c2011 (S)
My fourth novel, (SF) still awaiting suitable cover art and more free time for re-writes, incorporates world and ecology-building of a journeyman level, including hard and soft science fiction story elements. In this book I experimented with my own comfort zones as a writer, in terms of characters and their sexual preferences. I say this because the unsophisticated will always associate the writer with the thing that most stands out about the story in their own minds.
My fifth novel, (urban fantasy,) is safely in the can. It's a low-key, understated urban fantasy. It was a departure from science fiction into a world that had always impressed me as a little too easy from the writerly point of view—that is to say, ‘if your protagonist gets into a corner, all he has to do is to wave a magic wand and make everything go away.’ I’m not sure if I still feel that way. The rules of fantasy are there if you care to look. ‘Magic is acceptable and expected.’ But another consideration was how to compete in a field where ‘over the top’ is what people seem to be shooting for.
My solution—to downplay the fantasy elements and treat it as literary fiction about life in a small town after the mill closes down, where there just happens to be some shape-shifters running around, will probably fail in this market.
My sixth novel, (SF,) back again to hard sci-fi, allowed me to experiment with the creation of really different characters interacting as a group, while at the same time fine-honing the work, hopefully, showing rather than telling. The number one protagonist—there’s actually more than one—is an entirely humourless, yet still sympathetic character. Like an idiot, I called him ‘Kjarl,’ which any experienced editor would insist that I change. By this time I was comfortable with the pacing of the novel, as these last three came in at 76,000 to 80,000. This is perfect length to begin editing and re-writing the works.
When I look back a couple of years, and think about what I have learned, it does give me some confidence that I can plug away at my next book or story and get the thing done in fairly short order. All I have to do is to write five hundred or a thousand words a day, and keep the first draft a little light on details. This story (my new Maintenon story) was a 360-word start, until someone on Twitter mentioned, ‘a 20-minute writing blitz’ while her dinner simmered on the stove or something. I thought, ‘why not?’ It's up over 20,000 now. An hour a day, and in about a month we’ll be up to 40,000 or 50,000 words.
When I get this one ‘done,’ it would be a good time to make some decisions, about what to publish next. Then the re-write and editing process would take a few more weeks or months. In the meantime, if I stumbled across the perfect artwork, something that I could work with for the marketing image, it would be tempting to do one of the three books I have sitting there. That part is flexible in terms of planning.
Every so often, when I get a spare minute, I go off to morguefile.com or photobucket.com and look for images, as I also want to re-issue ‘Thirty Years Gone,’ in other formats. Right now, it’s on Lulu.com with a plain black cover in the pdf format only.
So basically, we're planning, plotting, and scheming our way through the next few months. Rather than dwell on our weaknesses or past failures, we've been doing some assessing of our strengths, our skills, and our special attributes, insofar as they relate to the future.
Saturday, June 11, 2011
Thursday, June 9, 2011
Oh No, Not Again.
c2011 (S)
Oh no! Not again!
What began as a short story is showing unmistakeable signs of turning into a novel.
These signs include an increasing attention to plot, and today a lot of fact-checking. Calling a character 'the chief of police' when in fact he is a 'superintendent' will quickly lose a writer a lot of readers.
This is the tough thing to remember about genre fiction: it must above all else be accurate, although I think I will stick to fictional names rather than try to tie in a fictional story with actual historical figures, which would of necessity include more research into the person who was the actual Superintendent of the Territorial Police CID in Devon County, UK, back in 1927-29 or thereabouts. And Dartmoor is definitely in Devon--I'll know all this stuff off by heart in a few more days or weeks, don't you worry about that.
Another tough thing about the novel: my first novel was a work of seven years. You can read a draft many times in seven years. The next few novels all took at least three months just to get a first draft. Each and every one of my published novels has been read at least 150 times.
It is important to keep in mind that I'm only three or four weeks into the project, with about 19,000 words down, and yeah: it's another bleeping novel, when basically I just wanted another short story.
At this stage, of course I'm worried, and of course much of it is fragmentary at best. The thing is just slightly too long to read it all before starting the day, and just reviewing the short bit I wrote yesterday isn't much help sometimes.
Today is a good day to hit Wikipedia and other sources, and maybe do a little fact-checking. At this stage of the game, 500-1,000 words a day isn't unreasonable as a writing goal.
Oh no! Not again!
What began as a short story is showing unmistakeable signs of turning into a novel.
These signs include an increasing attention to plot, and today a lot of fact-checking. Calling a character 'the chief of police' when in fact he is a 'superintendent' will quickly lose a writer a lot of readers.
This is the tough thing to remember about genre fiction: it must above all else be accurate, although I think I will stick to fictional names rather than try to tie in a fictional story with actual historical figures, which would of necessity include more research into the person who was the actual Superintendent of the Territorial Police CID in Devon County, UK, back in 1927-29 or thereabouts. And Dartmoor is definitely in Devon--I'll know all this stuff off by heart in a few more days or weeks, don't you worry about that.
Another tough thing about the novel: my first novel was a work of seven years. You can read a draft many times in seven years. The next few novels all took at least three months just to get a first draft. Each and every one of my published novels has been read at least 150 times.
It is important to keep in mind that I'm only three or four weeks into the project, with about 19,000 words down, and yeah: it's another bleeping novel, when basically I just wanted another short story.
At this stage, of course I'm worried, and of course much of it is fragmentary at best. The thing is just slightly too long to read it all before starting the day, and just reviewing the short bit I wrote yesterday isn't much help sometimes.
Today is a good day to hit Wikipedia and other sources, and maybe do a little fact-checking. At this stage of the game, 500-1,000 words a day isn't unreasonable as a writing goal.
Wednesday, June 8, 2011
Tough Times, Tough Decisions.
c2011 (S)
Out of simple curiousity, I Googled a few names the other day and got some interesting results.
Last summer I recieved a contract for a book. Checking out the publisher on 'Absolute Write/water-cooler' I found some negative remarks about the company, and nowhere what I would call positive remarks. Yet, remaining objective, it occured to me that a disgruntled former author/disappointed partner might not accept their own failures and end up disparaging someone who was actually quite good.
For my own reasons, I felt unable to sign that contract. There was no advance, and at that time, a $1,000 or $2,000 advance might have gone a long way to convincing me!
Even then, the decision not to sign was a tough one. Then, just before Christmas, this very same publisher approached me again, via e-mail, and again they had a lot of positive things to say about my work.
Again, that tough internal debate, that tough decision. The decision not to sign was made a little easier by the lack of response to certain questions I had about the contract, and again no budging on the advance or lack thereof.
Six months later, with no characterization or value judgements offered or implied, that company is gone. They are just gone. Nowhere in that contract, (and at the time, I didn't know enough to ask,) did it clearly state what would happen to the parties, or who would own the rights, or when the rights to the product might revert back to the author, in the event of company closure.
Speaking purely objectively, if my company was in trouble, and things were not going too well in the cash-flow department, as an officer of the company, I would have little choice but to continue day-to-day operations as if nothing was wrong, and to continue to do everything within the realm of my sole fiduciary responsibility, which would be to the company and its shareholders, and not necessarily to newbie authors, especially ones we haven't signed yet and who ask a lot of questions...to try and save the company and to make it work.
In another similar instance, the company is still going. The company is smaller, and has fewer staff. Again with no characterizations or value judgements, we can only 'objectively' assume that tough times called for tough decisions, and it is entirely possible that I will someday regret not signing with them either.
It's just a really tough call either way sometimes, and especially now.
Out of simple curiousity, I Googled a few names the other day and got some interesting results.
Last summer I recieved a contract for a book. Checking out the publisher on 'Absolute Write/water-cooler' I found some negative remarks about the company, and nowhere what I would call positive remarks. Yet, remaining objective, it occured to me that a disgruntled former author/disappointed partner might not accept their own failures and end up disparaging someone who was actually quite good.
For my own reasons, I felt unable to sign that contract. There was no advance, and at that time, a $1,000 or $2,000 advance might have gone a long way to convincing me!
Even then, the decision not to sign was a tough one. Then, just before Christmas, this very same publisher approached me again, via e-mail, and again they had a lot of positive things to say about my work.
Again, that tough internal debate, that tough decision. The decision not to sign was made a little easier by the lack of response to certain questions I had about the contract, and again no budging on the advance or lack thereof.
Six months later, with no characterization or value judgements offered or implied, that company is gone. They are just gone. Nowhere in that contract, (and at the time, I didn't know enough to ask,) did it clearly state what would happen to the parties, or who would own the rights, or when the rights to the product might revert back to the author, in the event of company closure.
Speaking purely objectively, if my company was in trouble, and things were not going too well in the cash-flow department, as an officer of the company, I would have little choice but to continue day-to-day operations as if nothing was wrong, and to continue to do everything within the realm of my sole fiduciary responsibility, which would be to the company and its shareholders, and not necessarily to newbie authors, especially ones we haven't signed yet and who ask a lot of questions...to try and save the company and to make it work.
In another similar instance, the company is still going. The company is smaller, and has fewer staff. Again with no characterizations or value judgements, we can only 'objectively' assume that tough times called for tough decisions, and it is entirely possible that I will someday regret not signing with them either.
It's just a really tough call either way sometimes, and especially now.
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