Tag: writing habits

Writing again…sort of

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I think it’s time to start writing again. The itch to do so has been constant lately.

Even though I’m working on Theadia (and doing a soft-start for the remaster of The Persistence of Memories), I’ve been itching to just write something new. I’m not sure what just yet, and I’m not going to force it. That, and I’ve sort of resurrected some of my writing habits again — noting word count in the small black moleskine calendar notebook, for instance. I’m not doing it every day of course, I’m merely entering it every now and again when the thought and the temptation strikes.

I know I talk about this here every now and again, and I admit sometimes I’m like a broken record (a skipping cd? a corrupted FLAC?) but it’s been an ongoing process that needs constant adjustment and tweaking. We writers sometimes get all meta about our process and it’s usually because we’re trying to figure out why our processes are the way they are, why they sometimes no longer work, and what we need to do to change them. That kind of thing never ends, I’m afraid, but it’s something I’m used to at this point.

As always, it’s just a matter of doing it. Once I start, the rest comes easier.

Somewhere in between

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I’m kind of in an interstitial space right now creatively, I think. I’ve mentioned before that I’ve stopped performing a lot of the habits I’d had over the last several years in Spare Oom — the whiteboard schedule, the logging of the word count, writing at 750Words, and so on. The main reason I stopped is that I wanted a fresh start here at the New Digs. For the most part it’s been a positive choice as I haven’t felt the stress of not hitting scheduled goals. It’s helped me focus on current projects with more clarity.

Not that I’m complaining, however. I like being here at this time, because it means that I’m breaking away from old habits and yet to forge new ones. I’m allowing myself to try new things and approach current projects in a slightly different way. Perhaps this is why I’m also allowing myself to indulge in a wave of comic reading on Hoopla these last several weeks…I get to try something new, see what inspires me.

I’ll be honest, I do occasionally feel the temptation to fire up the 750Words or do a bit of journaling, but I’ve been responding to that with well, you don’t HAVE to if you don’t really want to. Which, to me, means that if the only reason I want to do any of that is out of a sense of missing it, then I probably shouldn’t waste my time. If I’m going to return to the daily words or the journaling or anything else, I want to have a good creative reason. For the moment, I don’t want to split up my concentration on anything that’s mere folly right now, not when I want to put as much focus as I can on the Theadia project.

I suppose if this stage is anything like the one I had during the Belfry Years, this will (hopefully) mean that a lot of positive creativity will soon come out of it.

Going deep again…?

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Whenever I think about the Bridgetown Trilogy and the Mendaihu Universe, I almost always wonder if I’ll ever get around to writing something with that level of worldbuilding. Theadia certainly comes close, but that project’s a different beast altogether. While it certainly has an ensemble cast and multiple worlds, it doesn’t have its own conlang or its own highly detailed mythos. It’s a big story, but it’s not a part of a bigger universe like the MU is.

The MU is still alive and kicking somewhere in the back of my thoughts, and I still want to write more stories in that universe, but I’ve come to the realization that if I’m going to do it right, I’m going to have to go in deep once more. And I’m perfectly willing to do that once I allow myself to take that dive again. [And I will not complain one bit if that includes the music side of things, mixtapes and all. That was one of the best parts of the project!]

As you may remember, I deliberately chose to bounce away from that kind of thing because, up to 2015, that’s pretty much all I knew in terms of novel writing projects. Everything had to be a full-immersion, years-long intensity, and I needed not to do that for a while. I needed to know how to write something standalone and concise. Partly to prove to myself that I could do it, and partly because I knew that not all of my newer story ideas would translate well into that long of a format.

I knew I’d come back to the longer form sooner or later. I’ve often said it’s a format I truly enjoy writing. But in the several attempts in writing the temporarily-titled-MU4 novel, each time felt like I wasn’t doing it justice. The deep immersion wasn’t there, only a reflection of the past style. I wasn’t allowing myself that level of focus and, let’s face it, obsession. So it kept getting pushed to the back burner.

This will all eventually change, I hope. I’m not sure when, and I’m not sure how. Perhaps it’ll be a change in my writing schedule, better and more creative use of my break times at work, or perhaps it’ll be something else altogether. Who knows? I may even start a new extended universe instead…?

Working on it

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The Theadia project is turning out to be a tougher nut to crack than I’d expected, but at least I’ve learned from experience now that I shouldn’t let that bother me too much. I’ve been spending some of my Daily Words playing around with the plot and searching for the right story that needs telling. It’s very similar to the issues I had with Diwa & Kaffi.

So instead of forcing the story into shape against its will, I’m going the alternate, less stressful route: letting it come to me naturally. And given that this is probably the third or fourth time in a row where I’ve encountered this, perhaps this has become my current style of writing and creating. It takes longer, but there are far fewer dead ends to contend with.

In the meantime, I’m letting myself play around with a few other projects, one of which has been on the Spare Oom back burner for ages, just to keep the writing muscles in shape. I’m not taking them entirely seriously — well, I am, but I haven’t assigned any deadlines or hard stops as of yet.

As long as I’m moving forward, yeah?

Wait, it’s April already?

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nichijou calendar
What the year feels like sometimes.  Source: Nichijou, of course.

I think I’ve trained myself to the point where I’m not looking at a calendar and going ‘Wait, it’s April already?  I haven’t done jack!  MY LIFE SUCKS’ anymore.  Well, not as often, anyway.  Right now I just look at every new month as a way to start off fresh with my whiteboard schedule and see how far I can go with it.  I don’t even feel bad when I miss a day for whatever reason (even if that reason is ‘laziness’).  I just do what I can in thirty-odd day increments.

Typing this made me think of something I’d said during a panel at FogCon a few weeks ago, when someone had asked about the ability to get anything done when one already has a full schedule.  I’d told them about my whiteboard calendar, telling them that it’s not a matter of getting everything completed in one go; it was a matter of doing doing a little bit at a time, and that would add up.  Don’t aim for the finish line every single time…sometimes all you need to do is aim for the end of the chapter, or maybe even a few hundred words.  It does indeed add up by the end of it.  That’s how I was able to write 80k words for Meet the Lidwells in such a short amount of time.

I will fall back into the occasional ‘I’m not even close to getting any shit done’ stress-out, of course.  I’ve been fighting it a lot lately, what with my multiple attempts at trying to write/rewrite/restart the Apartment Complex story.  It’s partly why I’m trying out a rough draft of In My Blue World using 750Words; I’m tricking my brain into thinking that I’m being twice as productive instead of spending all that time freaking out over a single project.  [I’m actually kind of surprised it’s working, to be honest.]

So yeah, I’m not too worried that it’s April already.  In fact, I’ve embraced it — it’s getting warmer here in the Bay Area to the point where I have the window open in Spare Oom to let some fresh air in.  It’s also given me the impetus to get my writing work done early so I can get back into the habit of going to the gym after the Day Job!

It’s just a matter of taking it a bit at a time, apparently.  Or in this case, a month at a time.

Creating a Writing Regimen

Jon Chaisson1 Comment

exercise panda

Now that I have a new project to work on, I’ve been thinking seriously about revisiting and revising my writing habits.  I’ve already talked about my writing regimen during the Belfry years, which was probably the most solid and consistent I’d ever had.  [The Arkham West years, not so much.  I spent most of those years just trying to adjust to married life and living on the opposite coast.]  The Spare Oom years have been stable and evolving at a stable rate.

But I just feel that I’m not doing enough.

This is my current weekday schedule:
Eat breakfast, catch up on webcomics
Focus on Day Job stuff during Day Job hours (sneaking in a blog post or Daily Words if time permits during slow time)
Longhand personal journal entry during first break
Catching up on social media or writing magazines during lunch
Breather during second break
Dinner and maybe an episode of whatever A. happens to be streaming that night
An hour or so working in Spare Oom at the end of the night
Getting into bed and reading until lights-out

Weekends include e-mail catch-up, chatting with family on the phone, shopping and errands, outside activities, blog writing, and so on.  End the day continuing work on whatever project I’m focusing on.

Mundane stuff, yeah, but I can’t help but think that I’m really not doing my best at time management here.

BUT!  Since I no longer have a Giant Book Project weighing me down, I realize it’s time for me to give that all a rethink.  It’s too scattered, too disjointed.  I find myself wasting time when I shouldn’t be.  Sure, maybe I’m already using these few hours whenever I can, and just like every other writer, I feel it isn’t enough.  The question becomes: how to get the maximum work out of a limited time frame?

Or perhaps that’s the wrong question.  Besides, that way lies madness.  I’ll never have enough time, even if I decide to drop every other minor exercise to make it happen.

No, the better question is:  how do I organize my time better?

Well, the problem is that I’m dithering.  I’m in the very early stages of Meet the Lidwells! and I’m chomping at the bit to get writin’.  I’m trying a new approach this time: preplanning by way of index cards and an outline instead of making it up as I go along.  [Noted: the reason I’m doing this is that the trilogy project took so damn long and needed so much clean-up afterwards that I figured being more organized might save me a hell of a lot of time.]  All this precision is driving me batty, because I’m so used to being a pantser writer.  I still have this excess energy with nowhere to put it, so it ends up getting wasted on skimming social media or futzing around with my music collection.

And to be honest, I had the same problem in the Belfry years.  I’ve talked about my time wasted playing multiple rounds of FreeCell (or worse, wasting twenty minutes pondering over my cd collection trying to decide what I was going to listen to that night).  And I definitely had the same problem during the Arkham West years.

So what do I do?

Well, the best thing for me to do is to expand on that daily assignment regimen.

One of the steps I take is following my whiteboard schedule.  As you may have noticed, I’ve been reasonably consistent with my blog schedule here and at Walk in Silence.  I’ve also been good at writing the personal journal five days a week during Day Job hours.  I can expand on that, then.  I’ve already given myself a deadline of getting the indexing and outlining done for MtL! by the end of April, and to get the major writing started by the first of May.  I can certainly add more assignments with other projects if need be.

Mind you, I’m not trying to Write All the Things.  I’m just trying to be more productive.  It’s also a long and evolving process, so I can’t expect a complete change right off.  It takes time and practice.  And dedication.

It’ll take time, but I’d like to think it’s worth it.

Fresh Perspectives

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guitar

One of the first things I chose to do the day after The Balance of Light was released was to set one of my guitars to an alternate tuning.

No, really.  All my guitars have been in the usual standard EADGBE tuning for years, and over the last few years, I’ve noticed that I’ve been playing the same damn chord progressions and melodies for far too long.  I love writing new songs, but I haven’t been inspired enough to come up with that many new riffs that I haven’t already used elsewhere.  I figured it was high time to change it up.

My six-string Taylor acoustic is now in the DADGAD alternate tuning.  This is for two reasons:  one, so I’ll finally force myself to learn how to play it that way, and two, so I’ll pick up that guitar more often.  My sister’s a big proponent of this tuning as she loves the versatility it provides.  I’ve been meaning to do this for ages, and now that I have the time, I made the move to get started on it.

*

So what does this have to do with writing, anyway?  Why am I posting this here and not at Walk in Silence?  Well, mainly because I’m doing the same exact thing with my writing, now that I have the time to dedicate.  After years of focusing on the Mendaihu Universe and everything that goes along with it, I suddenly find my brain with a lot of extra processing power again.

So this means that I’ve decided to take some steps that I’ve been wanting to take for quite some time now.  The pre-writing work for Meet the Lidwells! has included a full outline — something I’ve nearly always avoided in the past.  I’m also playing around with the post-production work early on, since I already have a good idea of how it’ll look and where I think it might sell.

I’ve been reading a lot of different authors and genres lately.  I’ve been picking up on the varying styles and moods.  I’ve been figuring out how to write a much smaller standalone book with a much smaller cast.  I’ve been paying attention to how different races and genders are written.  Part of this is so when it comes time for me to write something similar, I’ll do it correctly.  Part of it is also because of my fascination in how stories are told from different cultural perspectives; I’m so overly familiar with how Americans tell stories that my own start to sound a bit…bland, so I’d like to try writing my stories from a slightly different perspective.

[Noted, I’m sure someone somewhere will complain that I’m falling into SJW territory, but that couldn’t be further from the truth.  I won’t write my novels purely for political reasons, because I already know I’ll fail miserably and they’ll read like crap.  The only reason I want to write from different perspectives is because I want to.  End of story.]

What else do I plan on doing to freshen up my outlook?  That’s a good question.  The Day Job does kind of keep me from playing around with my writing schedule, though there’s still room for shaking it up a bit.  I wake up early on the weekends whether I like to or not, so perhaps instead of draining my phone battery trawling the internet or watching several repeat cycles of the local news, perhaps I could use that time for creative endeavors.

I’ve also been extremely lax on my artwork, especially over the last year or so!  I’ve got some fresh pencils and pens that I’d love to start using again.  The art process has always been an enjoyable and calming one for me and I don’t utilize it nearly as much as I’d like.  I’d also like to be a better artist than I currently am, to be honest.  I’m okay, but I could be a hell of a lot better at it.  Same with my photography.

Will any of this end up in my future novels?  Sure, why not?  My reading a crapton of music biographies inspired the interview format for Lidwells.  My immersion in music inspired a fresh outlook on my writing.  My photography is sneaking into my side project of creating book covers.  And my knowledge of art has definitely helped me visualize scenes when writing.

Now that I have more time, I’m really looking forward these new perspectives.

Things and Stuff

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sweeping

I seem to be in one of those moods again.  You know the ones: where suddenly feel the need to change everything up, try something new (or bring back something old after I’ve freshened it up a bit).  I think it’s because I’m on the back end of the Colossally Long and Really This Shouldn’t Have Taken This Damn Long project of releasing the Bridgetown trilogy.  I’m definitely seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, and it looks quite sunny out there.

Which reminds me — the layout of this blog is rather dark, isn’t it?  I mean, I like the look of it myself, but I feel the color scheme is starting to outgrow its usefulness.  Book 3 is starting to kick up dust on the horizon on its way towards release (still looks like it’s going to be either very late this year, or possibly early next year, by the way things are going), and it’s got a much brighter outlook.

I’m thinking that in the next few weeks, I may change up the site here, make it a bit more warm and inviting.  I’ve got the next few weekends wide open, so maybe some Sunday I’ll pop in and open up the shades!

*

scully

I read a lot of webcomics first thing in the morning while having my breakfast and booting up the Day Job laptop, and I’ve noticed a very weird trend.  In particular, it’s a trend dealing with the balance between the creator’s vision versus reader expectation.  I first noticed this during my weekly reading of the Naruto manga series as it was being uploaded to various comic sites, in which a certain subset of fans were getting increasingly upset that the creator, Masashi Kishimoto, was driving the plot where they didn’t want it to go.  A few fans ragequitting the series towards the end (which was nearing 700 chapters by that time!) in protest.  Others going on lengthy Tumblr diatribes as to why Kishimoto was flat-out WRONG for writing his story the way he did.*

Fast-forward to the other day, when two webcomic artists, Mildred Louis (Agents of the Realm, a wonderful take on the magical girl trope) and Pascalle Lepas (Wilde Life, an incredibly inventive supernatural/horror story) both started tweeting about readers who have recently contacted them, either through DM, site comment or email, letting them know how much they like their work…except that if you fixed X, Y and Z, and did A, B and C instead, it would be so much better.**

Dude.  Really?

I could never quite understand why some fans would do that, especially to creators who are releasing their work on their own and not through any publisher or production company. Would you contact your favorite band’s lead singer on Twitter or Facebook to say you loved the new album but Track 6 sucks ass because it’s a bit too long and someone hit a bum note?

Why would you cross the line from appreciative fan to self-appointed Subject Matter Expert on someone else’s creation?  Why would you want to?  There’s obsession (like my discography completism, for instance) and then there’s obsession (NO NO! You can’t write *my* babies into a corner like that!!), and the second kind is really kind of creepy.

I’ve seen writers get this a lot too.  I’ve gotten it a few times.  Well-meant criticism, but really…it’s our creation, not yours.  We’re trying to tell you a story we think you’d enjoy.  You’re like Vern from Stand By Me, continually interrupting Gordie’s story about Lard-Ass Hogan and just pissing everyone else off.

Constructive criticism isn’t always about saying ‘you did X, Y and Z wrong; here’s how to do it better.’  It’s definitely not about saying ‘this wasn’t written the way I wanted it to be written, therefore it’s wrong.’  And despite your apparent knowledge about what makes a good story, you’re forgetting the most important part: you’re speaking from opinion, not experience.  Your criticism isn’t helpful; it’s coming across as pedantic and selfish.

If you’re a professional editor at one of the major publishing houses?  If you’re a pro artist who’s worked on your craft for years?  Sure, that’s different.  We all like hearing from the pros on what we can do to make our creation that much better.  But if you’re just a Fan With A Very Important Opinion, not so much.

I know, I know…touchy subject.  Just something I had to get off my chest.

* – Never mind that Naruto is, obviously, a Japanese story on numerous levels, and so the storytelling, as well as the character development, is going to be quite different from expected American storytelling norms.  This seemed to be the one major point that the most vocal of this subset would often forget or ignore in their arguments.

** – I’m well aware that this could be mansplaining.  Louis and Lepas didn’t explicitly state that’s what it was, so I’m not going down that route here, but it would not surprise me if that was part of it.  And yes, I have seen it thrown at both male and female creators.  Still, if it was mansplaining, that’s not cool either.  It’s not well-meant criticism.  You’re just being a douche.

*

kermit typing

WHAT IS MY NEXT WRITING PROJECT?  I can year y’all asking me that through the intertubes (mainly because you’re about as sick as I am with me blathering on about the damn trilogy).  I’ve got it narrowed down to three projects:  another novel in the Mendaihu Universe, the time-travel idea I’ve had for some time, or the music-related novel I outlined a short time ago using my daily words.  Each of them has merit, and I’m pretty sure the latter two will have a much quicker turnaround than the first one, so it’s still up in the air.

I’ll be making a decision quite soon, so as soon as I’ve made the decision, I’ll let you know.  One of them may actually involve some reader participation of some kind, and I’m really looking forward to trying to get that to work.  We shall see!

Until then, hope everyone has a gook weekend!

Spare Oom Unplugged (again)

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gravity falls
courtesy of Gravity Falls

Yes, I’d have to say it was definitely a good idea to work longhand with this edit.  The evenings where I’m focusing solely on this project is when I take the binder to the loveseat across the room and settle in.  I’m not chained to the desk, but I can still have the tunage going while I work.

Which brings me to the subject of unplugging again.  It seems every six to eight months I need to unplug from the internet and do some IRL things.  Or more to the point, needing to remind myself to unplug from the internet and do some IRL things.

What this usually means is that, even though I kvetch about it from time to time here at WtBt, I don’t always follow through.  Sometimes I’ll just have a long day at work and want to goof off online and watch cat-drifting gifs all night.  Or I’ll consistently distract myself with the Twitter feed.  Sure, I’ll catch myself and shut down the browser right there and then and do something more productive with my time.

It’s not like I haven’t eased up on the distractions over the last year.  I’m not as passive about them as I used to be.  In fact I’ve become quite tight with my latest writing schedule of practice words, blog entries and exercises, balancing them quite nicely with the Day Job and the regular writing work.

This time out, however, I’m thinking about actively unplugging for a bit.  I mean, doing some serious longhand work, for various reasons:

–Obvious:  Less chance of distraction.
–Health:  Reasons for me to start moving around and getting out of the chair more often.  Also, considering my Day Job is to look at a laptop all day, and following it up by looking at a PC later that evening, I really should give my eyes a break more often.
–Personal:  Sitting with A. instead of hiding away in the back room all day and night.
–Mental:  Focusing solely on the task at hand because, well, it would be the only thing I have at hand.  Also, I have something a little more tangible to work with, rather than having to remember where I was in the document, especially if I’m flipping back and forth.
–Physical:  Handwriting tends to be less straining on my wrists than typing, even with my new PC and its wireless keyboard and mouse.
–And let’s be honest here: when I write new projects longhand, I need to be able to write on the fly.  The habit of editing on the PC is far too ingrained right now, thanks to the Epic Trilogy Editing Seasons.  Once the trilogy project is done, I can reassess.

But yes…it’s one thing to say “I’m thinking of doing [X] to make my work better” or “I’m going to close the browsers now so I can work”, but it’s another to make good on those statements.  And unplugging does seem to be the only way to do this cleanly and efficiently.

Does that mean all my blogs are going on hiatus?  Nope, not this time around.  Those will still be around, as long as I have something to say.  I don’t have to unplug for mental reasons this time.

I just want to be a better writer is all. 🙂

On Writing Longhand

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image
Featuring the Pilot Metropolitan pen that A got me for Christmas. I haven’t used a nib pen in ages!

I’ve been writing and editing via my PC for so long that it still feels weird to be writing new things longhand.  The last major project I wrote longhand was The Phoenix Effect; the trilogy was written completely on the computer, using MS Write and MS Word.  I still have the 3″ floppies containing all the early .wri files, come to think of it.  I did do a lot of the world building and the brainstorming longhand, mostly on scrap paper from work (these were the Yankee Candle years), but the new words were all generated downstairs in the Belfry, tapping away on my PC.

Even later incomplete and/or trunked projects like Love Like Blood, Can’t Find My Way Home and Two Thousand and even the earlier versions of Walk in Silence were started or at least primarily written on the computer.  I liked working that way for varying reasons: I could chart my daily word count and my production in general; I could edit while writing when it was clear it was needed; I could open multiple documents for reference use and note taking; and peripherally, I could keep myself amused and entertained with my mp3 collection playing in the background.

Writing on the PC can be a great thing, and I still enjoy it, but over the years I’ve realized its limitations as well.  I have a penchant for distraction, whether it’s multiple games of FreeCell and Solitaire, futzing around with the tags and the arrangement of my mp3 collection, or the continued refreshing of my Twitter feed.  I’ve also been hiding myself in Spare Oom far too long.  And then there’s the fact that I already work from home, so I’m spending most of the day back there already, sitting on my duff for eight hours.  Spare Oom may not be a man cave, but over the years it began to feel like I was using it as a hideaway from the world.  It’s the one room in the apartment that has the best view (see the banner picture over at Walk in Silence), but I don’t look out that window nearly as much as I should.

 

Starting up my personal journal a few years back was my way of combating all this.  Its original purpose was to divert my kvetching habits from social media to paper and curtail them somewhat, and it worked almost immediately.  I also made it a habit to write its entries away from my desk.  For the last year or so I’ve been writing in it during my midmorning break, sitting on the loveseat across the room where I can glance out the window as well.  Much to my own surprise, I’ve kept it up consistently since then, skipping only weekends and vacations.

Early last year, when it was clear that I’d be wrapping up the trilogy project by year’s end, I started writing the new Mendaihu Universe story.  This was the first new story I’d be starting completely longhand, in a yellow-covered 3-subject spiral notebook I picked up at Target.  This too was kept up consistently until late last year when I put it aside to self-release the trilogy.  Once that project is finally wrapped, I’ll be able to pick it up again.  In the meantime, though, I’ve been starting new projects longhand, such as this latest version of Walk in Silence.  My return to artwork and renewed dedication to weekly poetry have finally torn me away from the PC as well.  In addition to that, I’ve been trying to make a concerted effort to work more often on my laptop out in the living room (where I am currently typing this) if I need to use MS Word.  And yesterday afternoon during the two football playoff games I sat at the dining table, writing a few WiS pages.

I’d commented elsewhere that I don’t plan on turning myself into a Luddite writer; I just feel the need to change up the habits to keep everything fresh.  I can view using the PC as a positive work process rather than a distraction or a slog.  I’m not chained to it, and shouldn’t be.  When I was working on the trilogy back in the early ’00s, working on the PC was something I looked forward to as an evening process, maybe even as ‘going to the office’ for my writing career, and I kept that separate from the rest of my life.  Returning to longhand after so long is sort of a return to that.

I’m curious to see where it takes me next.