Sunday, August 7, 2011
My Cluttered Mind: My Cluttered Mind: If I Ever Figured Out How My Mi...
My Cluttered Mind: My Cluttered Mind: If I Ever Figured Out How My Mi...: "My Cluttered Mind: If I Ever Figured Out How My Mind Works... : 'I think if I ever figured out how my mind works, I think I would not be abl..."
My Cluttered Mind: If I Ever Figured Out How My Mind Works...
My Cluttered Mind: If I Ever Figured Out How My Mind Works...: "I think if I ever figured out how my mind works, I think I would not be able to continue writing. Not that I'm slamming out the wordage no..."
If I Ever Figured Out How My Mind Works...
I think if I ever figured out how my mind works, I think I would not be able to continue writing.
Not that I'm slamming out the wordage now.
I have three projects that I'm working on, the novel Before The Dawn, and two shorter works, "The Fault Lies Not..." and "A Voice in the Darkness". I work this way so that if I get stuck on one, I can move to one of the others. I've always worked like this.
Now, I'm in a strange position. I'm stuck on all three projects. I'm either trying too hard or I'm letting real life get in the way of my writing. I haven't really written anything for the last three or four days. That's about the most I can go without writing. If I try to go any longer, I start getting all nervous and twitchy, and people start thinking I'm having a seizure.
Cure: add another side project. That is, return to an abandoned side project.
And so, I'm adding "My Soul to Keep" back into my group of projects. One main project, three side projects. Not a problem. And it may help.
I feel a little better about "My Soul to Keep" than I did when I put it aside a couple of weeks ago. I've tweaked the appearance of Helena Troy, my main character, so that might've been what held me up. It's happened before. When I was first starting Before The Dawn, I had trouble picturing Brynna in my mind. I changed her appearance and charged on into it. Hopefully, changing Helena's appearance will have the same affect on "My Soul to Keep".
Since I don't give extensive description of my characters, changing a character's appearance only benefits me. But hey, if I can't picture the characters in my mind, I can't tell their story.
I also considered plotting out "My Soul to Keep" before diving back into it. I don't usually do more than jot down plot points. I can't follow plot outlines; my mind is always coming up with ways to make the story better. (Way back in high school, I had to write a story for a class project. The teacher wanted a plot outline first. The story I turned in had the same beginning and the same ending but it didn't follow the plot outline I had turned in. The teacher wasn't happy.)
I tend to think of plotting the same way Heinlein did:
"Winslow says I don't understand plotting and probably I don't - I have been congratulated many times on the skill shown in my plotting when I knew damn well that the story in question had not been plotted in advance at all. My notion of a story is an interesting situation in which a human being has to cope with a problem, does so, and thereby changes his personality, character, or evaluations in some measure because the coping has forced him to revise his thinking. How he copes with it I can't plot because that depends on his character, and I don't know what his character is until I get acquainted with him. When I can 'hear the character talk' then I'm all right - he works out his own salvation." (from Grumbles From the Grave)
Hopefully having a different image of Helena in my mind will help me get to know her a little better so I can tell her story.
What was that? Who does Helena look like now? All I'll give you are the initials: K.B.
Not that I'm slamming out the wordage now.
I have three projects that I'm working on, the novel Before The Dawn, and two shorter works, "The Fault Lies Not..." and "A Voice in the Darkness". I work this way so that if I get stuck on one, I can move to one of the others. I've always worked like this.
Now, I'm in a strange position. I'm stuck on all three projects. I'm either trying too hard or I'm letting real life get in the way of my writing. I haven't really written anything for the last three or four days. That's about the most I can go without writing. If I try to go any longer, I start getting all nervous and twitchy, and people start thinking I'm having a seizure.
Cure: add another side project. That is, return to an abandoned side project.
And so, I'm adding "My Soul to Keep" back into my group of projects. One main project, three side projects. Not a problem. And it may help.
I feel a little better about "My Soul to Keep" than I did when I put it aside a couple of weeks ago. I've tweaked the appearance of Helena Troy, my main character, so that might've been what held me up. It's happened before. When I was first starting Before The Dawn, I had trouble picturing Brynna in my mind. I changed her appearance and charged on into it. Hopefully, changing Helena's appearance will have the same affect on "My Soul to Keep".
Since I don't give extensive description of my characters, changing a character's appearance only benefits me. But hey, if I can't picture the characters in my mind, I can't tell their story.
I also considered plotting out "My Soul to Keep" before diving back into it. I don't usually do more than jot down plot points. I can't follow plot outlines; my mind is always coming up with ways to make the story better. (Way back in high school, I had to write a story for a class project. The teacher wanted a plot outline first. The story I turned in had the same beginning and the same ending but it didn't follow the plot outline I had turned in. The teacher wasn't happy.)
I tend to think of plotting the same way Heinlein did:
"Winslow says I don't understand plotting and probably I don't - I have been congratulated many times on the skill shown in my plotting when I knew damn well that the story in question had not been plotted in advance at all. My notion of a story is an interesting situation in which a human being has to cope with a problem, does so, and thereby changes his personality, character, or evaluations in some measure because the coping has forced him to revise his thinking. How he copes with it I can't plot because that depends on his character, and I don't know what his character is until I get acquainted with him. When I can 'hear the character talk' then I'm all right - he works out his own salvation." (from Grumbles From the Grave)
Hopefully having a different image of Helena in my mind will help me get to know her a little better so I can tell her story.
What was that? Who does Helena look like now? All I'll give you are the initials: K.B.
Sunday, July 31, 2011
My Cluttered Mind: 07/31/2011: "The Fault Lies Not..." Progress
My Cluttered Mind: 07/31/2011: "The Fault Lies Not..." Progress: "Slow progress is better than no progress. As of now, 'The Fault Lies Not...' is an even 9500 words long. The only question about the word..."
07/31/2011: "The Fault Lies Not..." Progress
Slow progress is better than no progress.
As of now, "The Fault Lies Not..." is an even 9500 words long. The only question about the word count is how far over 10,000 words will it end up.
Gotta check story lengths and see what constitutes a novella or a novelette.
As of now, "The Fault Lies Not..." is an even 9500 words long. The only question about the word count is how far over 10,000 words will it end up.
Gotta check story lengths and see what constitutes a novella or a novelette.
Friday, July 29, 2011
My Cluttered Mind: 07/29/2011: Before The Dawn Progress...Finally!
My Cluttered Mind: 07/29/2011: Before The Dawn Progress...Finally!: "After being unable to do anything with the novel for a while, I finally got back to Chapter 22. A change of location for the opening scene,..."
07/29/2011: Before The Dawn Progress...Finally!
After being unable to do anything with the novel for a while, I finally got back to Chapter 22. A change of location for the opening scene, a few extra lines of dialogue and I think I've gotten a handle on it. Hopefully this will let me continue with the novel.
Putting aside "My Soul To Keep", which was nothing but a distraction, should help, too.
As of right now, Chapter 22 is 820 words. In total, Before the Dawn is 64,179 words in length, 15,821 until my goal of 80,000 words.
I'm searching YouTube for a particular scene from 2001: A Space Odyssey. It's the scene at the end, where Bowman is deactivating Hal. I need it for inspiration.
Putting aside "My Soul To Keep", which was nothing but a distraction, should help, too.
As of right now, Chapter 22 is 820 words. In total, Before the Dawn is 64,179 words in length, 15,821 until my goal of 80,000 words.
I'm searching YouTube for a particular scene from 2001: A Space Odyssey. It's the scene at the end, where Bowman is deactivating Hal. I need it for inspiration.
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