Fiction Scribe

Recent discussions I’ve had with one of the LB&LI winners as well as things I’ve been pondering and reading have inspired me to write about writing versus editing.

While I have always loved creative writing, my inner editor has forever been right there on the journey, too. I even got my start in ‘freelance’ (if it could be called that) editing in high school.

Editing has always been my fallback mechanism. If I don’t want to write – as it’s always a matter of want rather than ability – then I’ve always gravitated towards editing. While that is a good thing in one view, it’s actually a procrastination technique that many new writers use to avoid writing.

With editing, you’re not putting your heart on the line. When you’re writing, you are.

That’s not to say you don’t take risks with editing. There is always the risk that you could edit the wrong person’s manuscript and get an earful (or worse) because of it. Or, when editing your own work, you run the risk of getting caught in perpetual revisions that ‘protect’ you from taking the risk of moving on with your own work.

Pay attention to when the editor comes calling.

Does s/he attack you most viciously when you’re just starting? Then ask yourself what about starting a new story is scary. Are you afraid to fail? Do you compare yourself to other authors in your genre?

My editor rears her head when I’m in the middle. She tells me about how boring my writing is. Sometimes it’s more just questions about how I think I’m going to resolve all the messes I have been creating.

Or perhaps it’s the end. Does the thought of wrapping everything up together intimidate you? Do you think you can’t do it? Or is it just hard to bring everything you have created to a close and you’re not ready to let things go?

The thing to remember about your editor intruding on your writing space is that your editor is not a bad thing; s/he just needs to learn that there is a time and place. The time and place for your editor is not while you are writing.

Part of Paperback Writer’s - Lynn Viehl - Left Behind and Loving It virtual workshops.

Writing blocks come in as many shapes and sizes as writers and authors do. Whether you are facing a fear or a time constraint, blocks seem to always have a way of popping up and interrupting our writing/creative lives.

There is certainly a good amount of prestige that comes with powering through whatever comes your way, but the better way to deal with blocks is addressing them in a way that will make it so they don’t pop up again. Recognizing the cause of a problem is a much better path to solving it than just banging things with your wrench and hoping for the best.

Writing blocks can happen at any time during the writing process. I have a series of posts that address blocks that happen at different times. I definitely can’t talk about each and every block out there, but I think these posts can help.

*Time (Mis)Management - “If you asked a group of aspiring writers what their biggest hurdle is when it comes to writing, I would be willing to bet at least a third of the group – if not half of them – would say that it’s time.”
*Stopping Before You Start - The best time for the anti-muses to attack is before you have put a single word on the page.
*Confidence Complex - In many ways, for many reasons, nearly every author has to deal with wondering what possessed them to think they could ever write novels.
*Word Count Envy - One author’s bad 500 word day is another author’s 500 word day of success.
*Environmental Perfectionism - Are you getting a little too obsessed with your surroundings when (if) you write?
*The Fear of Only One – Are you afraid that this one is the only one?
*Worldbuilding Overload – When the role of god becomes too much in the face of a world’s complexity.
*Out of Control Plot – Too many plot lines that you feel don’t have any directions? Not to mention characters doing what they want instead of what you want…
*Mind on Failure – The inner voices of doubt start harassing you just as you’re hitting your stride.
*Boredom – The writing block that is the nemesis of initial inspiration.
*Repeating Revisions – Letting your need for scene perfection keep you from moving on to the next scene.
*Overzealous Editor – When your editor moves in to work while you’re still trying to create.
*Tongue Tied – What is the word I’m trying to think of?
*Lecture Mode – The writing block that involves writing…
*Too Many Stories – So many ideas, so little time…

In each of the posts linked to above, there are suggestions for how to get past the block talked about in each post. However, I would like to add on to that.

Identifying why you’re not writing is the key to getting past it. Maybe you’re feeling fear, maybe you’d do well to switch to another genre. No matter what the reason is you aren’t writing, trying to fight the block without knowing why it’s there is like trying to fight a ninja with a blindfold on. You might hit on it if you get lucky, but you’re more likely just going to end up exhausted and frustrated.

Take some time to identify how you’re really feeling and where it’s stemming from. Then you can start doing something about it.

* “The first draft is you telling yourself the story.” - Terry Prachett
* “To live a creative life, we must lose our fear of being wrong.” - Joseph Chilton Pearce
* “The good news is that you just have to sit down and write it. The bad news is that you just have to sit down and write it.” - Maxine McArthur
* “You will never ‘find’ time for anything. If you want time you must make it.” – Charles Buxton

Comfort Reading by Toni McGee Causey

Yep! This workshop comes with a giveaway! Two people will have their choice of one of these three titles:

*Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg
*Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott
*On Writing by Stephen King

To get an entry to win, leave a comment telling me which writing block you most identify with and why.

If you already have all three of these books - like me - just let me know when you comment. There are other options.

Comment between now and 11.59 PM Friday for your chance to win. Winners will be announced on Saturday AM.

E-publishing: From Query to Final Edits and Beyond — Authors Madison Blake, Paris Brandon, Cerise Deland, Fran Lee, Afton Locke and Nina Pierce provide helpful insights and tips on e-publishing. Today’s author: Afton Locke

Writing Transformative Sex - Part One by Joely Sue Burkhart — Any writer who has studied much of the craft at all knows that if a scene doesn’t move the story forward, it should be cut. But have you really thought about what that means for a sex scene?

Birds and Language by Suelder — second in a series of workshops on birds that will focus on the science as well as how to adapt this information to writing.

How-To Books that Saved My Life by Alison Kent — a look at the three how-to books the author can’t write without, and why.

Break through your fears and write! by Tamlyn Leigh — One of the biggest obstacles on a writer’s path is their fear. It can be for anything: fear people won’t like their stories, fear they aren’t good enough. In my workshop I want to offer tools to break through that fear, and get everyone writing!

Writing Prompt Series - Where? by Rosina Lippi — Pick from the images supplied by Rosina and give your characters a context. You might have to rewrite What? to make it work.

Writing in the Labyrinth by Marjorie M. Liu — first in a series of workshops about different aspects of writing and publishing.

From Pantser To Plotter: How I Joined The Dark Side by Kait Nolan — Thursday’s topic: What I’ve Used In My Conversion (Part B)

What eBook publishers look for: Loose Id by Midnight Spencer –- About Books, Accepted Genre’s, Sending a Proposal, Formatting your Submission, FAQ, and Contract Terms.

Epubs-wondering where to start? by Shiloh Walker — Info for those curious about epubs and where to start.

Killer Campaigns: Podcasts by Maria Zannini – Podcast an interview

Do you have a writing cafe? I want one.

One of the reasons I’m not inclined to get out of the house as much as I should – yes, I’m still in too much denial to call myself a hermit – is not because the youth wandering the streets these days are mostly scary and depressing. (I say that even though I’m still technically one of them for a while yet. Meh.)

The reason is I need a cafe.

As I’m typing this, I am sitting at the library. That’s all perfectly fine and well, as it is a big, clean (to the point of being almost sterile) place with huge windows. But it’s not an ideal writing environment. Sure, I can get work done here, but it’s hardly inspiring. You’re more likely to get a headache from all the squealing children than any sort of creative ideas.

The lack of a cafe culture is the problem for this entire suburb, unfortunately. Melbourne has kept up its cafe culture, yeah you want to be here vibe perfect for writing; this suburb is the student who tried way too hard to be like the cool kids in school. This suburb has lost all personality in favour of spending way too much money to look ‘neat and shiny’.

“Look at me! You want to live here!”

No. No I don’t.

Alas, I have no generous, rich, mysterious sponsor just yet, so I’m not going anywhere any time soon. So I make do with the library and, on the occasional sunny winter day, wander around to see if a cafe with personality has dared to try to grow in this suburb.

All the while I am incredibly jealous of those who have found their cafes.

Do you have a cafe? What is it like?

When I start giving my character’s theme songs, I begin to wonder if I’m spending too much time in their heads…

I know I have touched on music and how much it inspires me in the past, but I don’t have any internet access as I’m typing this… I’ll have to find the post later.

As I began working on my novella in progress the other day, I started on a scene with the main man of the piece. Not quite in my ‘writing groove’ just yet, I put my music player on shuffle and tried to find an appropriate song for him in that scene.

Firstly, I can’t believe how many sad songs I have. Ack! I need to remedy that.

Eventually I landed on Tommy Emmanuel’s Endless Road which is an instrumental that never fails to remind me of driving around in regional Australia on a sunny summer day… Beautiful, relaxing and with real depth if you listen to everything that is going on with the music in the song.

Living and Dying in America from RENT (I’m not sure of the exact title, but that’s what I have called it) came up a little while later. This song reflects the leading lady so many ways at different parts of the story. I couldn’t have found a better song for her if I had been looking for one for her.

To say that it’s not always to concentrate on writing when you sit down to do it would be a huge understatement. By picking out these songs that make me feel more ‘in touch’ with my characters, I bypass a lot of the procrastination and screen-staring that I would usually do otherwise.

Do you listen to certain types of music for certain characters? Do you use musical as a writing tool in other ways?

Last week I decided to take part in InkyGirl’s 500 Words a Day Challenge. 1000 Words a Day sounded like a little too much to start with for a daily word count, so I figured 500 would be perfect for me.

So far, it turns out I am right.

While I have made it over 500 words a night (I work better at night), I’m not at the point where I feel inclined to increase the challenge to 1000 words a night. Even so, over the past week - with the exception of Saturday night - my novella has grown from about four thousand words long to just over nine thousand words long.

As you can imagine, that makes me very happy.

I am planning to have my novella completed by early to mid-July and have edits finished by the end of August at the latest. For a long time, I thought adopting a business-like attitude to my creative writing would kill it. However, I seem to be flourishing rather than wilting under these loose deadlines.

Hopefully before the end of this year, I can celebrate being published again - this time for my own body of work instead of being part of an anthology.

I hope you all are having a wonderful time with your writing and/or editing.

*If you are participating in this or any other writing challenge, please let me know so I can check it out and direct other Fiction Scribe readers there. Also, feel free to check in with your personal or other challenges when I post about my progress.

Group encouragement is a good thing!

When it comes to NaNoWriMo, I am all about the good intentions. Three years I tried, three years I finished the novel in about May… about nine months too late. Even so, I always sign up because the original boost of adrenaline and confidence takes me through long enough for it to be worth something.

But in the end, typing thousands of words every day for work makes typing thousands more

I need more confidence-boosting, bite size, easily digestible daily challenges. Apparently, I’m not the only one either.

I am happy to announce that InkyGirl, wonderful creator of Will Write for Chocolate and other writerly comics is introducing not one but two daily word count challenges for those of us who like the challenge but get overwhelmed.

“Too often, I find that writers start motivational challenges like NaNoWrimo with enthusiasm and good intentions, but give up when they start missing their daily targets for more than a few days in a row…undermining their confidence and defeating the purpose of the original challenge.

Hence, the 1000 Words A Day Challenge.”

To make an awesome idea more awesome, she threw open the virtual floor and let people request other word counts in case 1000 words was a bit too much to try to achieve on a daily basis.

You can check out both challenges: 500 words or 1000 words

I started last night and got in over 500 words. I’m just trying to finish up on work tonight in time to get some more writing in tonight. 500 words is the perfect size for me to go for, as it’s a challenge that I can usually meet. Confidence boost instead of bummer. I’m hoping to have completed my current novella and start into revisions by the beginning of August.

How about you?

I haven’t had nearly as much time as I would have liked over the past few weeks to keep up with bloggers, blogs and blogging, but I am trying my best. I have come across a few gems I would like to share with you…

*Bookends, LLC has a must read post filled with publishing industry terms you’d do well to familiarize yourself with. Beyond that, you should have a browse around the blog anyway. It is filled with a lot of fantastic posts.

*14 Posts on Writing and Blogging from Get Paid to Write Online. While the post strays into posts about freelancing - which I don’t touch on often here - there is still a lot of information great information there.

*I have been working on romance novellas lately, and I found an older post but a great one from Redlines and Deadlines. Your heroine might be TSTL (Too Stupid to Live) if…

*Author Sandi Kahn Shelton is making me completely jealous by posting about the writing workshops she hosts in her own home.

*EREC - Erotic Romance E-Publisher Comparison shares the news that Mundania Press has acquired ebook ‘veteran’ company Hard Shell. (Probably a post only of interest to those who keep up with e-publishing.)

*Miguel from Wisdom and Life has a lovely post called 5 Rules for School Homework that I found quite useful for my usually cluttered writer-ly brain.

That is all for the moment. Of course, if you know of any posts you find valuable around the internet that you think I should read, feel free to leave me the link. I’m sure there are thousands of great websites I have never seen before that readers have.

It would just figure that my muse would cost at least sixty dollars a night.

The past weekend was a long weekend (happy birthday to the Queen!), so I decided to take full advantage of the time not for work but for showing my husband a little pampering. We went to the western district of Victoria, had some delicious seafood as well as relaxation and bonding time.

Funnily enough, I had some quality writing time, too.

We don’t travel a huge amount, so it has taken me a while to realize this, but I have found my muse on the road. At least, one of my muses.

Hotel rooms.

Strange as it seems, whenever I am settled into a hotel room, I have the urge to get my laptop and start working on something. This weekend was doubly pleasurable because I worked on a current project and roughed out some notes and scenes for an entirely new project.

All while on vacation.

I’m not sure if it’s the sterility of the rooms that lets my mind wander free of distractions or if it’s just being away from all the things on the to-do list at home. The quality of the room certainly has nothing to do with it, as I’ve stayed in beautiful rooms I would have never been able to afford to be in (thank you, contest win) as well as rooms that could barely fit the bed in let alone two people.

No matter what the reason, I don’t want to question it too much for obvious reasons. However, I did just recently get an electric blanket so I can work in the bedroom without turning into an icicle. I am curious to see if I am more productive in that atmosphere than sitting at my desk where I do my work writing as well.

Do you have any strange muses?

I think character portraits are always good writing exercise, and they are a great way to keep in touch with fiction writing even when you aren’t necessarily working on anything at the moment. I decided to work on a character portrait of Rose, the character who runs the pub at The Plot.

I’ve been less than accommodating to her demands that I clean up the place a bit, so I hope this will make her feel better until I do get the time to sit down and really do an overhaul.

***

Having raised her four younger brothers since she was barely a teen, Rose is anything but a delicate southern belle. When asked if she felt cheated by life because she wasn’t afforded the opportunities of other young ladies, she would always grin and say she didn’t have the bone structure for nicer society.

Rose was always judged pleasant looking at best, but if she minded it, she never showed it. Nor did she show any interest in the other sex. With her four brothers to raise, she always claimed to have more than enough men in her life.

There certainly were a few persistent suitors, but she never encouraged them. After she fixed up and started running The Plot – a rest place for characters of all sorts – the men seemed happier to see her as a good bar mistress to be appreciated rather than pursued.

She could talk the pants off any man if she wanted to, but through logical, fun talk rather than fluttering eyelashes and giggling.

Rose didn’t giggle.

She always felt very content and happy with her lot in life. Who wouldn’t with a thriving business and a family who loved her? And yet, there were times when she’d sit in her favourite window seat at night and stare up at the moon. No one could tell you for sure the ways her mind wandered those nights, but she certainly wasn’t thinking about The Plot.

No, I’m not going to make some snarky comment about you not being good enough for something like that.

Lately, I haven’t been doing a lot of writing. Between doctor appointments and permanent residency paperwork, I am exhausted and ready for bed quite early. I’m not getting worked up about missing out on my creative writing time, though, because everything I have been doing has been just as valuable – and not just for my health or immigration status.

My favourite way to spend time away from writing is to go people-watching – especially when I’m in inner Melbourne. People and their stories (or the stories I make up for them when I am feeling creative) will never fail to fascinate me. Plus, the beautiful thing about observing people is that you can do it anywhere people are, which makes it very easy and simple to do.

I also volunteer every now and then to do basic office work that lets my mind wander while I’m still helping people out. Daydreaming has long been my best friend when it comes to working out plot problems or coming up with story ideas.

The key to not wasting time – even when it may seem like you are – is to use every moment to your creative advantage.

Of course, always remember the first rule of writing: always carry paper and a pen with you.

Recharging your creativity battery every now and then is just as important as sitting down and writing. So don’t give yourself a hard time for going people watching or just relaxing for a bit instead of writing every now and then.

How do you recharge your creative writing battery?

The other day I got to thinking about horror. Since I arrived in Australia, I have become immersed in the speculative fiction world. (If you’re not familiar with the term, it covers most science fiction, fantasy, and horror.) While I have only tried my hand at writing horror once as a writing exercise, I have to admit I wish I could write the kind of horror that makes people shudder. (I have fantasies about writing in nearly every genre.)

But that got me wondering: What makes people shudder?

Horror movies these days certainly don’t give an answer about true horror; they’re all about making you gasp and jump. You’re not really scared but for the jump.

For me, there are two things that scare me the most:

1. The cosmic, cold intelligence. I actually have to thank a new acquaintance on Writing Discussions for bringing this one up because, while it is something that scares me, I don’t come across it very often in what I read or watch. Yet, there is something about the idea of an otherworldly force that humanity doesn’t understand – and has no hope to understand – that is scary to me.

2. Human evil. While it may sound cliché, the capacity of humans for evil acts is the scariest thing to me. Be it the child who kills, the adult who only knows how to dole out cruelty, or just the person you meet walking down the street who happens to have body parts in his/her basement freezer. There is just something about human evil that gets to me. Probably the fact that it’s possible for any of us…

Even so, those are only two examples of what horror writers use to get our hearts racing.

What scares you? What makes *good* horror?

You may have read my previous posts for where to find inspiration and thought, “Well, of course. I knew about those.” However, did you know that a great source of inspiration could be with the very people you would like to publish your work?

While wandering around publisher websites, as I am wont to do on occasion, I began investigating romance and erotica epublishers. While I don’t write romance and erotica exclusively, most of my pieces lately have fit squarely into that category.

As I checked submission guidelines and looked at authors who had already been published there, I started finding calls for submissions. One company was looking for stories that centered around ‘exotic’ romances with a heroine from the US…

Ding! Ding! Ding! Score one for fantastic inspiration.

I found a specific call for submissions and immediately an idea began forming in my mind. Now, I don’t know if I’ll have the piece done, edited and polished before the call is retracted, but that’s okay! For me, it’s just wonderful to be writing something that is almost writing itself.

As the final ‘P’ to the three ‘P’s of inspiration, I highly recommend you go to (and bookmark) as many publishers’ websites as possible. Not only will you narrow down possible publishers that you would like to submit your work to, you could just end up finding the inspiration you have been looking for all along.

Best of luck with your inspiration. As always, please let me know if you are being published. I always like to share good news.

After talking about how inspirational people are yesterday, it’s probably rather predictable that I’m talking about places today. However, you wanted an answer to the inspiration question…

Having now travelled more than anyone I know with the exception of my husband, I can honestly say that I have experienced some of the most absolutely gorgeous and inspirational locations in the world. Places that made me stand still in stunned silence. There is so much on offer and I would dare anyone to travel a good amount and not get some sort of inspiration.

Second place only to people, places are the best form of inspiration. There is nothing like seeing an ancient building that has been there for hundreds more years than you have been on this planet or sitting beneath a gigantic tree that has been a silent observer to more than you will ever see.

If at all possible, travel as much as you can. Go to places completely different than what you’re used to. Experience different climates, places with ancient history, places with stories behind them… Travel and my husband are my two biggest loves in life and my two biggest inspirations.

One piece of advice for using places as inspiration: Take a lot of photos and notes.

The utter beauty of some places can actually leave you inspirationally overloaded. It is better to take pictures, notes, video if you have it and save it for going over later because you might find it hard to do any actual writing while you’re experiencing the place.

Everyone finds their inspirations in slightly different ways than other people. For me, the biggest inspiration anyone can ever start paying attention to is people.

People are so incredibly complex and I learned from an early age that you can never, ever tell what a person has lived through from appearances alone. I have met some of the sweetest hard rockers and some of the worst so-called upstanding citizens. There are so many stories in just one life, so imagine how many stories there are in the world.

I have the pleasure of knowing many people from the poor, small town community people to people who make enough in one year to pay for my dream house. I’ve held a baby in one hand while helping paint the trailer house with the other and I’ve pitched the company I work for to a high ranking employee of one of the biggest computer companies in the world.

There are so many people, so many possibilities; it’s almost beyond comprehension.

Hang out in the mall food court. Do you realize how many different types of people pop in for a snack or lunch at the mall food court? There are hundreds, if not thousands, of people who wander by and they’re all different! Talk about open season for ideas. Sit down, sit back and open your eyes.

If you’re still not convinced that people are an incredible source of inspiration, sit down with one of your family members – best if you can sit down with grandparents or great-grandparents. Ask them what they think are the most significant points of their lives.

You’ll probably end up being very surprised what they say.

According to many published authors I have talked to, one of the most annoying (and frequent) questions they get asked is:

“Where do you get your ideas from?”

Coming from non-writers, the question is an acceptable one. The writer’s mind is a strange place and non-writers don’t always quite understand how such strange and fantastic things can be created out of nothing in one’s imagination. Coming from an aspiring writer? Well, that’s likely to at least get you an annoyed, if not a dirty look.

Even so, the question is asked often enough for there to be standard, popular responses:

“Santa.”
“The Easter Bunny.”
“From the Idea-of-the-Month Club.”

Of course, the people who ask the questions aren’t very happy with those responses. They’re looking for something, anything, that will be the magic key to imaginative bestsellers.

The problem isn’t that there is no key, the problem is the key is just to look at the world and people don’t like that.

Having talked about various sources of inspiration with people, I decided to make it a little easier on the people who are just looking for a little help in the inspiration department. The answer will always be that everything around you has the potential to inspire you, but if you need a little more specific direction than that…

This week I am going to introduce you to the three ‘P’s of inspiration, so be sure to check back in to see what they are and to get the idea mill of your mind churning.