Weaving Delicious Nightmares
Writing Advice
Sweet Emotion
11 years
(This post was inspired by Matt Haig‘s post, The Thin-Skinned Writer, at Booktrust.co.uk.)
At the risk of stereotypes, being of Midwestern Scots-Scandinavian blood does not lend itself to emotional availability.
Often it seems as if I don’t feel so much as observe, then analyze, then consider, then debate, and finally – usually around two in the morning on an important deadline – understand that what I’ve been turning over and over made me feel sad. Or angry, or happy, or whatever. It made me feel and that’s why I’m still thinking about it.
I’m told this shows in The Suicide Tourist, the documentary of my father’s assisted suicide. Mom and I both appear detached throughout the interviews, a studied remoteness I didn’t realize came across so strongly. My sister Katrina and I talked about this once – she had been slightly embarrassed by crying during her interview, and I assured her that, even to me, it was the only thing that humanized our family.
I sometimes fear my characters come across as too studied, too detached from the things they fear and the things they want. That level of gut-check, immediate emotional response or desire is far away from me, and I have a hard time understanding it, much less channeling it.
(On the bright side, I’m told my strong points are in description and dialogue – two areas that require observation and analysis over emotional responses.)
To come back to the point: I hear what Matt’s talking about when he talks about feelings and writing.
Let me be clear. I don’t suffer from clinical depression. It’s a serious condition that I’ve got no part of. Still, it fascinates me to hear him say his emotions become an intense inner hurricane. When something brings me low, my inner landscape turns into a marshland, filled with will-o-wisp doubts and quicksand pathways. It slows me down and forces me to pay attention to it, if only with the hindbrain.
That’s why, when writing brings my emotions to the fore – when I can’t deny that something has touched me and touched me deeply – I know I’m part of something special. It happens often enough to let me know I’m alive inside, to tell me that the shields can still be broached, even if only at the distance of the written word. It happens often with the works of Catherynne M Valente, whose lyricism overwhelms the rational core and drives straight into my body. It last happened with A Prince of Thirteen Days, by Alaya Dawn Johnson, and the wonderful phrase, “Where the dead go when they have lived enough to die.”
Which sums it up nicely.
As Matt says, I want life. I want to read it and write it and feel it and live it.
But we all come at those feelings differently.
Whether it’s a sharp punch to the gut or a long, slow bleed, you’re feeling; and as long as you’re feeling, you’re alive.
So keep living, however you come at it. Keep writing, however you write best. Watch and learn or feel and bleed, spill your words or measure them out; but be among us and share your path, because nobody else in the world is living the way you do, and nobody else can tell your stories.
And thank you, Matt. I hope The Humans does everything you hope for!
The First Time’s The Hardest
11 years
I was chatting the other day with Steve LeBel, who’s currently working on his first novel Bernie and the Putty. He mentioned that finishing it was a bit of a struggle – which we can all identify with – but also that he expected the second book would be easier.
I’ve defintely found that to be the case with THE COMMONS. So what was most different the second time around?
1. I changed from a pantser to an outliner.
Vorare, the basis for the Gentleman Ghouls series, was intended as a one-year arc ending with the hero’s destruction that turned into a three-year arc of ambition. For many months in the middle there, I was writing without a clear direction.
For THE COMMONS, I specifically wrote a full outline of 12,000 words in and of itself. This gave me much more line of sight into the flow and rhythm of the story. And I’m a convert now – I will never go back to discovery writing for anything more than short stories. The outline made even bad writing days feel like forward momentum.
2. I gave myself more realistic deadlines.
I was originally accustomed to writing serial-style: A few thousand words a month. It soon became clear that wasn’t going to get me to the length a novel needed. So with THE FARM, I started flailing, trying to cram as much work as I could into small, intense bursts.
With THE COMMONS, the outline above let me track my progress much more effectively. I’ll admit, I still missed the initial deadline due to outside circumstances. However, I was able to alert the publishers about a month in advance that we would need to push back this single date, why I needed the extra time, and how we could tighten future dates to make up the time.
3. I considered the future more seriously.
When THE FARM launched I didn’t fully realize the amount of follow-up work a book launch required. Posts, guest posts, events, conventions, signings, and of course the endless round of self-promotion that you worry must become tiresome.
With THE COMMONS I know what I need to do. Re-start the blog months in advance of the book coming out, establish guest areas, develop guest topics and interviews, and generally pay more attention to the human side of this horror equation.
Luckily, I tend to extroversion. How YOU doin’?
4. I fell more in love with the process.
Nothing about THE COMMONS has felt like a chore. It hasn’t always been sunshine and sorbet, but it’s also never been a task I dreaded approaching. With THE FARM and the endless editing required, I did have days when I considered chucking the whole thing.
I guess you do love your second child more than your first, though I’d have to ask my mom and younger sister.
5. IT CAN BE DONE!
I find the simplest way to procrastinate is to scare yourself out of succeeding. If you’ve never said “This will never work” or “Why am I trying,” why, I envy you, my friends. I envy you with mallets and meathooks.
But once I wrote “The End” I saw I could finish a book. Once I got the final edits back I saw that I could adjust a book. Once I saw the cover art, got the cover blurbs, received the books in the mail?
It can be done. Which means it can be repeated, and it can be done better.
So to Steve and all the other two-time runners, I would definitely say yes; the second book’s simpler than the first. Your milage may vary, of course – though if it has, I’d love to know how!
What Motivates You?
11 years
by Ivan
in Writing Advice
An old friend asked me the other day, “What is it that motivates you to keep following your dreams? Like writing?”
To which the basic response is embarrassment, though good embarrassment. Because part of the trick is that I don’t think I do.
In the interest of full disclosure, though, I spent some time thinking about what it is that keeps me going when I’d rather fold in on myself.
1. Make it about more than just yourself.
When I write just for myself, I don’t get more than a page done. If that. Because in my head it can stay perfect and unwritten, and also, because it’s easier to sit down and play Dragon Age for the umpteenth time than wrestle with the fictional problems of a homosexual nymphomaniac drug addict involved in the ritual murder of a well-known Scottish footballer. (Rest in peace, Chapman.)
But when I write because someone else has said they believe in me? Then it’s got to be done. Apocalypse Ink Productions put their pound of flesh on the scale long before I did, and the fact that they trusted me to come through made the first book easy … and the second book possible.
2. Come not to praise Caesar.
Look, I have a sweet life and good friends. I’m surrounded by lovely people. Half of them are incredibly, passionately, ferociously supportive.
The other half actually tell me when my fly is down.
I don’t know how it works for everyone else, but I need approval and support. Without it, I’d throw my hands up in the air and give myself over to the Cube. With that said, anyone who’s involved in dreams also needs to have someone tugging at their ankle, if for no better reason than to point out when the building inspector’s coming after their castle in the sky.
I write my first drafts for the dreamers. I make the dream come true for the realists. It’s their fierce voices, their challenges, that make the protean vision a reality. Listen to the ones who challenge you to rise up and do better, because while everyone who loves you believes in you, these are the ones who believe you’re stronger than you think.
3. If you always do what you’ve always done …
In line with the above, dissatisfaction with where I am gives me the pinch I need to sit down and work. It’s a hoary old truth, but if you don’t work on your dream, somebody else will pay you a reasonable wage to work on theirs.
And that is some bullshit, my friends.
Does that mean the dreamer always needs to stay hungry? Hell, no. That’s a masochist’s prayer.
The dreamer does need to consider what might make life better. What might make it finer. What could bring them into a better place.
So in short, to S and everyone reading this: Live for something bigger. Listen to the realists. Reject the pessimists.
That’s what it takes for me to keep following my dreams.
Your mileage may vary.
Music of the Fears
11 years
I talked a bit about using music as a way to clear your head the other day, which made me realize that music I currently listen to is a key part of my writing process. Not just because I need to tune out my wife’s television shows while I’m working, but because the words flow more easily when I’ve got a groove in my head.
So what was I listening to while writing FAMISHED: THE FARM?
Ambient music, mostly. No words, or words in a language I don’t understand. French seems to work well for some reason.
The Dusted Jazz albums from Jenova7 blend jazz and trip-hop in a delicious combination that lent themselves well to the few urban scenes in the novel, as well as a lot of the dialogue pieces.
For the scenes with the wendigo, wound, and other spirits of nature, Until We Meet the Sky by Solar Fields worked a shoegaze trance that put me into a different, driftier headspace. While the spirits I’m writing about are anything but unfocussed, it helped me disconnect a bit from my humanity in order to wrap a little alien into their features.
Into the Hinterland by the Secret Exploration Society and the soundtrack to the videogames Bastion and Minecraft both made good background tracks for places that needed better description or sharpening scenes.
And while I haven’t read or seen The Hunger Games, the fact that Sam Cushion actually wrote an orchestral fan-score for the book called Music of Panem: Beginning of a Rebellion tickled me so much that I kept it on repeat whenever I started wondering if my work was worth the effort. The thought that other creators might one day get something out of my creations kept me going through the rough spots.
Of course, different projects call for different music. My works of suburban horror tend to more modern or cool jazz such as Dave Brubeck, the Trio Vadim Fyodorov, or Nick Pride and the Pimptones; while my fantasy stories are almost always backed by either alternative world music from artists like Azam Ali or Irfan, or a shuffling of darkfolk and modern stoner metal such as The Sword of Doom or Witch.
What music fuels your passion and creativity?
Out of Your Head
11 years
As in, getting out of it.
Writers spend a lot of time alone in their minds, which can be translated as either a mystic dreamscape of endless possibilities and wonder, or as a windowless garret lit by a single candle rendered from rodent fat.
When it starts turning from the former to the latter, it is time to blow that popsicle stand for a while. Knowing what works for you is an individual thing that nobody can teach, but it’s crucial to your mental well-being to figure out how to air out your mind on a regular basis.
Personally, I’ve got four things that can always reset and refresh my mental energy.
- Music. Specifically, finding new music I haven’t ever heard before. Pandora, Bandcamp and Last.fm are incredible resources for exploring new sounds and finding new artists. Plus, you can generally multitask with this one, adding it into other means of clearing your head.
- Outdoors. I’m no woodsman or explorer, but I do love me some forests and parks. There are four in a reasonable radius from me, ranging from heavy pine thickets to wide-open prairie grassland. Nothing works for me as well as getting in the wind and letting it scour through my brainmeats.
- Exercise. I came late to this one – from adolecence through my early thirties I snubbed the idea of any physical effort, but once I got over the fear of the gym and the habit of a lifetime, I was hooked. Being able to get active and get the blood pumping helps both your body and your mind, whether it’s lifting kettleballs, running down the street, or doing yoga from a DVD.
- Cleaning. What? Yeah. Cleaning house helps me settle down in a very quiet way that also makes my living environment more pleasant. It doesn’t hurt that I notice the more cluttered my quarters are, the more cramped my brain tends to feel.
Those are the main methods I’ve got to bring myself around after my skull gets me stir crazy. I’d love to have more tools in the box, though – if you have a specific way that works well for you to stretch your mental muscles (or some new music you think I’ve got to hear), feel free to leave a comment.
