Sloth. Not Manny.
The thing about not blogging for a while is that I wind up with quite a lot of things which have occurred, and am of two minds about how much of it to post. It could warrant a trilogy of “Recap” posts, which would probably not be terribly exciting. Therefore, I think I’ll just move on and if anything comes up that addresses something which previously occurred, I shall do a beautifully segueing recap into the topic. You will all be amazed.
Today’s thought, which I will share with you before heading off to The Day Job: I am, as it stands, only 23,000 words into my manuscript for From Gray Mists, Returned. I hadn’t checked my word count until recently, and when I saw that it was so low, it alarmed me.
Story wise, this isn’t a problem. Story wise, I’ve got a great deal of story still left to tell, and I’m still expecting about 125,000 words when all is said and done. Probably more, if I do things right. So that’s not the problem. The problem is that I’ve been working on this for quite a while, and I’m not writing nearly as fast as I’d like to be.
While I was sort of gently aware of this, I wasn’t worried until last night, I got up after going to bed, because I had some notes that I had to get out of my head before I could go to sleep. One page of notes was about a short story called The Kiss That Did It* (which is buried somewhere in the Share Your Work section of the Absolute Write forums) and in that page of notes, I fixed the short story. Some people have pointed out that I shouldn’t re-work it, I should just send it out again. I’m of two minds on this subject as well, and now I have a page of notes that would allow me to comfortably turn it into a short story that I would like very much, instead of the current one.
The other page of notes was for an old novel idea that I’ve had bouncing around my head for quite a long time now, which I was just sitting on patiently. I had a solid idea for it, but there was still a spark missing that would ignite the whole thing, and I was willing to wait for it. That page of notes was that spark. Everything fell into place, and now I know exactly what sort of story it is and how to write it. I want to write it. I’m getting exctied about writing it.
Additionally, I have my six-part comic book series Dark which is waiting for me to complete this novel so that I can charge on with it.
You see what worries me, then. I have quite a lot of projects building up, all of which I’m excited about, and I’m starting to realize that if I don’t power my way through the first draft of my novel soon, I’m going to fade out on it, it’s going to rot on the page, I’m going to move, and I won’t be at all happy about it.
What am I doing about this? Well, I don’t know. I think I need someone to nag me. Barring that, I’m thinking about finding a handful of beta readers who are willing to have chunks of the story e-mailed to them every couple of days. I always wrote well for an audience, especially one that provides general feedback now and then. Barring that, I think I need to give my manuscript a hard look, give my life a hard look, and just pick a date (preferably fairly soon) on which I will plan to have reached 100,000 words.
That’s what I’ve got the moment. Now, I have to go figure out what I’ve done with both my shoes, and my tea, either of which normally take a fair amount of effort to find on their own. If you don’t hear back from me, call the police. I will have wandered off and gotten lost.
* Recently, I received a rejection letter for The Kiss That Did It, which I was expecting and wasn’t hugely worried about. I originally intended simply to shelve the story after the rejection letter came in, because I tend to dislike my writing after a few months have passed between us. However, the rejection letter contained a great deal of advice about the story, which is rare and valuable. However. The one thing that bothered me a good deal about it was how very, very strongly the editors disliked the fact that the story had a gay character in it. This bothered me. The character is passively gay, and if you’re not necessarily paying attention, you don’t notice that he’s gay, and your reading of the story isn’t remotely affected by it, I don’t think. That really bothered me.
Today’s thought, which I will share with you before heading off to The Day Job: I am, as it stands, only 23,000 words into my manuscript for From Gray Mists, Returned. I hadn’t checked my word count until recently, and when I saw that it was so low, it alarmed me.
Story wise, this isn’t a problem. Story wise, I’ve got a great deal of story still left to tell, and I’m still expecting about 125,000 words when all is said and done. Probably more, if I do things right. So that’s not the problem. The problem is that I’ve been working on this for quite a while, and I’m not writing nearly as fast as I’d like to be.
While I was sort of gently aware of this, I wasn’t worried until last night, I got up after going to bed, because I had some notes that I had to get out of my head before I could go to sleep. One page of notes was about a short story called The Kiss That Did It* (which is buried somewhere in the Share Your Work section of the Absolute Write forums) and in that page of notes, I fixed the short story. Some people have pointed out that I shouldn’t re-work it, I should just send it out again. I’m of two minds on this subject as well, and now I have a page of notes that would allow me to comfortably turn it into a short story that I would like very much, instead of the current one.
The other page of notes was for an old novel idea that I’ve had bouncing around my head for quite a long time now, which I was just sitting on patiently. I had a solid idea for it, but there was still a spark missing that would ignite the whole thing, and I was willing to wait for it. That page of notes was that spark. Everything fell into place, and now I know exactly what sort of story it is and how to write it. I want to write it. I’m getting exctied about writing it.
Additionally, I have my six-part comic book series Dark which is waiting for me to complete this novel so that I can charge on with it.
You see what worries me, then. I have quite a lot of projects building up, all of which I’m excited about, and I’m starting to realize that if I don’t power my way through the first draft of my novel soon, I’m going to fade out on it, it’s going to rot on the page, I’m going to move, and I won’t be at all happy about it.
What am I doing about this? Well, I don’t know. I think I need someone to nag me. Barring that, I’m thinking about finding a handful of beta readers who are willing to have chunks of the story e-mailed to them every couple of days. I always wrote well for an audience, especially one that provides general feedback now and then. Barring that, I think I need to give my manuscript a hard look, give my life a hard look, and just pick a date (preferably fairly soon) on which I will plan to have reached 100,000 words.
That’s what I’ve got the moment. Now, I have to go figure out what I’ve done with both my shoes, and my tea, either of which normally take a fair amount of effort to find on their own. If you don’t hear back from me, call the police. I will have wandered off and gotten lost.
* Recently, I received a rejection letter for The Kiss That Did It, which I was expecting and wasn’t hugely worried about. I originally intended simply to shelve the story after the rejection letter came in, because I tend to dislike my writing after a few months have passed between us. However, the rejection letter contained a great deal of advice about the story, which is rare and valuable. However. The one thing that bothered me a good deal about it was how very, very strongly the editors disliked the fact that the story had a gay character in it. This bothered me. The character is passively gay, and if you’re not necessarily paying attention, you don’t notice that he’s gay, and your reading of the story isn’t remotely affected by it, I don’t think. That really bothered me.
posted by Pete Tzinski at 6/10/2006 01:56:00 PM
6 Comments:
I commiserate. I should be much farther than I am also. What will you do with The Kiss... now?
They were upset because of a gay character? Who rejected it? I want to know because they'll probably reject my short-story-soon-to-be-novel with the two bisexual characters. Mine doesn't have any really over-the-top stuff either, although it makes little references or euphemisms throughout the story.
This sounds like The Sword Review, which, as you may have heard, rejected an AW member's story because of ONE obscure reference to homosexuality.
It's weird that some people still object to books with gay characters. It's a fact of life there's lots of gay people as well as straight people. Characters in fiction have to have a little variety in personal tastes of partners.
It was the Sword Review, and that AW member was....me. :)
I saw, in their guidelines, that they don't like homosexuality. The reason I sent them the story anyway was specifically because it was obscure enough, you wouldn't necessarily catch it, I thought.
Do you need a nag? I'm very good at it according to my children...I can set up a regular schedule with you :-)
RE the response you got on The Kiss That Did It, amazing how shallow some people are - writing is about reality (yes, sometimes a 'made up' reality, but it has to be grounded in something that will make sense to us Earthlings) and reality is that we are diverse. If the story isn't about homosexuality per se why would that matter? It's a good thing, at least, that the response had great feedback. I shall have to wonder over to SYW and read.
I dismissed a lot of their advice after that mention. Their opinions really didn't impress me much. I had another story that I thought I would send to them, but after that opinion, I shall not do so. Ah well. :)
(oh, and if you want to nag, I'm all for it. Having the Fear Of Dawno put into me would probably have me running off the rest of the novel in a week. ;) )
Works for me. Just PM me when you need an overseer. Btw, saw your post in the AW Addict Support thread, good job!
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