Life can change in an instant.
A horrific car crash, an unexpected joy of a baby, discovering you've been cheated on, your house catching fire and burning down. All sorts of things can change your perspective on life in an instant. The same can be said for your characters.
Their world can come crumbling down in so many ways. Makes for great stories. It is hard to write something like that unless you've actually faced it in your own life. Or at least that's how I feel. I have had tragedy in my life, I honestly can say it has helped me understand how people react to life-changing situations so much more.
Whether it made me a better writer or not, time will tell.
Have you drawn from any major life experiences in your writing?
Monday, June 29, 2009
Friday, June 26, 2009
Creating Characters
Character Creation. Google that and you'll get 13,200,000 results (in .32 seconds on my computer). That's amazing. All of those results don't pertain to writing, they have video game character creation, role playing games and so on.
I have probably done every character work-up sheet findable on the internet. Thing is, they don't help. Does it really matter what my character's favorite color is? How tall he is in feet and inches?
I get the ones that ask about deep, dark secrets. Greatest fears, those make sense. I have yet to ever use any of those answers to write. Most of the time, I forget my answers until I find the paper at the bottom of some pile.
I thought I prepared quite a bit before I started writing. In reality, I don't. I do write up all this information beforehand. It is supposed to help me get a feel for the characters, to know their story before I start writing. Once I start that first page, everything I've 'prepared' goes right out the window.
The only preparation tool that sticks around is my outlines. But even those are hardly glanced at unless I get stuck.
Am I alone in this? Does anyone else do lots of prep work to never even glance at it? Or a better question, can anyone see a benefit to doing all that prep work that I can't?
:)
I have probably done every character work-up sheet findable on the internet. Thing is, they don't help. Does it really matter what my character's favorite color is? How tall he is in feet and inches?
I get the ones that ask about deep, dark secrets. Greatest fears, those make sense. I have yet to ever use any of those answers to write. Most of the time, I forget my answers until I find the paper at the bottom of some pile.
I thought I prepared quite a bit before I started writing. In reality, I don't. I do write up all this information beforehand. It is supposed to help me get a feel for the characters, to know their story before I start writing. Once I start that first page, everything I've 'prepared' goes right out the window.
The only preparation tool that sticks around is my outlines. But even those are hardly glanced at unless I get stuck.
Am I alone in this? Does anyone else do lots of prep work to never even glance at it? Or a better question, can anyone see a benefit to doing all that prep work that I can't?
:)
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Didn't reach my goal for this morning. I want to have 10 pages done everyday. I've got three. When I wanted to be at 2.5%, I'm at .5% of 100k. I'm at least happy that I started the first page without any major first page jitters.
Does anyone have any tips on how to get yourself to wake up earlier than you want? I've tried the last few days, but I always end up back asleep until I have to get up or be late for work. I want to get up early, to have more time to write in the mornings.
The story is coming along nicely in my head. I am trying to implement what I learned from my first novel into this one. Main thing is, I learned I go extremely light on description, of everything. Almost to the point where my characters are floating in an air bubble talking.
Writing the first novel was hard. I know writing the second won't be any easier. If I can finish it in a decent amount of time, and have less revision work to do, I'll be happy.
When do you fit writing into your life?
Does anyone have any tips on how to get yourself to wake up earlier than you want? I've tried the last few days, but I always end up back asleep until I have to get up or be late for work. I want to get up early, to have more time to write in the mornings.
The story is coming along nicely in my head. I am trying to implement what I learned from my first novel into this one. Main thing is, I learned I go extremely light on description, of everything. Almost to the point where my characters are floating in an air bubble talking.
Writing the first novel was hard. I know writing the second won't be any easier. If I can finish it in a decent amount of time, and have less revision work to do, I'll be happy.
When do you fit writing into your life?
Monday, June 22, 2009
Posting Schedule
I know a while back I said I would never say which days of the week I would post.
Well, posting whenever I felt like it hasn't kept my blog all that active. I want to change that.
I will post on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. Writing posts, yummy recipes, whatever comes to mind. But I will post on those days. I promise.
:D
This is part of my plan to make the time in my life to write. My work schedule isn't as awesome as they told me it would be. We have to stay until all the stock is done. Sucks, but it's a paycheck.
I've made some serious strides on my outline for Entry Into Madness. I think I'm going to stop where I am and start really writing the first draft now. I'm not sure how I want to end it, so I want to let the story take me where it wants to go.
Just talking about it makes me want to get to work. I love writing.
Oh. And I will be more active in the blogosphere (is that even a word?). Don't be surprised if I take forever to reply though, I'll probably be active early in the morning then not around till late, if I even think to turn on my computer.
I like working, as much as it cuts down my free time, it's kind of fun.
Laters!
Meg
Well, posting whenever I felt like it hasn't kept my blog all that active. I want to change that.
I will post on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. Writing posts, yummy recipes, whatever comes to mind. But I will post on those days. I promise.
:D
This is part of my plan to make the time in my life to write. My work schedule isn't as awesome as they told me it would be. We have to stay until all the stock is done. Sucks, but it's a paycheck.
I've made some serious strides on my outline for Entry Into Madness. I think I'm going to stop where I am and start really writing the first draft now. I'm not sure how I want to end it, so I want to let the story take me where it wants to go.
Just talking about it makes me want to get to work. I love writing.
Oh. And I will be more active in the blogosphere (is that even a word?). Don't be surprised if I take forever to reply though, I'll probably be active early in the morning then not around till late, if I even think to turn on my computer.
I like working, as much as it cuts down my free time, it's kind of fun.
Laters!
Meg
Sunday, June 21, 2009
Sunday, June 7, 2009
I'm Bad at Titles
It's no secret I'm bad at titles. My first novel got it's title because I finally decided to just steal the MC's name. Blog posts aren't any better.
Excitement! I got a job! It's a good thing, I've been trying since January. It will be nice having a set schedule. It's a part-time job, with an awesome schedule. 8am till noon. How hard is that? I may start the waking up early routine to write before going to work.
Other excitement. I'm procrastinating. That's also a good thing. When I'm actively procrastinating from writing, I get more writing done then when I just ignore my computer all together.
All the other news in my life isn't so pleasant, most of it private and thankfully not directly involving me. Just indirectly involving me. I am an optimist. I see the best in people and hope till I can't hope anymore that they will be the best they can be. Just like I try to be. Doesn't happen very often I'm learning.
I go off on random tangents, but I finally finished Stephen King's On Writing. I rather liked it. I will admit it took me several reading sessions to get through it. I did better with the memoir parts over the technical parts. I will be keeping it as a reference though. Even if I just read a little random bit of it to remind myself we all have to start somewhere.
I just will not let work ruin my writing time. I love that I feel that way so intensely. I'm looking at my schedule, seeing it getting crunched for time and I am making damn well sure there is time for writing. And I love it.
It's funny. When faced with plenty of time to do whatever I wish, I get nothing done. But being faced with too many things to do, I get everything done. I guess I work better under pressure...
Back to writing reference books. I have...a few. First one I ever bought was Shrunk and White's. Love it. Sadly, I lost it so I get to buy it again. Then the order gets fuzzy, but I have Stephen King's which to me is more of a 'hey, this didn't happen over night' kind of smack on the head, I have one for editing. Writer's guide to self-editing or something like that. It's the one with text all over the cover with blue pencil marks. I have a couple more random ones that I think are for nonfiction.
What do you have in your writing closet?
Excitement! I got a job! It's a good thing, I've been trying since January. It will be nice having a set schedule. It's a part-time job, with an awesome schedule. 8am till noon. How hard is that? I may start the waking up early routine to write before going to work.
Other excitement. I'm procrastinating. That's also a good thing. When I'm actively procrastinating from writing, I get more writing done then when I just ignore my computer all together.
All the other news in my life isn't so pleasant, most of it private and thankfully not directly involving me. Just indirectly involving me. I am an optimist. I see the best in people and hope till I can't hope anymore that they will be the best they can be. Just like I try to be. Doesn't happen very often I'm learning.
I go off on random tangents, but I finally finished Stephen King's On Writing. I rather liked it. I will admit it took me several reading sessions to get through it. I did better with the memoir parts over the technical parts. I will be keeping it as a reference though. Even if I just read a little random bit of it to remind myself we all have to start somewhere.
I just will not let work ruin my writing time. I love that I feel that way so intensely. I'm looking at my schedule, seeing it getting crunched for time and I am making damn well sure there is time for writing. And I love it.
It's funny. When faced with plenty of time to do whatever I wish, I get nothing done. But being faced with too many things to do, I get everything done. I guess I work better under pressure...
Back to writing reference books. I have...a few. First one I ever bought was Shrunk and White's. Love it. Sadly, I lost it so I get to buy it again. Then the order gets fuzzy, but I have Stephen King's which to me is more of a 'hey, this didn't happen over night' kind of smack on the head, I have one for editing. Writer's guide to self-editing or something like that. It's the one with text all over the cover with blue pencil marks. I have a couple more random ones that I think are for nonfiction.
What do you have in your writing closet?
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Life then Writing Chatter
LIFE:
The fact that I am willing awake before 6am should tell you something about how my day is going so far. Not bad, so much as. I'm awake before 6am. Awake since 5am really. I am not a morning person. Not one little bit.
I have two giant red marks on my chin, previously zits. I have a job interview this afternoon. I have to exercise and go grocery shopping this morning. And then shower and all that fun stuff before the job interview. And I'm awake before 6am. Since 5 actually, first got woken up around 4 I believe.
This is my life during deployments. I can't give you any of the gooey details, this is way too public for that. But that's what it is. Whenever he's awake and able to just sit at the computer for a while, I'm awake too. Not that this happens all that often, but when it does, it's on days when I really could use the sleep. Totally going to suck if I do land a job, but the extra money coming in will be worth it.
And I either have a headache and runny nose from the lack of sleep/allergies, or I'm getting sick.
WRITING:
I know I started to write a post about how I finally did some writing again. I think I forgot about it and just went to bed the night before last. Short story is that I've dived back into writing. Forgot how much I loved it. I'd been stuck in 'editing only' mode. Not anymore!
I started working on a small scene for Ivory. It needed some help, mainly because it was lacking in description. Pretty sure I mentioned before that the entire novel is lacking in description. I have one part, the part I actually wrote first, that has a good amount of description. Everything else is on a description diet.
I've got my first reader helping point out where description is lacking. One chapter...it was is first note and it was for the whole chapter. That's when I decided to start back at the beginning and go though it again. I just have to break it up into scenes. I seem to do better staring at a scene then a chapter. I don't do the chapter a scene thing. My chapters range in the number of scenes.
I'm rambling.
My point is, my life is pretty crazy right now. So the fact that I managed to get my butt back to work is amazing. And I'm proud of myself for it.
The fact that I am willing awake before 6am should tell you something about how my day is going so far. Not bad, so much as. I'm awake before 6am. Awake since 5am really. I am not a morning person. Not one little bit.
I have two giant red marks on my chin, previously zits. I have a job interview this afternoon. I have to exercise and go grocery shopping this morning. And then shower and all that fun stuff before the job interview. And I'm awake before 6am. Since 5 actually, first got woken up around 4 I believe.
This is my life during deployments. I can't give you any of the gooey details, this is way too public for that. But that's what it is. Whenever he's awake and able to just sit at the computer for a while, I'm awake too. Not that this happens all that often, but when it does, it's on days when I really could use the sleep. Totally going to suck if I do land a job, but the extra money coming in will be worth it.
And I either have a headache and runny nose from the lack of sleep/allergies, or I'm getting sick.
WRITING:
I know I started to write a post about how I finally did some writing again. I think I forgot about it and just went to bed the night before last. Short story is that I've dived back into writing. Forgot how much I loved it. I'd been stuck in 'editing only' mode. Not anymore!
I started working on a small scene for Ivory. It needed some help, mainly because it was lacking in description. Pretty sure I mentioned before that the entire novel is lacking in description. I have one part, the part I actually wrote first, that has a good amount of description. Everything else is on a description diet.
I've got my first reader helping point out where description is lacking. One chapter...it was is first note and it was for the whole chapter. That's when I decided to start back at the beginning and go though it again. I just have to break it up into scenes. I seem to do better staring at a scene then a chapter. I don't do the chapter a scene thing. My chapters range in the number of scenes.
I'm rambling.
My point is, my life is pretty crazy right now. So the fact that I managed to get my butt back to work is amazing. And I'm proud of myself for it.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)