I'm going to stay up a little tonight and get a quick jump on the writing. These are the rules that I'm going to play by in my head. Remind me to look back at this post when I get frustrated.
1. No editing. Spelling, I'll fix. But I'm just going to write one sentence after another. Sort of like running a marathon. You may plan out your next step, but you don't stop and contemplate each step as you take it.
2. Internal consistency? What's that? I'll try to keep things clean, but I won't worry too much about it if I don't. Remember, I'm not writing the finished draft of a novel, here.
3. Write for one hour a day. That's write. Not one hour of thinking about writing, or making tea, or fiddling with a playlist in iTunes, but setting down strings of words.
Let's go!
Wednesday, October 31, 2007
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
False Starts from the reject pile #1
If there's anything sadder than a Stuckey's gift shop at 3AM, I don't know what it is. The brown carpet is wet from the clerk's boots, after taking his smoke break around 2:30. This section of highway doesn't see many people stopping, regardless the time of day.
I'm still six hours from home. I'd call, but she'd just be pissed that I woke her up. Maybe I'll bring home a souvenir spoon of Pennsylvania: the one with the roughed grouse on it. It's the state bird after all. Maybe, I'll just drive right past my exit and become something else altogether.
I'm still six hours from home. I'd call, but she'd just be pissed that I woke her up. Maybe I'll bring home a souvenir spoon of Pennsylvania: the one with the roughed grouse on it. It's the state bird after all. Maybe, I'll just drive right past my exit and become something else altogether.
Sunday, October 28, 2007
Reject pile
From the scrap heap, a generous helping of terrible ideas:
A roadtrip novel. I never figured out why the guy was on the road, but he drove an old Honda with nothing but old mix tapes in it. Quickly tossed aside. There would have been a lot of Velvet Underground and PJ Harvey references in this one.
A reunion of players for a game called One Hundred Hands. It was some massive 25 on 25 sport. One of the players lost a hand in Iraq, so the new version was called Ninety Nine Hands. But I couldn't figure out how to manage that many characters, or what the hell the a game with that many people would be like. Capture the Flag?
The reverse roadtrip novel. The main character works the graveyard shift at a service plaza in the middle of nowhere. Not much action besides watching the pecan logs move towards their expiration date. Lots of weird people blow through the store, but not much else. Terminated with extreme prejudice.
A family gathers for a funeral. Too close to home right now, thanks.
A birth mystery story. Totally ripped off from a Dickens novel. Of course, the kid figures everything out with the help of his great dane and his meddling friends. Wait, that's a Scooby Doo spec script, isn't it?
Tales told from the point of guy reincarnated as a suburban housecat. Of course, he's got all the memories of a guy born in 1947, but he's stuck inside a tabby cat and can't express himself any further than "MEOW". We have to settle for his internal monologue and his dreams.
Workplace novel about a dating service and the losers in love that work there. Things get weird when they have to create an account to test the system and real people respond to their fake ad. This would be a great sitcom though. Maybe if it starred cavemen.
A roadtrip novel. I never figured out why the guy was on the road, but he drove an old Honda with nothing but old mix tapes in it. Quickly tossed aside. There would have been a lot of Velvet Underground and PJ Harvey references in this one.
A reunion of players for a game called One Hundred Hands. It was some massive 25 on 25 sport. One of the players lost a hand in Iraq, so the new version was called Ninety Nine Hands. But I couldn't figure out how to manage that many characters, or what the hell the a game with that many people would be like. Capture the Flag?
The reverse roadtrip novel. The main character works the graveyard shift at a service plaza in the middle of nowhere. Not much action besides watching the pecan logs move towards their expiration date. Lots of weird people blow through the store, but not much else. Terminated with extreme prejudice.
A family gathers for a funeral. Too close to home right now, thanks.
A birth mystery story. Totally ripped off from a Dickens novel. Of course, the kid figures everything out with the help of his great dane and his meddling friends. Wait, that's a Scooby Doo spec script, isn't it?
Tales told from the point of guy reincarnated as a suburban housecat. Of course, he's got all the memories of a guy born in 1947, but he's stuck inside a tabby cat and can't express himself any further than "MEOW". We have to settle for his internal monologue and his dreams.
Workplace novel about a dating service and the losers in love that work there. Things get weird when they have to create an account to test the system and real people respond to their fake ad. This would be a great sitcom though. Maybe if it starred cavemen.
Groundwork
So, I've created and thrown away about 15 different plots for my attempted novel. I've finally settled on one. All I will say about it is that it shares a plot arc with a song by the Police. And that it's not "Sally." As far as I can tell, the new movie Lars and the Real Girl is cribbed from that song. It's a popular thing to steal from Sting, Stewart and Andy, what with the reunion tour and all.
I have the rough idea of how the story will work, but absolutely no idea how it will resolve. I'm sort of hoping the answer appears during the writing of the thing. I have never had the attention span to write anything of this length before. Coming from a poetry writing background, it was always easy to leave threads dangling. If anything, the mystery added to the work. I don't know if you can get away with that in a novel. Certainly not to the extent that I am used to.
I have the rough idea of how the story will work, but absolutely no idea how it will resolve. I'm sort of hoping the answer appears during the writing of the thing. I have never had the attention span to write anything of this length before. Coming from a poetry writing background, it was always easy to leave threads dangling. If anything, the mystery added to the work. I don't know if you can get away with that in a novel. Certainly not to the extent that I am used to.
Monday, October 15, 2007
Covers askew
Sharp little fangs have
been appearing in my dreams lately.
Tiny icebergs, in a gummy sea,
coming to tear flesh off of me.
How can we sleep?
The pearly spiders,
move soquickly.
How can we wake?
This is a handful of soil.
been appearing in my dreams lately.
Tiny icebergs, in a gummy sea,
coming to tear flesh off of me.
How can we sleep?
The pearly spiders,
move soquickly.
How can we wake?
This is a handful of soil.
This is my new sketchbook
I'm going to try to write a novel this November. Yes, National Novel Writing Month is coming. I've got to get my writing chops back, so I'll be posting random sketches and things here while getting ready for the main event. I have no idea what I'm going to write, but it's gonna be an adventure. Let's go!
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