So, between work and auditing a course at my old university, I've gotten 3,000 words in on the short story I started for the writing contest I brought up last week. Now, I'm a pretty slow writer, so I feel pretty good about that.
How have your WIPs been progressing?
A little, sneak-preview, if anyone's interested, in my novella. Still waiting for the cover as patiently as I can. (The artist isn't late or anything; I've been going crazy since I placed the order.)
So, I tried my hand at writing my own translation of one of my favorite passages in the Bible.
1 The words of the Preacher, son of David, King in Jerusalem.
2 Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher. Vanity of vanities; the whole is vain.
3 What is left over for man in all his toil in which he toils under the sun?
4 A generation comes and a generation goes; but the earth remains forever.
5 And the sun rises, and the sun goes [down]; And to his place, there he strives to rise.
6 Going to the South, returning to the North—turning, turning, the wind goes; And over its turning, the wind returns.
7 All the rivers run into the sea, but the sea is not full.
[From] the place where the rivers run, there they return to run.
8 All these words are tiresome. Man cannot utter [it].
The eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled by hearing.
9 That which is is that which will be, and that which is done is that which will be done; and there is nothing wholly new under the sun.
10 Where is...
How are the WIPs going?
It's been a week, and I've read through my short stories as one whole collection, red pen ready. Now I'm going back once more to the documents and applying the changes I need to make. Soon, I hope, it will be time to start looking at beta readers and editors. It seems like there is always more to do.
"In making many books, there is no end, and much study wearies the body."
Editing is always a trying affair, but it is made all the more so when I am also formatting everything. Either Friday or Saturday, I realized that I had removed all the italics when I was adjusting something in the Styles Pane.
All in all, I keep realizing that this is going to take more time than I thought. This is going to take more attention, more work, than I had planned. I haven't even tried to hawk it, yet; a key reason I am trying to self-publish my short stories is wanting to see if I can even manage to get anyone to buy my books on my own.
Oh well, I'll just keep plodding ...
How are the WIPs going?
I have read through thirteen of the fifteen stories in my collection, giving my red pen free reign. Through all the marks and notes I've scrawled across the pages, I'm slowly uncovering, and it seems surprisingly fundamental, a real cohesion to the whole: though there is no unifying world or setting or even style, I keep finding that they all contain variations of the same basic themes.
If I didn't know better, I would think I had planned it all out, but as I move from the raw creation of these stories into their nurturing and ordering, I find one tale leading into the other as though their interrelation was intrinsic to their natures, as though they were all conceived to be fit together. However, I know that many were written to fulfil a prompt for a competition, some were based on dreams, and others came in the usual way, one of the striking mental images/desired effects that haunt me until I write them down.
Anyway, I don't know how useful this ...
How are the WIPs going?
I'm in that wonderful phase of writing that can steal all joy and life from of one's soul, editing. I'm not even really ready for β-readers yet. It's a mixed bag, though. In this short story collection, some I have gone over many times, and for some I have individually hired editors. Still, some I wrote and put away knowing there was an incompleteness in them. They needed…something. The best I could give them was time. I have already gone back over a few of these and found that I now could give them what they wanted. One or two, I still fear, may want more.
Okay, now is the hour of the red pen and the critic, the slow, careful read and the clearing out of the bramble. Now is the time that tries writer's soul…or some such thing.
Let me know how your WIPs are going. Wishing you all the best.
After my disappointment with The Lovecraft Investigations, I thought it would be a good idea to write our own Lovecraft inspired work.
I saw an interesting question posed on twitter: Would you write an entire book series and not publish a single book until it's all done? Now, that is precisely what I've been doing, or, perhaps I should say, what I've been planning. Right now, I've somewhat given up on traditional publishing, partially as it seems like traditional publishers want me to do the marketing as well as the writing, and partially because it seems like most forms I fill out ask me how well I've self-published my own work so far.
So, I started to consider whether to self-publish the book I have written, and it seemed to me that since I had already organized it into three major sections, each about the length of a short novel, it would make sense to self-publish it in those organic pieces. As my original outline extended beyond this book, I figured I ought to finish writing to the end of my outline. That should make a fourth part. Furthermore, when I finished that outline, I jotted down a few notes for a continuation of the story. I've been working on a new outline, off and on (mostly off), and hope to finish it and add it to this possible series, thereby reaching a total of either five or six parts.
Now, why do I want to chop up my story like this? For one, I think these breaks in the story make sense. Also, one piece of advice I've heard about self-publishing is to keep a steady flow of work coming out. So, before I self-publish, I want have a ready well of titles to publish at regular intervals. My overarching plan is to, over the next two to three years, get ten titles ready, half or so consisting of this series and the other half based on a few short outlines I've jotted down here and there throughout the years. Then, take the leap and self-publish.
I was listening to a video talking about harnessing creativity. It didn't say much that hasn't been said before, but it did get me thinking about my own reasons for writing. It is, in a sense, a bit of a mystery: I can tell you I write because I want to tell stories and because I love books and language, but why do I want to tell stories? Why do I love books? Why do I find language such a captivating subject?
The question was, "What did the first frog say?" And the answer was, "Lord, how you made me jump!"
~Chesterton
The stories are just there. They pester me. They want time and thought and form, and it's my great joy in life to give it to them. A story appears and demands my attention, and it just so happens that that is what I love to do. I find no answer beyond my own actions; I simply do it.
Books, at least the written word, are my medium, and I can hardly put into words the way printed words make me feel. If I ever won the lottery, I would probably convert my whole house into a library. Here there is some explanation: Certain associations from childhood may have molded this love, but I can remember some fairly bitter experiences here as well as good, in fact some of my earliest encounters with books made me swear I'd never read anything ever again; it was only in my later childhood that I learned to love to read.
But just as the stories I tell come to me seemingly from out of the æther, and just as my love of those stories is something that merely is, so I find another love, an unexplainable delight in language itself. Every tidbit of etymology is my treasure, every quirk of grammar my delight. It is a struggle, the work can even become drudgery at times, and yet I can't escape.
I don't know why I write; I just know I do.
