That moment you realize what your ending will be

For Week 7's challenge I've been writing piecemeal, 15–20 minutes every morning before work. It's not the fastest way ever to write, but it's nice knowing that I showed up and did at least some of the work each day. Not writing has a way of gaining its own momentum over time.

So anyway, I realized what my ending will be this morning. Knowing for certain how the story will end is always a happy feeling for me (because then I can concentrate on just getting there without also having to worry about how), but there's also a lot of relief mixed in there when I've been writing to find out what I'm writing.

(I'm in an italics kind of mood today.)

That's all—just a quick update. It'll be up soon, and then onward to Week 8...!

Week Seven: By and by it comes...

Just a quick update: I'm still plugging away at Week Seven's challenge. I'm exploring the interview thing—the most difficult part is making it a short play with funny moments rather than a comedy sketch. Giving both characters equal moments to shine rather than just crazy person + normal person = hilarity.

(I guess I could just write a comedy sketch...)

Anyway, I've been writing a little bit each morning before work and it feels good.

And lastly, I know everyone's been waiting for this: I deleted my first spam comment earlier today! It's a real blog now!

A room of one's own in the middle of everything

From Megan Stielstra:

Until recently, I never much understood the whole room of one’s own thing. Love me some To The Lighthouse, but I didn’t need my own space. I could write anywhere: library, coffee shop, the bar before starting a shift. In part, I preferred writing in public—the people, the action, the whitenoise—but mostly this nomadic office was determined by necessity. I lived in the city. Space is expensive, and a second bedroom was a luxury I couldn’t afford. Also, like many freelance artists/teachers/servers/twenty-somethings, I had three jobs; no time to spend in a second bedroom even if I had one. Also, I moved around a lot, apartment to apartment, neighborhood to neighborhood, relationship to relationship, so I learned to write whenever and wherever I could.

Aren’t you supposed to build your writing process around your life?

Or—wait. Is it the other way around?

Read the rest at The Rumpus!

I crave a gorgeous book-crammed study with soft lighting and a leather reading chair, but my writing usually happens more like this—between things. How about you?

Reflections on Week Six

[Read the completed story here!]

It's kind of illuminating that the only way I'm able to break these silly prompts into actual stories is to stretch the meaning far enough that it becomes an almost new idea. There's a reason (apart from a near-chronic case of procrastination) that I didn't turn any of these ideas into stories when I first jotted them down nearly 12 years ago.

(...12 years...?! Eff.)

Anyway, if they didn't quite work for me then, the inertia of not having touched these ideas in over a decade makes all of them seem that much more stale. So really how else could this work? I understand now that part of the process of each week's challenge is that I have to make the idea fresh and exciting again—otherwise, this is just homework. (And I have always excelled at not doing homework.)

So that's a useful revelation.

For this particular challenge, I thought I would attempt science fiction or fantasy, but that felt like too much of an investment right now. I do eventually want to write a series of sci-fi/fantasy-ish books, but I don't think I'm quite ready for that yet.

(Possibly I'm just building it up so much that I'll never start. I've also been known to do this...)

Anyway, this challenge involved some brainstorming, a bit of freewriting, some procrastination, and finally an hour of freewriting one day (mopey rambling about why video games are a lot more fun than writing—I will spare you the agony of this) followed by outlining, writing, and revision over several hours the next day.

Overly observant readers will notice that I named the siblings after the siblings in Week Two's challenge. I just liked the names, okay? And I've always thought that Blake would be an awesome girl's name. Blake knows what's up. She's extremely likeable, sure, but you do not mess with Blake.

For the longest time I struggled with the bones of the story—single child or sibling? is the boy or girl older? does the older sibling trick the younger into going down into the basement? or accidentally lock him/her down there? Knowing that it was going to be a children's picture book with 16 pages of text forced me to narrow the scope of the story to its bare essentials, which is good for me, since I tend to get verbose.

The final result is cute, I think, and has a moment of two that makes me smile, but I don't think it's an instant classic. Let me know what you think in the comments. Don't be shy—constructive criticism is always welcome!

Week Six: In which novella = "picture book" and psyche = "basement"

 

Week Six's completed challenge can be found here!

As I mentioned in a previous post, this prompt eventually germinated into something a bit different than the original idea I had for it. 

Basically, I ended up writing a children's picture book that would, I think, scare the piss out of anyone under the age of, let's say, eight. 

Anyone with kids care to give it a try...? (Mwah ha ha.)

Will post reflections as well as Week Seven's challenge soon!

Written? Kitten!

If you're someone who really needs small, measurable goals to get your writing written, you might find something like 750 Words or Write or Die to be a lifesaver. Then again, neither of these feature adorable, fluffy kittens as incentive to keep writing.

Enter Written? Kitten!

Yes. You write, and then every 100, 200, 500, or 1000 words (you can select which), you will be rewarded with a random image of a cute kitten.

I am, in fact, composing this post within Written? Kitten! right now. I am somewhat skeptical of the effectiveness of this. I mean, kittens are adorable, but do

...

Writing advice from Ray Bradbury

Via Open Culture, some Friday afternoon inspirational viewing for you: A master class from the late Ray Bradbury.

I'd never seen Bradbury speak before, and I was struck by what an educator he was. He really wanted young people to benefit from what he had learned. Also he swore a lot. I have a new hero.

It turns out, too, that I've been unwittingly following his advice with this blog:

"The best hygiene for a beginning writer or an intermediate writer is to write a hell of a lot of short stories. If you can write one short story a week, doesn't matter what the quality is to start, but at least you're practicing; and at the end of a year you have 52 short stories, and I defy to you write 52 bad ones. It can't be done."

Lots of great stuff in here—check it out!

Instructions for the proper care and feeding of writers

From David Farland's Daily Kick in the Pants:

When I was young and newly married, I used to sit down to write, and my wife would immediately think that “since you’re not doing anything, let’s have a conversation.” That’s a frequent problem for those who work from home. It might not look like I’m busy, but sometimes I really am busy. 

In order to write, I have to get into what I call my “writer’s trance,” a state where I’m vividly dreaming about my world (with my right brain) while composing and analyzing my prose (with my left brain). So I have to work with full mental capacity, and it can take about ½ of an hour to get into that state deeply enough to get some good work done. So, if I’m in the groove, don’t bother me. I need time to focus completely on my work.

I've found that having a discreet but limited amount of time to write is perfect. If I have all day, I will definitely not spend all day writing, even if that's what I've been craving for weeks, months. Instead, I'll read some things, watch some things, play some things. Whereas if I have only, say, an hour before I have to be somewhere, so long as there's no distraction I can get into the writerly headspace pretty efficiently. However:

Your writer is insane. Remember that your writer spends a great deal of time in a dream world, talking to imaginary people, visiting places that don’t exist. Shakespeare often lamented about his poor mental health, wondering if he was a genius or a nut. He was obviously both. I once heard a psychologist say that “most writers are provably borderline schizophrenics.” I know that I am. I’m a science fiction writer, and being spacy is a job hazard. 

...Getting back out of the writerly headspace can be a challenge. I tend to miss train stops and spill things on my pants. How about you?

Link to the rest here.