My WIP has taken a strange turn.
My brain has suddenly insisted that I stop what I'm writing and set down a (fairly detailed) account of the main character's eighteenth birthday. Chances are good that 99% of these scenes will never see the light of day. But I appear to have decided that I need to write it all down anyway.
I'm discovering, as I get deeper into editing some of my WIPs, that there are some scenes that need to be written not because they need to appear in the final story, but because I, as the author, need to assimilate that information about my character(s), and the best and most effective way to do that seems to be by writing out scenes that will never appear in the finished story.
The trick is to recognize the difference between the back story bits that need to appear in the finished work, and the ones that don't. In my current story, I know that there are two bits of information from the "birthday" section that do need to be worked into the final story. One is that the MC's grandmother, gave her and heirloom pendant for her eighteenth birthday, and the other is an interaction between her and her stepfather that occurred later that night and prompted her to move out of her parents' house the next day. I'll probably be able to work those bits in without too much trouble. But the other 3,500 words...well, I guess I'll save them for the "director's cut" version.
I've been having problems making forward progress on this story anyway (see previous blog entries), but the fact that this is happening now tells me that I have a problem with my story: I don't know my character well enough. Writing this bit of backstory helps me understand her and her motivations better, as well as those of her older sister, who is another key player in the story. I knew that the character owned a pendant that had been given to her by her grandmother. But now I know that:
- The pendant should, by rights, have gone to the MC's older sister. But it turns out that her older sister is really just her half-sister. Grandma knows this, but the MC does not. The trick will be for Grandma to justify her bequest without revealing the reason why the legacy is not passing to the older sister.
- The MC had more than sufficient reason for wanting to move out of her mother and stepfather's house when she did.
- The MC's sister was completely unaware of how the MC was being treated by their stepfather.
- When the MC left her parents' house, she moved in with her paternal grandmother for the remainder of the school year.
- The MC went to Iowa State University on a full scholarship, and majored in English. (Now if she would only tell me what she did for a living before she was laid off!)
Could I have finished writing the story without knowing all of these details about the MC. Sure, just like I could make spaghetti sauce without putting in eight or ten different herbs/seasonings and a tablespoon of sugar. I could make spaghetti sauce with just garlic and oregano, and it wouldn't taste bad. But with all of the subtle flavors added by the additional herbs and spices, it has a richer, deeper flavor--just like knowing all of this information about my MC will give my story a richer, deeper flavor.
How do other folks approach back story? Do you write it all into the story and edit it out later? Do you write it all down before you even start writing the main story? (I don't, but maybe I should!) Got any tricks for recognizing back story that doesn't need to appear in the final product?
Showing posts with label stalled story. Show all posts
Showing posts with label stalled story. Show all posts
Thursday, July 14, 2011
Monday, July 11, 2011
Working Through The Rough Bits; or, What To Do When The Words Just Won't Come Out
I've been plugging slowly, stolidly away on my current WIP, working title "Fairies Living At The Bottom Of The Garden." But it's going slowly. Very slowly.
I know why it's going slowly:
1) Inner Editor won't shut up. She's read the first three chapters and thinks they're pretty good...and wants to know why the rest can't be up to that high standard.
2) Other People have read, or will read, parts of what I've written on it so far. (This is the piece I submitted to the WorldCon workshop, I also read parts of it to Beloved Husband and some friends.) That's as bad as letting Inner Editor out of her cave, if not worse. Because now other people have expectations for how the story is going to turn out, and what if I don't live up to them? The weight of those expectations can be crushing, sometimes.
3) Vacation Happened. We went out of town for a week, and while I thought I could get some writing done while Beloved Husband drove, turns out when he was driving, he wanted to listen to Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy (we only recently discovered that they made more than just the twelve episodes). It's impossible for me to write while listening to something like that. And then, once we were there, we were involved in activities from 9:00 am to 1:00 am every day. So, almost no writing got done.
4) Motivational Challenges: I'm working on this story as part of my summer writing challenge, which is a Good And Fine Thing, but somehow I'm having problems motivating to stay interested in it. Probably because last year, my friend Branni was also taking part in the challenge, and she helped motivate me. Since she's no longer with us, I'm finding it difficult to stay focused.
So, now that I know what the problem is, how can I fix it?
Inner Editor is notoriously hard to jam back into her box once she's been let loose. I just have to convince myself it's okay to do things like use the word "unfamiliar" twice or even three times in one paragraph, because I can go back later and fix it. But that's not always easy to do. So perhaps I need to start posting daily word count updates on my LJ, so my friends can help guilt me into keeping the words flowing.
Dealing with the fact that others have read parts of the story is harder to deal with. What if they come up with an obvious and glaring problem that requires me to go back and do an extensive re-write? Wouldn't it be better to wait until I have the critiques back before I finish? Worse yet, what if people read it and think it's not even worth finishing? No. I just have to convince myself to trust my instincts, that this is a good story, and that it'll be worth finishing, for my own satisfaction if nothing else. But that's easier said than done.
As far as coming up with the time to write, that'll be more difficult. It being summer, the yard demands a certain amount of my time. Also, we have various projects we'd like to complete before heading off to WorldCon. But perhaps I can go back to getting a few hundred words done in the morning before work, and a few more at lunchtime. That would make a difference.
When it comes to motivation, I'm hoping that posting my daily word counts will help with that as well. After all, it's mighty embarrassing to get out there for several days in a row and have to admit that I've written nothing. Hopefully, that will provide enough incentive to keep me writing.
What do other people do when they hit a writing road block?
I know why it's going slowly:
1) Inner Editor won't shut up. She's read the first three chapters and thinks they're pretty good...and wants to know why the rest can't be up to that high standard.
2) Other People have read, or will read, parts of what I've written on it so far. (This is the piece I submitted to the WorldCon workshop, I also read parts of it to Beloved Husband and some friends.) That's as bad as letting Inner Editor out of her cave, if not worse. Because now other people have expectations for how the story is going to turn out, and what if I don't live up to them? The weight of those expectations can be crushing, sometimes.
3) Vacation Happened. We went out of town for a week, and while I thought I could get some writing done while Beloved Husband drove, turns out when he was driving, he wanted to listen to Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy (we only recently discovered that they made more than just the twelve episodes). It's impossible for me to write while listening to something like that. And then, once we were there, we were involved in activities from 9:00 am to 1:00 am every day. So, almost no writing got done.
4) Motivational Challenges: I'm working on this story as part of my summer writing challenge, which is a Good And Fine Thing, but somehow I'm having problems motivating to stay interested in it. Probably because last year, my friend Branni was also taking part in the challenge, and she helped motivate me. Since she's no longer with us, I'm finding it difficult to stay focused.
So, now that I know what the problem is, how can I fix it?
Inner Editor is notoriously hard to jam back into her box once she's been let loose. I just have to convince myself it's okay to do things like use the word "unfamiliar" twice or even three times in one paragraph, because I can go back later and fix it. But that's not always easy to do. So perhaps I need to start posting daily word count updates on my LJ, so my friends can help guilt me into keeping the words flowing.
Dealing with the fact that others have read parts of the story is harder to deal with. What if they come up with an obvious and glaring problem that requires me to go back and do an extensive re-write? Wouldn't it be better to wait until I have the critiques back before I finish? Worse yet, what if people read it and think it's not even worth finishing? No. I just have to convince myself to trust my instincts, that this is a good story, and that it'll be worth finishing, for my own satisfaction if nothing else. But that's easier said than done.
As far as coming up with the time to write, that'll be more difficult. It being summer, the yard demands a certain amount of my time. Also, we have various projects we'd like to complete before heading off to WorldCon. But perhaps I can go back to getting a few hundred words done in the morning before work, and a few more at lunchtime. That would make a difference.
When it comes to motivation, I'm hoping that posting my daily word counts will help with that as well. After all, it's mighty embarrassing to get out there for several days in a row and have to admit that I've written nothing. Hopefully, that will provide enough incentive to keep me writing.
What do other people do when they hit a writing road block?
Saturday, January 22, 2011
Doing The Splits; or Maybe You're Not Writing One Book, But Two
I have a confession to make.
I've really been struggling with my current WIP, the second book of the "Daughters of August Winterbourne" series. It's not that I wasn't enjoying writing the story, because I was. But before I'd started, I'd put together a rough outline of things I thought ought to happen in the book. And after three months and almost 90,000 words, I was only about a third of the way through my outline. Which meant that the finished product was headed for...way too long.
Sigh.
On top of which, at about 75,000 words, one of my characters did something unexpected but perfectly logical. But it was also something that was sure to add a good 20,000 to the word count.
That was when work on the piece slowed to a crawl. Inner Editor was making loud growly noises and refused to shut up about it. "Why are you writing this scene? You'll just have to cut it out later anyway," she kept saying.
Then, one night earlier this week, as I was driving home from work, I was pondering the new developments in the plot, and trying to figure out what I could cut out and still have the story make sense. And I realized that the new plot twist I had added had changed the dynamic of the story, creating an arc that could be resolved nicely at a point about halfway through the outline I had originally laid out. And that what was left after that would make a nice story on its own.
In other words, the story had just neatly divided itself in half. And when I looked at the plot arc for each was much neater, cleaner, and more interesting, and allowed for some development of key characters and their relationships.
Well, then. My neat, tidy trilogy just grew into a four book series. I suppose worse things have happened.
(Note that I felt somewhat better about this revelation when, at a convention this weekend, a published author admitted to having had the same thing happen to her.)
So how do other people to tell what makes a book a good complete story?
I've really been struggling with my current WIP, the second book of the "Daughters of August Winterbourne" series. It's not that I wasn't enjoying writing the story, because I was. But before I'd started, I'd put together a rough outline of things I thought ought to happen in the book. And after three months and almost 90,000 words, I was only about a third of the way through my outline. Which meant that the finished product was headed for...way too long.
Sigh.
On top of which, at about 75,000 words, one of my characters did something unexpected but perfectly logical. But it was also something that was sure to add a good 20,000 to the word count.
That was when work on the piece slowed to a crawl. Inner Editor was making loud growly noises and refused to shut up about it. "Why are you writing this scene? You'll just have to cut it out later anyway," she kept saying.
Then, one night earlier this week, as I was driving home from work, I was pondering the new developments in the plot, and trying to figure out what I could cut out and still have the story make sense. And I realized that the new plot twist I had added had changed the dynamic of the story, creating an arc that could be resolved nicely at a point about halfway through the outline I had originally laid out. And that what was left after that would make a nice story on its own.
In other words, the story had just neatly divided itself in half. And when I looked at the plot arc for each was much neater, cleaner, and more interesting, and allowed for some development of key characters and their relationships.
Well, then. My neat, tidy trilogy just grew into a four book series. I suppose worse things have happened.
(Note that I felt somewhat better about this revelation when, at a convention this weekend, a published author admitted to having had the same thing happen to her.)
So how do other people to tell what makes a book a good complete story?
Thursday, November 11, 2010
NaNoWriMo Week 2; or, I've Got The Week Two Blues
Hello from Week Two of NaNoWriMo.
This week, things are going along less swimmingly than last. I was nearly two days ahead on my word count; now, if I don't get 1,500 words written before I go to bed tonight, I'll be behind on my word count.
Why? Well, as I see it, there are three -- no, make it four factors:
1) I've been thinking about where I wanted to start this story for the last couple of months. So I had already pre-visualized the opening sequences pretty thoroughly. That meant that when I sat down to write them, they fell out of my head in one big blort. Which was cool, and actually quite encouraging, since the scenes turned out even better than I had imagined them. But then ... well, the first few scenes ended up setting a sort of structure of scenes alternating between two main POVs, and I'm finding that harder to maintain than I'd expected. I will probably end up bagging that structure for this draft and just get on with the story as I know it now.
2) The chapter I'm currently writing is one that I'm pretty sure won't exist in the final novel. However, my lizard brain insists that I write it anyway. But Internal Editor is screeching at me to just forget it and move on. I know I should just write the scene and mark it for later editing -- after all , it will provide useful background information for me later in the story -- but it's hard to do when Internal Editor won't shut up about it.
3) I accidentally fell into Edit-head. My posting to my critique group got moved up two weeks, and I thought I had my next piece ready to go. Only when I looked at it, I kept finding another bit that I wanted to take out ... and another one ... and another one ... plus there was that whole action sequence that needed to be re-done (the mechanics of which will, I think, end up being a posting of their own in December). In the end, I shortened a 14,000 word section of the story by a full 25%, or 3,500 words. I'm pleased with the result, but the problem is that switching to edit-head let Internal Editor out of her box, and now she doesn't want to go back in. In fact, she's identified at least a dozen more changes she'd really like to make to that section of the story before we call it a second draft. Dealing with that has been a challenge.
4) Related to that has been the fact that I'm just a victim of my own poor time management skills. When I can roll out of bed at 6:00 a.m. and spend an hour or so writing before work, and then spend my lunch hour writing, that gets me a good jump on the day's word count. If I have a solid 1,200 words in the can by the time I get home from work at night, picking up the remaining 500 or to meet the day's quota is a piece of cake. But when, as today, I ended up hitting the snooze button instead of writing, and then since my Beloved Husband was off work for Veteran's Day, he came and took me to lunch, my word count for the day so far is, well, zero. (Too bad I can't count this blog entry!) Plus we've spent some time this week hanging out with friends -- which really is more important than word count in the long run, and which I certainly don't begrudge them, but it does mean that there is simply less time available for writing.
But not to worry. I've got a good, solid two hours left to write tonight, and maybe more if I'm on a roll. I'll make those NaNos happen, see if I don't!
Anybody else struggling with the morass of Week Two? What works for you when you need to up the word count but the words don't want to flow?
This week, things are going along less swimmingly than last. I was nearly two days ahead on my word count; now, if I don't get 1,500 words written before I go to bed tonight, I'll be behind on my word count.
Why? Well, as I see it, there are three -- no, make it four factors:
1) I've been thinking about where I wanted to start this story for the last couple of months. So I had already pre-visualized the opening sequences pretty thoroughly. That meant that when I sat down to write them, they fell out of my head in one big blort. Which was cool, and actually quite encouraging, since the scenes turned out even better than I had imagined them. But then ... well, the first few scenes ended up setting a sort of structure of scenes alternating between two main POVs, and I'm finding that harder to maintain than I'd expected. I will probably end up bagging that structure for this draft and just get on with the story as I know it now.
2) The chapter I'm currently writing is one that I'm pretty sure won't exist in the final novel. However, my lizard brain insists that I write it anyway. But Internal Editor is screeching at me to just forget it and move on. I know I should just write the scene and mark it for later editing -- after all , it will provide useful background information for me later in the story -- but it's hard to do when Internal Editor won't shut up about it.
3) I accidentally fell into Edit-head. My posting to my critique group got moved up two weeks, and I thought I had my next piece ready to go. Only when I looked at it, I kept finding another bit that I wanted to take out ... and another one ... and another one ... plus there was that whole action sequence that needed to be re-done (the mechanics of which will, I think, end up being a posting of their own in December). In the end, I shortened a 14,000 word section of the story by a full 25%, or 3,500 words. I'm pleased with the result, but the problem is that switching to edit-head let Internal Editor out of her box, and now she doesn't want to go back in. In fact, she's identified at least a dozen more changes she'd really like to make to that section of the story before we call it a second draft. Dealing with that has been a challenge.
4) Related to that has been the fact that I'm just a victim of my own poor time management skills. When I can roll out of bed at 6:00 a.m. and spend an hour or so writing before work, and then spend my lunch hour writing, that gets me a good jump on the day's word count. If I have a solid 1,200 words in the can by the time I get home from work at night, picking up the remaining 500 or to meet the day's quota is a piece of cake. But when, as today, I ended up hitting the snooze button instead of writing, and then since my Beloved Husband was off work for Veteran's Day, he came and took me to lunch, my word count for the day so far is, well, zero. (Too bad I can't count this blog entry!) Plus we've spent some time this week hanging out with friends -- which really is more important than word count in the long run, and which I certainly don't begrudge them, but it does mean that there is simply less time available for writing.
But not to worry. I've got a good, solid two hours left to write tonight, and maybe more if I'm on a roll. I'll make those NaNos happen, see if I don't!
Anybody else struggling with the morass of Week Two? What works for you when you need to up the word count but the words don't want to flow?
Thursday, July 15, 2010
Stay On Target; or, Did I Set The Bar Too Low?
Okay, first things first:
If there's anyone on the face of the planet who hasn't yet seen the pictures (hard to believe because I've been babbling about it all over the place), my office is more-or-less finished. You can take a little tour of it over on my LiveJournal account (which in turn links to my Flickr account).
Yes, I am all squee over it. It's a warm (okay, at the moment, a little TOO warm), welcoming space. If we ever get to turn off the fans(1) again, I'll be able to hear the babbling of the water circulating in the fish pond outside the window. There are actually two windows and an exterior door, so there's at least some airflow.
But frankly, I don't care that it's a little warm. It's my space, and I'm happy in it.
Which is good, because I really need to find my Happy Writing Place. It's now July 15, halfway through my summer writing challenge, and I'm just over halfway to my goal. The problem is that with my energies focused on finishing the office, I haven't had much left to give to my writing. Last week's word count was not even what I would put out during one day of NaNoWriMo; the week before was half of that, and this week is on target to be even less impressive. Granted, this is short story writing, which is harder for me, but I'm still feeling pathetic and unworthy.
I could say that I'm having writer's block. Or I could say that the muse just isn't inspiring me at the moment. But I know that's not the problem. I know that I'm capable of putting out 1,500 words a day without much effort, muse or no muse.
I'm beginning to wonder if part of the problem was that I set the bar too low on my challenge. I have another 14,900 words to write by the end of August. I know -- because I've done it -- that I am capable of writing over 10,000 words in one day. If I had a couple of really good days of writing, I could blow past that goal and coast for the next month and a half.
Maybe I just need to up my goal. If I were to write just 500 words a day for the next 45 days, that would give me 22,500 words. Five hundred words a day is certainly do-able; if I would just quit spending my lunch hour catching up on Twitter and write, I can easily do 500 words at lunchtime.
I know that another part of my problem is that my brain has been mulling over The Daughters of August Winterbourne for the last month or so. I've had four beta readers finish it now (Beloved Husband finally finished it on Sunday), and I've gotten some constructive feedback from them. So I want to dig my fingers into it and start editing. Now.
Perhaps what I need to do is offer myself a reward of editing time once I get my 500 words per day written. That could work.
I'll give it a shot and report back in a couple of weeks. As I've mentioned before, I have a hard time swapping back and forth between writer-head and edit-head, so this will be yet another challenge for me.
And now, time to go see if I can find 500 words to say about a fairy invasion of the garden...
(1) Our house does not have air conditioning. It used to have a big whole-house fan, but that stopped working last fall and we haven't gotten it fixed yet. And daytime temps here in sunny Colorado have been in the mid-to-upper 90's for the last couple of days...
If there's anyone on the face of the planet who hasn't yet seen the pictures (hard to believe because I've been babbling about it all over the place), my office is more-or-less finished. You can take a little tour of it over on my LiveJournal account (which in turn links to my Flickr account).
Yes, I am all squee over it. It's a warm (okay, at the moment, a little TOO warm), welcoming space. If we ever get to turn off the fans(1) again, I'll be able to hear the babbling of the water circulating in the fish pond outside the window. There are actually two windows and an exterior door, so there's at least some airflow.
But frankly, I don't care that it's a little warm. It's my space, and I'm happy in it.
Which is good, because I really need to find my Happy Writing Place. It's now July 15, halfway through my summer writing challenge, and I'm just over halfway to my goal. The problem is that with my energies focused on finishing the office, I haven't had much left to give to my writing. Last week's word count was not even what I would put out during one day of NaNoWriMo; the week before was half of that, and this week is on target to be even less impressive. Granted, this is short story writing, which is harder for me, but I'm still feeling pathetic and unworthy.
I could say that I'm having writer's block. Or I could say that the muse just isn't inspiring me at the moment. But I know that's not the problem. I know that I'm capable of putting out 1,500 words a day without much effort, muse or no muse.
I'm beginning to wonder if part of the problem was that I set the bar too low on my challenge. I have another 14,900 words to write by the end of August. I know -- because I've done it -- that I am capable of writing over 10,000 words in one day. If I had a couple of really good days of writing, I could blow past that goal and coast for the next month and a half.
Maybe I just need to up my goal. If I were to write just 500 words a day for the next 45 days, that would give me 22,500 words. Five hundred words a day is certainly do-able; if I would just quit spending my lunch hour catching up on Twitter and write, I can easily do 500 words at lunchtime.
I know that another part of my problem is that my brain has been mulling over The Daughters of August Winterbourne for the last month or so. I've had four beta readers finish it now (Beloved Husband finally finished it on Sunday), and I've gotten some constructive feedback from them. So I want to dig my fingers into it and start editing. Now.
Perhaps what I need to do is offer myself a reward of editing time once I get my 500 words per day written. That could work.
I'll give it a shot and report back in a couple of weeks. As I've mentioned before, I have a hard time swapping back and forth between writer-head and edit-head, so this will be yet another challenge for me.
And now, time to go see if I can find 500 words to say about a fairy invasion of the garden...
(1) Our house does not have air conditioning. It used to have a big whole-house fan, but that stopped working last fall and we haven't gotten it fixed yet. And daytime temps here in sunny Colorado have been in the mid-to-upper 90's for the last couple of days...
Thursday, February 4, 2010
When Inspiration Fails To Strike; or, Technical Difficulties
I've known this moment was coming since the beginning of November, and I really hoped that when it got here, I'd have the answer I needed, but I don't. Inspiration has failed to strike, and I'm stuck.
I've reached the point in my current Work In Progress, The Daughters of August Winterbourne, where I need to describe a bit of technical gadgetry. Dr. Winterbourne has designed a small weapon that can be made up of parts from four ordinary-looking items. And he has given one of the items to each of his four daughters.
The weapon is a small gun that fires poisonous darts using compressed air. That much I know. I also know that three of the four items Dr. Winterbourne gave the girls are:
But I'm stuck as to what the fourth item should be, and how it could fit into the weapon. All I know is that it needs to be something a female university student could carry or wear on a daily basis without exciting comment. It should be the kind of thing that (to use a modern analogy) you could take through airport security without getting pulled out of line and strip-searched. But I have no idea what the item could be.
So now what do I do?
Perhaps it's time to consult The Oracle (a.k.a. my friends on the Internet) once again. They were certainly helpful in the matter of Mr. Fletcher's name.
In the meantime, I'm not sure how to proceed. I'd really like to know what Mystery Item #4 is before I write the next section, but failing that, I might just have to put up [[And A Miracle Happens Here]] signs in the manuscript and come back to them later. I hate doing that -- when I've done it in the past, when I go back to fill stuff in, I always end up having to change more than I expected -- but it may be my only choice.
What do other people do when technical inspiration fails to strike?
I've reached the point in my current Work In Progress, The Daughters of August Winterbourne, where I need to describe a bit of technical gadgetry. Dr. Winterbourne has designed a small weapon that can be made up of parts from four ordinary-looking items. And he has given one of the items to each of his four daughters.
The weapon is a small gun that fires poisonous darts using compressed air. That much I know. I also know that three of the four items Dr. Winterbourne gave the girls are:
- A circular slide rule (looks like an oversized pocket watch, but when you open it, it's a slide rule. Such things do actually exist, although they weren't invented for at least sixty years after my story's time. But it's an alternate universe, so I'm cheating and using it anyway.) I think that it doesn't actually get used as part of the weapon, but rather serves as a place to hide the instructions for assembly.
- A very nice, top-of-the-line fountain pen. I'm figuring this is the barrel of the gun, and it might also serve to compress a small amount of air into a chamber.
- A brooch that uses the poison darts as design elements that look like stylized flower petals.
But I'm stuck as to what the fourth item should be, and how it could fit into the weapon. All I know is that it needs to be something a female university student could carry or wear on a daily basis without exciting comment. It should be the kind of thing that (to use a modern analogy) you could take through airport security without getting pulled out of line and strip-searched. But I have no idea what the item could be.
So now what do I do?
Perhaps it's time to consult The Oracle (a.k.a. my friends on the Internet) once again. They were certainly helpful in the matter of Mr. Fletcher's name.
In the meantime, I'm not sure how to proceed. I'd really like to know what Mystery Item #4 is before I write the next section, but failing that, I might just have to put up [[And A Miracle Happens Here]] signs in the manuscript and come back to them later. I hate doing that -- when I've done it in the past, when I go back to fill stuff in, I always end up having to change more than I expected -- but it may be my only choice.
What do other people do when technical inspiration fails to strike?
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