When Ideas Fail
I have been stuck on Chapter 12 for nineteen days. It's the longest period of drought between completed chapters other than the 32 days between chapters seven and eight. That 32 day break included a complete re-write of chapter eight, but most of that time covered a period when I did no writing on the novel at all.
This current drought, though, is not from lack of trying. I think I've learned from the experience of chapter eight, and did not stop writing even at my most frustrated. I've probably written enough text for three full sized chapters, but unfortunately little of it is usable. Simply put, I've placed my intrepid troupe of adventurers into a predicament that I have not been able to extricate them from. Every attempt at a solution found it's way to a dead end. The frustrating thing is that I know exactly where I want them, and I have all the pieces I need to make it happen. I just can't make all those pieces fit.
My persistence ultimately paid off, though, and I am very happy at the way the resolution of the conflict in the storyline finally turned out. A lot of words died along the way. I thought I had a 6,000 word chapter in the bag, and enough to get a start on chapter thirteen. After the cleanup, though, I had a hard won 3,000 words and more work to do.
The troupe is on it's way again, however. Now it's back to the grind time, with hopefully fewer snags.
Wednesday, April 24, 2013
Sunday, April 14, 2013
The Message Board
The Message Board
I have to admit that I am excited, and a little impatient. It's been four days since about a dozen of us new members of Go, Be, Write! were welcomed into the writer's group. The most recently held meeting of the group was on March 6th, more than a month ago. There has been no word on what future meetings or activities are being scheduled.
I wanted to make some kind of contact, if only to express my excitement in joining the group. The website has a message board. There was only one entry, dated 8 Jan, 2013, that asked about locations for future meetings. There was one reply, in a group with over 140 members.
So I became the second person in the group to post on the message board. I wrote this:
Hi,
My name is Charlie and I'm a writer. I've had this affliction in varying degrees most of my life. Now I believe it has become a permanent condition.
Thank you, Sally, for accepting me into Go, Be, Write! I am looking forward to meeting and working with the great folks here. I'm here to learn and to contribute in any way I can.
I'm sure there are many writers here that are far more experienced than I am, so I don't know how much help I can be.
One project I did learn a lot from, however, was a compilation of my previously published short stories that I released as an e-book. There are a lot of steps required to get a project into e-book format, and some of it is quite technical. If anyone is interested I would be happy to share my experience in getting it published.
I'm excited to be here, as I'm sure all of the new members are!
PS - Hope you don't mind my starting this discussion thread.
Charlie
I feel a little bit naughty and presumptuous, being such a new member. I've never been in a writer's group before. Maybe I'm going about this all wrong. But I'm here because I want to learn more about my craft and how to improve it. I'll happily make my mistakes and learn from them here, so that I won't make them when it really counts.
I don't really know what to expect from my post, but I hope to get a few replies.
I have to admit that I am excited, and a little impatient. It's been four days since about a dozen of us new members of Go, Be, Write! were welcomed into the writer's group. The most recently held meeting of the group was on March 6th, more than a month ago. There has been no word on what future meetings or activities are being scheduled.
I wanted to make some kind of contact, if only to express my excitement in joining the group. The website has a message board. There was only one entry, dated 8 Jan, 2013, that asked about locations for future meetings. There was one reply, in a group with over 140 members.
So I became the second person in the group to post on the message board. I wrote this:
Hi,
My name is Charlie and I'm a writer. I've had this affliction in varying degrees most of my life. Now I believe it has become a permanent condition.
Thank you, Sally, for accepting me into Go, Be, Write! I am looking forward to meeting and working with the great folks here. I'm here to learn and to contribute in any way I can.
I'm sure there are many writers here that are far more experienced than I am, so I don't know how much help I can be.
One project I did learn a lot from, however, was a compilation of my previously published short stories that I released as an e-book. There are a lot of steps required to get a project into e-book format, and some of it is quite technical. If anyone is interested I would be happy to share my experience in getting it published.
I'm excited to be here, as I'm sure all of the new members are!
PS - Hope you don't mind my starting this discussion thread.
Charlie
I feel a little bit naughty and presumptuous, being such a new member. I've never been in a writer's group before. Maybe I'm going about this all wrong. But I'm here because I want to learn more about my craft and how to improve it. I'll happily make my mistakes and learn from them here, so that I won't make them when it really counts.
I don't really know what to expect from my post, but I hope to get a few replies.
Thursday, April 11, 2013
Expanding the World
Expanding the World
In the coming Chapter Twelve, Dice's Troupe leaves the river and heads eastward toward their next objective, the port of Ocean's Embrace. While the character Jaundice has her route laid out, my author's map of the area Dice's Troupe will be traveling through is a blank slate. Much of the northern half of the Glades is rolling hills, forest, and tamed land. The lands further south along the western boundary are also diagramed and named as well. It's the eastern portion of the Glades north of Ocean's Reach and extending south to The Drain that I had not yet spent any time describing.
I won't reveal any details of the new terrain here. You'll just have to follow along with the troupe and explore along with them. I do wonder how other authors build their worlds, though. I have an overall mental map of the world I'm building, but I generally leave the details out until I need them. Where do I get such details? Partly from taking bits and pieces from our own world, and partly right out of my imagination.
For example, the shape of Glades, if you looked at it closely, is patterned from the state of California. The terrain of the Glades is much different, but that is where the shape comes from. I had originally envisioned keeping the terrain features as well, but frankly, it was easier for me to develop my own terrain map than try to mimic California's. There is even an early map I made up of pasted together chunks of terrain that had features that I was interested in. I don't use that map directly, but it has influenced some of my decisions.
In my last post I talked about writer's groups. Since that post of 24 March I have been waiting to hear back from one group that I was interested in joining. It took 18 days and two queries, but on 11 April I was accepted into the writer's group called "Go, Be, Write!" The reason for the time it took to receive a reply and acceptance was quickly obvious. More than a dozen applicants were approved all at once, some of which had been waiting longer than I. I'm looking forward to getting to know the group members and taking part in the meetings. Right now there are no meetings scheduled, but I hope we get word of that soon.
In the meantime, Spark grows richer as I fill in more and more of the details. I made a broad estimate that I would need twenty chapters to finish the first book, which was a reduction from the original thirty chapters I had envisioned. I now have a framework laid out for each of the remaining chapters, so I can estimate a little more tightly just how far I have to go. As things stand now, the book will have 18 chapters. At the pace I'm on, I'm still two to three months from the finish line.
In the coming Chapter Twelve, Dice's Troupe leaves the river and heads eastward toward their next objective, the port of Ocean's Embrace. While the character Jaundice has her route laid out, my author's map of the area Dice's Troupe will be traveling through is a blank slate. Much of the northern half of the Glades is rolling hills, forest, and tamed land. The lands further south along the western boundary are also diagramed and named as well. It's the eastern portion of the Glades north of Ocean's Reach and extending south to The Drain that I had not yet spent any time describing.
I won't reveal any details of the new terrain here. You'll just have to follow along with the troupe and explore along with them. I do wonder how other authors build their worlds, though. I have an overall mental map of the world I'm building, but I generally leave the details out until I need them. Where do I get such details? Partly from taking bits and pieces from our own world, and partly right out of my imagination.
For example, the shape of Glades, if you looked at it closely, is patterned from the state of California. The terrain of the Glades is much different, but that is where the shape comes from. I had originally envisioned keeping the terrain features as well, but frankly, it was easier for me to develop my own terrain map than try to mimic California's. There is even an early map I made up of pasted together chunks of terrain that had features that I was interested in. I don't use that map directly, but it has influenced some of my decisions.
In my last post I talked about writer's groups. Since that post of 24 March I have been waiting to hear back from one group that I was interested in joining. It took 18 days and two queries, but on 11 April I was accepted into the writer's group called "Go, Be, Write!" The reason for the time it took to receive a reply and acceptance was quickly obvious. More than a dozen applicants were approved all at once, some of which had been waiting longer than I. I'm looking forward to getting to know the group members and taking part in the meetings. Right now there are no meetings scheduled, but I hope we get word of that soon.
In the meantime, Spark grows richer as I fill in more and more of the details. I made a broad estimate that I would need twenty chapters to finish the first book, which was a reduction from the original thirty chapters I had envisioned. I now have a framework laid out for each of the remaining chapters, so I can estimate a little more tightly just how far I have to go. As things stand now, the book will have 18 chapters. At the pace I'm on, I'm still two to three months from the finish line.
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