Day -6: A Few Choice Hors D'Oeuvres Of Observation

I don't have a 'real' blog post today. I just have several tidbits -- things I realized over the past few days.

No, I didn't make this.

• Interestingly enough, I find that whenever I start a novel, I automatically default to third person past, omniscient, even if it changes later. However, whenever I start a short story, I automatically default to first person present. Both are written equally badly, but I wonder what that means. 
• My stories keep blending together. Maybe it's because I'm working on different things, as they bite me, so inspiration leaks. Maybe I'm just being paranoid, and it's really just that you can't avoid some cliches, which are so general that they're common to all, and it'll sort itself out as I keep writing; the devil is, as they say, in the details. Maybe it has nothing to do with working on separate projects or not, and the characters/worlds really are the same; maybe I just tend to create characters along certain repeated tropes. MAYBE it's all three! At this point, I don't know whether I'm just worrying too much (I mean, everything is still really abstract at this point, not much than thematic at best), or whether there really is something to worry about. It's all a big fat 'I don't know!' At the same time, I can't simply focus on one project, even though it's what I'd prefer, because once I do, that story starts taking me for granted, and promptly sulks in a corner, and refuses to cooperate.
• I'm shamelessly ripping this off of a forum post I wrote earlier, regarding something I noticed lately: Adequate characters are holograms (seeming real but fizzling out when you poke them) because they reflect the trope. Good characters are 3D because they show reality. Compelling characters go beyond the semblance of reality, and actively create the world around them. My point is, in order to make a character seem real to the reader, the character can't just be real, but has to be more than real. Part of that is due to the limitation of the written word, or non-auditory/non-visual sensory deprivation of film/television. How many real people do we know who would make good characters, exactly as they are, life and all? Story logic doesn't work like real life logic. The most human characters are superhuman. The most lifelike characters are larger than life. The most realistic story is larger than life. How or why this works, I can't say. I wish I knew. All I can say is, the beauty in it lies in the creator's ability to project not The reality, but to project a lie -- warped perceptions, misunderstandings, lying narrators, perceptions shaped by biases, and all. I wish I knew how to do this. How do you break through the wall of the trope? I don't want trope. I don't necessarily want to be a George R.R. Martin -- I mean, after all, I'm not him -- but I do want to similarly break the walls, in my own way. I want them to define themselves, and not be defined by any of my mental restrictions. The strongest characters, the ones that leap off the page, not only build the world for us, but they build the world as they see it. 
• And as they don't see it. We all know that moment when we see through a character's eyes, and we, the consumers, know a moment when we know something is wrong, but the character doesn't. Wrong boyfriend. Wrong door. Wrong career choice. Wrong path in a moral dilemma. This most especially hits home in an opening scene -- ever see the opening for something, and you just know that the character is in the wrong place, but doesn't know it? It basically sets the tone for the entire story. I wish I knew how to do this. So far, when I've read books, or watched openers in film/TV, I was never able to figure out how they did it.
• I am my own worst enemy. My fear of failure is so potent that it's woven into me like one of those choking vines around an old tree. It's gotten so bad that it literally stops me every other sentence. Even if I find myself writing randomly, under the heady throes of muse bite, the fever cuts me down before I can even eke out a sentence of the burgeoning brilliance bullshit. Then I slog on, writing on autopilot, never hitting the heights, because after every other sentence thereafter, my own inner editor tells me I'm not a good writer, and that I should just quit. This voice is so insidious that I thought I'd defeated it already when I got into a daily writing habit -- and only today realized that I'm still crippling myself. How do you defeat something like that?

There. I think that wall of text counts as a post, right?

Camp Countdown: Day -12, Or, A Skeptical Muse And The Terror of the Lapine Glomp

I'm insane.

12 days until Camp NaNoWriMo, and I decide to do a blogging challenge?

After I said I would never again do one of these things?

And then I go and create one myself?

As usual, I'm going to skip straight past what's been going on in The Tree of Life, because most of you already know, and for those that don't...*sigh* It's mostly me having nervous breakdowns in the Chasm of Despair.

Anyway, what I plan to do this Camp is to work on the second draft of Dark Arcana: The Amber of Time.

Henry: Writing a second draft requires that you sort of write a first draft.

Quiet, Henry. You know nothing of such matters.

*Henry opens her mouth*

It's true. Muses don't.

Muses get to lounge about on comfortable chairs, chuck out ideas, and criticize as and when they please. It is their minions we who get the unenviable task of finding plot holes (an experience akin to stepping in a land mine, except when you step in a land mine you get to go to the hospital), and filling out said plot holes.

In writer words, something I'd much rather not do.

That's why I went straight for the second draft. I have with me a plot pile, which is sort of wandering mental prose doodling, and which I suppose could be called a Zeroth draft. It can't be the first draft, because there's really no defined start and end point. I just started writing, and stopped when I got so deep in the Chasm of Despair that I started running out of dental floss.

And, in so many, many words, that's my plan for Camp: treat it like a first draft. Go through, make notes, and write down every single mental leap I make. Hopefully the end result will be something resembling enough of an outline, or an outright draft, that I can finally admit I've finished something.

*Henry starts laughing*

I have a special gif that shows how much my dear muse believes in me.

But I have a plan! That's P-L-N plan!

*Watches a giant plot bunny walking out of a field*

*Without moving its legs*

*Backwards*

I'm a believer in taking advantage of the Lapine Glomp. Ray Bradbury never worked on an idea until it came and bit him, and I find that the same strategy is working for me. This is quite different from not writing and waiting around for the muse. Muses never just show up. They need bait.

Henry: That's quite untrue! I show up all the time, and no beckoning needed!

Me: *raises eyebrow and puts out a heap of autopilot writing*

Henry: Something smells really good. I...must...follow...

I'll be writing. I'll be writing every day. I just won't force myself to work on Dark Arcana if it doesn't want to cooperate. I swear, writing is like trying to feed a running two year old. You don't run after the two year old. You let them come to you. (According to my mother, this really works. >_>)

Well.

Maybe I should get off this neverending blog post and go write actual story instead, before I resort to finding yet another silly gif to fill the big empty space.

At least it's not a silly gif. AND this album totally gets me in the mood for Dark Arcana. Shut up, Henry! This totally counts as homework!

A Hamster In The Dark

The correct party to whom you might apportion the blame for this post entity's existence is my friend Maxwell, over on The Wandering Quille. Around me, blog posts from the internets wastelands that formed at the beginning of 2013 are starting to pop up like little guilt gophers with big blinky eyes. I suppose I'll join the ranks, and be grumpy about how I feel like I'm running while standing still, like a hamster on a treadmill in a dark, empty room.

*Cue Dio singing A Rainbow Hamster in the Dark*

That has got to be the worst reason for a blog post ever. 

Be that as it may, it's that time of year where writers everywhere suddenly start waking up after the January doldrums. In my case, it's been a little more than a month since I started writing Deus Ex Machina.

That recurring quote in Battlestar Galactica comes to mind -- "All of this has happened before, and all of this will happen again." 

What it means is, this is the time frame when my stories fall apart. I start feeling like I've made no progress. I feel like my characters are flatlining. I start spiraling into the Chasm of Despair, in a fit of black depression, feeling like I'm the worst writer on the planet.

Which is exactly what happened. 

I've ranted about all of this before, and I will rant about all of this again, so there is no need to go into it all, because the answers remain the same. 

I'm in the pit, and I want out. My characters are bored. My dialogue is wooden. My setting is nonexistent. 

Oh, Exxox. Nothing happens in Exxox. It's the same thing every day. The worst part is, I can't change that. That's the point of Exxox. It's a prison camp hermit retreat for prisoners of state. It's a voluntary retreat from the rest of humanity.

Yet, for some reason, two agents have decided that this is where they have to be.

Also, why does it so prominently allow access to the Sybe? And what's with the hyperspatial death hallways? I know what Exxox is supposed to symbolize, but how to turn it into plot, I have no clue.

Then there's the moon that looks so boring that no one even looks twice at it, yet Ante says that it's haunted by something beyond science.

There's the virtual reality realm inhabited by The Presence, mysterious NPCs which come and go as they please, which seem to serve no purpose, and whose origin no one knows. Yet, Mike and Nova seem to have the ability to control them. Who is the master, and why?

There are movements and migrations all over the place. Suddenly, the human government decides to kick the  Earthmen off of Earth. 

There are the mysterious red discs, each the size of a large thumbnail, which shine like the eye of Sauron in the darkness...also known as the Chaos Nodules, also known as a Maguffin.

There is the force of the Chaos Division, a.k.a. Memory Men, an organization of official "paper shredders," who erase from history any incidents the government and anyone else with enough money wants covered up. (Not the same as the Agency, which is Khronos Division -- I don't think they have time travel.)

There is Michron Nebulon, a mysterious man with a past that he seems to prefer forgotten. I could launch into an entire blog post by itself of his idiosyncracies, but suffice it to say that he could have anything in the world that he wants, but he doesn't want most of it. I won't say much more, because spoilers, but I am wondering why he is in Exxox, and why he and Crais are simultaneously enemies on the weekdays and friends on the weekends.

There is Nova, who is a homeless Syber star, and who doesn't even seem to want to be in the story. 

There are Crais and Ante, the former a Memory Man, the latter a Sybernetic soldier, or Sybernaut, who, for some reason, think Exxox is the place for the cool kids, and who love stepping on each other's toes.

There is also Rena, who is...Rena. I have a feeling that she will serve as one of those narrators who is there for a lot of the story, but whose actions aren't as central. Oh, and that brings up an awkward question that you'd think I'd have thought about before: who is Rena? I have a feeling that that's something that might even turn out to be central to the plot.

Oh, and I can't forget about the depressed Imperator of humanity, and his ailing son, Victor. 

Then, of course, there is Nicholas, who gets sent off on a huge ship into the deeps of space, and meets mysterious space elves who warn of a great danger that threatens to engulf all sentient species.

Then there is C. Valen, the existential Earth girl who refuses to leave Earth.

I know all of these things are related, but I don't yet know how. I have no plot. I know what I want this story to be, but I have no idea how to turn it into that. I want an epic science fiction story, of the sort that often comes up in fantasy, except this is science fiction. It may not always be hard science fiction, and may sometimes venture into science fantasy, but that's about the gist of it.

Oh, and how do I summarize this whole thing? Lord of the Rings in space. It's not at all the same story, really, but it resonates in some ways.

Anyway, the only thing I know to do at this point is to keep writing, and to hope that something will make sense at some point. So forth I venture, running and standing still...or not. 

That hamster wheel better be comfortable.

2012: A Year In Review

And the award for least creative blog title ever goes to...

Three guesses.

I suppose this will come a little late to a lot of you, seeing as you live in the future. It's still a few hours ahead of midnight here.

Honestly, I don't remember much of what happened this year, at least not in a coherent fashion. Yesterday, I decided to do Milwordy. I blinked, and suddenly it was February, and I was getting the cramps out of my fingers from writing nothing at all after NaNoWriMo 2011. I scratched behind my ear, and had visions of finished drafts dancing in my head. It was going to be my birthday present to myself, for my 25th birthday.

Well, we all know how that turned out.

This was a year of wins and losses, of making mistakes, and learning, of heavy metal, of excited exultation, and of many, many visits to the Chasm of Despair.

After ten months of National Novel Plotting Month, I still haven't learned how to plan, but I did make a start. I do know now that my mind works in an iterative linear fashion, where every day, I can only see one single tiny end to end thread at a time, and that over time, the collective might evolve into a whole. (Yeah, that's the software developer in me talking.)

I lost Milwordy badly, but I learned that a word counter is just a tool, and not an end. I learned not to lose sight of the real goal, which was to complete something, not to vomit chaos.

I ended up devoloping chronic tendonitis, but I learned my limits. I learned how to prioritize my activities the hard way, to continue doing what I love, without injuring myself.

The old drafts of H öllebergen, Amber, Calor, and previous Dark Arcana rot in their folders, forgotten, but a newer, stronger Dark Arcana, composed of everything that they once were, emerges from the mist.

Speaking of Dark Arcana, I never quite finished even one draft, at least not the way I intended it. However, I did learn when to draw the line. I learned that the Tunnel is much longer and darker than I had once thought, but I also learned to acknowledge, if not accept, small victories.

Even now, as I gear up for a last mad dash to round the thing off before midnight, I can't help feeling that it's done. Then again, I guess

Lastly, one thing I still can't quite believe is that I've been a writing forum addict for less than a year. It seems like just yesterday that I crept onto FebNoWriMo, and stumbled onto the awesomeness of a small community of awesome people who actually know your name! ...In a manner of speaking.

*Cue Cheers theme song.*

(I'm sorry. I had to.)

I learned how to use Twitter. Yes, that had actually been a huge struggle to me. Seemingly simple? Yes, seemingly. I don't think I will ever fully get the hang of it, but I'm getting there.

So, things to work on for 2013:

Learn to plan. To make it less vague, let's say...learn to produce a loose outline of a novel, preferably by doing less work than I am doing now, which is to say, writing it.

Write every day. I have a skip counter, which started on November 1st, 2012. That number is now at 60, because it has been 60 days since I skipped writing. If I don't write some fiction -- even if it's only 100 words -- that number goes back to 0. As that number gets bigger, I find the thought of resetting it progressively harder, and that's just enough to blackmail me into spending at least five minutes writing 100 words. Sometimes, I'm having a bad day, and it stays 100 words. Most of the time, though, it's enough to kick me off. This will continue into 2012. No resets, not even for the new year!

And now, it is time for me to put my money where my mouth is. I have a draft to reorder before the day ends! (Of course, anyone who knows anything about me will know by now that 'day' can stretch well into the small hours. If I haven't gone to sleep, it's still day!)

Six hours to midnight.

Happy New Year, everyone!

"My car doesn't have power windows, but it does have an infinite improbability drive." -- My sister.

The Voice of Chaos. The Tick of Khronos.

It's December 1st. Yep. That time of year again. It is the time for doing things still undone.

The clock is ticking.

Time to avoid writing, and instead stare my eyes out at the TV shows I did not have time to watch in November.

Time to randomly subvert myself in the middle of something completely unrelated to writing, and then slap down words when I least expect it. In fact, I think I WILL do that to myself. I AM NINJA WRITER.

Time to start sketching my characters' clothes and places from the Five Worlds again.

Time to catch up on my reading.

Time to start several things simultaneously in order to accommodate my short attention sp

(I'm really hungry.)

an. And...hopefully finish them all.

Time to avoid as much of the ubiquitous Christmas music I can, and assemble my own delicious tunes: some for me, and some for Dark Arcana. This album would be perfect for Ethan, as he tries to track down what went wrong with history...I really must check out more epic cinematic music!

Listening To:



Time to subvert the topic of my own blog post. Speaking of which, here are the five worlds, along with two...places that are not places.

• Alpha: Nodus - The source of all things, but which is not the thing itself. The Inside. The Mind. The Inner being.
• 1. Calor - The age of the false gods. When the truth dies, and a new truth dawns. 
• 2. Engleter - The age of chaos. When truths and other truths collide in chaos, there is only the human, alone.
• 3. Quan Sai - The age of fire. When reason trumps emotion, and wrong and right mean the same thing.
• 4. Acheron - The age of darkness. In the void of truth, deception, chaos, reason, and emotion, there is only the night.
• 5. Grehai - The age of the human collective. When the nodes are scattered far in space and time, of sentience beyond truth, yet united. 
• Omega: The Wall - The final rest of all things, that which defines the thing. The Outside. The Outer being.

I have no idea what this even means. This is what happens when I let Dark Arcana do the typing for me. Now this damn hydra bunny is all smug because he knows exactly what he's talking about with all this fancy sounding philosophical stuff, but he won't tell me.

I think my blog posts have gone beyond editing.

This is utter chaos. Interestingly enough, each of these places matches up with a work of fiction that resonates in my head. WHY they resonate I can't very well say, but they do.

• Calor - A Song of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin
• Engleter - His Dark Materials by Phillip Pullman
• Quan Sai - Avatar: The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra
• Acheron - Star Wars and Lord of the Rings
• Grehai - Neuromancer by William Gibson

Pretty soon, I am going to be bleeding all over the place about how this is the worst idea ever. Oh, hello, Chasm of Despair.

I'm glad to see you've warmed up my comfortable blanket for me.

NaNoMongering 9: This Title Is Longer Than The Actual Post, Because Week 2 Blues Suck And I Am Tired

14141 words. Palindrome. :-)
ROTTING plot fell apart! :-(
Week 2. BLEH. >:-P
Iteration 1 meltdown done. -_-