Be happy, John Scalzi!

Well, I couldn’t help myself. I went over to Barnes & Noble on my lunch break and perused the SF section. I found John Scalzi, China Miéville, and Bruce Sterling. But I did not find Edward Willett! I don’t know why.

Unfortunately, I am not in the position to buy hardcovers right now, and so The City & the City was out. I’ll have to wait for that to come out in paperback. And so there was the hemming and hawing about which author to buy. Since I’ve been wanting to buy Old Man’s War for a while, Scalzi it was! I’m really looking forward to reading it. 

Hmm…his book is not that old, but the sequel is out. Does he qualify for a Retro Review?

What I’m reading now

Just last week I finished Ringworld by Larry Niven. What a ride! I’ll try to get out a Retro Review about this excellent book soon.

Now, to move on to the next book. What will I read…what will I read? There are all sorts of great books out there. I have book money burning a hole in my pocket. I’m thinking of making a book page on this blog, where I will list all the books I want to read, and which I have finished recently. (If I tried to list all the books I’ve read, I think the page would be too big!)

My real dilemma is how to spend the book money. I already know what I’m going to read; more on that below. But, the short list for the shopping spree is:

• Old Man’s War by John Scalzi. I’ve read the first chapter already from the complete pdf that was available recently. Now I want to read the whole thing, and the best way is to buy the book!
• Marseguro by Edward Willett. I’ve heard about its sequel Terra Inseguro and thought the idea was pretty neat.
• The City & the City by China Miéville. Wow what a story concept. And when I heard him being interviewed on I Should Be Writing, I thought I just had to read his stuff!

That’s the very short list. There are so many others!

But, what am I going to read next? That’s simple. I’ve decided to mix up my fiction and non-fiction writing. My next read is Plot & Structure by James Scott Bell. I think I lack some ability in the area of plot. Maybe it’s just a lack of confidence on my part. No matter. If there is something I could do to improve my craft, I owe it to myself to do it. I’ve already read the first chapter and am looking forward to the rest of the book. I’ll give a review of it just like I hope to be doing for the fiction I read. 

Have a great weekend & keep cranking!

OK I’m back!

Well, I’ve been a blogger for only two or three weeks, and already I’ve taken time off! Maybe I should get a guest blogger to fill in some space when this happens. So I won’t disappoint all my Imaginary Readers!

It was a good week, but not a lot of writing got done. I am working on the short story outline still; getting a plot is hard and evasive for me. Usually what comes to my mind is a short snap of a cool scene, but without a plot to go with it. How do I get it from the cool scene to the real story? Any of my Imaginary Readers are certainly welcome to chime in!

What are my goals for this week? I will finish the outline and get a few blog posts under my belt.

Have a great week & keep cranking!

A little behind

Well,

I’m late posting a progress report. It is supposed to be on Sundays. My bad! But really, this last weekend we were out of town,  and the next weekend we will be similarly busy, so conditions are going to be impossible for any posts. I will try to post this week, but even that is not guaranteed. Soon I hope to return to a normal week.

Nothing has changed much in writing. I still owe myself the outline for the short story that is at the top of the project list. In the next 2 weeks I hope to get that cranked out.

Have a great week! Keep cranking away! Even slow cranking is cranking.

In the queue!

I just got word that my short story “John Glorious” is in the critiquing queue at Critters. Hoorah! Now I have to do just three things: 1) keep a regular stream of critiques going to support the workshop, 2) wait 3-4 weeks for my story to percolate up to the point where it can be critiqued, 3) move on to my next project in the Project List! Once the critiques come in, “John Glorious” will achieve more energy and shoot to the top of my list, where I will act on the critiques received and start sending it out to magazines.

Go me! <uproarous applause!!>

The Project List part 2

So, you have a Project List? That long-and-getting-longer list of half ideas and semi-stories? I just finished mine this week. Then I had to find where I had put it before I wrote it out again. Now it’s in my notebook, the ubiquitous capture tool. (Now, why wasn’t my notebook handy like it’s supposed to be?)

The list is 11 items long. Each list item has the designation S (short story), N (novel), or SN (short story or novel, potential for both). It is in no particular order and in no way shows how far along each item is toward completion.

Behind each cryptic list item is a well of energy. At least, that’s how I’m looking at it. Some items have a lot of energy behind them. Some seem more sluggish. These latter ones maybe will not last long on this list; some day they may return to the chaotic abyss of random ideas that are my notebook entries.

It’s the former items I’m most interested in. The ones with a lot of energy in the well. One of them is a completed story. Others have a lot of energy because they have real plots and need to be written. Others catch my imagination enough that I am enthusiastic about developing them.

What am I going to do? Well, I have already started. The finished short story is the one I’ve posted about before. It has the most energy and so gets first attention. After identifying the project I’m going to work on, I will determine the next logical action that will advance the project toward completion. This is what Dave Allen (of Getting Things Done fame) calls the next step. For this story, the next step (because I have already edited it on paper) is to key the changes into the electronic copy. That is DONE as of my lunch break at work yesterday. The next step is to submit the manuscript to the Critters workshop for critiquing. That was also DONE yesterday, after a little formatting for use in the workshop. The next step now is to wait until it works its way through the queue. This project suddenly drops in energy, there is not much I can do with it right now. So, I move on to the next project with the highest energy.

In this case, it is another short story. On Wednesday, the direction this story should take came to me in a little flash of insight, and so I am jazzed to get going on it. The next step is to take the insight and write out a short outline. I’m not good at writing outlines, but I feel the need for one now. 

It feels good to have a next thing to do. And since I am not trying to grasp the project globally I am not very overwhelmed. Writing a short outline is a small thing, so it’s something I can do without problem. Once that is DONE I will figure out what the next step is after that. And I suggest that the Project List/next step method could be a good way to approach cranking out a plot. I’m somewhat new at this, so what you’re reading is an up-to-the-minute report of what I am trying so I can focus on writing. If something else works for you, please feel free to comment below. I’ll keep you posted.

In the meantime, keep cranking plot!

A fine use of my time

So, what have I been up to this a.m.?

After sending my Princess off with a good breakfast and lunch, I sat down to my short story and began keying in the changes to it I had been making on paper. After about 15 minutes, I’m halfway done. After the changes are done, I’m going to upload it to Critters and wait for some feedback. It goes into a queue and waits its turn. Critters feeds its critiquers a handful of stories each week, and so understandably it takes a while to get around to yours. After it’s uploaded, I’ll go to work on the next quickest job on my Project List.

A good use of my time today so far!

The Project List

Once your ubiquitous capture tool is in place, some of the ideas will coalesce into something bigger. Whatever you call these somethings, some of them are the nucleus of a story. What do you do with them?

The coalescing may take some time. Don’t force it. This is the point where some subconscious gear cranking happens. The ideas are just ideas right now, but your story making center in the brain is now free to tinker.

Now is a good time to make a list. If you’re like me, you already have a few unfinished short stories or books. Put those on the list! Don’t write down a lot of details, just the title if you have one, or a phrase that sums up the story. Some of these ideas are not fully realized, but instead are only half stories, missing that certain something that makes it a whole story. On this list will go the ideas percolating out of your ubiquitous capture tool, the ur-stories.

This is your Project List. This is the list you want to work from, taking one at a time and focusing on it until it is done. For example, my short story is the current WIP (Work In Process). As I’ve noted in the last progress report, I’ve decided to finish the few changes on it and submit it to the Critters workshop. By the end of the week, I hope to have that bad boy uploaded and in the Critter queue. Then I move on to the next project. My short story is not  done, but it is at a point where I am waiting on someone else to act, in this case Critters. What will be the next project? Not necessarily the one at the top of the list. But probably the one that will need the least amount of work, another short story that is half written and waiting for my attention.

If you find that you work better with a list, give this a try and let me know if you like it. However, we’re not done with the List. It’s a good start. In my next post, I’ll talk about what to do with each of those items on your Project List.

(BTW, sorry this post is late! I try to have them come out at the same time each time, but I’m running into my first real blogging challenge: the schedule. I try to have a few posts scheduled ahead of time, but I’ve allowed myself to fall behind a little. I’ll try not to let this happen again without reason. Keep cranking!)

How do I crank?

Everybody has their own way that works for them. Somebody’s going to read this (oh, I hope they’re going to read this!) and say, “What, are you daft? That’s not the way to write!” And they would be right, of course…for themselves! In listening to podcasts, reading interviews, and talking with a few, I’ve found that writing methods, or How They Crank, is different from one person to the next.

Here’s how I crank: I bring a pen, a notebook and a 3-ring binder around with me wherever I go. They are always with me. When I get the chance, I whip one of those out and start writing. In the notebook I keep, well, notes. In the binder I keep the story I’m writing.

Typing is much faster. Why don’t I carry a small computer with me? I’m cheap or broke, take your pick. Why don’t I have a specific time for writing? I’m sure my personal indentation in the time/space continuum would collapse on itself and form a black hole if I tried to bring order to my day. Too much structure in a day already filled with waking, working out, driving, working, driving, spending quality time with Princess, studying, preparing talks for the congregation, the ministry, and meetings would hurt very, very much.

So, it’s like the illustration of the rocks and the sand. A guy has a jar that he wants to fill with rocks and sand. He starts by pouring in the sand, but when he tries to add the rocks, he can’t fit them all in. If the rocks are all the major things in life and the sand is the smaller things, the best strategy is to put in the rocks first, THEN to pour in the sand, which fills in all the spaces in between the rocks.

Family, faith, work are the large rocks. They are important and need to be fit in. All the other things in life are the sand. I’m not saying that writing is not important; it is. Especially for the creative person who needs to express himself. But, I’m just saying the way I crank plot is to fit my writing times into the spaces left by the big rocks. So my life is full, just like that jar.

Whoah, I got a little philosophical and preachy there. Sorry! You just wanted to know how I cranked? I’d like to know how YOU crank! Feel free to tell me in the comments below.

Progress Report

Well, it’s been quite a week! I’ve managed to write a couple of blog posts this week. I wrote about 4 pages of my current novel project. (That sounds so pathetic, doesn’t it? I will get better!) I’ve worked on the short story revision, adding material that should clear up some confusion about the plot. And I’ve come to a conclusion about this story: I don’t think I will be able to trim any fat. But, the question this raises is do I just not see any potential trimming places because I’m so close to the story? Assuming that’s the case, I have decided to get the story workshopped.

Have you heard about Critters? It’s an online workshop for SF, fantasy, and horror stories. I’ve been a member on and off for some time now. Check it out if you have a story that needs work. It’s a private workshop, meaning that the public does not have access to the stories being submitted. This prevents the story from being considered as ‘published’ while it is being evaluated. The trick of the workshop is that you have to be actively critiquing other people’s work before you can hope to have your own put into the workshop queue. I’ve fallen behind in my volunteering in the past, but this time I should be able to do it.

So, my next week will look somewhat like this:

• Put the revisions into the short story and submit it to Critters.
• Critique a story for Critters.
• Write for 15 minutes a day on my current novel.

Princess and I will be gone on Sunday, so that may keep me from writing one day. But, I hope to have a good solid report regardless.

Have a great week, and keep cranking plot!