The Fountain Pen

I was lucky last night; at least that is how I look at it. My wife’s car needed some work done on it, so we took it over to my parent’s place as it is better suited for work (our drive way is sloped, and I’d rather not trust an emergency brake with my life). I knew last night would be a hard night for writing; my parents are friendly people and we get along well enough that we usually miss our intended departure because we are engaged in conversation. Last night was not much different, with the exception of my ability to show off my writing software to my mother (who writes), and that they left me alone for about an hour so I could try to hack out something, and that is where I got lucky.

I dodged a bullet, but it grazed me. My writing time was divided last night. I planned my story some on the way to my parent’s house, spent some time writing while I was there (thank goodness I have some really good headphones), and had to wait until I was in bed before I could pick up again. I have never worked in such spurts, and I felt certain I would fail to meet either of my goals (either 2,000 words for the night or 6,000 words total). I don’t know how I did it, and I am a little proud of myself, but I managed to make it to 6,000 words before I went to sleep; I was grazed by that bullet in that I worked longer than I should have and did not finish until Midnight (I am drinking tea this morning!).

Characters

I ran into an interesting situation last night, one I am not sure how readers (or editors) will react. I hope that I can state, without sounding mentally ill, that I talk to myself from time-to-time. My main characters takes after me in this regard and is one who would think things through by having a mental dialog with himself. The quandary lies with showing the reader the thought process of my protagonist without sounding too awkward. There are times that I will just narrate that he thought of something, but as I found last night, it seemed completely uninteresting to just state that, so I decided to have my character spill his thoughts upon the page in a sort of dialog with himself. This is one thing I have not heard anything about from other authors or from writing teachers, and I cannot recall reading anything similar either. I could be violating some “rule”, but I decided it is far more interesting to show my audience (will I actually have one I wonder?) what is going on in the troubled mind of my character rather than just tell them his mind is troubled. (If you’d like to chime in your opinion on this, feel free to leave a comment.)

Tense

One thing I recall I have been instructed on over and over again is to maintain a consistent tense. I should not interweave past, present, and future tenses in the same scene, or so I am told, and I fear that is one of my weaknesses. As I was writing last night I realized I most probably have mixed my tenses as I have been attempting to close my first chapter (I almost pity my readers, for my first chapter will probably be around 8,000 words). I know that I will need to carefully re-read my story, when I am done, and fix this little mess I am leaving for myself. I could try to catch it as I write, but I think I’d rather get my word count done than spend time making sure my grammar and my structure are sound. No one said I need to have a finished ready-to-publish “novel” by the end of November, just 50,000 words. :)

One last thing, I managed to come up with a “side” quest help fill in that early hole I was facing. Since I did not reach it yet and I have begun to fill it in I am quite happy!

Posted by Seth Croston Barber at 8:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

I could not let myself go to sleep so close to my goal, so I managed to punch out 400 more words and actually hit my 2,000 word mark! It was a good feeling, but not great; great would have been three or four thousand words. I was too tired last night to properly think through my first attempt, my first leg of my month-long journey, but this morning I hope to capture the few things that ran through my head.

Word Count

I was surprised to find I took me ninety minutes to get the first 1,000 words, but only forty-five minutes for the second 1,000 words. In the first hour I only managed 600 words! The start was much harder than I thought, and at first I wanted to attribute it to my general fatigue. I was tired enough to go to bed when I got home … 4 hours early! As I was plodding along (that is the word for it, plodding) I began to realize I have a hard task in front of me regarding the first chapter. My outline and my desire forces me to establish quite a few details. Plans I have for the middle of the book have their genesis in the first scenes, thus I found myself carefully considering the mood, the setting, and the message I was communicating. It was no wonder things were going slow.

Regarding my outline, I completed the first two points, and may have covered enough of the third to consider it done. I had no expectations regarding the amount of words I would consume for each point, but if I only manage 1,000 words per point, I will not make it, as I do not have 50 points. Either I will need to add points or I will need to elaborate more on each point (without burdening the reader of course).

Perseverance

I in no way felt like writing last night, yet I knew I had no option; I did not want to start today 1,700 words behind. This caused me to force myself into putting something down, even if I don’t like it (actually, I didn’t do that, instead I edited phrases as I went). The advantage here is I managed to get 2,000 words done, even when I did not feel like writing. I count this an accomplishment, for when I do feel like writing I will hopefully increase my productivity, and when I do not feel like writing I know I can still produce something (and in the case of yesterday’s work I don’t feel like I need to much revision).

Tonight is my local kick-off party, and while I will be two hours late I still hope to go. Hopefully I will meet some friendly people and still be able to hammer out a couple thousand words. I am not the only author to write in the fantasy genre in my region, so it might be even more fun. Here’s hoping I keep on track. I had a decent start, now I need to continue it for 29 more days.

Posted by Seth Croston Barber at 9:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

It was only this morning that I realized why my plots have failed, up until this point that is. I usually start out with an idea, then I start adding to the idea, and I start answering some questions about the idea (so I can better fill it out). Somewhere along the way I don’t like what I see, and I scrap the entire plot and start all over again, meaning I lost time. This almost happened last night, but due to not having time to play around with a plot I ignored the part I did not like, and low-and-behold I made some additions and an adjustment and now I really like the plot!

Specifically, the hero of my tale would set forth to retrieve The Package for his master. On the return journey the hero will find out The Master will use The Package for evil ends. I had set the hero to take The Package and flee to another kingdom thereby securing peace for a time. Yuck. I was not liking it, and I could not figure out why The Package (who is human) would go along with this in the first place. Then it struck me. The Package, through circumstance, will have no choice but to flee, for his life. The hero will take The Package to another kingdom, and from there The Master will be defeated.

It took me until this morning to realize the import of this. I should not throw away my plots because I do not like them. There was a time that I was not happy with the end, nor with The Package, and those were two rather large pieces of my plot. Without The Package there is no quest, no quest means no story. Instead I was able to add a new ending (my original “ending” is there, but it no longer ends the tale) and give a better purpose for The Package. It is my hope that in the future, when I work on plots, I will remain calm when I do not like something and come back to it later. In this case it worked great!

Maybe a little pressure, a deadline, actually will help me.

Posted by Seth Croston Barber at 9:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)