggled to keep up with my writing speed. I end up typing as fast as I can, and then pausing, fixing some matters, reviewing what’s been written, and then jumping back onto the word train.

I’ve been doing small chores around the home, like repairing and painting posts, and repairing crawl space vents. I believe this manual labor freed and stimulated my creative side. I’ve always noticed that when I need to think more deeply to resolve something, I achieve more success by working on things that don’t take much thinking.

Done writing like crazy for today. What a session. It’s days like these that make writing so addictive. What a drug. The rest of the world seems so mundane as I come down from my high.

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The Writing – Wait

On normal days, I sit down, and take a few sips of coffee. Then I turn on the writing mode and brace myself. Sights and sounds pummel me. Smells come last.

Seeing the scenes happen, hearing them, and smelling it, I struggle to keep up. I can’t type as fast as it comes. I barely think fast enough to keep up with what’s streaming into me. It’s more like a movie, with smells. I’m more like a man with a hammer, chisel, and stone table.

I begin with a stream of consciousness form to capture it all. My writing frustrates me, though, correcting me, and suggesting changes, improvements, and elaboration even as I still try to type what was already given. The replay is wonky, so it needs to be caught the first time. Sometimes there are leaps into other avenues that are to come, like coming attractions, or previews. Those are most exciting, the spur that digs in to sit down and repeat this process.

Not much time is consumed during my writing sessions. I’ll typically write forty-five to ninety minutes. I’d like to extend my writing period to a three hours in the afternoon. I envy those who can pace themselves, handle the onslaught, and pump out five thousand words in a day’s work. I’m below half that, and feel spent when I stop. Worse in this process, though, is that I’ll finish typing for the day, the writing mode doesn’t get turned off. So I walk, and remember what I’ve written, and what needs to be written. Sometimes a flash of a scene comes to me, and I remember, “Oh, yeah, I need to go in and add that.”

This methodology always prompts wonder in me about how others work. Please share, if you’re willing.

Now, time to turn on the writing mode. Time to write like crazy, at least one more time.

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The Air, the Fitbit, the Writing, the Dreams

Our outdoor air sucks. Need more?

Smoke from wildfires is filling our air. The Air Quality Index leaped to one hundred fifteen last night. DANGEROUS. It hasn’t been hot, only into the nineties. We open the house at night to cool it off, and then close the blinds and windows during the day. Opening the windows last night sent us into coughing fits as wet smoke smells wafted in. Eventually, we donned masks.

Today isn’t as bad. The A.Q.I. is in the fifties, and officially, moderate. Visibility remains down. It’s like a white-out beyond a a few hundred feet.

All this wildfire smoke has reduced my Fitbit activities. Walking is way down, to five miles a day average. It’s not as critical as many other issues resulting from wildfires. None of the fires are directly affecting our community. We feel for all those being evacuated in those areas, and appreciate the firefighters’ efforts. If this stuff is terrible for me, a guy in his early sixties who considers himself in good health, those with emphysema and other respiratory issues must be deeply suffering.

I took to the Orson Scott Card method for visualizing and organizing the novel in progress. O.S.C. talked about just drawing places, like a city, and then adding details. With each detail and area added or defined, entertain questions about why those areas and details exist. I’ve done this exercise before, with excellent results. I wasn’t disappointed this time.

I had been editing the novel’s first draft. Halfway through that process, I perceived a problem. A new ‘greater arc’ was required as the solution. I could be wrong, but this is how I decided to address the issue. It’s essentially an epic. I like epics. Bigger is better.

This was decided over a four day period. Then, after deciding it was necessary, I went on a reading sprint. I finished reading two novels, and read two others, in five days. I also read fiction stories and news articles online. This reading stimulated my writing juices and invigorated my writing dreams. I found myself re-committed to who I was, and what I was doing. It’s a matter of taking a deep breath, turning on the computer, and putting the ass in chair, and the fingers on a keyboard.

This new arc takes place on a planet where technology fails. An outpost is established using outdated technology. Suddenly, it’s like living in a frontier castle. I loved that difference in direction from my usual challenges of visualizing the far future and other intelligent races.

I drew the outpost on my computer, and brainstormed about how the lack of technology affects them, and solutions and work-arounds. The team living in the outpost are hunting for people, but can’t use their suits or vehicles. They fall back to horses. Having horses adds more problems and dimensions.

So do the powerful windstorms endured on the planet. That’s why the outpost becomes a castle; something stout enough to survive the windstorms are necessary. That’s the iceberg view of all the scenes, problems, and challenges realized. I don’t want to give away more. Drawing and brainstorming in this manner was a catalyst to my imagination. I scrambled to capture ideas an create an event timeline. It resulted in *shudder* an outline. 

As an organic writer, the outline overwhelmed me. Suddenly, there it all was, this part of the novel mapped out in all its complications and key events. I could imagine, see, and hear them. Writing them was required. It’s daunting for an organic pantser. I decided I would scramble to write key scenes and moments, and patch them together with bridge and pivot scenes, and build the story in layers, much like I used to do when oil painting, or writing a business case, or analyzing data.

I think that whatever opened my creative floodgates also turned the dream valves to full open. I had six remembered dreams last night. Friends from my past were featured. My wife also made an appearance. Of course, maybe it was the eclipse opening the dream and creativity gates. Who can say?

Trying to capture details this morning diverted personal resources already earmarked for other activities. I resorted to dream summaries. The dreams were wild. Once again, my muses were prominently featured. They were attempting to guide and assist me in different manners. Sorting the chaos was a fascinating exercise.

Having your muses show up in my dreams injects high confidence levels. I felt empowered and emboldened when I awaken. Yet, being me, the confidence evaporates to more normal levels by midday. Having your muses and some higher beings populate your dreams and offer encouragement has a good thing. I’m certainly not going to kick them out.

Time to write like crazy, at least one more time. How about you, writers? Have you seen increased creativity? Maybe it is the eclipse.

Or maybe it’s the coffee.

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