Reality in Fiction

Realty isn’t so simple.  A lot of time is spent on making decisions, neither of which is clearly the “right” one.  Most of the time when someone opens one door, they close another, and there is a certain amount of regret when that door is closed.  Sometimes fiction makes choices far too easy.  There is always a right choice, and once it is made, the characters can live happily ever after.  This lack of reality can sometimes frustrate me.  But at the same time, if I wanted to read something realistic, I would simply read non-fiction.  The question of how much reality to incorporate in fiction is still very important though.  Fiction can’t be completely unrealistic; it needs elements of reality for us to connect with it.  I just feel fiction allows us to touch upon reality without having it banged over our heads.

I write mostly fantasy.  One of things I like best about fantasy is that characters are often placed against nearly impossible odds, but are given tools to fight those odds.  A skinny, little boy can hold incredible power, enough to combat even the most frightening enemy.  Whereas sometimes in our world, no matter how big or small someone is, impossible odds are often crushing.  This means, I guess, that I love happy endings.  I wish they happened more in real life, but I certainly happily anticipate them in the books I read.  I would feel really disappointed to read a book without a happy ending, but I also don’t want the happy ending to come too easily.

So how do you find the right balance between a fantasy world with a happy ending and reality?  In truth, I’m still not entirely sure.  I guess I just feel that if I read the book and believe the characters struggles, the book has enough reality for me.  What about for you?  How do you know when you’ve found the right balance?

And you’re doing this why?

Although I’m out on the road with Knight and the Prankster Duo visiting Grandma’s House, over the hills and through the snow, I wanted to share a very short blog post with you all.  Plus, I have to let you all know that the awesome Faith Hunter, author of the Jane Yellowrock novels will be visiting us next week, so mark your calendars and come help us welcome her to our lovely and slightly noxious Swamp!

While we traveled over the roads and pathways, I began to ponder some of the reasons behind the “why”s of my fourth of novel. Things in the Kyn world are a bit unsettled at the end of Shadow’s Moon, so now we have to fill in the blanks.  One of the things I’ve learned from the first three books, as the writer you best know the “why”s behind the story.  Why are your characters acting this way, why do they need to address these questions, why are they doing what they’re doing, why, why?

Once you have an idea of the answer, then you can start your story.  I know where I want to start the fourth book, I know who the main characters are, I know what problems they are going to face, I know why they act the way they do, but this time, I need to know what they’re going to do to solve these problems and why.

Character motivation and character evolution is critical to a good story. Your characters, especially in a series, have to continue to grow and evolve. Not just in an emotional sense, but in the challenges they face and how they triumph over said challenges. Sounds easy, right? It’s not.  For me, my characters have become real people, and rarely does a person have just one reason behind why they do something.  There are always a multitude of factors involved no matter how complex or simple our decisions. Getting this across in our writing, that’s true talent.

For the writers out there, how do you figure out your character motivations? Do you do interviews, use worksheets, just know because your crystal ball has fantastic reception? I’d love to hear.

For readers out there, how complex do you like your characters? Do you enjoy it when there are multiple factors playing part in their decisions and actions or do you like things straightforward and simple? Share, please.

Since I have to pay attention to the road as I’m the one in control of the vehicle, I guess I’ll let you go until next week.  Remember, Faith Hunter is coming, so make time and visit with us!

Wicked

It’s Time for the “G” Word!

It’s that time again, when blogs across the blogosphere tout the joys and agony of setting those “G” words.  Oh yes-GOALS.  The one thing my mom always told me about goal setting was to WRITE IT DOWN.  Something about putting it to paper makes it all too real.  Then when your faced with the evidence, there is no squeaking out of it.

Wait!  Don’t run and hide! I’m way too tired to chase you down!  I swear, no preaching from this choir.  Look, we’ll even review those pesky things I set for 2012.  I’m not sharing the non-writerly ones, oh heck no.  That would be way too depressing.  So focusing on my creativity goals for 2012, we had:

Finish SHADOW’S MOON by end of year.

Status Check:  DONE! Yes, indeed, we finished our first draft just before the holidays! Which means it got shipped off to the other Evil 7 for evisceration. Now I can remind the Prankster Duo and my Knight in Slightly Muddy Armor that, yes, they do have a wife and mom living with them–somewhere!

   Blog every week for both Jami Gray and 7 Evil Dwarves

                           Status Check:   We’re going to call this one good.  I think I may have missed a total of two weeks, but only because I was recovering from the TKO life had decided to lay on me.   DONE!

        Concentrate on getting out in the world of the internets

                           Status Check:  Okay, I am now the proud mama of a website, Facebook page, Facebook Author page, Twitter account, Goodreads account and author page, Amazon author page and I remember running around to various blogs through out the year, trying to come up with entertaining answers to questions or picking juicy tidbits from SHADOW’S EDGE and SHADOW’S SOUL to share.  Done!

Grow enough that writing career can replace job-that-pays-the bills

Status check:  Umm, yeah…still working on that one.  Seems to be a bit harder than anticipated.  Guess it will graduate to the 2013 list.

I’m thinking 3 out of 4, not so bad. 

Want to share how your list looks? Come on, we’d love to celebrate with you!

You Survived NaNo…now what?

So we’ve survived the madness that was NaNo and we actually did it! Consider it a major miracle.  I know the whole point of having this in November is to test your ability to meet your goal under severe duress, but seriously, folks? I think you’ve gone beyond severe, into freakin’ terrifyingly horrendous…but now that we’re done, what happens next?

Well there’s this minor celebration involving an overly decorated tree, hastily wrapped packages (some reappearing from last year), and a never ending stream of family and friends just “popping by” to get through.  If you could find the time to write during the wild halycon days of November, I promise, you can find the time in December.  Now, whether or not your brain is able to focus and make sense, well that’s another story.

I have to credit NaNo with getting me through SHADOW’S MOON’s mid point and well on the speed track of the last handful of chapters.  The goal is to have this first draft done by (what month is it or yeah…) December, get it out the other Evil Ones for dismemberment, then it’s onward to the polishing stage.  By end of January it should be winging it’s way out into the query world.  I will keep you updated.

Apologies ahead of time but my posts this month will be embarassingly short as something has to give and my family has already started to wonder who I am. 

So to keep the conversation going, what all do you guys have planned for this holiday season?   For me and mine, much celebrating with loved ones has the starring role!

Cooking , however, is no where on my list unless it’s a move to invite the local fire department over. 

Until next week…

Wicked

NANO- National Novel Writing Month

November is National Novel Writing Month!  We Evil Dwarves are proud to say we are participating this year (and November is ALMOST here).  I have prepared my blogs ahead of time with a plan, so I can spend November working on the second novel in my new series.  But, I do have some reservations.

First of all, you have to understand my writing process to understand why something like NANO could get me a little stressed, so here it is:

1. Wake from an intriguing dream.  Write it down.  Mull it over.  Write it down again, with some of the weird that doesn’t make sense when you wake up stuff, gone.
2. Start writing.  Understand my character and my world.  Adjust how the character changes what I originally thought.
3. Stop writing.  Create a general outline for the remainder of the book.
4. Start writing again.  Make it to about the halfway point in the book.
5. Stop writing again.  Go back and edit/revise the first portion of the book.
6. Rewrite the outline with more details, adjusting for the changes that have occurred during the writing process.
7. Start writing again.  Write until the end of the book.
8. Finally, the hardcore revising begins.

Okay, so I never claimed my writing process was neat and organized.  What is your process like?  Also, this is why I fear NANO so much.  I am expected to go against my obsessive writing behaviors and just write for an entire month.

I don’t know how successful I will be in this process.  Our expectation is to write 50,000 words in one month, BUT it has taken me three months to write the first 50,000 words of my current novel.

So, wish me luck!  I hope I can proudly say, come the end of November, that I accomplished my goal, but if I end up mumbling something less than 50,000 words as my accomplishment, don’t judge me too harshly.

Also, does anyone else plan to participate this year?

Prepping for NaNo…

Welcome back, Swamp visitors!  I hope you enjoyed last week’s jaunt into the wonderful world of new writers.  I hope you found something wickedly cool to add to your reading lists! 

In honor of the looming presence of NaNo, I thought I’d share a bit of my prep experience for this year with you.  Yes, I know, a pantser who preps? What an oxymoron.  Except I’m finding it necessary before I dive head long into the roaring abyss of NaNo next week. 

Writing by the seat of your pants is not only a creative whirlwind, but it’s terrifying.  Here’s why:  when you get stuck, you get stuck and sometimes you can’t tell up from down and start digging deeper into the mire of fragmented concepts and useless plot points. I call myself a pantser, but in actuality, I cheat because I do plot out the major plot points.  You know the ones, this happens in the first third to start the ball rolling, this happens in the second third because this is where everything is going to change for the characters, and this has to happen in the last third because now that my characters have a new reality, this is how it will solve the problem.

Since I’m stuck just past the first third of Shadow’s Moon, I have been paying attention to various blogs about structure and plot and planning.  I know, I know, I can hear the screams of denial from my fellow pantsers–but really, what else can you do if you want your story to work?

As I continue to write and improve my craft, I’m discovering that the OCD that rules my life in every other aspect, is starting to bleed over.  Not as much as it can, but enough so that yes, I am preparing for NaNo to make sure I can get unstuck and tuck Shadow’s Moon under the “completed” section of my writing checklist.   I am going back to make sure that I have down my characters’ motivations, what’s driving my protagonist and why, where is the central conflict (romance or mystery?), what other conflict layers are there (and there are more than one!), what are my three major turning point that change my characters’ goals/motivations, drive their darkest moments, and then enable them to beat the bad guy. 

Do you see how the picture is starting to form.  Not really an outline per se, but more of road map.  I’m hoping it will allow me to keep my pantser identity, but I have a feeling no successful writer is really a true pantser, because at some point we all have to plot.

Because I’ll be swimming with the NaNo sharks all of November, my blogs will just be a word count with maybe one or two sentences (if I can form them) on what’s happening.  Keep your fingers crossed I survive NaNo and bring forth some awesome habits and new writing skills! 

Now onto NaNo!

PS: If you want to add me to your NaNo buddy list, feel free! I’m at NaNo Wrimo under Jami Gray!

–Wicked

To NaNo or Not To NaNo?

Did you see that blur? Were you able to make out the bits of green of Spring 2012? Or the shimmery waves of heat of Summer 2012?  Did you miss the burnished coppers of the impending Fall 2012?  I sure did.  As a matter of fact, when I bothered to poke my head up lately, do you know what was staring back at me?

NaNo.

Oh yes, it is time to start wondering the age-old question-To NaNo or not to NaNo.

Last year, I wimped out.  I used the fact I was tying up Shadow’s Soul not to participate, but let’s be honest…NaNo is intimidating.

For those of you not familiar with NANO, never fear, it will soon become the relative/friend who dropped by for a night and didn’t leave for years.  NaNo is National Writing Novel Month and is also identified by the name NaNoWriMo.  It happens every November–no matter if the Mayans are correct or not, it will still be here in 2013.  It will haunt your computer, stalk you in the wee hours of the morning, and taunt you late at night while you’re enjoying your primetime shows.  It whispers to you–”Come on, you know you could be putting these voices to paper here!”  One month, where every day you write-1 line or 1,000, doesn’t matter. What matters is you write–no Inner Editors allowed. They’ve been banned to the kiddie table in the corner and they are not allowed to speak.

So although I’m still working on Shadow’s Moon, trying desperately to drag it to completion by the end of the year, I’m actually starting to listen to the sibilant whispers of NaNo. Perhaps I’ll start doing some research, sit down for coffee with some characters and poke around, play God and create some new worlds…tempting.

Anyone else out there starting to get the itch to prepare?  Are you looking at a HazMat suit to get through it or are you more the flip-flop and Hawaiian shirt type? C’mon, share…we want to know who else is going to go insane in November.

PS–Come on over to Cynthia Woolf’s place on the 25th of August as I pop over for an interview.  If you comment you get a chance to win something cool!

 

–Wicked

And to think you were done…

I promised to drag you along this journey of crafting a novel from beginning to end, but I have found that my OCD tendencies have put a kibosh to multi-tasking in this one aspect of my life.  I may be able to juggle the Prankster Duo, the hellhound, the knight in slightly muddy armor, the job that pays the bills, life in the Swamp, and various other aspects commonly referred to as LIFE, but when it comes to writing, I can only do one thing at a time.

So now that Shadow’s Soul is off my desk and on my editor’s, I thought I was good to go for book 3.  Until I realized I’m not finished with Shadow’s Soul just yet.  Nope, now I need a tag line, a synopsis, and a cover.  Great.  I’m so thrilled (and yes, that is sarcasm in my voice!).

Although the opening scene of book 3 is floating around in my head along with Eerie’s voice screeching “Just write it, damn it!” while Snarky’s whip is whispering along my prickling skin, I can’t do it.  Not yet.  Not until the tag line and synopsis is done.

I enjoy writing, because let’s face it, if I didn’t, I’d have to be a masochist to put my self through all this crap for some words on paper. Yet I have to say that trying to pare down 387 pages into two catchy paragraphs is like trying to get my hellhound into the backseat of my car for a vet’s visit.  It’s not pleasant and suddenly there seems to be a long list of things I just HAVE TO DO RIGHT NOW.  It stinks but it’s something that has to be done.

Plus I’ve found that my working line of logic to tie up the project known as Shadow’s Soul is somewhere along the lines of:  DO SYNOPSIS, CREATE TAG LINE, and then, go forth and try to piece together your cover so it matches what the book’s really about.  I have started but I just keep stalling out.

As soon as this post is done, I think I’ve run out of THINGS I MUST DO RIGHT NOW and will be forced to finish my dreaded synopsis and tag, then submit it to the other Evil 7 for dissemination.

Procrastination is now heading for the door and wiggling bony fingers in a very snerky way leaving me chained to my desk with a keyboard super glued to my fingers and a mental countdown clock is slowly driving me mad.

I will get this done, really…

Oh look, a text message from my BFF… movie at 5 tonight?  I think I can work that in…

New Year, New Story…

Okay so the New Year has arrived and it’s time to get back to writing.  Shadow’s Soul is out being eviscerated, I mean critiqued, by the other Evil Six so I decided to start the year off write…I began to plot out Raine and Gavin’s next adventure.

But to get to this point took time.  Here’s a little insight into the schizophrenic maze known as a writer’s mind. 

I’ve spent the last few weeks prepping the Prankster Duo, the knight in slightly muddy armor, and the hellhound for the holidays.  We had to hunt down holiday gifts, bind them and then deliver them out to the other Swamp residents.  The Swamp Thing family has had a rough time this season so we had to sneak in late one night to leave their gift on the doorstep in an effort not to be dragged into their “martial discussions”. The Prankster Duo managed to get in and get out without any major setbacks (fires, explosions, dismemberment, etc.) while delivering Smokey, Quirky and Jedi’s gifts.  The knight and I took on the tougher residents. Evading Snarky’s newest whip was perilous and dropping off Eerie and Mischievous’ gifts, well I won’t go into detail. Suffice to say the hellhound was in need of some bone therapy afterwards, and knight’s armor had a few more dents to add to his collection.  Don’t tell Eerie, but I think I lost a blade to one of the shambling hordes.

Regardless, we made it through the season.  The Prankster Duo has increased their weaponry supply with some new additions and they’ve been tormenting the zombies scuffling through the Swamp.  The hellhound was quite pleased with his decapitated duck and unidentified leg bone.  Overall it was a lovely Holiday!

While hunting down and setting sneaky traps for our holiday gifts, I decided to pare down the towering pile of nightstand books and got caught up with some of my favorite stories.  When I finished with that, it was time to face the ominous quest looming on my horizon… the creation of my next book.

For those not familiar with a writer, let me explain why your writer friends seem to morph into bi-polar maniacs with multiple personalities in-between their Works in Progress (aka WIPs).  We all fear the blank page or screen that mocks us with its whiteness. 

Typing the last word on your last story is a relief, until you realize you have to start all over again.  Regardless if you’re doing a stand-alone or a series, beginning a story is terrifying.  Let’s follow along with my neurosis as I begin a new WIP.

First question that hits—can I do it?  Can I really get another three to four hundred pages that will keep a reader on the edge of their seat? Am I all tapped out? Was writing that last book, was that it?

A few deep breaths and a handful of chocolate later I’ve managed to smash that stupid voice into silence.  Yes, I’m a writer, damn it, I can do this.  I’ve done it before.

Next question—so do I continue with Raine and Gavin or do I let other characters have their own story? Should I go back to that other story line and take a break from Raine? If I continue with Raine, I’ll have to pitch to my editor for book three, if I don’t I’ll have to go back out to the vicious world of pitches and throw myself on the mercy of another editor.  What to do?

I re-read the 125 pages I have of the other WIP and it hits me…this isn’t going to work without some major re-writing.  Where do I start? Should I throw it away and just start from scratch? I mean, I really like some of it, but other parts are going to have me sporting a Sinead O’Connor look real quick.  Oh man, maybe it’s not so smart to go back to that one just yet….okay let’s think about Raine. 

What do I need to do next? Where is the overall story arc going? Every book has to accomplish something or why write their story? Fine, let’s torment the newly established couple, throw in some twists and turns and then…miracle of miracles, words are spitting across the page.  A plot emerges.  This is good, I haven’t lost the ability yet. 

Okay so I have a plot, but I’m still thinking this year I’d like to get two books done, so where do I focus?  How do I choose which gets to be done first? The massive re-write or begin Raine’s latest adventure?

Dear God I think the voices in my head are going to stomp my brain into mush and it will leak out of my ears and then neither story will get written.  ARRRGHHH!!!

I manage to piece together Raine’s story and I’m turning over how to re-write the other story, but in the meantime those around me are giving me a wide berth.  Maybe it’s the fact I’m continuously mumbling under my breath while wildly gesturing to get the voices to lower to a dull roar, or maybe it’s the fact that while eating a lovely dinner with family, I blurt out, “She’s being hunted by a psychic psychopath!”

Chairs scrape a few more inches away from me, the Prankster Duo just shake their heads, and knight simply responds in a gently voice, “Do you want some more chocolate, babe?”

And the year has barely begun…

Wicked!

First Drafts

I love first drafts.  I’m pleased to say that I’m currently in the middle of a new one for NaNoWriMo and that while I’m a day behind, it is progressing.  Part of the fun of NaNo is just putting down junk, turning that inner editor off and saying, “screw it, I’m gonna write as many adjectives and adverbs as I want and no one can stop me!” (Your option whether or not to insert maniacal laughter here; I often do.)

But there’s also that first burst of creativity, the rush of new characters, and the heedless joy at dialogue that while objectively awful, seems inspired at the time.  You are the creator of whole new worlds, born to breathe life into being!  There’s also the rush of throwing in random things when you start to feel a little uninspired.  Need a new character halfway into the story?  Throw him in!  Pretend he was there all along.  You can always fix it later.

I have learned though, that the more random things you do, the more ends you leave loose at the very beginning, the more clean-up you’ll do later.  NaNo is good for getting everything out and down so you can work with it.  A lot of people need that.  I know I did when I was first starting out.  But is NaNo always good?

I’ve found myself struggling with NaNo this year.  I’d gotten used to the slow write, the burn that builds up over months and months as you back story, research, cross-reference, and fine-tune (and believe me, I’ve still got a long way to go).  And this year, I’ve been struggling to get into the 2,000 words a day this year, not just because of my internal editor, but because I can’t write quality and quantity.  I can’t have it both ways.  It has been frustrating at times, to say the least.

I may ditch NaNo after this year, if what I’ve seen shows it’s become less of an effective tool for me as a writer. I don’t know yet, I’m still in the early 20,000′s and this draft is still developing.  But that doesn’t mean I would abandon the idea of getting first drafts down in a NaNo-like form.  Just maybe not in such a strict formula.

In the meantime, I’ll keep plugging away.  Take care, friends, and happy writing.