See? Told ya I wasn't dead!

Okay, here we go, new post. Lots of stuff's been happening, which is in part why I've been so crazy quiet. Let's address the issues.

Since we last sat down and talked, I changed jobs again. This new place is pretty awesome, but it's actually busy (most of the time) so it's been kicking my ass.

In the time that transpired between jobs, I took a week to just sit on my ass and do nothing. I played video games. I watched movies. I went golfing for the first time. All in all it was hella enjoyable.

Oh, and I bought a new computer.

I don't have pics (I'll work on that) but she's a beauty. Dell Inspiron 351 AMD Athlon Core Duo 2.80 Ghz with 2 gigs memory. Not like ... top of the line, but she's suiting me rather nicely after Deborah became old, bitter, and ready for retirement to the occasional coffee shop.

I've named her Ghita. And to top her off, I put THIS on top to sweeten the deal.

So all of this week (when I wasn't working) was mostly spent getting everything set just how I like it. Some minor hiccups aside (my music library has been added about 5 times now, because I keep messing up some setting and throwing it all out of whack) I'm about in business.

Which means it's time for writing.

Screnzy's over. I'm getting settled. And the spring is slowly starting to give way to summer so it's time to throw down and do what needs to be done. CDE Project is calling me. Too much potential not to explore it. And the countdown to clear my project queue (one new book, two edits) by November is creeping up faster than I'm entirely comfortable with.

In other news, I have down time here at work each morning before FedEx arrives. I'm not sure if that means that I'll post more, but I certainly have a nice slice of time carved out for it, if I choose to exploit it.

Oh yeah, Morgetron interviewed me last night because she's silly and I like to talk. When it's up, I'll link it. But people should be checking her out anyway. I mean daaaaaayum, if only all teachers were so stylin'.

Well, it's May First, which means ...

That the people who got the second draft of Marton Syan to read over hit their deadline.

I sent the email out to ten people. All of these people expressed interest. And I was explicit that if they couldn't make the obligation, to just drop me a line and that would be fine. I understand, people are busy.

Total people who finished: 2

Total people who offered any sort of excuse: 2.5-ish

Which means that there are six people who couldn't be bothered.

You know what, six people? Fuck you. Each and every one of you.

It'll be a cold day in hell before I come to any of you with my fiction again.

True friends and all, I guess...

Sayonara, Silver Screen!

Well, me and Tony have officially won Script Frenzy 2008. It's been an interesting month, we me moving during the first week and Tony ready to move next week, but somewhere in between, when I wasn't doing taxes, I figured out how to write a screenplay.

Not a good screenplay, by any stretch of the imagination. It's poorly paced (books aren't movies) and talky and confusing. But it's done. 100 pages even. I even had to concoct a scene that I'm sure would find it's way onto the cutting room floor in an instant to grab those last two pages.

For a writer like me, with elephantitis of the word count, this was an eye-opening experience.

Screenplays are an interesting game. The lack of narration, the sparsity of descriptors, the funky and oh-so-easy way to throw out massive amounts of dialogue are all wildly different from the books I'm used to. It's a fun medium, I'll admit. The only problem I have is what comes after--when you finish a script, you still have to ship it off to hope that people can hack at it and reinterpret it before people see it.

I could never deal with that disconnect. It'd drive me mad. No, I want my words to be what people experience. If that's ego, it's ego. I'm okay with that.

But now that April's over, and the script's done, I'm looking forward to NaNo in November, and Screnzy next year, where I'm sure I'll dabble again (whether me and Tony team up for another script remains to be seen, a year is a long way off).

Until then...

Ciao, Hollywood!

Here thar be lists!

Here’s another arbitrary update because I’m uncompelled to produce content. It was either this or work on the script, and to be completely honest I’m just not feeling the whole noir vibe under fluorescent lighting. Maybe it’s just me.

By all accounts (barring complete block or disasters both medical and technological) Tony and I should be finishing the script up by Friday. Which means that I’ll be free to pursue other things. There are three that are standing at my door waiting for me.

1. Finish writing Tango
2. Edit WTC
3. Do a third draft on MS

I’m not really keen on 3, since it’s been only two months since I kicked it back out, so I’m bouncing between the other two. Opinions have been weighed in, though they’re mostly biased. I don’t know what I want to do, though, and since I’m the one who has to sit down every night and be happy with my output, this is something of a problem.

I also am tempted to do something rash and foolish. I won’t say what, but there are a few options not listed up there (4-6, I think, offhand) and they’re tugging at me from time to time.

I have until Friday to figure out what the hell I’m doing. Saturday, if I really want to press it. When these are decisions about what you’re going to be spending the next two months of your life focused on, this sort of indecision is a real pain in the ass.

Maybe I’ll just do all six of them at once and break down from the stress and lack of sleep.

New Bibliography!

Well, I updated my bibliography with redone blurbs (practicing for the querrying process) for the novels that were already on there, and the screnzy script and other novel I've put on hold for the moment.

Follow the link to the bibliography in the sidebar to the right if you're interested.

Other than that, I have nothing to report. Raining cats and dogs, which makes me feel wonderful. Sleeping poorly, which makes me feel not-so-wonderful.

And thinking of vacationing in the desert, nearly inexplicably.

A long-expected update!

So, I’ve been more than a little negligent lately. Not just about this blog, but about everything in general. Moving twice in a month I think drained me mentally more than I care to admit. And, also, the three weeks between those two moves threw me out of my writing habit.

So lately I’ve been trying to get back into it. Tango was a bit of a lost cause—returning to a novel after three weeks away is a terribly hard thing to do, especially when you went cold turkey with your writing like I did.

I decided instead to focus on my Script Frenzy script I’m writing with Tony. It’s light, it’s fairly straightforward, and it’s serving as a good way to ease back into my previous writing habits. It’s not quite NaNo, but it’ll hopefully bring me back up to something resembling speed.

Which is going well. It’s noiry (that’s a word!) as hell, but mostly a positive experience. I don’t know what I’m going to do with it once it’s done, since I’m not trying to be a screenwriter. Tony can gussy it up if he wants, or else I’ll just sit on it and publish it on a website someday as miscellanea.

After that I’m completely unsure. Two of the nine or ten readers I’ve sent MS to have finished it (the rest of you, two weeks left until shame on you) and that’s gone very well. So I can approach editing a third draft of that. There’s also a desire to give a second draft to WTC.

Of course, there’s also Tango. Oh Tango.

I’m suffering from an embarrassment of riches, here. Too many irons, many of them hot enough to strike.

But it’ll work out. As for the blog? I’ll see what I can do. Getting back into the writing swing of things might mean I get more inspiration. It might not. It’s really hard to say, honestly. My focus is all over the place. Pointing it in a constructive direction is little more than guesswork these days.

... actually, I saw it, I'm just too lazy to find the quote tonight

During my internet hiatus, I've had plenty of time to myself. I hadn't realized just how much time I kill by doing nothing much at all. Of course, I also spent that time writing (or trying to write, depending on the day, but a subject for another day) so that takes an appreciable amount off of it.

I've spent most of that time reading and thinking. Thinking about what I've read, thinking on my writing, thinking about myself. It's been kind of a down period, a time to focus internally, take assessment of where I am, and strike out again restocked from a new fortified and rejuvenated center.

What I've found, more than anything, is that my writing is lacking.

Some dude named [ find this guy later and put him in here, and haha on me if I post this with this tag still intact ] said that "a writer's apprenticeship includes one million words which are then discarded. Then he is ready to begin."

I'm not at the big 1,000,000 (impressive written out like that, ne?) but I'm about halfway. This is if we only include works of fiction, because if we attribute all my lengthy bits of roleplaying and blogging and journaling and ranting over the years, I've well surpassed a million and I'm probably pushing or have beaten 2mil. I don't like that idea, though, because to be completely honest I flew into my first novel as blind as if those words hadn't counted, so I'm content to say they did not.

So I'm not at a million, but I'm getting there by hook or by crook. And I've found that while I'm getting a grasp for the demands of a book--be they character bits, or plot lines, or themes or whatever--the bones of the writing is what really needs the work.

I think this has a lot to do with the editing of MS, really. I read through it, and was struck time and again with the fact that it was a great story, but that my writing just wasn't up to par. Often it was soft, unsure, lacking the confidence I needed to have. As much as I hate the bastard's writing, Hemingway never pulled a punch when it came to narration. Things were. They weren't. People said and did and lived and died. Nothing was ever a maybe.

I'm not going to write like Hemingway, or even attempt it, but I need to learn to tighten up my own voice. I know my book. I'm telling the story. I can't back away from it or hem and haw over it. I need to stride forward and put the words on the page and not blink in the face of them.

There is a painting by Japanese hero Miyamoto Musashi of a bird on a branch. I have this picture prefacing one of the books on Zen I have. The most remarkable thing about the picture is the complete purity of it. Done with black ink and a brush, the main focus of the painting (the branch) is drawn in one master stroke. A single like cutting across the page, turning to and fro, but never stopping. It is a line that defines. A line that divides.

But beyond everything else, it is a line put down without fear. It is what it is. It is a killing stroke turned into creation. It is the mind's weapon unleashed for poetry as opposed to distruction.

I still stands, to me, as one of the most defining ideas to me of what art should stand for.

I'm looking for my voice. The thing that is ME as a writer. Many people say I already have voice, but it's not where it should be. The book I'm trying to write requires my voice to grow and change. This is great, because I need to always stretch for something greater in order to evolve as a writer.

I need a bigger voice. A surer voice. A voice that writes the way Musashi painted. A voice that is a killing stroke, a voice that puts the words on the page and makes no excuses for them. A voice that is willing to utilize the language without fear.

I don't know what my voice will be--whether it'll be flashy or simple; casual or formal. When I think of the kind of writing that makes me feel something stir, it's writing with powerful voice. There are specific authors I have in mind, but my books will look nothing like theirs. Indeed, my voice is nothing like theirs and never will be. Nor would I want it to be. But in them, I see something of myself. I see where I want to go with these words.

So I've been reading. And thinking. I pulled back my overextended and weary forces, I sent the troops home to tend to their families for a while, and now they're back on the front. The winter's passed, the harvest was safe and babies will be born in time for the next one.

Now the forces stand at the ready again, feeling stronger. Sun Tzu knew the meaning of morale when it came time to fight a war. And while there have been plenty of warfare metaphors here in this post, I think they're accurate enough. All things are related to all things, so they say. In Writing Down the Bones, Natalie Goldberg mentioned offhandedly that the further one gets into writing, the more things seem to relate to it. In the end, a writer relates to all things through the vehicle of their task. The medium itself becomes transparent and all encompassing.

Maybe this is just a moment of that. And it's not just writers. Anyone who is very into their career or passion eventually sees things through the skien of that passion. It can't be helped. It's as natural as runny noses and muddy shoes.

The troops might be ready to strike out on a new campaign, but let us not forget, it is still spring.