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Resolving to be Resolute

29 Monday Jan 2018

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It’s that time of year again. The beginning!

I’m sure there have been many a resolution made. About your writing. About your health. About your personal life.

I’m going to be honest with you: I don’t believe in New Year’s resolutions. I believe that if people want to change they will, they don’t need to wait for a new year to begin. You can make yourself new anytime you want by committing to change. Studies agree with me. Several have been done, and something like 85% of New Year’s resolutions are forgotten/abandoned by mid-February, if not sooner.

So, if you’ve made resolutions about your writing, I’m sorry. Some of you are probably already struggling to keep up with the changes to routine/style/genre. It can be rough. It will continue to be rough. And I’m sorry for that. Seriously.

I’ve been in the same boat. When I graduated college (the first time), I said I was a writer. I’d taken classes. I’d gotten a degree. I had the verbiage: I am a writer. I also had bills: I had to eat; I had to have a place to live; I needed a job to get money to pay for that, and I needed a car to get to the job, and car insurance on top of that.

Life getting in the way of life.

I wrote when I could, but most days I was tired, or happy to have some time to myself. Writing became a footnote in my life.

Then, I met my wife—she wasn’t my wife at the time, we were just dating. I told her I was a writer, that it was my passion, and showed her some of my work. She liked it, thought it was good. I was happy to share my work. But…

Life got in the way of life, and, to be honest, I was out of the habit of writing so there was more than a little slacking off.

Decisions were made, and something miraculous and horrifying happened. My wife (still a girlfriend) and I moved in together. Every day when she got home she’d ask me what I’d done, expecting to hear about my writing. But…Life and slacking.

After a couple months she did something that I sorely needed. She yelled at me. She asked me why I wasn’t writing. She accused me of not being a writer, and said if I wanted to be a writer then I needed to FUCKING write.

I was hurt at first. Having her yell at me from, what I felt was, out of the blue was a tad scary. What hurt the most, and was eye opening, was that she was right.

Writers write, and if I wanted to be a writer then I needed to write. It was a dose of tough love, but I needed it.

So, with that in mind…

All you aspiring writers out there! FUCKING WRITE!

I want you to write. I love hearing stories, and I want to hear yours. If no one else does, at the very least I do.

I’ve said this before (and I’ll probably say it again), only you can tell your story the way you can tell it. So, tell it! If you want to write, you have to write. No one else is going to do it for you. And why would you want someone else to write your story?

This has been your dose of tough love.

Until next time: Be yourself, be well. Write yourself, write well

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Ghosts of NaNoWriMo Past

25 Saturday Nov 2017

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Hey!

So, for those of you that follow the blog, all the way back in November of 2016 I decided to participate in NaNoWriMo. The project has since taken on a life of its own. You can find the story and the Introduction explain more over there. ====================================================>

The Ides of NaNoWriMo

15 Wednesday Nov 2017

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Oh, holy hell! Has it been a year already?

Hey, all!

So, we’re back in November. Right, smack in the middle of National Novel Writing Month. It’s that time of year, just this one month, that dedicated to writing a novel.

It may be evident already, but I’m not participating in NaNoWriMo this year. Let me tell you, last year’s project is still kicking my ass. Based on my wife’s editing so far, I may have to take out an entire character. (Sigh.) On top of that, I’m in the middle of a project anyway. And there’s life.

We’re not here to talk about me though. I want to talk about you. NaNoWriMo is for you. It’s for the people who need that extra push, or that initial excuse, to write a novel. If having an entire month dedicated to it isn’t enough then…

Come on! What are you waiting for?

Believe you me, it’s not going to get easier to write a novel. It may get harder though. Life keeps going, work keeps going, the world won’t stop turning. You honestly just have to sit down and do it. The people out there that love this sort of thing have given you a perfect excuse to do it. Try it for a month and if don’t like it, return it for a money back guarantee.

I’ll let you in on a secret, you might not like it. It might be that’s what’s stopping you. You’re afraid to tell your friends and family, ‘I’m writing a novel for NaNoWriMo.’ You’re afraid, because what if you don’t like it? What if you don’t get close to finishing? What will you say if/when the ask how it’s going?

Here’s your permission, and if anyone says anything to you about it you send them to me: You don’t have to like it. If you don’t like it, you don’t have to finish. It’s okay. Not everyone can be writers. Just like not everyone can be surgeons, or electricians, or welders. Maybe you’re not a writer.

The thing is though, you’ll never know if you don’t try. So, if you’ve been thinking about writing a novel, if you’ve felt like you’ve got a novel inside you, then you owe it to yourself to try.

That’s all anyone can ask of you.

Until next time: Try to be yourself. Try to be well. Try to

Ventriloquism, Learn to Throw Your Voice. Fool Your Friends. Fun at Parties

16 Monday Oct 2017

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Howdy! Howdy! Howdy!

I like ventriloquism. This probably stems from growing up with the Muppet Show and a steady diet of Sesame Street. There are numerous, talented, ventriloquist out there, but the one I’m going to reference is Jeff Dunham. He should be easy for you to find (he’s very popular now). (If you get a chance look for Nina Conte too.)

Jeff Dunham is popular (go ahead and google him, take a look at his act), but the main reason I want to talk about him, is because during his act he has multiple puppets (“friends”) that he brings on stage. There’s Walter, the old man; Bubba Jay, the hillbilly; Peanut, the weirdo; and Jose Jalapeno on a stick, the pepper on a stick. Mr. Dunham is popular because he’s good at throwing his voice and because he has so many interesting and funny characters. You’d be hard pressed to confuse Walter with Bubba Jay, or Peanut with Jose. At some point in the act, he even has Peanut and Jose out together. It’s very fun to watch.

Now, you might be saying: I thought this was a writing blog, why are you talking about ventriloquists? (You might also be thinking: I hate when he writes like it’s his readers talking to him. That is a different subject for a different post.)

The reason I’m bring up ventriloquists is because I’d like to continue the discussion on character. Specifically, I’d like to talk about character voice.

The best analog I can find for writing a character and finding its voice is ventriloquism. Think about it. We all know it’s the ventriloquist making the puppet move, making the puppet talk, all the dialogue is the ventriloquist’s. The point is though, at some point, and this might only be for an instant, we forget that and accept the puppet as a separate character.

It’s the same for writing. We know it’s the writer making the character do things. We know it’s the writer making the character say things. All the dialogue is the writer’s. The art, the magic, of storytelling is making the characters feel real.

To make the characters feel real we have to keep in mind three questions. 1) How does your character talk? Do they take the ‘g’ off the end of ‘-ing’ words? Making ‘making’ into ‘makin’? Or changing ‘changing’ into ‘changin’? Do they st-st-stutt-tt-tter? Do they not use contractions? The point: Can we identify the character by what they say? 2) How does your character think? This can be an extension of talk, especially in first person stories when readers can get the character’s thoughts first hand. It can also mean their actions. Is Joey the action orientated type, jumping into a situation without thinking about it? Or is Joey the sit back and overthink type? Or is Joey a coward? These characteristics stuff the character, making them stick out from the background (and can be great ways of foreshadowing how they’re going to react in a situation; also gives them something to overcome later in the story—or not—whatever’s more dramatic). 3) How does your character sound? Are they sarcastic, entitled, mean, sincere. This is a combination of several things. If your character acts to help people and tries their best, then they will sound sincere when they talk and think. If your character acts to help people for the glory and does their best to prove they’re the best, they will sound cocky and entitled. If your character acts to help people for a reward and does their best to show they’re worth the price, then they will sound jaded, possibly cold.

See how this works?

I do have some writing advice from one of my writing mentors. He has a very strict policy of not writing from the first person perspective unless he can clearly hear the character’s voice. It’s a good rule. If the main character’s voice is clear in your head, it will be clear (with some work) on the page, and keep the character easily identifiable.

I’d like to give you a real world example involving character voices. Everyone familiar with Veronica Roth? She wrote Divergent, Insurgent, and Allegiant. Disclaimer: I only read Divergent. The following example is from my wife’s reading of the whole series. So, apparently, in the third book Ms. Roth goes back and forth between two characters to tell the story. Chapter one in character one’s voice; chapter two in character two’s voice; chapter three in character one’s voice…and so on. It took my wife two years (three?) to finish the book. She would start it, get frustrated with it, and put it down again. She had to force herself (her words) to finish the book. She had several complaints about the book, but the number one complaint, the complaint I heard about multiple times a day until she was done with the novel, was character voices. She couldn’t tell who she was following in a chapter because the two characters sounded so alike to her. There were several exclamations during the reading of the book, when she thought it was from the first character’s point of view, and then someone would call the character by name and she realized it was from the second character’s point of view. She didn’t like the book, and not only that, it brought the whole series down for her. So, a cool idea [telling the story from two differing perspectives] turned into a gimmick, and not a good one (again, her words).

Until next time: Be yourself, be well. Write yourself, write well.

Character, to Thine Own Self be True

28 Monday Aug 2017

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Confession time: I’m a big nerd

No, it’s not true.

I know, I know, it’s hard to believe, but this cool writer persona is nothing but a façade.

I’m bringing this up because what I want to talk about comes through one of my hobbies, roleplaying games. I was hooked on roleplaying games in high school with Advanced Dungeons and Dragons second edition, and I continue to game today (I’ve recently fell in love with Fate Core). It might come to no surprise to you that I’m, like 98% of the time, the Game Master of these games (the one who makes the story the players play in). As a result, I’m the one that knows/understands all the rules and I’m the one that helps everyone make their characters (the personas/people they’re going to be in the game).

It’s the character creation aspect of gaming that I want to talk about today. (This might sound like an intro to roleplaying games, but stick with it and I’ll bring it back around to writing. Promise.) So, creating a character can be as serious or as whimsical as you’d like it to be. For instance, in the current game I’m running, one of my friends got the idea to be an eighties’ business man that got turned into a vampire, but is inexplicably stuck in eighties. Another one of my friends ended up being a mermaid stripper. As you can see, things can get pretty out there if you let them.

What’s this got to do with writing? You might be saying. Give me a minute, I haven’t got there quite yet.

That’s two of my friends (the vampire and the mermaid), but I have to talk to you about my third friend (for privacy sake we’ll call him Dudley). Dudley came in, all serious like, and had a pretty solid idea for his character, came up with a good backstory for him, but as play began quickly became frustrated with things. Why wasn’t his character working the way he thought it should? Why was he having such a hard time doing what he wanted? His character is awesome, why is everything so difficult?

Let’s jump back to my vampire and mermaid friends. When we all sat down to make characters, my two friends were instantly struck with the ideas for a vampire and a mermaid. They were equally struck with the ideas that the vampire should be mentally stuck in the time period he loved the best—the eighties—and that the mermaid was fascinated by humans and ashamed of her mermaid heritage. Everyone thought this was funny, or a good reason to have a mermaid on land, and so they went with the ideas. As the game progressed they jumped into their characters’ traits and fun was had by all.

Now let’s talk about Dudley. Dudley made a character backstory that came out to make him a doofus. First, he learned about the magical in the world by being attacked by a magical being. Then he gave himself an “evil imaginary self,” which is a dual personality disorder (indicating that the trauma of the attack was too much for his weak mind to bear). Then it turns out that because he survived the initial attack by the magical thing, the magical thing has taken a liking to him and keeps coming back to play with him. On top of that, the vampire character has taken advantage of him twice in the backstory, one time causing a magical backlash onto Dudley’s character giving him a “false aura of power.”

All this adds up to, doofus.

However, as that fateful first gaming session commenced, and I, as an attentive and mischievous game master, began poking at Dudley’s character he got increasingly frustrated. Again, his character is awesome, why is everything so hard. Needless to say, Dudley went home a bit miffed about the whole thing (not the intended outcome of playing a game with your friends).

Everything’s okay now. We talked about his character, I told him my take on things, and he’d already thought about it and agreed that he should embrace the doofiness of his character. (To be fair, I did offer to help him make a new badass character).

Yeah, whatever. This still isn’t about writing.

Okay, okay. I promised to bring it back to writing, and we’re here now.

What happened with Dudley and his roleplaying character is a common problem that writers have. They have a cool character concept, but when it comes to putting the character on paper they struggle. This isn’t so much a ‘how do they fit into the story’ in a grand sense, but in a much smaller sense. In a scene by scene sense, a ‘why is this character in this scene’ sense. It’s a meshing of your concept for the character concept and their role in the story.

To bring Dudley’s character back up: His concept for the character was a badass wizard, when the execution of his character creation made him the comic relief of the group.

It is very important for you, as a writer, to line up character concepts with character motivation and character roles in your story. If you don’t it can be a shoe horning effort to find a place for your character in your story.

Alright, let me give you a literary example of what I’m talking about, just so you don’t think I’m talking out my ass. What am I going to use to prove this? Twilight by Stephanie Meyer.

Stop the eye rolling! I can hear you rolling your eyes, you know. The Internet is a magical place, it allows me to do that.

Are you done?

I’ll wait.

Okay. Bear with me, and I’ll walk you through the steps here.

So, we’re going to be comparing Twilight to Bram Stoker’s Dracula.

Let’s get the perfunctory disclaimers out of the way first. I love Dracula, the movie with Gary Oldman and Wynona Ryder. If you haven’t seen it and you like vampire movies I highly recommend it. I also acknowledge that Bram Stoker’s work is a classic and pivotal to the Gothic tradition. This is not me telling you that it’s not an important part of literature, or that you shouldn’t like it. This is me holding it up as an example of shoe horning.

So, we’re going to comparing Twilight to Bram Stoker’s Dracula. We’re doing this because they are basically the same story: immortal creature of darkness finds his one true love and struggles to be with her because of his dark, immortal nature. They also have the same character concept in Edward and Dracula, immortal, strong, fast, predatory.

What we’re going to do is start with a scene and walk backwards through the story to find how the character fits into the story.

Let’s start with Dracula first. Remember: Dracula=immortal creature of darkness.

Here’s the scene: Dracula has found Mina in London and has just bitten her to turn her into an immortal creature of darkness to they can be immortal creatures of darkness together. Bwahahahahaha!

So…we know Mina is in London because she lives there. Dracula, though, why’s he there? Better yet, how’d he find Mina in London, I hear it’s a fairly large city and fairly congested. And Dracula has been chilling in Transylvania for the past six, seven, eight centuries. Well, it helps that, 1) one of the people from London, like the second person, Dracula knows is insane, and just so happens to be in an insane asylum run by the doctor, that’s courting one of Mina’s friends, who, coincidently, Dracula has fed upon and turned into a vampire earlier in the book. Because London only has about fifteen people in it, according to Bram Stoker’s viewpoint. Oh, and 2) the other person Dracula knows in London is a reality lawyer who just so happens to be Mina’s fiancé and had a picture with him so Dracula could see it. Going back to the first question, why is Dracula in London? Why, diversification of course. I’m immortal, and the sole ruler of an entire country, with all of Europe at my fingertips, but I want to own half a dozen rundown houses in London.

Have you spotted the shoe horning yet? It would seem Bram Stoker had a great character concept, immortal creature of darkness, was once a man who lost the love of his life, and damned himself to find her. And he does find her! I just feel like it took a lot of shoe horning him into the story Mr. Stoker wanted.

Now let’s look at Twilight. Remember: Edward=immortal creature of darkness.

Here’s the scene: A car has just lost control in a high school parking lot. Edward jumps between Bella, the love of his life now, and the truck, stopping it with his immortal creature of darkness strength.

So…why is Edward there? Edward, is in Forks because it has horrendous cloud cover that allows him and his family of vampires to walk around in the day (quiet you! I know the reason why and we’re not here to talk about that!). Yes, okay, but why is Edward in high school, being that he’s 150 years old? Well, even though he’s 150 years old, he still looks seventeen, in order to keep up appearances and lead semi-normal lives, he and his “siblings” attend high school. They’re still the creepy kids in the school, but it’s better than being the creepy kids that live in that house waaay out in woods and never come into town except when they want to show off how cool they are.

See how easily Edward fits into the scene? There’s no magical coincidences about Edward knowing half of Bella’s family before he even meets her.

Character concept meets character role seamlessly. Say what you will about the actual writing or the story, but Mrs. Meyer’s planning of the story is spot on.

So, if you’re having trouble finding a reason your character is in a scene or the story at all, maybe you re-evaluate the concept you have of the character and the role they’re playing in the story.

Until next time: Be yourself, be well. Write yourself, write well.

PS: this is the last update before I post A Dinner for Crows. It’s finished. Yay! I just need to edit it a bit and then I’ll be putting it up. I know it’s been a long time coming. It’s almost as if it’s hard to write a novel that’s any good.

With the Bath Water

01 Tuesday Aug 2017

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There’s an old saying: Don’t throw the baby out with the bath water (you know, when you toss the water out of the metal/wood tub you used to clean your baby). Basically, it’s going for just because you had one bad experience don’t let it sour the whole thing for you. Examples include: just because one date went bad don’t stop dating; just because you had a bad time playing Monopoly don’t stop playing board games all together; just because you had a bad day at your job doesn’t mean stop working. Stuff like that. To be perfectly honest, I’m not sure the saying applies here, but it comes to mind when I think about this.

So, a couple months ago, in April (which is now three months now that I think about it), I watched an episode of The Know (video game news show on YouTube). The episode was all about Andrzej Sapkowski and The Witcher videogames. Quick update for those maybe not aware: The Witcher videogames are based on Andrzej Sapkowski books which feature the world of the witcher as well as the main character of the games (Geralt of Rivia).

I’m bringing this up because it’s been stuck in my brain for a while now, and I thought about it again when I sat down to write this. I’m not going to get too specific on what went down (if you’d like the story, including Sapkowski’s quotes, you can find the episode here), but the gist of the whole thing is: BOOKS are the end-all and be-all of storytelling, and videogames are crap for babies!

Let’s put aside the fact that the first game takes place five years after the events in the books, making them stand alone stories on their own. Let’s put aside the fact that these games are considered some of the best storytelling in videogames. Let’s even put aside the face that the people making the games are fans of Sapkowski and thought they were honoring him, and he just shit all over them.

Let’s put all that aside. What he said is still one of the stupidest things I’ve ever heard.

Now, am I saying every videogame is a masterpiece? NO. GOD, NO.

That being said, I’ve read some pretty shitty books.

Here’s what I’m saying, society and culture evolve. As an example, when I was a kid in the nineties, and videogames were picking up steam, a common parental disparagement was: do something else, you can’t get a job playing videogames. Now there are literally thousands of people doing just that. To give the argument a more literary context; history, of a person, of a tribe, of the world, used to be oral, handed down from one person to another, then we had books filled with history on every subject you could imagine, and now we have access to a world of information in our pockets.

Videogames too have gone through a similar evolution. From Atari’s Pong, literally a digital version of ping-pong (and not a very good one), to arcade machines meant to take your quarters, to consoles for in home gaming. It’s not just the hardware that’s changed either. I’d like to mention a couple games now, Firewatch and That Dragon Cancer, both of these games are commonly called “walking simulators.” They’re called that because they are first person (the whole screen is your POV) point and click adventures (you use the mouse to click on things on the screen to pick them up and learn something about them). With walking simulators, the whole point of the game is the experience of going through the story with the main character, seeing how it unfolds and resolves. In the case of That Dragon Cancer, the game tells the story of the developer’s child dying of cancer. Not only did making the game help him(?) deal with the loss, he hopes that it can help other people deal with similar losses. Again, these videogames focus more on the story than the “gameplay.”

Now I’m going to mention, Until Dawn or any of the Telltale game series (Wolf Among Us, The Walking Dead, Batman). While these games have some stunning visuals, and larger than life characters, the focus of these games is also the story, specifically the choices you make during play that affect the story one way or the other. There might be some quick time events (pressing certain buttons when prompted before time runs out), but basically you’re watching a movie where you get to pick what the main character does in each scene.

Writing a videogame, or having one of my stories turned into a videogame, would be pretty cool, and I would jump at the chance. Live the dream!

Here’s what I’m trying to say: don’t close your mind. There are many ways to tell a story. There are many ways that culture can evolve, and different ways it can be influenced. Sapkowski has decided that videogames have no poetry, instead of a) seeing the poetry that’s there, and b) contributing to videogames so they have more poetry. Remember, at one point television was a fad, and I dare say there’s some awesome storytelling going on there right now. Just stay open to the possibilities of storytelling.

Until next time: Be yourself, be well. Write yourself, write well.

P.S.: Things are going slower than I’d like. A Dinner for Crows should be coming in the next month or two.

Phallacy? No, It’s Totally True

28 Wednesday Jun 2017

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Exciting news!

Phallacy: a Little Shop of Porn Mystery is out and you can find it here.

I hope everyone has a chance to pick it up and enjoy it. I think it makes for a funny and saucy addition to the library of my works.

Sabine is a savvy business woman who has managed to make her porn shop a success by making it a boutique that promotes sex for couples. AJ and Rocko are her grandsons, working at the store until they figure out what to do with their lives, but generally being directionless. This all changes the day they come into work to find the store has been robbed. With no proof of a robbery, and the store’s reputation hanging in the balance, the brothers rise to action. AJ and Rocko bumble their way from seedy rival porn store to the dark dungeons of an S&M club in search of help. Rocko even works up the courage to call his ex-girlfriend, a cop on the vice squad, for help. Will they find the missing merchandise, or will each lead they chase turn out to be false? Find out in: Phallacy, the first Little Shop of Porn mystery.

Until next time: Be yourself, be well. Write yourself, write well.

Determination Maturation

18 Saturday Mar 2017

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Hey. There’s been a lot going on here. A lot of stress permeating the air. It’s put a damper on the writing.

And that’s what I’m here to talk about with you. Losing your determination, your will, to write.

This is not the same as writers’ block, though it can certainly contribute to it. It’s not the same as writers’ block because it can come over you even though you’ve been writing fine, and even have some great ideas coming to you.

It’s not about bad writing, or no writing, or over writing. In fact, I’d say, it’s causes are mostly external. Basically, it’s just life, LIFE, coming at you too much, or too fast. As life—LIFE—does this, you sit down to write. There’s nothing wrong with your writing, but in the back of your mind everything that’s going on keeps coming at you. [Yes, I know that other writers will tell you to take all that emotion and put it into your writing. And yes, I know that we—oh, I do it too—write to retreat from the world for a while, or help us process what’s going on.] I’m not saying this isn’t good advice, or that it doesn’t work. What I’m talking about is when, for whatever reason, that’s just not working. Then you have that thought. You probably know the one. The thought: ‘What am I doing?’ Then you start thinking of all the things you could be doing instead of writing. All THE THINGS that could be fixing your problems, or be better for you, instead of making up stories. This thinking leads to an apathy towards your writing. You don’t see the point of doing it.

As a writer, you’re part of a very subjective craft. There’s a lot of rejection involved in doing what we do, both professionally and personally. It can be easy at the beginning to lose your determination, but even long time writers can fall prey to this.

John Green wrote The Fault in Our Stars. It was an international bestseller, and they turned it into a movie. And then he stopped writing for a while. Which some of your, I’m sure, are confused about. Well, here’s the thing, everyone seemed to love The Fault in Our Stars. It was hugely successful. How do you follow that up? What can you do that tops that? Some people were calling it a masterpiece. There’s the expectation that anything he writes from now on is going to be as good, if not better. How can he care about his next story when he’s made his masterpiece? How can he care about his next story as much as he did that one? And if he doesn’t care as much about his next story as much as he did for that is it going to be nearly as good? Is it worth writing if he doesn’t care that much?

There are many pitfalls being a writer, putting yourself out there, including success. 😊

Elizabeth Gilbert tells a story in her book Big Magic about meeting a man at a book signing. This man had been writing for fifteen (twenty?) years, but hadn’t gotten published. He asked her what to do. She told him to try doing something else, but if he didn’t feel as fulfilled as he did when he wrote, then he’s a writer and he must deal with it. (It’s a good book. I recommend it.) This man had been writing for twenty (fifteen?) years, and had finally lost his determination. No writers’ block for him, but he couldn’t see the point anymore.

I think loss of determination is even more insidious than writers’ block. You’ve probably seen my post about writers’ block, and what to do about it. But with loss of determination, the setting in of apathy, you lose connection with the thing that drives you. It’s hard to pick that back up.

Now, there are two things you can do here. (There might be more, but I don’t see them, so we’re going to stick with two.) The first thing is, take a break while. Maybe a week, maybe two, possibly a month. Give yourself time to untangle yourself. Let the urge to write build up again. Maybe during this time some of things causing stress in your life will be resolved, thus taking that off your mind.

This can work, but the problem with this method can be getting back into the writing routine. Not always, but it could happen.

Of course, sometimes the loss of determination can be born of frustration. The frustration of not being published, of continuous rejections, of seemingly not getting anywhere with your writing. (Ironically, the only way to solve any of those things is to keep writing.) So, method one won’t really help.

In this situation, method two is the way to go. Method two is, what I like to call, finding the fun in writing again. It’s exactly like it sounds, find the fun. Go back to the first things you read that made you want to write and re-read them. It could mean finding something you’d never read (fluff reading) and reading that. It could mean writing something you’d never write, a short love story if your thing is horror. If you’ve been writing a novel, try writing a play (or taking one of your short stories into a play). Sit in a coffee shop and try to come up with stories for the people you see come in for coffee. I’m a big roleplaying nerd, so I create characters (in various gaming systems) and write backstories for them. Maybe write a blog post *cough, cough*. (Excuse me.) Do anything that’s truly only for you, so you don’t have to worry about it. It’s very freeing. It can help you re-connect with your writing, which is what you need to do when this happens.

Recently, I was talking to someone about getting my MFA in Fiction. The person looked at me with disdain and confusion and said: “What can you do with that?” At the time, I didn’t really say anything, the conversation including some bad news for me, but on retrospect I wish I’d said: “You dream.”

It’s all well and good to pay the bills, to eat, but that’s just the body. What soothes the mind? What makes you get up in the morning? As writers, we are the keepers of dreams. We have the privilege to share our dreams with the world. And that’s worth staying connected to.

Until next time: Be yourself, be well. Dream yourself, dream well.

Exposing Yourself, The Hard Way

16 Thursday Feb 2017

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Let’s talk about the ultimate goal of writing.

Is that a foreboding enough opening for you? Are you scared? Because fear is what I want to talk to you about today.

The ultimate goal of writing is: sharing your work with people. That’s what getting published is, putting your work out there for people to read, to experience, to absorb, and to form an opinion about.

It’s that last part that a lot of people find terrifying. The fact that people will have their own opinions about what you wrote.

How dare they!

I know, right. I don’t know about your stories, but my stuff is great.

They should just enjoy the story I wrote and keep their mouths shut!

You see, we see eye to eye on this.

Okay, let’s be serious now. First, if they kept their mouths shut then they couldn’t tell if they liked it either. Secondly, the whole editing process—you know, the part I go on and on about as an integral part of the writing process—is based on people reading your work and talking to you about it. Lastly, even after the editing is all done, and you’ve made the story you want and love, there are still going to be people that comment and critique it, because that’s the way the world works.

Some people are afraid to write, or at least put their writing out there, because of this criticism. It’s a perfectly reasonable reaction. You’ve put so much time, effort, so much of yourself into this piece of literature. It’s your baby. You don’t want people to tear it down.

If you want to be a writer, one that shares their work with the world (gets published) then you just have suck it up and grow a thicker skin.

I really wish there was a secret for not letting things get to you, but there just isn’t. There are going to be people who read your stuff and just don’t like it. They won’t get certain things, or they won’t like the pacing, or how you describe something (combat for instance). They’ll feel the need to *ahem* blog about it, or write a review on your author page, or tweet about it. And you have to know their opinion is out there. There’s just no secret formula or method for dealing with it.

Let me share. There’s a review forAmsterdam and the Murder Twins in: The Oysters on Amazon.com (I’m not sure if it’s still there) that’s less than flattering. Overall the reviewer liked the story, but was confused about the pacing and didn’t know why there was a dirty cop in the story. They gave it a three -starred review, but the way they put it about the pacing and the dirty cop bugged me for a long time. To be honest, I’m not even sure why. It just did, but I got over it with time. I haven’t even thought about it until I went to write this. Another example (and this one is really personal), involves Superiority Complex. A friend of mine bought a copy of it, an actual physical copy, which was cool, they didn’t have too, and I saw it on their shelf. I took it down, amazed to see it there. I asked if they liked it, and they said they did; they liked the characters and the setting. So, I flipped through it, because that’s what I do with books (I like how the pages sound) and see all these pen marks all over the pages. Apparently, as they were reading they edited out spelling mistakes and some grammar things I missed (and it seemed there was a lot of them). At the time, I was very upset and embarrassed. I was upset because I don’t write in books, and here was a copy of mine scribbled in. I was embarrassed because this is out there online and in hard copy. It was a shock to me that my friend had done this. Why couldn’t they just read the book and liked it? Why had they taken a shot at me? Of course, they didn’t, but that’s how I felt at the time.

(I know they read the blog, so excuse me for a moment. I’m fine now. I actually find it funny.)

There’s a separate point to be made here about self-publishing not having the same support structure as mainstream publishing, but I’ll leave it for now.

I’m going to keep going, and these next ones are pretty cool. Keep reading.

I used to go to conventions before life got in the way, and money, and at one convention a group of guys came over to the table. These were teen guys. I wasn’t expecting them to buy anything, just because I was selling novels at a comic convention. But they came over, and I like talking to people, so I talked to them. As they were looking over my books, they asked if I was the same Samuel Eden that wrote Snowfall. I said I was and asked them if they’d read it. They said their friend read it and liked it so much they made them read it. Then they asked for my autograph. It was the first time that I’d ever met fans. It was really fun finding out I had some. The last example (yes, we’re getting to the end), also comes from a convention. I was at a local con, and this girl (also in her teens) came up to my table, her mother and brother in tow. She asked me if I was the author of the books I was selling, and I, of course, said yes. She proceeded to talk to me for half an hour (?), an hour (?), a while. We talked about writing, we talked about her writing, and the need to write, places to get published (there are a lot if you’re a teen—check the sidebar for one such place), and how to find more. Before she left, she gave me a hug. I guess I must have helped her. I’m glad I did. Now, she didn’t know me before she came to my table, but me putting myself out there as a writer made it possible for me to meet her. So it counts!

Here’s the point of today’s blog. When you put yourself out there, yes, you’re going to have some bad experiences (relatively speaking), but if you don’t put yourself out there then you don’t get the good experiences either. I vote for putting yourself out there. I hope you do too.

Until next time: Be you, be well. Write you, write well.

Editing is 20/20

30 Monday Jan 2017

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Hey, all! So, today I want to talk about focus. Focus in your writing, of a scene or of a chapter.

For example, say your main character is a hard worker. In the first chapter or two you show a couple, three or four even, scenes where they work hard. Now, chapter three is here, we’ll say chapter three is twenty pages, ten pages are filled with the character working hard, and ten pages are filled with an interaction with a family member. This interaction is supposed to be meaningful, a bonding point.

Based on this info, what should the focus on chapter three be?

That’s a bit of a trick question. Sorry.

See the way chapter three is set up now equal focus is given to the scenes of the character working hard as the family interaction.

Roughly speaking, equal space, equal attention/importance.

Let’s add to the example. Let’s say when asked about the story, you say it’s about this person’s life, their family bonds and becoming an adult.

Okay. Got it?

So, what should the focus of chapter three be?

If you said on the family interaction and bonding, you’d be correct.

If you want the focus of the story to be on this character’s life, family, and maturation, then that should the focus. Giving equal space to scenes of mundane labor that the character does, then leaves behind with no problem, only takes focus (the readers’) and time (yours) from the family interaction.

This isn’t to say the character being a hard worker isn’t important, but it becomes characterization. Once you’ve shown us they’re a hard worker then it can be dropped to the background. Unless their work begins to slip later on, or something interesting happens with/during their work, then, please, show the readers that.

Another example for keeping focus (from my writing group), was a story that’s a quilt of several people’s lives. Each character got their own section. So, we got to (let’s say) “Claire’s” section. The author introduced “Claire”, then promptly introduced “Roger”, who we learned a lot about. Then the author introduced “Stan”, who we got a lot of information about. Then we met “Stephanie”, who was this nice girl with mean ambition. Then “Claire” came back, and the section ended.

When I read this section of the pages the author gave the group, I found it difficult to see why “Claire” was there. We got very little of her in her own section. I think what the author was going for was a sense of “Claire” feeling out of control in her life, feeling like a bit player. This can work, the author had a solid idea for it, but the execution of the section made “Claire” a bit player. It took the readers’ focus away from “Claire”. The other characters can come into “Claire’s” life/section and be larger than her, but the readers must always have a firm gaze on “Claire”; what she’s feeling, what she’s thinking, while these larger characters are horning in on her. However, at least in the draft I read, “Claire” seemed to fade to the background completely when these characters were on the page. Then when it came back fully to her, we didn’t get that much reflection from her, almost none, before the section was over.

My point: you have to keep the focus where you want the focus.

This may sound simple, but everyone, EVERYONE, struggles with this. It demands an awareness of your writing. An awareness that takes time to build up, to hone, and to keep. The thing that makes this awareness a slippery thing to hold on to, is that you’re you, writing your story. You have all the information in your head, something that’s obvious to you about the story/in the scene might not be obvious to someone else who’s reading the story.

An interesting exercise to try, is finding an older story of yours. Just read the title, maybe the first page, to remind yourself what the story was about. Then write down the point to the story, the focus, what you wanted to accomplish with the story. Now go put that off to the side, and go read the story. Does your story conform to what you wrote down? Where was it lacking? Were there any bits of information that weren’t in the story that needed to be there/or you thought were there?

There have been several stories of mine, where people have read them and been confused by something; and I’m like: “How can they be confused? It’s obvious why this is important!” Only to re-read the story and realize I never actually explain the important thing. It was all in my head why the important thing was important, but I never actually put it in the story. My bad.

Whenever I think about focus, I think about an old black-and-white Humphrey Bogart movie, The Maltese Falcon. In the movie the Maltese Falcon has been stolen, it’s all over the news, which they show you. Bogart’s character is a private eye who is hired to find the Maltese Falcon. At some point, he’s attacked by people who want him to stop looking for the Maltese Falcon. He starts to have feelings for the woman who hired him to find the Maltese Falcon, and is ultimately betrayed by her because she wants the Maltese Falcon.

Can you guess what the focus of the movie is? Yes, there’s violence, there’s love and betrayal, there’s the underlying issues of trust and relationships, but these all happen, the characters all meet to participate in said acts, because the Maltese Falcon has been stolen.

So, that’s what I think about when I think about focus.

Until next time: Be aware of yourself, focus on yourself. Be aware of your writing, focus on your writing.