another week of writing

I'm halfway through the second week of J-term now, and, for the record, J-term has come with a few surprises, not all of them bad.

Good things:
1. I have way more free time than I do during the normal semester.  If I don't want to go to the gym in the morning, I don't have to wake up until 9:30 or 10:00.  After maybe 1:45 or 2:00, when I'm done with class and lunch, I have almost nothing to do except homework until 6:00, which is our normal dinner time.
2. The spare time has led me to actually get to the gym, which is always nice (except when I get scared of judgement from the actual athletes).  Also, I actually have time to write for my class, which is nice, but I also tend to procrastinate on my own writing because of podcasts and yarn.  Nevertheless, J-term has been fun so far because of all the time I can actually use now.
3. Since I actually have time to do homework during the day and I don't have to wake up early, the evenings can be spent doing things other than sleeping (sleeping does get involved).  These new activities include Apples to Apples, Capture the Flag, Marco Polo (played on the football field and not in the pool), and Hide and Seek.  All of these activities have commenced at around 10:00 PM and proceeded until midnight or later, which is fine, because I can still get sleep.
4. The course itself is really interesting - though it is a workshop class, the feedback really helps with what I'm writing.

Bad things:
1. Though the class is fun and I like that I get to write, sometimes the peer editing aspect can get kind of irritating.  Don't get me wrong: I do like to read and comment on other people's writing, as well as receive feedback on my own.  However, quite a few people in my class seem to be unaware that Spelling and Grammar check is correct on many occasions (there are times when it is incorrect, but when one is in college, one should be able to tell the difference).  Sometimes I have to edit my classmates' grammar and spelling as I read their work because it can get rather distracting.
2. Sometimes having all of the extra time can get kind of boring.  Though it's easy to find ways to pass the time, afternoons can get long, tedious, and unproductive.


In all, though, I'm glad I took the J-term class that I chose: at the very least, it shows me how not to write a script.

Homework...

Well, I got homework on the first day of J-term.  For once, I am actually kind of excited about doing my homework (being excited about doing homework?  Yes, that can happen. Who knew?).
As I may or may not have mentioned, my J-term course is called "The Playwright's Process," where the final is a one-act that is fully written, edited, and thought out.  This is turning out to be (in the one class I have attended of this course) more of a workshop environment than one of instruction - there will be a lot more peer editing than I expected, and a lot less of the professor saying, "LET ME TEACH YOU HOW TO WRITE A ONE-ACT!"

About an hour ago, I went to have a meeting with my professor about my one-act - everyone has to, just to brainstorm ideas about what each of us is going to write about.  From that, the professor has given us each an assignment that is supposed to help us figure out what we are going to write about further (at least, that is what is happening for mine, because I need to work some details out).  I have to do two scenes: first, a scene in which the murder victim is the main character, and has to persuade the murderer not to kill them; second, a scene in which the being tasked with the murder is the main character, and, to maintain the secrecy of their mission and society, they must convince a relative of the victim to kill the victim.  This is supposed to be to help me decide which side I want to focus on - the secret society, or the being who investigates it (and who may or may not wind up dead).

So far, I think I like this course.  The professor is interesting, and the discussion today really helped with just generating ideas.  I came in with half a plot I threw together in ten minutes, but came out with something that I can actually work with (I'm not saying what it is, because I haven't finalized it yet, but I'm excited).  The main parts of the story - a secret society and a murder - are things that I don't normally write, because I feel that I'm really bad at coming up with plot twists and good reasons for a secret to be kept (she did once say that a secrecy motive I suggested was boring, which is really true.  I don't remember what it was, but I remember agreeing with her).

Anyway, I have to go forth and do cool stuff.  Farewell.

2013!

Well, so far into 2013, I have not done very well in any of my resolutions.  Though I am moving more than I might have during school, I still do not feel like I am moving around enough.  I am still on break and I will be until Sunday; I also have a feeling that on Sunday, when I get back to school, I will start remembering what I said I would do and I will start acting on it.  Though I have done some knitting, I have been mostly working on a commission that is due when I get back (or a few days after), and it is not big enough to be called a 'huge project.'  As for my writing, I have only written one page of anything so far.  I need to work on that.
Right now, stuff is just not very interesting.  I have been knitting.  I have been reading a little bit.  I have gone on long walks and tried out new drinks at Starbucks.  I saw Les Miserables, the movie (I have a love/hate relationship with the movie; I adore the show, but I truly wish that Hugh Jackman and Russell Crowe each could have had a better balance between singing and acting.  Hugh Jackman could act but struggled with voice; Russell Crowe was mostly good with singing at the cost of his acting).  Mostly, however, my activities during the holiday have consisted of sleeping late, watching junky TV, and knitting and crocheting a lot.  I saw a few friends and hung out with my boyfriend a bit, and did a college panel at my high school about the application process (for the upperclassman parents who were terrified about their child's college stuff).
So, fair readers, what have you been doing?

resolutions of the new year

As 2012 rushes to its close, the time of resolving to do stuff next year is nigh.  I have thought for all of five minutes about what I shall resolve to do in 2013 (maybe less than that), and I have concluded that I shall do the following things:

1. I will work out more. I'm going to Maccu Piccu in May; I need all the exercise I can get.
2. I will complete some big knitting or crocheting project.  Why not?
3. I will finish writing as many of my current novels as possible.  There are at least half a dozen lying around without endings (and one without two scenes).  I will finish and type those in 2013.

That is my rather short list that I will probably add to at some point.

But the main topic here is that of the journey of the resolution. I mean, you cannot expect to write half a dozen novels (or end them, rather), without learning something.  You can't go to the gym every day without pushing your endurance, even a little bit.  I've always had issues with going to the gym because I'm always scared that people will laugh at my extensive inability to properly use the machines.  But I've realized that nobody at the gym gives a crap about what you're doing there, as long as it doesn't interfere with what they're doing there.  That in itself is a bit of a journey.

So, dear readers, of which there are probably very few, what sort of resolution journeys will you be embarking on in two days?

On length of tale

I realized something fully last night that has been in my mind for about four years now.
I admitted to my parents that I think in novels, and I can very rarely fit all my ideas into a short story.  We got on this topic when we started talking about my January Term (henceforth referred to as J-Term) course, The Playwright's Process.  The final is not a normal final: it's a fully written, developed, and edited one-act.  For those of you who aren't fully familiar with the world of theatre, one-acts are generally the short stories or novellas of the stage (you can, theoretically, resolve a larger plot line in a one-act, but I've never seen it done; after a point, you need more acts).  One-acts are generally between 20 - 45 minutes long (again, you could see longer one-acts, but I haven't); according to Wikipedia, a new sub-genre has started called "flash dramas" - one-acts that are only around 10 minutes long.

Anyway, this J-Term course is going to be a challenge for me.  As I previously stated, I think in novels - stories that take two or three acts to resolve.  To scale down one's thinking is something you rarely hear - most motivators I've heard tell their listeners to think big and shoot for the moon.

But maybe scaling down my thinking is not what I need to do.  Maybe I just need to think differently.  Not scaled-down, exactly, but just not as big a scale.  Maybe I should think big, but not as big as I'm used to thinking. Maybe, over the course of this J-term, I will realize that I'm actually more of a short-story writer than a novel-writer, and I've been fooling myself this whole time.  I admit, I need to put my characters through a fat lot of crap before they make it to the end when I'm writing a novel, but I always have trouble coming up with more than a little bit of crap to throw in their faces.  Maybe that's the main difference: the crap that gets thrown at people is a different sort of crap than the crap in novels (smaller, perhaps, but no less disgusting), and the hands that throw it are smaller than the ones that throw crap in longer works.

So, dear readers, what do you think?  Any one-act/ novella/ short-story writers out there who would like to share some opinions on the writing process?  Anyone who's done both and would like to offer sage advice to a college student?  Feel free to comment!

On Openings

I just returned from Barnes and Noble, and I have discovered my new favorite opening line, from a Steampunk novel called The Friday Society, by Adrienne Kress:
"And then there was an explosion."
First off, this is a great use of in media res. Explosions don't happen on a daily basis in many places, so you start with a question of what the hell is going on.
Then it continues:
"It was loud. It was bright. It was very explosion-y."
That bit sets the tone for the rest of the story (or at least, for the page and a half that I have read) - for what I have read so far of The Friday Society, the 3rd person narrator is rather sarcastic and witty, and keeps up a similar narration to what has just been displayed, even if it only involves the development of the focus character, who caused the explosion (it wasn't on purpose, but... she's a lab assistant in a Steampunk universe; explosions are bound to happen).

A good opening, my friends, is more important than a good closing.  Why?  If you don't have a good opening, your readers are never going to make it to the end, so you will never know whether the readers will celebrate a good end to a good book, or complain of a terrible end to a decent book.  They're not even going to make it to the middle bits, even if the middle bits are of a higher caliber than the ending or the beginning.  Though it is important to develop every part of your writing, and to edit (which, unfortunately, I have displayed a severe lack in the writing of this blog), open your book well.

A Buddhist Prayer

I saw this on Facebook, of all places. Like the friend who posted it, I think it's a good mission statement, regardless of what faith you follow.


May I be a medicine for the sick and weary,
Nursing their afflictions until they are cured;
May I become food and drink,
During time of famine,

May I protect the helpless and the poor,
May I be a lamp,
For those who need your Light,
May I be a bed for those who need rest,
and guide all seekers to the Other Shore.
May all find happiness through my actions,
and let no one suffer because of me.
Whether they love or hate me,
Whether they hurt or wrong me,
May they all realize supreme nirvana.

finals week

I know that finals week is perhaps the worst week in any college student's career - there is a lot of stress, and you realize how much you should have been studying (I know I have), and the prospect of the train/ car/ bus/ plane home is the only thing that might be getting you through the end of exams.

As this is my first finals week ever, I don't know how much I can relate to the feelings of going home being great - does the prospect get better?  Worse?  Stay the same?  Obviously, I'll be excited to go home, but the only thing I'm really stressed about is my Greek final, as Greek is my hardest subject and writing "It's all Greek to me" instead of a verb I forgot is probably going to get me a failing grade.  Of COURSE it's Greek to you, dummy! This is a Greek test! The professor will think as she grades the exams.  Sometimes I wonder how many first-semester Greek students she teaches would dare to put that on one of the tests or quizzes.
The first quiz?  Maybe.
The final?  Never.  Unless you WANT to fail.

Anyway, finals week could make a good climactic sequence for some story - the story of one's first semester of college, most likely, or the story of one's final semester.  Each are equally admirable - for one, it is the conclusion of a new adventure, and leaves the door open for many more to come; the other  is the conclusion of the adventure, and is probably a story about moving on.

You know what would be really interesting?  To write a series of eight novels (or twelve, if your school does a January term), about the eight (or twelve) semesters of college.  Same characters, different stories, and the end of each is finals week; the finals are the Final Test (see what I did there?).

Maybe I should do that.  That would be really cool.  I like that idea.
Now, if I only didn't have about five other novels going at the same time, and a Greek exam to study for, I would totally be willing to keep going with it.

But I have a Greek final to study for.  And then I'll work on it.

On Reading

One of the things I'm going to miss during the finals week cramming - and that I have missed during the semester and during NaNoWriMo - is reading.  If there's one thing that almost all writers can agree on (all novel writers, anyway), is that reading books is important for style development and just plain fun.  It doesn't matter what genre, really - I guess if you want to write erotica, you should probably read a fair dose of erotica before and during your erotica writing experience.  Similar goes for romance, fantasy, sci-fi, and anything else you might want to write, and it's especially important if you want to do a crossover - if you want to do a sci-fi romance novel, that's your choice, but you'd need experience reading both.

There are reasons for this - reading when you're writing.

First off, you can't just put "how to write a romance novel" into Google. Well, you can, but there's a difference between reading the wiki how-to on it and actually seeing it in action.  Besides, the tips in the wiki page are very generic - "create two characters," "end your novel well."  Read to know what those mean: every writer is different, so there will be some variation in how each character is presented, what the plot is, what causes the emotional tension, and such like.

Secondly, read to know what not to do.  Every writer has their good bits and their bad bits.  The trick is to finding which is which - especially in your opinion.  You're the writer; write what you like.  Grammar rules, however, cannot be bent under any circumstances that are excusable if you have an editor.

Read what you know, and what you don't know.  Expand your horizons a bit, and you'll be able to write more and better.  I'd say "write what you know," but that's a piece of advice I have mixed feelings about.  I'm a fantasy writer.  I've never met a dragon.  I don't know any dragons.  But I've written several dragons.  In each of my three mostly-complete novels, and in two that are in progress, there have been reference to a dragon at some point or another.  In four of the five aforementioned works, the dragon is a significant being.  In the fifth, its existence is situational and any other creature could have thrown the characters together adequately.
Anyway, the point is, I've never met a dragon.  I've never met a dwarf.  I've never met an elf.  I don't know any of these beings personally, but I write about them all the time.

That's not the point.

The point is, READ!

December 2: just after the end

Well, yesterday marked the end of another NaNoWriMo, and the first year where I did not make it to the finish line.
Oddly, I have come to terms with this, for a few reasons:

1. I still have a novel out, and this year, I really do only have a couple of scenes - no more than two or three - until I can tie together the ending I wrote on the computer.  Altogether, that's better than what I've done in the past.  My first year's novel still has two bosses to beat, not counting the final boss; my second-year novel, I wound up adding a TON of stuff between the final fight and where November left me.  I'm more done than I have ever been at the end of November.
2. In all honesty, I wasn't as excited about this novel as I was with my others.  Maybe it was because I just didn't plan, and NaNo sprang up almost out of the blue - I have a lot of friends who were also doing it, but I lost track of time when I was doing other things to realize, "HEY! IT'S ALMOST NOVEMBER!  How about a plot?"
3. Speaking of which, it seems like an excuse, but business was a factor.  If you are a high schooler and you are reading this, then let me tell you: time management in college is a LOT different than it is in high school.  NaNoWriMo can be done - of the group I did NaNoWriMo with, and of the people that it was obvious would finish, I was the only one who didn't - but it is more difficult than high school.
4. after all, it IS my first year of college.  School is actually important - you aren't paying thousands of dollars to write a novel for free.

I still enjoy NaNo, and I still want to do it again next year, but I'm kind of glad I didn't finish.  Everyone has to have at least one NaNo loss, right?

Unless, of course, your name is Chris Baty.