Characteristics of insanity

I know I wrote a post a while ago that touched on this, but it's happening again.

There is seriously a screw loose in my head (well, probably more than one...) that pops up in times of extreme busyness/stress.

When things are piled up so high it's hard to plan out a day, much less a week, my brain decides it's a great time to push everything aside and think about writing.

Is this a strange form of procrastination?

Is it a way to force a mental break?

Or is my brain trying to kill me in a slightly different method?


There are few reasons why I think it might be attempted-suicide-by-brain.

1) It's not just one story. It's all of them, actually. 6 major/full length stories (well, 9 actually, since the 'sort-of-trunked' one was a trilogy). If it was just a single one, I'd be more included to think, "wow, after a good rest/break from that story, I have gained fresh perspective!"

2) It's not just one change, it's many. Thoughts on TRoRS would require me to delete about 1/4-1/3 of the story and go from there. Thoughts on AotD, L&R, and SO would require a complete refocus of each story... too scared to calculate how much re-writing would be required (easily 1/2 of each story)... Thoughts on the trilogy would require rewriting from scratch in a different POV. Thankfully, at only 20-ish-thousand words, the changes to SL would be less... but it's also the one I have the least thoughts on, which means it's the story least worth delving into.

3) I'm still banned from typing. Even just typing out this post has my neck aching, a sharp repetitive stabbing in my rotary cuff, and the fingers of my right hand are starting to hit the wrong keys, or not move at all (due to the shrink-wrapped-fascia tissue in my forearm restricting the tendons that work the fingers).


Yet my brain is full of *ideas* that it wants to get out.


May is going to be an insane month, with the convention and all, so I'm hoping I can mentally sandbag/barricade this tsunami until June 1st.

...we'll see how it goes...

Yeah, I'm kind of slow sometimes

It just hit me, why I'm writing Jay.

'Cause when writing "The Rules of Riding Shotgun", I never really got to write from Jackson's perspective.

And Jay is a lot like Jackson (and it's not just the 'J' name thing*). They are both confident, pushy, and selfish. Their needs come first, always, and if someone can't help them, then that person is disposable.

The reason why I'm saying that I'm slow, is 'cause every time I start a new story, the main aspect of the main character is something I wanted to explore more in whatever I was previously working on.


Project #1 had primarily female characters, and I hated my main female character. Yes, hated. As in, I plotted her destruction daily, but couldn't kill her off since she was (duh) the MC, so instead, she got beaten up a lot by other characters -> so I wanted to write from the male perspective, which I was more comfortable with anyways

Project #2 flipped between two brothers -> I really enjoyed writing from the younger one's perspective, since I had never written a character that young before, plus I knew the narrative was too distant, so I was toying with the idea of trying 1st person for a change, rather than my usual close-3rd POV and seeing how that went.

Project #3 is MG, not YA, 1st person, present tense (also a new/first-time thing for me) -> I wasn't confident I was pulling off a MG voice, and I wanted something more action-y (plot-wise), and I kind of liked how a preteen boys and girls can be nearly interchangeable in a lot of ways, especially since romantic relationships aren't the first thing on their brain when they interact with their peers.

Project #4 I went back to YA, there's a more action-y plot, genderless character who is pretty slow on the whole 'growing up/relationship thing', and I felt confident enough to swap between past/present, and keep it in 1st person -> but I didn't have a good handle on Jackson. Actually, that's still bugging me while I'm editing the 2nd draft. Since the MC is so 'Triss-focused', it's impossible to show Jackson as anything other than how the MC views him as: a dangerous, selfish jerk who is trying to take the MC's place (in a way). Jealousy sure throws up some strong blinders... and it bothers me that I can't show a more objective view of Jackson.

Project #5 I flipped a complete 180. Female MC who makes her choices/mistakes 'cause she loves her sister (not for selfish reasons), there's an actual *romantic* relationship that isn't weird/creepy, and I got to play with my own mythology (which is always awesome)... but then after NaNo was over, I went back to re-read Project #4 with fresh eyes, and all those things I was already thinking about resurfaced, so...

Project #6 has a male character who is similar (personality-wise) to Jackson, and since I'm in his head, I can actually focus on why he does what he does, not trying to pry small details out from an extremely difficult, Triss-obsessed character who only focuses on whether someone is going to hurt them or not. So, (contented sigh) I get to show a more objective view of an unlikable character and (somehow?) make him interesting enough that readers want to follow along on his journey. Although, it would probably be easier to kill him off, like Jackson ;)


See why I say I'm kindof slow? I have this clear pattern... and I only clued in 20 minutes ago as to why I'm writing such a difficult character as Jay.


OH, and after many hours of research**, I know Kell's "real" name now. HINT: it's an Arabic name meaning "good looking/beautiful". Since Jay wants to paint her, I figured that was appropriate.

It was a real pain trying to find a name with the sound 'kell' somewhere inside it, and have it come from the right part of the world.***

I also looked up names for Jay's ex girlfriend and a couple teachers, and chose them 'cause they "fit", not just 'cause I needed a name, and whatever fell off of my fingers and onto the screen was good enough. So that's a first-time thing for me too.


Although, I do realize I wasted hours on this yesterday... which is why I will probably go back to my usual lazy-naming-scheme. After all, I can always change names later :) Heck, that's what I do with titles, so names really aren't any different.



How about you guys? Do you put a lot of thought into your character names? What about weird quirks like my 'J-name' thing?

Do you have strange writing patterns like I do? What inspires you to write a new story, and is it usually the same kind of genre/characters/POV/etc, or do you mix it up?





* I mentioned this a long time ago in another post... but I have the tendency to use a lot of 'J' names. In Project #3, there was a kid names Jack (changed to 'Zach' after I started Project #4), and there are two of them in Project #1... not the MC, but the next important female and the... sort of (but not really) male 'interest'. I seriously can't call him a romantic interest 'cause... well, I just can't.

So far, Projects #2 & #5 are 'J-free', but I'm sure one or two will sneak in there when I'm not looking...

** also known as procrastination

*** Kell almost got a complete background re-write, instead of Arabic/Persian, there was one African name that worked, and like 4 or 5 Hawaiian names. But I'm glad I stuck it out.

Fear & Connection

It's been a while since I wrote a post about writing...

I think the mental exhaustion of so many deaths/funerals is finally lifting a little off my mind.

I had a bit of an epiphany on the drive down to Seattle. Not one of those glorious, "Oh my goodness I understand completely how the physics of the universe works!" kind of thing... no, this was more of a Homer Simpson slap-in-the-forehead "Doh!" moment.

One of the kicking-off-points would be this post on whether the genre you're writing fits you.

Due to all the good feedback I received from agents when I sent out the 10 queries for Simon's Oath last November, I've been thinking hard about why I write the way I do, and why SO wasn't "enough".

And after reading that post on genre, a few things clicked together while on the long, 7-hour trip from Victoria to Seattle. The main being, I've always been scared of first person 'cause I don't want to connect too deeply, which is part of that whole emotional intelligence thing.

So the slap-the-forehead-Doh-moment was the realization that, if I'm afraid to connect deeply with my own characters, then obviously that will come through in the writing, and readers won't be able to connect deeply with my characters.

Yeah, it was a "Doh!" moment indeed.


Now, the funny thing is that I never used to write YA. I started my Project #1 (the one nearly permanently shelved) as a gift for someone else, specifically to write something that person would love. For example, there are a ton on horse/riding references/influences because that person loved (and still loves) riding. The school uniform was based on the traditional riding costume, one character's name is "Roan" (a term for a specific horse colouring), and many other things like that.

I was writing for someone else.

Before that, I used to only write short stories that were dark, twisted, and mired down. Writing was a way to get the bad stuff out of my head so the rest of the time, I could be upbeat and optimistic. Kind of like a literary-cleanse to re-set my brain/emotions ;) Even when I was a young teen, I wrote stories meant for adults with adult characters.

"Brake Fluid", although still a YA story, is certainly way closer to those short stories than to the first YA story I wrote. Unlike SO, I did let myself connect to the nameless/genderless MC.* While I didn't mind connecting with Hector (one of the reasons I started Project #3, to explore another innocent character), Simon was someone I wanted to stay far away from 'cause he just spirals down through the story and I didn't want to be there when he hit rock-bottom and didn't bounce.

While it's out with readers/CP's right now, I'm left wondering if my connecting to the character will make the reader connect more to the character.


Maybe, because I'm afraid to write in first person 'cause I know I'll connect deeply, this is a sign that I should be writing in first person.

Maybe this is a perfect time to feel the fear and do it anyways.


How about you guys? Have you analyzed how/why you write the way you do? Have you always stuck to a similar style/genre of stories? Have there been things you've held off from writing about?

And have you ever had one of those slap-to-the-forehead-Doh-moments that completely changes your perspective on writing?



* Just to be clear, I'm not saying that I'm nameless (well, kindof, at least online) or genderless (female=yes), or that I have been involved in twisted bets where someone ended up dead.

My brain is trying to kill me

So, I seriously think my brain is trying to kill me.

Here's how it begins:

First, I happily confirm to myself that, "I can't do < x >, and that's perfectly okay!"

Then, my sneaky brain gets to work. It pokes and prods and teases. It holds up a shiny new idea and waves it around until I'm thoroughly distracted from whatever I'm currently doing.

...and that shiny new idea always seems to include whatever I had just happily accepted that I couldn't do. Somehow my brain finds the perfect bait, it points to the teeniest loophole it has found and says, "Y'know that < x > thing you said you couldn't do? Well, c'mon, looky here... can't resist now, can ya? I know you wanna give it a try..."

So, a year and a half ago, Project #1 got torn apart (rightly so) by my writing group. I said to myself, "Well, that's the only story idea I had, I guess I can't be a writer, and that's perfectly okay!"

...then I start getting harassed by thoughts/images/scenes from Project #2. My evil brain was keeping me awake until I was nearly insane. Isn't that considered some kind of torture? Sleep depravation? Don't cults use that to bewilder their new recruits? It hasn't water-boarded me yet, but I don't want to take that chance...

I might need a good lawyer to sue for emotional and psychological damages.

So, Project #2 got written, but while it was out with beta-readers this past August, I said to myself, "Well, I guess I can't write 1st person, oh well, that's perfectly okay!"

...and my dastardly brain began to pester me with another story... one where the main character was mute. MUTE! So the only possible way to tell his story was (you guessed it) in 1st person!!

So I thought, "Well, okay, a small child's perspective is pretty tame and he's sort of innocent/calm, the same kind of slow-stories I normally write. I still can't write a tension-filled first-person voice with, like, murder and stuff."

Groan... do you see where this is going? So, Project #4... and just to throw in an extra monkey-wrench, the character is freaking genderless. Really brain? Really? What have I done to make you hate me so much?

So why am I talking about my murderous brain?

Oh my goodness... there might actually be a semi-normal boy/girl relationship in Project #5!

I swear I haven't been replaced by a dopple-ganger, it's only my brain trying to kill me.

I'm not a romantic, either in real life, or in my writing.

This has been, like, my kryptonite for as long as I have ever been writing. I have never remotely been interested in, or considered writing, a story with romantic sub-plots. I often joke that my attempting to do so might be one of the signs of the coming apocalypse (hey, it is 2012).

I was writing a scene and I suddenly stopped and went, "Oh crap..." 'cause there it was, a romantic relationship on the horizon, like when you've already stepped off the curb and your centre of gravity is pulling you down... and then you notice the puddle under your feet... the moment it's too late to avoid it.

Do you have any idea how disturbing this revelation was?!?! I could almost hear the diabolical laughter ringing through my synapses as my brain chortled with glee.

I swear, after this point, I will never say, "I can't do < x >, and that's okay!" ever again 'cause I know that's like feeding a straight-line to my evil, evil brain and it will then mercilessly plot against me.

Seriously, anyone know a good lawyer?

...and you do know I'm totally joking, right? Truly, I think I just enjoy making things difficult on myself. Stubbornness, plain and simple. I hate giving up.

Does your brain try to kill you in nefarious ways? Ever hopped on board to try something you never thought you would do, either in writing or real life? What's the craziest thing you've ever tried?

Gruelling marathon, short distant sprint, or capture-the-flag in the dark?

Show of hands:

Which sounds the most fun?

Anyway you look at it, writing is a long-haul, from the first moment of story-conception, through the long hours of typing, the cringing, self-torture of proof-reading your first-draft, that first stage of editing, the handing it to CP's to slash apart your pretty bows and neat plot-points.

...then more editing, and if you're lucky, you round the track and hit the gravel trail of querying which is another trek in itself... and let's not even talk about all the stages necessary to get from agent to shelf.

But you also get those nice, short sprints, right? Where your lungs are burning, but you can see the goal line of a finished scene before you, or hitting a daily/weekly word-count high.

Sure, it's a lot of hard business and serious work and sacrifices, like sleep, and family, and uhm, actual human interactions...

I think we should all have more fun, though.

I don't know if you guys are like me, but I think I have a pretty good idea about what my writing weaknesses and strengths are.

I'm not saying I'm 100% right... but I think I know. I have some awareness about what I struggle with and what flows with not a lot of effort. And the parts that come naturally, well, you start to get a kind of confidence from that. The weaknesses, you kinda laugh and push them a little off to the side so they won't be staring at you quite so directly.

Well, I do.

And the main reason I do push them out-of-sight-out-of-mind is 'cause they're not fun.

But there's probably something interesting about them, if I looked hard enough, from a different angle, or maybe trying to turn off all the lights and attempting to build a helicopter out of Lego in the pitch dark... oh wait... straying off topic...

Okay, the Lego helicopter came up 'cause my little nephew always says, 'Build me this!' And I go, 'I don't wanna!'

Real mature, I know, but he's only 4.5, so what can you do?

Building helicopters are boring. I'll do it to please him, but I build 'em fast and really don't care when he smashes it to bits three seconds later. I rush and have little-to-no emotional investment in whether it lives or dies. Like writing a scene simply to transition to a better scene that I actually want to write. It's never going to be good if I'm just trying to get it over with.

So, what do you do to make writing more fun for yourself?

I put in a lot of small details that make me laugh. Like the reason behind Simon's name and then challenging myself to never use the phrase, 'Simon said'. In one of my stories, there's a stuffed cow named Melvastyke (pronounced mel-vah-steek). The same stuffed cow that still sits on my bed (husband permitting, well, tolerating) that I've had since I was thirteen. I throw in prime numbers and perfect numbers, I make vague references to weird math-things, like phi, the number by which you calculate a spiral. In Project #5, I plan to sneak in a sort-of-mention of Schrodinger's Cat.

Sometimes I simply designate one sense per character. That character's descriptions/experiences will only ever use that one sense. I do this with colours, too, or images/associations.

There are an obscene number of sly references to my cat...*

And I'm trying to think up the oddest combinations of food for Triss to eat.

Having these things keeps the story fun for me, no matter how many times I go through and re-write, cut, change, etc.

My writing group (unknowingly) are also part of my game. When they make suggestions or ask questions, I remember those things. I read through the text and go, "oh, I purposefully used the word 'rend' here, 'cause of J's last story" and, "here's the part where L smacked me over the head 'cause I was being an idiot. Then she told me how to fix the problem and totally saved me."

I can read a line and recall who patiently re-wrote it on the page so I finally understood what an umbrella pronoun is, or which muddied-description became clear after all the baggage was stripped away.

And it becomes a game of capture-the-flag because every word, every phrase, every sentence has a history, a memory and often a reason to laugh.

Sometimes all you need for a little staying power is making a game. Who says you can't hide a few flags in your work? If that'll motivate you to keep going, to keep it fresh and fun and excited as you work through the text over and over and over again, then do it!



*No, I'm not a crazy cat-lady, despite the evidence...

NaNo, Day 17

...oh my goodness, day 17 already? (please, please don't ask about my word-count...)

One thing I'm super happy about today... 'Hundred Thousand Kingdoms' by NK Jemisin is finally available via Kindle for Canadians!! ...and I just bought it!

I'm serious... like, two years ago one of my writing buddies told me I had to read this book. She had read... pieces of Project #1 (but parts of the second book) and said it reminded her of Hundred Thousand Kingdoms. Ever since I got my Kindle, I have been checking like, once a month, and even after it was available on Kindle... it was not available for Canadians...

I've never read a lot of fantasy books, even though that's what I started out writing. So, as a new writer and as a non-reader of fantasy, I kind of made a list of what I didn't want to read and asked for recommendations from other writer friends.

Some of the things I didn't want were*:

- farm boy realizes he's the chosen one and goes out to save the world
- big-bad-evil dukes it out with ultimate-good-guy+friends
- elves, wizards, orcs, dragons, etc, etc, etc
- magic that kindof saves everything and is basically a bunch of shouted Latin or other dead language
- medieval setting

I'm sure there was more on my list, but those were the basic ones. So, I got introduced to a lot of authors I didn't like, and a few I really liked/like. I got introduced to the show 'Firefly' the same way, well, technically the movie 'Serenity'. Supposedly one of my main characters (also from Project #1) was... eerily similar to the character River in the movie. And after seeing it, I realized immediately why the buddy would think so (and not just 'cause my character's name also starts with an 'R').

So, even though these weren't direct influences on my writing, it was pleasantly surprising for me to know there were similar things out there in the wide, wide world... and that people actually liked them!

Honestly, I get worried, like everyday, whether what I enjoy writing is commercially viable at all. And by that, I don't mean sell-a-million-copies... I mean, other people actually find what I write interesting.

It's the concern that freezes me up and makes me look for anything to distract me from writing. Anything.

I don't write big-exciting-stories, I write quiet ones. Like, contemporary YA style, but within a fantastical world with no magic or actual bad-guys. So, Speculative YA, I suppose, but perhaps even a little quieter. If this was manga, you could call my genre 'slice of life'. Out of any writer in the world, I think my style of story-telling is closest to Banana Yoshimoto. If you've ever read any of her works, you'll notice right away that none of the action takes place on the pages. Usually it has already happened (a death, divorce, etc) and the actual story is about the characters dealing with the aftermath.

So, yes, there are nasty things happening all around my characters, but they ultimately aren't going to be solving any of the greater problems... they just want to survive the best they can. You could call them incredibly self-absorbed (since they have no interest in changing the world), or you could consider them to be incredibly self-aware... in that, they realize they can't change anything big, so they focus on the things they do have influence over.

...and I think perhaps this is why I'm currently stuck on my NaNo novel. There's a death at the centre of the story, and I haven't settled on why the death happened. Each time I think, "Oh, what if <x> happened..." I almost immediately discount it because the consequences are suddenly too far-reaching from the boundaries of the story, so it feels wrong. And I'm not interested in those consequences. The death of Jackson, like the decaying civilization in 'Simon's Oath', impacts the characters choices/growth/etc, but ultimately, it's not what the story is about.

So, instead of writing, I have been browsing the Kindle store, digging up my front lawn, giving my dog a bath, cutting the cat's nails and brushing him, re-potting indoor plants, splitting/hauling in firewood (oh! We lost power last night for a few hours and it was AWESOME!!) and things like that.

I'm hoping that taking a short break from this story will help me figure out where it needs to go.

...and no, I'm not going to read the book I just bought. I'm trying to hold it back as a post-NaNo-reward.

How about you guys? Anyone else fighting with a story right now? Or something else?


*The reason I actually started writing in the first place was 'cause a girl I used to babysit (and still hang out with on occasion) was a really big reader of fantasy and complained to me that it was all farm-boys-saving-the-world, that the world and races were always similar and that there were no good female main characters kicking-butt and saving others. So, Project #1 was intended to just be a fun gift for her to read and enjoy... and then I sort of fell in love with writing. That's also why Project #1 took place in a high-school, 'cause she had just started high-school... not 'cause I was trying to write the next Harry Potter (which I also had not read).

Protecting what you love

No, this isn't a campaign against the (brilliant) advice to kill your darlings...

I think, especially for writers who have never had their work torn apart by CP's or beta-readers, this topic is important.

There's a difference between killing your darlings and killing what you love about your story. A 'darling' is when you love a specific string of words on the page. What 'you love about your story' is the heart of it, why you wrote it, the *idea* behind it, the parts that get your excited/passionate about the story and the characters.

I've written about my thoughts on beta-reading before.

The key point of that post was to suggest that beta-readers keep three things in mind:

1) what they, as a reader, want
2) what the author wants
3) what the story wants

...and this is especially true if you, as a beta-reader, are suggesting significant changes, or, as a writer, your CP or beta-reader has suggested big changes.

Let's use my own writing as an example. Project #1, which no one (other than my writing group) is familiar with.

It's on hold for the moment because my group suggested I re-write the entire first 1/3 of the story. Well, they were more detailed than that... essentially, there were a number of problems:

- I was *telling* them at the beginning that Jess behaves like 'A', but on the page, she was behaving like 'B' the entire time (so, no transition)
- Because of this, it made no logical sense for Jess to bring Roan into the group
- Jess also had little-to-no power within the group dynamic (which contradicted some plot points)
- So it made much more sense for a different character, Ray, to bring Roan in
- But Ray's backstory/etc would then need to change, and that would change later plot points as well as other character dynamics... which then snowballed...

...and that's why it's been set aside for now :)

When you actually get down to it, probably about 1/2 the story will have to be re-written. But that's what the story wants. I, the writer, didn't necessarily want it... and my writing group disagreed strongly (with each other) how to handle the problems they uncovered... one suggested I keep the plot as-is, but re-write/re-imagine Jess so she was 'B' the entire time. That was what she, as a reader, wanted. And though that would have worked and could have been what the story wanted, it wasn't what I, the writer, wanted.

Jess's transformation from 'A' to 'B' was one of the major things I loved about the story, and I was (am?) willing to re-write half the book to make that happen.

Jess's character arc through the story is not a 'darling'. It's at the heart of what's important. I may love a lot of the scenes with her in them, but I'm willing to dump/delete/re-write them without a second-thought. Even huge parts of the plot can be discarded/changed because staying true to the characters is far more important to me.

As a writer, and as a beta-reader, you must be aware of the story's *heart*.

As a beta-reader, you may uncover a huge problem, but be careful how to point it out and suggest solutions. If you don't understand the *heart* of the story, ask questions. Don't assume you know the writer's intention because, without meaning to, you might destroy what they love about their story or make them feel it is not worth pursuing/re-writing. That's not your judgement to make.

As a writer, think about what you are willing to change, but more importantly, think about what you're not willing to change. Usually the *heart* of the story is emotional and has to do with how you perceive a character, or a certain relationship between two (or more) characters. If your CP or beta-reader tells you it's not working, don't shut them down, and don't just rewrite it like they suggest. Talk to them. Tell them your intention and find out what actually worked and what didn't.

As a writer, the entire story is in your head, but a lot of it may not have made it onto the page. Often, it's what you didn't write that's the problem.

Don't get attached to your words and dig your heels in. It's far more important to get attached to the *heart* of the story, for that is what readers will remember, not a clever turn-of-phrase on page 187.

Don't mock me

Okay, I admit it... I'm watching Tangled (the Disney movie) for like the dozenth time.

I re-watch movies a lot... especially animations. I love watching the sub-characters and concentrating on what they're up to in the background while the main characters are living their own tale.

Books too, I'm a re-reader. The main reason is because, not only am I a speed reader, but 'cause I'm dyslexic, I tend to miss stuff the first time around. I like to re-read, 'cause I always find something new and interesting... just like re-watching an animation to concentrate on the background things. Seriously, I'm even curious about the effects like leaves, water, grass, etc. 'cause every tiny seemingly insignificant element, movement or object are deliberate, unlike live action where there can be unexpected variables.

So that's all fine and good, but what does this have to do with writing? 'Cause you know I'll inevitably lead it back to that...

Well, I'm very interested in the re-read potential of the stories I write.

Okay, that sentence sounds a little weird, but it's still true.

Like 'easter eggs' on a dvd, I like learning about little details that authors intentionally put in their writing, 'cause it's normal for people to attach significance to certain things. It not only helps you remember facts, but it plays a large part in organizing your world-view, and therefore, the way someone writes. And it's always different for everyone.

Two things in my writing that are always more than what they seem are colours and numbers.

As a personal tidbit, I'm particularly fond of the number thirteen 'cause it's my birthdate :) ...next month, actually, which is why I also have a special place in my heart for the number nine, outside of the fact that √9 = 3, so 9 is a square number. Thirteen is also the most classic unlucky number, which revs my under-dog spirit into overdrive. I get particularly excited/hyper when my birthday falls on a Friday the 13th.


Is it weird that a dyslexic person is so interested in numbers? Probably... because I suck at math. Yup, it's the second lowest grade I ever received in school (the lowest being French). Languages and math are the two subjects that, no matter what I did, no matter how hard I worked or memorized lectures, I could not overcome my disability. And that's why they have special significance. The two subjects I couldn't find a work-around for. French, I re-took in University. I couldn't gradate with an Honours degree without having a second language, and I succeeded at that. Well, barely. Math... well, I had to claim it in a different way. So as a result, numbers always show up in my stories.


In Project #1, everything important is tied to a prime number (sorry I'm such a nerd). Prime numbers mean the world makes sense, so when there isn't a prime number, it's like a subtle hint. Thirteen columns, five compass points, four wings in a school, all the numbers are what they are for a very specific reason. Nothing is simply a number chosen by random.

In Project #2, the main superstition of the glass city is tied to Phi (the number which is used to calculate a spiral which occurs in nature, like a spiral seashell). In Project #3, the repetition of the number two is very important to the final *reveal* (which I only figured out last week).

As for colours, grey shows up numerous times (okay, I know grey is not technically a colour), as does red... but I'm not going to reveal my thoughts on those two colours. In the strange inner-workings of my brain, yellow and green are *happy colours*, orange is calming and blue hypes me up. Black is a colour of wildness & passion. White is not a colour of purity... rather, it is a blank canvas waiting to take on the appropriate colour(s). Take that as you may, and if you've read my SSS page (or the individual SSS posts), the fact that Faith wears a white nightgown is not by chance. That the floor tiles in her room are alternating grey and red, is also not by chance. Her bedroom door is also grey. Red and grey also show up in Project #3 along with yellow. Yellow and green are of special significance in Project #1, as are red and white (in that specific combination).

A single number or a single colour can pack a huge amount of significance into seemingly unimportant line of description.

There are many key things I add into my writing, sometimes intentionally, and sometimes they just appear without prior planning. The way I view colour often determines my character's hair colours, as does my obsession with numbers plays a key role in setting, world building or significant points in a character's life. I always love it when a particularly devoted reader picks up on the repetition/importance of these things, just like I love discovering new layers when I re-read a book or watch a movie, though I doubt anyone would pick up on the prime number thing (or much of the other stuff) if I didn't mentioned it. Oh well, at least I'm having fun, right?

I'm curious, what items/things do you wrap with significance in your own writing?

...and yes, I'm aware I'm a little bit crazy.

Something a little different 3

Okay, this last post is going to be a bit of a hodge-podge, and by the time it goes up, I should be home from my little vacation.

By the way, if you double-click any of these (or the previous posted ones) you can see them full size. If you do that, you can totally tell which ones I kept the original pencil lines and which ones I re-drew in Photoshop (if you're interested in that kind of nerdy thing).

Since I use the black cat as my profile picture , here's a *visual interpretation* of what I look like. My hair is naturally blonde and every two-three years I get it hacked off until it's only about an inch long at the back. I do this 'cause I donate my hair to the Wigs for Kids program, and they need a minimum of 10-12" to make a wig. Right now it's nearly long enough to cut. I'll probably do it in the fall sometime before the static-y winter weather causes my hair to devour my head.

 To graduate from the Classical Animation Masters Program, each student had to complete a 1.5 minute short animation. These are some sketches from when I was working out the main character in my short. The final product looked a little different, but these are from when I was getting close. Instead of telling a story, I animated the siamese kitten playing with a catnip mouse, and the whole thing was timed to the *diva* song from The Fifth Element.

 One of the many assignments... this was from a Character Design class where we had to design a villain. Now, I'm not much for the evil-dark-lord wanting to take over the universe, so mine was a computer nerd named Kraig who would use his evil knowledge of technology to try to take over the school. I had fun. I still love his buggy fish eyes and his weird jowls. And the fact that when he stands, it looks like he's got a stick up his butt. Oh, his nemesis was a skater-chick who had similarly strange hair. I did a short animation (like, 10 seconds long) of her snowboarding, not for an assignment, just 'cause I wanted to.

Another class assignment, this time for the Digital Animation Program. This is a ship I built in SoftImage XSI, then exported it into Maya 3d to texture/animate. When you work with 3d models, you usually keep the poly count down while working on it (which is why it looks sharp/boxy) otherwise it uses too much RAM and the program can crash. You increase the poly-count just before you render, which essentially smoothes/rounds everything out. Probably this isn't a big deal now-a-days, but back when I made this, it was a major problem. My favourite part is the crazy multi-level wings.

Now this is something I made quite recently... like, last year sometime. Y'know how some books have images at each chapter break? Well, this is the chapter break image I created for Project #1.

It's based on a ribbon eel. Google it. They are awesome. And don't ever ask me about salt water fish or koi, 'cause I'll keep talking 'till your ears bleed.

'cause I'm
O.B.S.E.S.S.I.V.E.
(seriously)

This is also one of the few things I've done where I love every line, every shape, every speck of negative space. Okay, there's one thing I would change... the spot where the back leg touches the body/wing is slightly too pointy.

One benefit from classical animation training is you get used to drawing the same thing over and over and over and over again, 'cause you're drawing an image for every frame, and there's 24 or 30 frames per second. Then add on all the extra layers for background/foreground, other characters, things the characters interact with... and so on, and so forth...

...see why I have no problem working hard on edits/re-writes? I know some people can't stand the refining process, but I think my favourite part of drawing is also my favourite part of writing... cleaning up the lines.

sorry, that was a bad joke ;)

Something a little different 1

Since I'm on holidays, I wanted to do something a little different. Usually I talk about writing, or something that somehow relates back to writing.

Last week I posted about reading, so this week, I'm going to talk about drawing.

I've mentioned in the past the reason I got interested in animation. When I quit university and joined a technical school for animation, I did a classical animation program (this means everything is hand-drawn) and a digital animation program (everything is created in the computer with models). I truly only loved doing classical animation, but due to the scarcity of jobs, I took the second program. I didn't love it. Well, I loved creating the models and animating them, but I hated texturing and lighting.

While I was unpacking stuff at the witch's hut, I found a hard-drive with all my old animation files. Maybe at some point I'll throw a couple of the short animations online and post links, but not today :)

In the last few years, I regret that I have not drawn as much as I would like. Writing has taken over as my major outlet, but that doesn't mean I've completely stopped. I've done a ton of quick sketches that I give a 10-minute clean-up/colour job in Photoshop (one really crappy one I posted for Dead Monkey Day). I don't spend a whole lot of time on them, so there are always lines I hate, shapes that just a little *off*, but they're just for fun, so I don't stress over it. Most of them look something like this:

Roan from Project #1 getting advice from a character in a CP's story. I was playing with softer shadows/shading, but I didn't like the final result. I prefer the sharp/strong contrasting shadows of the following ones:

Someone wanted a cute picture for their MSN profile. My favourite part is the two antenna. The hands are pretty cute too.

someone I know online posted a picture of themselves with an evil, plotting smirk... 

...and I just had to draw it... though I was scolded 'cause I originally coloured the eyes wrong, so I had to go back and change them from blue to green.

All this kind of stuff is my fast, fall-back drawing style, well, the oval shaped noses, the simple eyes, the hard shadows and exaggerated proportion of head to body. I think I spent the most time on the middle one, making the planet-pillow look cool.

Where am I?

Funny how just after I finished writing a post on voice, I should flip to my dashboard and read this awesome post.

Go, read it.

Seriously...

Are you back?

Here's the part I especially wanted to highlight:

One thing I need to understand in order to make my characters breathe on the page is what piece of me is in that character. What of my own core emotional truths does this character have? This is usually the key for me to an authentic character voice.

The truth is, pieces of ourselves show up in all our work. I have been surprised many times by unplanned pieces of me that show up on the page, usually spotted long after the book went to print and I acquired some distance from the story. Since this happens even when we don’t intend it to, we might as well consciously choose which parts we include and let them do some of the heavy lifting for us.

But how do we consciously develop our characters’ voice?

Well, if voice is an author’s core emotional truths and personal wisdom, combined with their use of language, then to evoke a real-seeming, authentic character we need to understand their emotional truths, personal wisdom, and use of language. And while some of ourselves will be in them, they will in large part be wildly different from us, not unlike how kids have some of their parents in them, but are also their own unique selves.

This is something I've *known*, but not known. It's great to have other voices, other writers out there to translate a vague feeling in your head/heart into something concrete.

If you've beta-read for any first-time-writers before, you're probably familiar with authors who write themselves into their story as the main character. Usually it's a wish-fulfilment sort of book where everything turns out alright in the end.

I've been asked before which character is *me* in my first book (Project #1), and I've always felt like I was lying when I would say none of them are. Because parts of them are me. Even the most ruthless, obsessive and abusive characters. I wouldn't have been able to write any of them unless I understood them, or at least understood the jumping-off-point from which their characters/personalities suddenly boomed out of control. I can look at every character, even the small, side ones who never get a name or a line of dialogue, and *know* them. I can slip into their skins when they throw other nameless characters off a roof, when they devour their classmates, or when they light someone on fire... just for the fun of it.

But none of them are me.

...did you just breathe a little sigh of relief? I swear, I'm not a cannibal. I don't even like pork.

So how much of yourself goes into your characters? Do you agree with the linked post, or not? What are your thoughts on slipping into a character's skin?

Symbolism. I needed a little help...

Alright, so I'm a self-admitted over-thinker, right?

So why didn't I put this thought together (on the actual front page of my blog):

I favour survival-of-the-fittest worlds, and I won't lie, there is always a literary seasoning on top.

...with the fact that Project 1 & Project 2 both take place in desert settings...

...until I read the following selection from this blog article on drought:

Mood: Water is one of our most basic needs. When it stops appearing in the form of regular rainfall, and existing water slowly starts to disappear, desperation is spawned. People turn anxious as they wonder when it will rain again and if it will happen before the crops fail or grocery bills skyrocket or someone's future disintegrates. Because it is entirely out of our control, drought also can produce a sense of helplessness.

Symbolism: Need, desperation, survival of the fittest, barrenness, failure

Project 1 and Project 2 are both set in deserts. Both stories take place in extreme survival-of-the-fittest type worlds, although in both cases, access to clean drinking water is one of the few things the characters don't have to worry about. In Project 1 and Project 2, even though drought is not directly influencing the characters... the desert setting implies the same characteristics/symbolism of drought.

...and I didn't even put this together until reading that article...

So, now I'm thinking hard about the setting of Project 3, which is never specified directly, but takes place in a setting similar to where I live on the west coast of Canada. Rain is heavy and ever-present in the dull grey overcast skies. A sunny day can feel like a miracle, an unexpected chance, a new beginning.

Now read over my *blurb* or Project 3 and tell me if the implied meaning/symbolism of that setting fits with the story.

Sometimes it just takes another person's thoughts to click two things together for you.

I wrote, it sucked, I wrote some more

I read this today. The article is good, about hard-work, diligence and not giving up.

But this paragraph in particular struck a chord:

Years ago, I wrote a novel and it sucked. I wrote another one, it sucked a little less. I wrote another one, and was almost there, and then, I wrote a fourth one. It was different.

I've heard/read this so many times. Write a story, it sucks, write a new story, it sucks a little less... and so on and so forth.

Am I wrong to think that any story is redeemable with enough work?

If you've looked at all at my 'what I'm working on' page, you'll notice that it starts with Project #2, next is Project #3, and finally Project #1 is the last one on there.

Project #1 was my first *book*. I wrote the first draft in 2004 when (newly-married) I had just moved to Calgary, Alberta where I knew absolutely no one and worked in a satellite office by myself. I was lonely, I was bored, and because I was in the satellite office instead of the main office, the work that found its way to me was about half of what it had been. To keep myself sane, I started writing.

And yes, it sucked.

I re-wrote it, scene by scene (I jumped all around) and it got better. I put it aside when I moved back to the west coast about a year later, back into the main office. I picked away at the story in little chunks, only when I felt like I wanted to work on it or when an idea was keeping me awake at nights. And yes, it still sucked. Then I moved onto Vancouver Island and about 8 months after living there, quit my job and went to finish my university degree. During that time, I picked away at the story. I re-wrote parts here and there. I even joined a critique group.

And the story sucked a little less. Then I put it aside going into my fourth year of university. I was offered a fully paid for spot in the Masters program and, a week before classes began, had to bow out due to health problems.

And I picked up the story again. I re-joined my critique group and they agreed with me that it sucked a LOT less than when they had previously read a few chapters. I finished my edits, I handed the whole thing over and they tore it apart about a year ago. I put the story aside and wrote a new one (Project #2).

But that isn't the end of Project #1. Instead of writing story after story and learning something new each time, I re-worked the same one over and over again. I looked at it like practicing letters on a slate tablet. I could practice my craft, re-working the same thing (well, the same characters and mostly the same plot) over and over again until I could recognize my mistakes, my errors in pacing, my tendency to flip into different character's heads within the same scene (a leftover from my animation training, I am sure), and everything else.

I hate not finishing something. I hate not following through on what I've started or promised.

I'm sure I could have abandoned Project #1 and written a slew of bad novels between then and now, but I'm glad I stuck with it because I can clearly see the advancement in my own work. I can go back to that first draft, or a draft from two years ago and compare them. I've worked on this story so long and so hard that I learned to be ruthless. I learned to break down scenes or characters I loved, tear away my emotional attachment to them, and re-write them into something better.

When I finally needed a true break from the story and started Project #2, I didn't just see a little bit of advancement. It was like a babbling child reciting a line of poetry, or the old adage of 1000 monkeys eventually typing  the works of Shakespeare (yes, the inspiration for this blog title).

To me, writing is not about talent or some kind of mystical muse. Writing is about a lot of hard work. Perhaps a little more because I'm dyslexic. Writing was not originally about loving to tell stories or escaping into wonderful imagined worlds. It was about hiding the fact that there was something wrong with me. It was about not having my teachers mock me in class and make me re-write my schoolwork on the blackboard in front of my jeering peers. Writing was my own personal battle to first become average, and then to become better than average, then finally to become the best.

...and I'm still working.

Maybe I feel so strongly about not giving up on first drafts 'cause I know I could have given up on myself when I learned there was something wrong with me. I've seen it. Kids (and adults) who wear their disabilities like badges of merit, they flash it around, they demand they be treated differently, to be given extra consideration. They snarl at the *averages*, complain how their lives have been so difficult, and condescend when someone else mentions a difficulty that seems *minor* in comparison to their own. Just this weekend, I heard someone say they, 'played the dyslexic card' to get out of doing something...

I hate this. I hate the attitude of victimhood, no matter what the situation.

Why can't we strive to be something better? Something more than what we are? Why can't we reach higher instead of dragging others down just so we can step on their backs and feel better about ourselves?

I remember a scene from a book called 'The Lily Theatre', which was about a girl growing up in China during the time of Chairman Mao. In the scene, the girl is being taught Math by an ex-professor in one of the work camps. He says that only in China can the number 6 can be greater than 10. Basically, he was referring to how in the university/school systems, the lower teachers would denounce the respected teachers so they could take their place.

I don't want to compete with other writers. I don't want to trash their books, their first drafts, their ideas, just to make myself feel better. My blog name doesn't only have to do with diligence and not giving up, it also reminds me that I am just one of many. One nameless monkey typing on a keyboard. It is not one monkey that writes the works of Shakespeare, it's the combined effort of all of them.

Okay, that was really long and rambly.

Edits, New Writing and Taking a Break

Since I started this blog (not long ago) I've been trying to find and read blogs of other writers, or those who travel within the writing/editing/publishing sphere. I have never had much interest in blogs before, other than keeping up with a few of my writing friends that I already know quite well.

I ran across this (older) blog entry yesterday and it got me thinking about a previous entry I wrote about weeds and avoiding edits.

Writing for me is not an outlet that I escape into.

I need to escape from my own writing.

Don't get me wrong, I love writing and editing, otherwise I wouldn't do it in the first place, but I find writing to be intense. Sometimes it feels unbearably heavy, like being dragged down into dark water.

Let me say again, I love writing, I just always write extremely dark worlds and even darker characters. No, I don't write horror, I don't write suspense or murder mysteries. I don't read them either.

For years I haven't been able to think of a category that my writing fits into. I was devouring the short stories of Edgar Allen Poe and Franz Kafka before I was ten. I read Bram Stoker's Dracula about a dozen times before I became a teenager and I read Mary Shelly's Frankenstein so long ago that I barely even remember what it's about. When I was fourteen, I read The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner three times in a row without taking a break. My favourite books, that I have read and re-read, are ones I hesitate when recommending books to people because they are so incredibly dark. ...and I haven't included them in my profile, so don't bother checking :)

Now, after saying all of that, what I do write is YA.

Project #1, that I referred to in the Weeds post as one I'm avoiding at the moment, is incredibly dark. It takes place in a survival-of-the-fittest world. The characters are going to a school where kids have to form packs/alliances because other students might very well drag them into the desert and devour them (literally, not figuratively). Injures, broken bones, nearly being beaten to death, these are all things the teachers ignore because students are expected to take care of themselves. They're at the school because they are strong, they are there to get stronger, and even their alliances with other students are filled with mistrust and fear.

Add on top of this that I have a large cast, essentially 7 main characters, all with their own issues and character arcs.

...and that this is the first of three books set in this world. The first draft for the first story is done, the second two are roughed out with major scenes written, often in point form, but all the planning is there.

When I start working on this story, on this world, it's exhausting and it sucks up every bit of my energy and attention. I forget to eat. I can't sleep. The dog needs to practically climb onto my lap to remind me that she exists and that she doesn't have the brain power to comprehend indoor plumbing. The number of characters, the darkness of the world, the complicated arcs that extend over all three stories... I have to escape from it or it will swallow me whole.

I don't consider this to be procrastination and I'm not avoiding it 'cause I'm afraid of tearing it apart, hacking off scenes or re-writing entire characters.

Thankfully, how I escape is to write (or work on edits) for other stories. I can take my much-needed mental break, yet I am still improving my writing skills, still getting new words down and letting my brain reset.

I just wish I could somehow reset my own brain so I can writing lighter stories/characters :)

Weeds

I've been out all morning doing spring cleaning, picking up branches, edging, mowing the lawn and weeding the garden.

Weeding is a job I absolutely hate even though I love having a garden. I tend to ignore it... out of sight out of mind, right? Until one day I go out and there is no garden, there is only a large patch of weeds. As I'm standing there, one thought runs through my mind.

I should tear everything out, spray weed killer and then go and hide in the house until everything is dead and I can start over from scratch.

Real mature, I know.

Then I look to the corner where I know all those beautiful lilies I planted last year will come up soon. Or they might be up already and are simply lost among the ugly weeds. I find where the plants should be that my mom dug up from her own garden and gave to me... the Solomon's Seal, the irises and those bright yellow flowers that I love, but can never remember the name of. Somewhere in the mess is the white Bleeding Hearts plant that took me two years to finally find, the Trillium bulbs (my favourite flower) and the black and green Gladiolas that I bought and gave half the bulbs to my sister so we both have the same flower.

And I give in.

I know that no matter how much I don't want to, I'm going to put on my gloves and dig out every last growing thing that I don't want in my garden because there are a precious few things that I do want and I can't give up on them.

I've been thinking about weeds a lot lately because I am alternating between writing a new story (project #3) and working on re-writes for a story I started about a year ago (project #2). I started that project #2 so I could avoid doing re-writes on another story (project #1), promising myself that when I finished the first draft of project #2, I would go back and do my re-writes on project #1. So I finished project #2, my writing group tore it apart about a month ago and I was all ready to go back to project #1.

...and then I started writing project #3.

I know project #1 is absolutely packed full of weeds. Whenever I open the file, I sit there and one horribly familiar thought runs through my mind...

But I also know that there are treasures hidden within that mess, things I love that I don't want to give up on. So maybe when I'm done with my spring cleaning outside, I might open project #1 and read through it once to see if I can see past the weeds.