It's finally happened: when I thought I was done with a story, it came back.
About two years ago, I wrote the first draft of a Sci-Fi novel called Bliss, with planned sequels in mind. I considered that book complete. At least, the story was complete. Part of me considered writing a novella set during the time of the novel to explore one aspect of the tale that isn't of real importance for anything else going on.
But that's not what I'm talking about here. I had that idea way back when I actually finished writing the book. I didn't actually write that novella - college will get in the way like that - but I still have it in mind.
I'm digressing. Yesterday, as I was getting ready to go to college for an exam, it struck me: a revised ending for Bliss. Don't get me wrong, I liked how it ended. It felt complete. I'll obviously have to change things a bit when I write the new ending.
Thing is, it's a whole extra section to the book. Several chapters, of actual significance.
How I didn't think of it before, I don't know. I think I was wondering how to make certain things work for later in the series when the idea actually popped into my head. I was quite proud of it, actually, but I won't know how well it works with the rest of the book until it's actually written. (I need to plan it, still, but it should be easy enough to make a natural progression from where I left off.)
Ideas don't usually come to me like this when I feel like a story has been finished. The only time an idea has ever stuck around for a while is with my many attempts to write a story with superpowered characters. I get ideas, I try to work with them, and inevitably I give up on the book.
The last time I was happy with an idea that I was working on was with The Jump, and that didn't last long. I didn't really plan the book too well to work with, or plan for sequels.
I'm planning a superhero novel at the moment - or, I was, for a while, and I need to get back to it - so hopefully that'll finally produce something close to what I've been trying to write since I started out writing. Early attempts resulted in being rip-offs of X-Men or Heroes. Even The Jump was veering on being too-close-for-comfort.
It's difficult to deal with such problems when the market already has a lot of different stories out there. However, I think what I'm working on now is coming closer to original than anything else, insofar as a superhero novel can be original.
We'll see how that works out, but for now I need to deal with the idea that won't stop hanging around for Bliss. I'm dying to actually get it written! On a related note, how did I get to be the person who writes these stories?
Showing posts with label bliss. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bliss. Show all posts
Friday, May 17, 2013
Saturday, June 30, 2012
Malfunction
Yesterday, as I set down to make the changes in Bliss on my laptop - that being a book I wrote for NaNoWriMo - after doing my proofreading when...the laptop died.
If you know me, you know I love my laptop. I do all my work on it. I use it all the time. It's an extra limb for me. And it just stopped working. No explanation, no warning, just dead.
I swear, I almost cried, except I know people who generally know what to do in these situations. I resolved to merely panic that it might be irreparable, that I can't afford to replace it. And I sent an email asking my best friend what to do.
He didn't just offer me one solution, which is just as well. The first one didn't work. It was the most basic. But the second option fixed my laptop in about ten minutes.
Yes, it works.
I love my best friend right now. He's just saved my laptop. It's the most valuable item I own, and it didn't cost me a cent to fix it.
While it wasn't working, I resorted to using the desktop computer. Technically speaking, it's better than my laptop. But in practice, I can't use it as well. I can't do half the things on it I can with my laptop, including design book covers how I like them. I mean, I'm limited to the certain standards, but I'd wanted to do a cover for Bliss.
So, I resolved to make this on the desktop:
It's not the best, but I just wanted it for the five free copies from CreateSpace. I got that from NaNoWriMo, and damn it I was going to take advantage of it! I love having copies of my books. It's much handier to hand someone a bound book when looking for feedback than sending an ebook or handing a bunch of loose pages. Plus, it's just cool.
There's a reverse image, but I don't think it's almost the same.
In case your wondering at the concept... well, initially I'd wanted to have a full face of pink/violet light on the cover, but with the laptop dying I wasn't able to devote as much time as I'd wanted to do actually doing it. So, I decided to go as minimal as possible, since I didn't have the time or software to do much more. I think it looks pretty cool, but then, I would.
The front cover is literally just one image and the text you see above. And that image took about thirty seconds to make. I just used the Internet! This nifty site let me make the image and save it: http://29a.ch/sandbox/2011/neonflames/#
Anyway, I have my five free copies on order now, and my laptop is working again. Things are looking up today, compared to yesterday!
But God, I do not want this to happen again!
If you know me, you know I love my laptop. I do all my work on it. I use it all the time. It's an extra limb for me. And it just stopped working. No explanation, no warning, just dead.
I swear, I almost cried, except I know people who generally know what to do in these situations. I resolved to merely panic that it might be irreparable, that I can't afford to replace it. And I sent an email asking my best friend what to do.
He didn't just offer me one solution, which is just as well. The first one didn't work. It was the most basic. But the second option fixed my laptop in about ten minutes.
Yes, it works.
I love my best friend right now. He's just saved my laptop. It's the most valuable item I own, and it didn't cost me a cent to fix it.
While it wasn't working, I resorted to using the desktop computer. Technically speaking, it's better than my laptop. But in practice, I can't use it as well. I can't do half the things on it I can with my laptop, including design book covers how I like them. I mean, I'm limited to the certain standards, but I'd wanted to do a cover for Bliss.
So, I resolved to make this on the desktop:
It's not the best, but I just wanted it for the five free copies from CreateSpace. I got that from NaNoWriMo, and damn it I was going to take advantage of it! I love having copies of my books. It's much handier to hand someone a bound book when looking for feedback than sending an ebook or handing a bunch of loose pages. Plus, it's just cool.
There's a reverse image, but I don't think it's almost the same.
In case your wondering at the concept... well, initially I'd wanted to have a full face of pink/violet light on the cover, but with the laptop dying I wasn't able to devote as much time as I'd wanted to do actually doing it. So, I decided to go as minimal as possible, since I didn't have the time or software to do much more. I think it looks pretty cool, but then, I would.
The front cover is literally just one image and the text you see above. And that image took about thirty seconds to make. I just used the Internet! This nifty site let me make the image and save it: http://29a.ch/sandbox/2011/neonflames/#
Anyway, I have my five free copies on order now, and my laptop is working again. Things are looking up today, compared to yesterday!
But God, I do not want this to happen again!
Monday, April 2, 2012
The Things No One Has Seen
I've got a friend. Okay, I have a few friends. A few brilliant friends. But this one friend wants to see things no one else has ever seen. And that got me thinking: I might be insane, but when I walk down the street, go to a concert or try to sleep, I see things no one else has ever seen.
My imagination is weird that way. I'm not unique; I think it comes with the self-imposed job description of Writer, seeing things that aren't there but not in a trippy I'm-losing-my-mind sort of way. Something simple, like the way the sun shines through a white cloud, can set something off in my head. I like the way the particular whiteness of the light makes everything seem extra-real, like walking through a dream. It's a weird experience that only lasts a few seconds, until the cloud has moved just that tiny bit.
I saw two birds flying through the sky, a seagull and a blackbird, and I see Yin and Yang. It makes me think about balance in the universe. A scale isn't balanced without both ends weighing the same, and those two birds set off that idea about the scale, about two opposing forces being necessary in the world. (And a note for writers: you don't get away with writing a story without an opposing force.)
I went to a concert in the O2. There was an impressive light show, lots of lasers and whatnot, and it made an idea in my head click. It was to do with the sequel to Bliss, the Sci-Fi novel I wrote last year. The concert was in no way Sci-Fi. It was just this connection, and in making that, I saw what the book would show the reader, a beauty I can't describe without the context of the story to unfold around it.
And I think, why would anyone need to go anywhere if they just change the way they look at the world. Seven or eight years ago, when I started to write the first book I ever completed, everything changed for me. I looked at different things in the world for inspiration, from old weapons to Biblical texts, at images of mythological creatures to the regular people who walk the streets of Dublin, trying to figure out the world I was writing. I wasn't very good at it, then, but I was young and only starting out.
The point is that I was opened up to the particular beauty of the world that can only be experienced when you stop worrying that people will think you're crazy. I doodle a lot in class, a lot of eyes and faces and monsters made of black spindly lines, and I jot down ideas and words in the back of my notebooks, and all that time the lecture could be talking about anything interesting or boring but I'm too caught up in the images in my head to pay too much attention.
That's what writing is all about: finding something in the world that matters more in that moment than anything else. No, there's more to it than that. It's about sharing that experience with other people. I don't mean like this, just telling you about that I do when I lose interest in a lecture for a few seconds to write down an idea - especially fun when the idea comes from two different lectures in a day and something about them just clicks. Writing is about turning the experiences of writing down words and doodling into words that people can read to understand what you see in your mind.
That's why I write. Not just the things I plan on releasing into the world, but the stories I write that only one person in a dozen might get (a very particular dozen, too, though maybe that number is too big or too small.) I just want to share the sort of beauty I see in the world, even if it all comes across as being a bit weird. At the end of the day, I'm stuck in this city at least until I graduate college, and I get to see things no one has seen.
The world will be a crazy place when I finally get out to see it.
My imagination is weird that way. I'm not unique; I think it comes with the self-imposed job description of Writer, seeing things that aren't there but not in a trippy I'm-losing-my-mind sort of way. Something simple, like the way the sun shines through a white cloud, can set something off in my head. I like the way the particular whiteness of the light makes everything seem extra-real, like walking through a dream. It's a weird experience that only lasts a few seconds, until the cloud has moved just that tiny bit.
I saw two birds flying through the sky, a seagull and a blackbird, and I see Yin and Yang. It makes me think about balance in the universe. A scale isn't balanced without both ends weighing the same, and those two birds set off that idea about the scale, about two opposing forces being necessary in the world. (And a note for writers: you don't get away with writing a story without an opposing force.)
I went to a concert in the O2. There was an impressive light show, lots of lasers and whatnot, and it made an idea in my head click. It was to do with the sequel to Bliss, the Sci-Fi novel I wrote last year. The concert was in no way Sci-Fi. It was just this connection, and in making that, I saw what the book would show the reader, a beauty I can't describe without the context of the story to unfold around it.
And I think, why would anyone need to go anywhere if they just change the way they look at the world. Seven or eight years ago, when I started to write the first book I ever completed, everything changed for me. I looked at different things in the world for inspiration, from old weapons to Biblical texts, at images of mythological creatures to the regular people who walk the streets of Dublin, trying to figure out the world I was writing. I wasn't very good at it, then, but I was young and only starting out.
The point is that I was opened up to the particular beauty of the world that can only be experienced when you stop worrying that people will think you're crazy. I doodle a lot in class, a lot of eyes and faces and monsters made of black spindly lines, and I jot down ideas and words in the back of my notebooks, and all that time the lecture could be talking about anything interesting or boring but I'm too caught up in the images in my head to pay too much attention.
That's what writing is all about: finding something in the world that matters more in that moment than anything else. No, there's more to it than that. It's about sharing that experience with other people. I don't mean like this, just telling you about that I do when I lose interest in a lecture for a few seconds to write down an idea - especially fun when the idea comes from two different lectures in a day and something about them just clicks. Writing is about turning the experiences of writing down words and doodling into words that people can read to understand what you see in your mind.
That's why I write. Not just the things I plan on releasing into the world, but the stories I write that only one person in a dozen might get (a very particular dozen, too, though maybe that number is too big or too small.) I just want to share the sort of beauty I see in the world, even if it all comes across as being a bit weird. At the end of the day, I'm stuck in this city at least until I graduate college, and I get to see things no one has seen.
The world will be a crazy place when I finally get out to see it.
Monday, December 19, 2011
Life and the World to Come
Way back in July, I made a few decisions that would, inevitably, change the way I lived my life. Almost five months have passed since I made the choice to do a massive writing challenge to finish Bliss's Camp NaNo 50K. That, in itself, wasn't massively life-changing, except that it made me realise how much I could do if I stopped messing about, and if I put aside whatever was happening in my life that might distract me from my work.
In that same week, I made the decision to set up a website - which I worked on from then until the middle of September, when I launched the site. That involved a lot of planning, of course, and a lot of mulling over what would eventually end up on my site on Day 1. Over the next month and a half, I edited Stepping Forward, fixing up a novella I was already pretty happy with to give away for free.
That's been the first big change in my life: I now have a book out in the public domain.
The website has, since, been host to a number of articles, poems and short stories. While these haven't exactly changed my life, they have gotten me thinking about the different ways I live my life, and the way in which I write. I also decided to use the website to play host to a couple of projects in the New Year, one of which is an X-Men story I've been planning for some time. (I've checked, and given the fact that Marvel pick up writers and stories from self-published works - and that's the only way they will now consider someone new - I am perfectly within my rights to release this story as I see fit.) That one doesn't have any immediate effects on my life, though it will at least encourage me to stick to creative deadlines.
The other project is an adaptations ezine, which will help me (a) hone my critical writing and (b) review books, films and the adaptation process. Again, no immediate effect, but it will involve, once again, sticking to deadlines.
Aside from my website, I also decided to apply for a writing position at The Phantom Zone. While the rush of college work has stopped me writing for the site in some time, I still have this job. More than that, I still have my first ever writing job. It was something for me to be proud of.
In the two months that followed, I wrote and edited a play, The Rest is Silence. This is where things took another big turn: as a result of this play, I'm going to have something performed on-stage. More than that, it will, hopefully, raise some money for a worthwhile cause.
At the same time, I've set up an ezine in college, which has gotten someone else writing. He's a good friend of mine, and he's decided to put his quirkiness to good use. The immediate benefit for me? I can have a good laugh reading his blog when I'm stressed; he has all of these really funny observations and stories that aren't as noticeable in a group of ten (yes, there are ten of us... we're a bit of a mob.) It's also fun to be able to talk about writing with someone who's only just started to think of it as having potential to be more than a hobby.
The driving force behind a lot of this work was an old friend of mine. Whether I was trying to make him proud or merely using that as an excuse to make myself do something with my life, I mustered up the courage to finally put my name out there. As I said in my dedication in Stepping Forward, he taught me there's more to life than just existing. No matter what happens between us, I will always remember that I was too scared to do any of this on my own. Having a reason to get going has made the past few months some of the best of my life.
That's the immediate effect of knowing him; after so many years writing, and so many years living the same mundane life, I ceased to just exist. As a result of that friendship, I started to live.
In that same week, I made the decision to set up a website - which I worked on from then until the middle of September, when I launched the site. That involved a lot of planning, of course, and a lot of mulling over what would eventually end up on my site on Day 1. Over the next month and a half, I edited Stepping Forward, fixing up a novella I was already pretty happy with to give away for free.
That's been the first big change in my life: I now have a book out in the public domain.
The website has, since, been host to a number of articles, poems and short stories. While these haven't exactly changed my life, they have gotten me thinking about the different ways I live my life, and the way in which I write. I also decided to use the website to play host to a couple of projects in the New Year, one of which is an X-Men story I've been planning for some time. (I've checked, and given the fact that Marvel pick up writers and stories from self-published works - and that's the only way they will now consider someone new - I am perfectly within my rights to release this story as I see fit.) That one doesn't have any immediate effects on my life, though it will at least encourage me to stick to creative deadlines.
The other project is an adaptations ezine, which will help me (a) hone my critical writing and (b) review books, films and the adaptation process. Again, no immediate effect, but it will involve, once again, sticking to deadlines.
Aside from my website, I also decided to apply for a writing position at The Phantom Zone. While the rush of college work has stopped me writing for the site in some time, I still have this job. More than that, I still have my first ever writing job. It was something for me to be proud of.
In the two months that followed, I wrote and edited a play, The Rest is Silence. This is where things took another big turn: as a result of this play, I'm going to have something performed on-stage. More than that, it will, hopefully, raise some money for a worthwhile cause.
At the same time, I've set up an ezine in college, which has gotten someone else writing. He's a good friend of mine, and he's decided to put his quirkiness to good use. The immediate benefit for me? I can have a good laugh reading his blog when I'm stressed; he has all of these really funny observations and stories that aren't as noticeable in a group of ten (yes, there are ten of us... we're a bit of a mob.) It's also fun to be able to talk about writing with someone who's only just started to think of it as having potential to be more than a hobby.
The driving force behind a lot of this work was an old friend of mine. Whether I was trying to make him proud or merely using that as an excuse to make myself do something with my life, I mustered up the courage to finally put my name out there. As I said in my dedication in Stepping Forward, he taught me there's more to life than just existing. No matter what happens between us, I will always remember that I was too scared to do any of this on my own. Having a reason to get going has made the past few months some of the best of my life.
That's the immediate effect of knowing him; after so many years writing, and so many years living the same mundane life, I ceased to just exist. As a result of that friendship, I started to live.
Saturday, November 12, 2011
After a few days...
So, I started NaNoWriMo. It was originally my intent to pull out of the competition, but Bliss got the better of me. I'm now over 7000 words into the novel (added onto what I wrote during the summer - only a slight cheat in picking the same novel!) and, thankfully, less than 13K behind what I should be on. I have time to write this weekend, since I don't have anything I need to do any of my college work, and I have a rough plan. More importantly, I know where the novel is going outside of this rough plan, which has been ignored for the most part up to this point anyway.
The novel has taken on greater depths since I started writing it. For a start, the characters are a little more believable, there are more of them (the original plan called for four characters; I now have seven main characters) and they have more interesting stories behind them. Braddock is trying not to follow in his father's footsteps, while also trying to make himself known in the scientific world; Lyo is trying to start a family after leaving her own behind to marry Braddock; Alastair is trying to prove himself as a scientist in a city that praises Braddock's family; Michelle is trying to continue the research of her late parents into solar and nuclear energy; Andy is trying to prove himself to his community; Bliss is trying to find her place in whatever world she ends up in; and the Mother Muse is trying to give the world her greatest gifts, through a warped sense of delivery.
Add to that the ecological and ethical issues that various characters face, the struggle of faith in the world, and the impending desecration of a world without love, and you've got Bliss. I was proud of my ability to actually plot the novel, initially; the first plan was based on the singles of Muse played in order. That has, obviously, changed, since most of the elements of that plan no longer make sense: Lyo wasn't part of it then, and she's important now. That's what I'm more proud of: actually altering my novel to write something worth reading, something more creative than the novelization of twenty four singles.
I have a lot of work ahead of me, though. As much as I love the novel, it will require a lot of perseverance to actually write 50K in 20 days. 30 is difficult enough! However, I think I've already beaten my fail of a 2010 attempt, so that's a plus.
Building on my Camp NaNoWriMo experience is definitely the only way I'm going to get this done. I have to take advantage of the fact that I get into college about two hours before lectures, bring my laptop in every day with my charger and my plan that I will ignore, and block out all sound with music for at least an hour. Every day I have Drama or a workshop, I have to stay behind in college, anyway. At lunch time, I will go to the library and get my assignments done. There are only three for the main modules left, so that won't be too bad.
The real problem is this teaching programme we have to do in college. That'll take up a lot of time, I think. Especially since I can't find anything about the assignment we're expected to do. No deadline date, no details on what we're actually supposed to do, nothing.
Can I scream? I think I'm going to scream. Or drink tea.
Anyway, back to the novel. After a few days, I'm well under way to getting this done. If I'd started at the right time, I wouldn't be in any trouble. With So much to write before I'm even caught up, I have to write an average of 2250 words per day to finish on time. Otherwise, at the rate NaNoWriMo think I'm writing (as in, if I'm writing from day 1), I'll finish in January.
That feature is always fun for me. The more I write, the closer than date gets. It makes it look like I'm doing a lot more work when an hour of writing knocks off a month of time it should take for me to finish.
Anyway, my plan is to just keep on writing. I want to finish, mostly because I wanted to finish the book before Christmas anyway, and partially because I want to get the five free copies CreateSpace are offering to winners. I love incentive, I really do.
I'll still be writing my pep talks - Week 3 is the week people hate their novels and feel like giving up - but I'll have to focus a lot more time on writing fiction. If I can catch up, I'll also have to write a short story for something in college. There's a day of NaNo gone out the window! I might write it on my way to Croagh Patrick on Wednesday.
Only a few hours before I can get back to writing Bliss. It's going to seem like such a long time...
PS You can track my progress here.
The novel has taken on greater depths since I started writing it. For a start, the characters are a little more believable, there are more of them (the original plan called for four characters; I now have seven main characters) and they have more interesting stories behind them. Braddock is trying not to follow in his father's footsteps, while also trying to make himself known in the scientific world; Lyo is trying to start a family after leaving her own behind to marry Braddock; Alastair is trying to prove himself as a scientist in a city that praises Braddock's family; Michelle is trying to continue the research of her late parents into solar and nuclear energy; Andy is trying to prove himself to his community; Bliss is trying to find her place in whatever world she ends up in; and the Mother Muse is trying to give the world her greatest gifts, through a warped sense of delivery.
Add to that the ecological and ethical issues that various characters face, the struggle of faith in the world, and the impending desecration of a world without love, and you've got Bliss. I was proud of my ability to actually plot the novel, initially; the first plan was based on the singles of Muse played in order. That has, obviously, changed, since most of the elements of that plan no longer make sense: Lyo wasn't part of it then, and she's important now. That's what I'm more proud of: actually altering my novel to write something worth reading, something more creative than the novelization of twenty four singles.
I have a lot of work ahead of me, though. As much as I love the novel, it will require a lot of perseverance to actually write 50K in 20 days. 30 is difficult enough! However, I think I've already beaten my fail of a 2010 attempt, so that's a plus.
Building on my Camp NaNoWriMo experience is definitely the only way I'm going to get this done. I have to take advantage of the fact that I get into college about two hours before lectures, bring my laptop in every day with my charger and my plan that I will ignore, and block out all sound with music for at least an hour. Every day I have Drama or a workshop, I have to stay behind in college, anyway. At lunch time, I will go to the library and get my assignments done. There are only three for the main modules left, so that won't be too bad.
The real problem is this teaching programme we have to do in college. That'll take up a lot of time, I think. Especially since I can't find anything about the assignment we're expected to do. No deadline date, no details on what we're actually supposed to do, nothing.
Can I scream? I think I'm going to scream. Or drink tea.
Anyway, back to the novel. After a few days, I'm well under way to getting this done. If I'd started at the right time, I wouldn't be in any trouble. With So much to write before I'm even caught up, I have to write an average of 2250 words per day to finish on time. Otherwise, at the rate NaNoWriMo think I'm writing (as in, if I'm writing from day 1), I'll finish in January.
That feature is always fun for me. The more I write, the closer than date gets. It makes it look like I'm doing a lot more work when an hour of writing knocks off a month of time it should take for me to finish.
Anyway, my plan is to just keep on writing. I want to finish, mostly because I wanted to finish the book before Christmas anyway, and partially because I want to get the five free copies CreateSpace are offering to winners. I love incentive, I really do.
I'll still be writing my pep talks - Week 3 is the week people hate their novels and feel like giving up - but I'll have to focus a lot more time on writing fiction. If I can catch up, I'll also have to write a short story for something in college. There's a day of NaNo gone out the window! I might write it on my way to Croagh Patrick on Wednesday.
Only a few hours before I can get back to writing Bliss. It's going to seem like such a long time...
PS You can track my progress here.
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
Workload Overload
Nobody ever said college would be so much work. I have to write two essays for Thursday. That's not really too bad. I mean, I've done the research for one (and the other is about a film), but I have to do other projects for college. Still, not too bad. Except we're going to get more work.
No, the real problem is that I want to do NaNoWriMo. Really want to.
This is a problem because, to start, I have to wait until my essays are out of the way. So, Thursday night, or on Friday. That gives me twenty days. Nineteen if you take away the day I'm going to Croagh Patrick next week. I'll have a teaching programme coming up soon, too. That'll delay me a lot. And I have to write a short story for a book in college, while also running the magazine.
But I really, really want to give it a shot.
Am I crazy? I mean, I'll be pushed to the limit every day. I'll have to write every single morning in college and every single night, and I'll need to get about a 1500 words done per session. That's possible, but exhausting. This is also probably the last time I'll get to do NaNoWriMo until I graduate, unless I can get most of my thesis work out of way early next year.
Ha!
I'll probably still give it a shot. I've wanted to finish the book, and I wanted to do NaNoWriMo before I realised I wouldn't be around for five days. I just don't want to let that get in the way. With Drama, I'm going to be stuck in the college for a couple of hours each audition day before auditions even begin, so I'll need to do something to fill the time, and working all the time on college work will just drive me insane.
So, all of this is why I am going to be facing a workload overload. I don't know whether this will cause me any serious problems. I know I can stop writing if I have to, because the college work comes first, but I don't think anything is guaranteed when it comes to NaNo.
Madness it is then. I'm going to do it, until I finish or I reach the point where it really is too much work to attempt anymore.
No, the real problem is that I want to do NaNoWriMo. Really want to.
This is a problem because, to start, I have to wait until my essays are out of the way. So, Thursday night, or on Friday. That gives me twenty days. Nineteen if you take away the day I'm going to Croagh Patrick next week. I'll have a teaching programme coming up soon, too. That'll delay me a lot. And I have to write a short story for a book in college, while also running the magazine.
But I really, really want to give it a shot.
Am I crazy? I mean, I'll be pushed to the limit every day. I'll have to write every single morning in college and every single night, and I'll need to get about a 1500 words done per session. That's possible, but exhausting. This is also probably the last time I'll get to do NaNoWriMo until I graduate, unless I can get most of my thesis work out of way early next year.
Ha!
I'll probably still give it a shot. I've wanted to finish the book, and I wanted to do NaNoWriMo before I realised I wouldn't be around for five days. I just don't want to let that get in the way. With Drama, I'm going to be stuck in the college for a couple of hours each audition day before auditions even begin, so I'll need to do something to fill the time, and working all the time on college work will just drive me insane.
So, all of this is why I am going to be facing a workload overload. I don't know whether this will cause me any serious problems. I know I can stop writing if I have to, because the college work comes first, but I don't think anything is guaranteed when it comes to NaNo.
Madness it is then. I'm going to do it, until I finish or I reach the point where it really is too much work to attempt anymore.
Sunday, July 3, 2011
A Life of Its Own
Earlier this evening I allowed my brain to decide what I was going to write, rather than writing what I had been writing all summer. It chose to write Bliss. I've had the idea for Bliss for about two years now, and when I started writing it today, it decided it was going to be a bit different than I'd planned.
See, originally it was going to be just a simple story of cross-dimensionality, neuro-transmission, androids and love - sometimes all at the same time - and now its taken on new characteristics. Without meaning to, I introduced an eco-system of poisonous cloud and venomous journalists, made a society of long-living archetypes of perfect humans, and gave my protagonist a wife who is more than just a bossy bitch as I'd originally planned. Now she's a hot blonde model. Who cares about stuff. Who thinks. She's actually amazing. For now.
The reason I'm writing this, of course, is as a warning for people who think they decide what goes into the book in the end. No, as writers we're just the people who have developed typing skills and whose brains act as the hyper-dimensional gateway for ideas to make it from the Realm of Forms into the world we live in. Essentially, I'm my book's bitch, if you want to get ghetto about it all.
But it's not just the book that takes control of the final product, and that's where this gets serious. When entering the world of publishing, first time novelists will be astonished to find out that someone wants them to change their book. Yes, it's true. There are these people called Editors who, if they existed alongside God, would have made sure things ran smoothly before we were release into the world.
Using the all powerful Red Pen, the Editors are what get a book from the submitted draft to the book on the shelves, and its entirely out of the hands of the writer. Well, they still have to do all the work the Editors suggest - and they're quite pushy, so really it's an order, not a suggestion - but they don't get to put their foot down. If they do, they generally do it without a publishing contract. C'est la vie.
Anyway, midnight is staring at me. It's giving me a threatening look, like it knows I should really be in bed by then if I want to do anything productive tomorrow. With 3440 words written on Bliss - just tonight - I think I should be able to manage Camp NaNoWriMo. I hope this book doesn't decide to take control and shut down...
See, originally it was going to be just a simple story of cross-dimensionality, neuro-transmission, androids and love - sometimes all at the same time - and now its taken on new characteristics. Without meaning to, I introduced an eco-system of poisonous cloud and venomous journalists, made a society of long-living archetypes of perfect humans, and gave my protagonist a wife who is more than just a bossy bitch as I'd originally planned. Now she's a hot blonde model. Who cares about stuff. Who thinks. She's actually amazing. For now.
The reason I'm writing this, of course, is as a warning for people who think they decide what goes into the book in the end. No, as writers we're just the people who have developed typing skills and whose brains act as the hyper-dimensional gateway for ideas to make it from the Realm of Forms into the world we live in. Essentially, I'm my book's bitch, if you want to get ghetto about it all.
But it's not just the book that takes control of the final product, and that's where this gets serious. When entering the world of publishing, first time novelists will be astonished to find out that someone wants them to change their book. Yes, it's true. There are these people called Editors who, if they existed alongside God, would have made sure things ran smoothly before we were release into the world.
Using the all powerful Red Pen, the Editors are what get a book from the submitted draft to the book on the shelves, and its entirely out of the hands of the writer. Well, they still have to do all the work the Editors suggest - and they're quite pushy, so really it's an order, not a suggestion - but they don't get to put their foot down. If they do, they generally do it without a publishing contract. C'est la vie.
Anyway, midnight is staring at me. It's giving me a threatening look, like it knows I should really be in bed by then if I want to do anything productive tomorrow. With 3440 words written on Bliss - just tonight - I think I should be able to manage Camp NaNoWriMo. I hope this book doesn't decide to take control and shut down...
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