Set Theory

The analyses about the election show a House divided as well as an unbalanced Senate.  This sets the stage for more divisive interference with the wishes of the opposite party, largely for political dominance reasons rather than what might be good for the country.

Clearly, the Republicans hold a majority, but not one sufficient to guarantee dominance over the Democrats, but I wonder if those political labels really mean anything in today's fractured world.  What would, for example, the congressional balance look like if you separated members into liberal/progressive vs conservative/reactionary camps?  What about gradations of left- or right-ness with the moderates occupying the broad center?  What about social conservatives vs liberal ones?Or even (shudder) coastal vs interior?

There are many variations of separation, but what if, among them we could find a grouping that maps a way that members can bridge the apparent political gaps that has brought the meaningful management of our country to a virtual halt and cooperate?  What if there is a grouping that makes an end run around party rules, gotcha politics, and concerns about the next election cycle?

Wouldn't that be nice?

#SFWApro

Despoiling the Commons

We live in an interconnected world where peoples of diverse backgrounds, beliefs, and dispositions rub up against one another all of the time and, quite often, in uncomfortable ways.  Most develop an insulating layer about their own constellation of beliefs and understandings that enable them to live with, but not accept those who believe otherwise.  It's a large playing field and there is sufficient room for everyone.

But most of us realize at an early age that there is a social contract that allows for discord, a way of resolving issues without resorting to behaviors or actions that would destroy the precious bubble that allows us to co-exist.  There are laws to prevent the most harmful actions, a moral code that deals with things of lesser consequence, and common decency to keep everyone but sociopaths from needlessly bothering others.  The contract we all commit to when we become part of society both protects and supports us throughout our lives and helps preserve what we value most.

We jail or fine those who break laws, we confine and try to help those who are a danger to themselves or others, but we have only a few mechanisms to deal with those with little value for human decency; those who in a moment of pique would poison the well from which we all drink, pollute the food we consume, or tear down a shared fabric that provides delight and pleasure to everyone.

Destroying a work of art, a piece of literature, the commons, or a useful social construct are equally vile for doing so not only destroys the current culture's enjoyment, but also denies their appreciation from innumerable future generations.

Just saying.


#SFWApro

Convention Boobs

I have deliberately restricted my posts on this blog to the agony and ecstasy of writing as a way of life and steered clear of the swirling controversy surrounding the science fiction "community."

Today, I read a post by Mahenia Delvenni that seemed to conflate SFWA with offensive convention behaviors and obliquely reflected on several parallel discussions with the SFWA community.  I am not defending any point of view but I think the air needs to be cleared a bit for those new to the writing community and/or conventions.

Let's be perfectly clear:  The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) holds only one (1) convention per year and that is the annual Nebula weekend during which we honor the best and brightest writing in our genre.  The Nebula Weekend is the ONLY SFWA-sponsored event that fans can attend.

All, and I repeat ALL other science fiction conventions held around the world are organized, managed, and conducted by groups of dedicated fans.  SFWA members may attend these as guest panelists, to sign autographs, or just schmooz with their fans.  This may give the appearance to the uninformed that SFWA as an organization is somehow involved in the convention. In actuality, SFWA has nothing to do with the way any convention, up to and including WorldCon, is run nor does the organization have any authority over the bad behavior of attendees at these conventions.

Do not distain SFWA for the behavior of a few ignorant boobs.

Those wanting to have a career in the genre would be doing themselves a disservice should they choose not to join SFWA and avail themselves of the many relationships that can be forged there.  The community has a long history of paying-forward by veterans to new writers.  They will also learn that the organization is not an "old-boys club" as some have inaccurately termed it; we have four women and one senior citizen on the SFWA Board of Directors, the Nebula ballot this year was packed with female writers as well as those in non-traditional relationships, of different national origin, and religious dispositions.   SFWA members are a multihued and varied group who are expanding the boundaries of the genre with every word they write. As an often contentious group the members nevertheless talk out their issues, ask the Board to make a decision when they can't, and abide by the results.  SFWA sometimes makes mistakes but when it does, more often than not, we work hard to repair the damage.

That's what a professional organization does.

#SFWApro

Whew

As you may know I got hit by the derecho last week which sort of messed up the eastern seaboard of the US with massive power and communications outages that we have yet to recover from. Coupled with the extremes of temperatures (90+ degrees most days and a few over 100!) it has been miserable.
But now I am back on line and able to pick up the threads of my rambling dialogue, that is, once I manage to clear the backlog of other things that keep me from my writing.

That's an interesting turn of phrase: "keeping me from my writing" as if life was going to put itself on hold while I share my fantasies with the keyboard.  But "life" always interferes, there's always shopping to be done, car repairs that demand attention, washing to be done, meals to be prepared, and, oh my God, you have to get out of bed and get dressed EVERY morning!

All this stuff leaves me hardly enough time for dealing with the business side of writing - like keeping my work in circulation in the hope that it finds a buyer, keeping records of writing expenses, and ensuring that the family doesn't starve of become homeless.

Worse, it barely leaves any time at all for writing, that is, if I don't give up reading the paper, the latest book, watching television, listening to the radio, talking to friends and family, and being otherwise a member of society.

It's a wonder that i get any writing done at all!

Rant

This is not about writing but something that has irritated me for too many years.

I live near the grounds of the annual Maryland Renaissance Festival which, for more than a month, attracts thousands of people to chew turkey legs, watch plays, but crafty stuff, sword fight, and do all the things that represent old English customs from about 1200 - 1700, more or less. Fun stuff but costly (especially the turkey legs and I'm not talking about the damn tights that ride up your crotch and.... not that I'd ever wear anything like that, no sir, not me, never.  Besides, they itch.

There is no train station, metro liner, bus service at the Faire (note how I am getting into the spirit of things) so everyone has to come by automobile to produce acres and acres of parked cars, some so distant from the entrance that some take a lunch so they can snack along the way.  Hillsides of automobile, cascades of steel and plastic stretching as far as the eye can see.  Acres and acres of parked cars each of the weekend days it is open.  And all of those cars make it to the site down a two-lane road forming a parade miles long and manages to block access to the surrounding communities.

None of which bothers me much, except that they all seem to need gas.  The nearest station/snack shop has eight pumps, four on each side, and has two entrances at ninety degrees to each other.  Cars pour in from either of the entrance to gas up, some coming from the right and others from the left.  In a logical world this would present no problem: Cars would line up to take their turns like good little soldiers.*  But we do not live in a logical world.  In the real world car manufacturers have no appreciation of mechanics or the realities of gas stations.  Willy-nilly they put the filler pipe on the driver's side or the passenger's so that it is impossible to have an orderly line.  Instead the cars butt head to head, cutting from one side to another and, on too many occasions, finding that the side nearest the pump is the wrong side.  In older times, but hopefully later than the RenFaire period, hoses were long enough to reach the opposite side of the vehicle, but today the behemoth trucks, SUV's, and even ordinary cars, that is not possible.

What I want to know is why there can't be some standardization?  I don't care which side they want or whether it has a flip lid or not.  Just put the damned filler cap on one side.  Is that too much to ask?

So each Saturday or Sunday a low level conflict takes place as those in line for one side scream at those who, at least to them, cut into line from the opposite direction, or block them from leaving by parking too close. Lesser skirmishes blow up when someone* decides to do a little shopping or have lunch while leaving their car at the pump, but that is a subject for another day.

*except for the occasional oblivoid (e.g. asshole) who ignores social conventions
*ibid

"Short" People

Several years ago, after I had a few stories published and wrote my first Nebula finalist (Primrose & Thorn), I was invited to dinner by four accomplished novelists. I listened with rapt attention as they spoke knowingly of agents and contracts, of royalties and galleys, and talked with the ease of experience about book launches, autographing, and the other things that seldom impact a short story writer's life.  This was heady stuff and I reveled in being graced to be among their number.

Yet, as the evening wore on, I began to wonder why I had been invited to sit among this prestigious group since not only had I not written a novel, but the possibility of embarking on the long and arduous task of writing long had not yet crossed my mind.  Were they going to give me the secret of writing huge works?  Were they about to give me the keys to novelist heaven?  Were they going to impart the secrets of the book?  I waited, growing more concerned and anxious as the evening wore on through salad, entree, desert, coffee, and finally drinks.

Finally the leader of this pack of wolves turned to the lamb among them and said: "Bud, how do you manage to sell to Analog?  What's the secret of writing short?"

I forget what I said, but most likely it was "Huh?"  That was my first glimpse of something that I have debated ever since that night: why can some people produce novels with seemingly little effort while others struggle to produce more than a few thousand words at a time? What quirk of mind causes a novelist to spend fifty pages on an action that a short story writer dismisses in a sentence?  Why does no one go to the bathroom in a shorter work while novel characters detail every aspect of their daily ablutions?  And why in the world does the novelist allow dozens of characters to creep into their story, diverting the plot this way and that, pestering the protagonist with niggling, bothersome trivia that prevents resolution of the central issue chapter after chapter?  Why do they insist on burying the core of the story with excessive detail and descriptions?

Why can't they just say what they mean and get off the stage? 

Short story writers don''t feel the need for glittering ornamentation or writing casts of characters that are not directly related to the central thesis of the story.  A short story's protagonist is never diverted for long from their path, not with the premise's tease far behind and the end of the story looming just a few thousand words ahead.  No, the short story writer's brain focuses on the immediate, the important, and nothing that does not support the central thesis is allowed to intrude on making a clear and utterly unambiguous end.  The short story always has a point, damn it!

Perhaps that is the central difference between the novelist and short story writer: While the novelist cannot resist the call of complexity, the short story writer cannot resist the need for simplicity. 

But I fear that is too much of a simplification since many novelists write short stories and some short story writers manage to eke out a novel or two.  The answer might be the simple economic reality that you can't make money writing short so most novelists chose not to.   That also is a simplification that begs the question I was asked at that long-ago dinner and today, after all those years since, I am left not knowing the answer.  I do know that I write short because I couldn't do otherwise.  I feel impelled to reach a conclusion quickly, to make my point, tell my tale, and start on the next, and the one after that, and on and on.

And maybe novelists feel the same impulse to expand, expostulate, and discourse because they cannot do otherwise.

Unspoken Things

We've all heard the gripes and complaints about the writing game - the difficulties completing the first draft, the pain of editing and revising, revising, revising and the further indignities of yet another god-damned edit and revision before casting the piece adrift, only to see it flounder on the shoals of editorial whims.  Yes, and then, when it does sell, seeing the niggling copyedits, the galley mistakes, and finally, seeing a botched print job, poor cover art or illustration or all three, and usually at once.  We've all heard the litany of missing manuscripts, computer failures, files forever lost or worse, unreadable. Then there are unsympathetic agents, penny-pinching editors, illiterate copyeditors, and other hated minions who dislike your work.


On and on, the writers complain at the cons, on facebook, twitter, myspace, and a thousand other channels of the bitter hand fate has dealt them by cursing them with the writing compulsion. They say a better income could be realized flipping burgers, a better marriage if only they didn't waste time at the desk, happier kids if they took the time to be with them instead of cursing and slaving at the word-smithing anvil they've chained themselves to.  Yeah, all that.


But the thing they're reluctant to tell you, the precious secret that they all hold in the deepest recesses of their being is the absolute joy they experience while writing.  They rarely mention the high they achieve by crafting the perfect phrase, choosing the precise word, or arranging the well-crafted scene.  Joseph Campbell said to "follow your bliss ..." will lead you to a life of happiness. You may not be wealthy, healthy, or respected as a result of writing, but you will be happy.  

In writing as well and over time one gets more pleasure as their skill in the craft improves.  Just as a marathon runner experiences a high after they hit the wall, so too does a writer feel a jolt of exhilaration when that penultimate revision recedes into memory and only the final editorial gloss remains.  Acceptance provides satisfaction for a time, publication gives a temporary glow, and the income a certain feeling of accomplishment, but the true writer's joy comes from none of those - it comes from simply knowing that you have created a well-structured and carefully edited story.

And that, more than anything, is the meaning of joy.

Showing Up

This week I'll be at the Nebulas in Washington DC and consequently lose four or five days of writing productivity because I won't show up at my desk for the daily struggle with my muse.

I am firmly convinced that ninety-nine percent of success is simply showing up.  This applies to writing as well as work, life, and love.  If you don't put your tail in chair, fingers on keyboard or pen in hand, and WRITE every day.  You only get those mythical flashes of inspiration when they are watered by gallons of sweat and fed by bales of words on a regular basis.

Yes, writing is hard work as you strain to put one word after another, toil at stringing sentences together in some semblance of order, and facing this continual pressure to somehow make sense of the current piece.  On your worse days you practically rupture brain cells to produce plodding, barely literate, wooden narrative. On your best days the words flow from your fingertips like liquid gold, each phrase a gem of language and expression. You never know what will happen when you sit down, since either alternative seems to have little to do with how you feel, but if you don't sit down to write it is likely that your sudden flash of inspiration won't strike.

Years ago I started putting aside a couple of hours each evening in which to write - not email, not social networking, not rearranging deck chairs, but simply putting fingers to keyboard and producing lines of text. The exceptions were weekends, although I admit to sneaking an hour or two of writing in on occasion.  Some nights it was creating, sometimes revising and editing, sometimes simply blocking out story ideas or doing research on something needed for a story.  This last was difficult since I am very, very easily distracted.  Nevertheless, each night I would sit at the keyboard and try to write.  The result off those years of effort allowed me to sell a few stories, only two or three of which I can honestly say wrote themselves.  The rest, and especially the novellas, are the result of showing up, night after night, and slogging away at the craft.

Occasionally, I'd even have a small flash of inspiration.

Plotting

For too many years I didn't bother with actively and deliberately plotting my stories. Instead i allowed them to grow organically, sometimes going in unexpected directions, often wandering away from the point of the story, and occasionally diverting the characters into doing something different than intended.

The not unexpected result of this sort of garbage collecting was that I wasted considerable time editing and rewriting, often throwing out pages of perfectly good narrative and dialogue that had nothing to do with the purpose of the story. Much of this effort was spent moving blocks of words about to achieve the best possible order.  It was usually the third or fourth draft that achieved some semblance of plot.

My relentless pursuit of plot drove me to develop all manner of tools - outlines, sketches, copying plots from other stories, and even developing standard outlines for mysteries, drama. etc.  For novellas I even cut the printed pages into scenes, spread them on a table, and rearranged them to the order they story needed before taping them together, going back to the computer and cutting and pasting once more.

Along the line I developed the concept of scene theory (see some of my older blogs) as wrote software to help me structure my stories. These ranged from Hypercard, several relational databases ending with FileMaker Pro.  Finally, thanks to Charlie Stross, I discovered Scivener and have been using it as my primary compositional and writing tool ever since.

What I finally realize is that Plotting involves more than simply sequencing reasonably well-written scenes into a certain order. The essence of Plotting is making the story seem "real" to the reader - verisimilitude, in other words e.g. written dialogue is NOT the way people talk.   A good plot requires that there are dramatic high points that capture the reader's interest and explicitly demonstrate character. A good plot makes the reader continually ask "What happens next?" and turn the page.  A good plot carries the narrative along despite the quality of the writing.

And I'm still struggling to find out how to do that.

Why do I do this?

As I write the final chapter of my latest novel I know that act will not mean that the work is done, but that I have merely reached the bottom of a steep months-long rewrite slope, a slope that I must climb while carrying the burden of the work's assumptions and mistakes on my back. Should I go on or should I abandon the work of a few years of on-again, off-again development? Will the finished product be worth reading? Am I just kidding myself that this is worth the effort?

I doubt I'm the only writer to face these issues, not the only one who wonders why they make the effort.

Why do I do it when I realize that I am never going to be as good as the writers I admire, never going to win awards, and probably will be brutalized by those critics who bother to read the finished work? In fact, I doubt that this particular novel will ever see the desk of an agent, much less that of an editor, given the sorry state of publishing and the byzantine process through which an author attempts to reach the reader. Eventual remuneration is, of course, beyond any hope of expectation.

So why push on to finish the damn thing? Why give up time better spent on other endeavors when hope is so diminished? Why attempt the drawn-out novel form when short works provide a quicker response? I ask myself this question at the end of each draft chapter and after each unsatisfactory rewritten passage.

Here is my answer for today, which may be different from anyone elses', and probably different from my own thoughts in a week or two. But for now, for this moment, for this day, I provide my answer.

I keep on working at this novel because I love my protagonist, his tribulations and triumphs and the choices he must make. I do so because I love the sweep of the background and the cast of characters that have exploded from my muse into a reality on the page. I am intrigued by the challenges they face and overcome, the twists and turns of the plot, and the interweaving of story arcs.

I keep on writing this novel because there is a joy in crafting a story out of cold words and giving them emotional voice.

I keep writing because I enjoy the art of making a line parse properly, and of building scenes that contains all of the necessary elements and are a pleasure to read.

Finally, I will keep writing because there is the simple satisfaction of a job well done.

Stretching Exercises

I just completed a decent (IMHO) 7500 word short story. What started as a single thought went from idea to finished draft in just ten days using the processes I've described elsewhere in this blog.  The effort was not very strenuous; even putting on an emotive layer and coloring in the world didn't prove that difficult. Satisfied with the result, I sent it out into the wild to find a home.

While casting about for the next story, looking at the latest ideas I'd at least written down, I realized that I could do any of those as easily, as quickly, and with an equal level of quality.  Doing the same thing in the same way does nothing to advance one's facility with the writing affliction or expand one's horizons.  Further, doing the same thing again and again might keep me from writing stories that grasp the hearts and minds of the readers,  that resonate with the human condition, and that take the reader out of themselves and into worlds of wonder.  To accomplish that I might have to step outside of my comfort zone and, perhaps, even outside of the SFF genre.

With that in mind I've started fooling with a pure plot sans content, doing research into possible McGuffins, and playing with character descriptions/viewpoints/alternatives in the hope that something useful can be glimpsed in the resulting mess.  It might be a nugget or a shining gem that comes from this exercise that will propel me to new heights.  On the other hand it may be that I'll reach some insurmountable barrier I have neither the skill nor insight to climb.  It may be that I'll finish a story but it won't be worth reading or fail to find a market (not a new experience by any means.)  For all I know I might take an abrupt right turn at some point and produce another Sam Boone -for God's sake!-- or a masterpiece.  Embarking on this without a firm goal in mind is frightening and uncomfortable, but that shouldn't stop me.

I have to try to become a decent writer.

The Symbolic Draft

In her excellent guide to writing novels - Beginnings, Endings, & Middles - Nancy Kress stated that the final draft, after all the other window dressing and plot shifting is over,  is where the symbolism makes itself known.  Her point is not that you slather symbolic import over perfectly good narrative as if it were another coat of paint, but that you have finally reached a point in understanding your story where what was unstated now becomes clear.  Of course, you have to make certain that the reader sees this too so, with a few tweaks, a word here and there, and a bit more description (or less) is all that is necessary to effect this transformation.

In going through the third draft of my latest I came to that symbolic realization while trying to put a bit more emotional color into the two protagonists.  Suddenly I realized it was not a simple, heroic story at all, but a comment on man's inhumanity to man and where the ethical boundaries lie when the stakes are high. With that insight I am now embarking on the fourth and hopefully final draft.

Wish me luck.

Emotive Writing

After reading a bunch of old reviews I come away with the impression that I have been a rather cold writer, delving seldom into emotional issues. In part this is because I write "hard" SF where the emotional opportunities are few and the primary focus is on the facts, not the feelings of [name you thing]

I have always longed to write an insightful, significant, and touching story.  Perhaps one that would evoke tears or incite longing for what might never be or could have been.  I want to elicit emotion, feeling.  I want to engage the reader on both an intellectual and emotional level. It should be about something universal yet applied to not only the protagonist, but to the reader as well. Instead I find that although I have managed to produce salable stories, some parts of which might touch on some of the above, none of them reaches a level that I would be proud of producing.

Was it some fault of my upbringing - my parents insufficiently cruel or uncaring or my environment so unappealing?  No, I can't remember any period where I felt neglected, ignored, or otherwise abused. All in all, I've had a happy, contented life.  Even during periods of unemployment or sickness things have not been all that dark. Is that my problem?  Does a writer need a depressing childhood or flawed relationships to produce emotionally meaningful work?  Do I need some emotionally wrenching experience to enable me to mine the depths for material? Perhaps I am simply not sufficiently talented and capable of only producing the journeyman stories that fill the pages between more memorable works and that I am a mere foot soldier in the war of words.

Postcards

I often wonder where the ideas come from, the little flashes of insight, memories, or facts that are the germ of a new story. Random events, articles in magazines, the papers, or on the Internet spark something that grows into a "what if" moment.  Usually I chew on it for a while, exploring how it might be worked as a plot, device, or character, fitting it with whatever else gets dredged up in such moments and then, if it seems workable, added to my story ideas file or discarded if it doesn't look like something I'd enjoy working on.  Mostly, the new story ideas come when I'm in the middle of writing something else and don't have time for digressions (as opposed to most writing time when I am desperate to digress into anything more interesting than plastering words on the screen.)

At a con several years ago I joked that I got my story ideas from a guy in New Jersey who, for ten bucks a month, sent me a postcard filled with story ideas.  That got a laugh, but when more than one fan came up to me for his address and asked if he had a subscription service. I began to wonder if I couldn't start a business of thus relieving the legions of conceptually impaired of their money by offering just such a service.

It wouldn't take much.  Every day I have at least three ideas for a story but only the time and energy to write one or two a month.  That means I must discard eighty or ninety story ideas each month for one reason or another.  It would be no great labor to prepare such cards and mailing them would cost little extra.   In MBA terms the project would allow me to realize frangible economic gains from capitalizing on my excess productive capacity with little inventory dissolution.

Exciting as that possibility might be I blush at prostituting my writerly soul with such mundane concerns.  Besides, there can't be that many idiots out there who think they can actually buy story ideas, are there?

Scene Theory 105

  I plotted the latest short story initially as an ten line outline with only a word or two of description on what it might contain.  Using that  outline as a guide I created more complete scene descriptions, changing the single words into sentences and, to be honest, adding more ideas.  I put the scenes in the order I wanted - in this case as chronologically continuous sequences - and then wrote each scene, fleshing out the sentences, and ensuring that all the scene elements are there.

When I completed all of the scenes I had a first draft that contained all the action sequences, dramatic point, and established the principal players, primarily the protagonist and antagonist and the forces that drive them.  I did a final check to make sure that the flow felt right.

During the second draft I tried to develop the characters into more than plastic action figures.  This involved filling out some personal background details, imbuing them with recognizable personalities, and developing the multiple relationships among the principals.  Giving them names and roles not already in the first draft is an important addition at this stage.

At the same time I tried to paint a word picture of the environment where the characters are performing.  This meant creating a more complete world where weather, insects, and plants existed.  I tried to appeal to all the senses - sight, sound, smell, and the way movement feels as you pass through a glen or wade across a stream. How does water sound when rushing over a rock filled stream, for example.

The driving force of the second draft was to make the story come alive for the reader and put as many associative hooks into the story as possible so that the reader becomes the protagonist, becomes one with the world I created.

The final draft is making certain that the logic holds, the details are "correct," and that spelling and punctuation are acceptable.  After that it is a matter only of finding a welcoming home for the beast.

Revitalized

After reading yesterday's post I want to assure everyone that I am not contemplating suicide   I was just in a funk from not being able to write anything decent - a dry spell, nothing more, that passed within a day.

I think every writer goes through these periods of despondency, these dark hours when you doubt your ability to produce anything of worth.  It's part of the manic-depressive cycle of creativity where periods of depression are counterbalanced by manic happiness where words pour out of you like a golden shower and nothing, absolutely nothing written has any faults whatesoever.

Of course, that opinion changes when you start editing.

So today I revert to my manic state and write, write, write, ever hopeful that this day will actually be good instead of just feeling that way.

Resignation

One day it hits you that there will be an end to this; that one day you will close the unfinished piece you are working on and simply walk away from the keyboard, never to return.  On that day you will realize that all you have written, the millions of words you've edited, the few that managed to be published, and the too-many pieces of unsold stories languishing in the dark recesses of your hard drives are nothing more than scratches in the sand, doomed to be washed away by the rising tide of other younger writers who will together produce more in any single day than you could in your entire life and further, that many of them will not only write better than you, better than the anyone whose writing you now admire, but most likely better than anyone you're read.

 Maybe the well of creativity has dried up for you on that future day, perhaps a string of rejections has finally etched away the last of that thin armor of hope that has sustained your production of submissions, or perhaps it has simply tired you of the race, the performance, the struggles, and the effort.  Maybe one day you simply decide that the charade is pointless to continue and resign yourself to the fact that all your work will disappear into the heat death of past memory.

You know, I think there's a story there . . .

Writing Schedules

I did not have a schedule when I started writing. In the beginning I took the occasional boring evening to write, sometimes listening to music or watching television.  Then I started writing an hour or so each lunchtime, sparing fingers from the keys only to grab a bite of sandwich or sip a drink.  I produced my first thirty stories (two of which actually sold!) this way before I abandoned writing entirely.

When I did get back to writing about thirteen years later, I set aside a few hours each evening to simply write.  Only occasionally did I miss writing for at least an hour.  My pattern was the same for years; eat dinner, do family things, walk the dogs, and then write for a couple hours.  Because of the time constraints I turned out mostly short stories, although I did manage to struggle through a few novels that could have stood some more serious attention.

I cannot stress the importance of sticking to a schedule for writing.  A decent novel contains about a hundred thousand words.  That's less than three hundred words a day!  If you write a thousand words of crap and edit three quarters of it out you've accomplished your daily quota.  Anything more than that is a bonus.  Writing regularly also hones your literary voice, making your phrasing and styling more consistent.  Another benefit is that it allows you to maintain a steady focus on the story itself, holding everything in mind prevents missteps of timing, characterization, or "fact."

It also improves your typing speed.

Step Eleven of the Ten Step Process

I come back to the story after producing a diverting piece of work, ready to do battle with the thirty-two thousand word monster I'd left lingering in the recesses of my mind.  In the interim I decided how I want it to end and fully intend to now bend it to my will.

It sits where I left it, each scene glowing in all its color-coded glory, unknowing of the surgery I am about to perform.  After saving the draft I create a copy and begin to pare away all the gloss and glitter that was the result more of me talking to myself about the story (what we call the creative process - noodling, in other words) than informing the reader.  With the fervor of a berserker I hack away any scenes that do not directly impinge on the ending I want.  I use a little judgment and leave only those scenes that I believe are part of a logical flow.  When I finish after a few hours I discover that this has reduced the draft by ten thousand words - a good start.  Of course, I may want to restore some of that material later, but for now it's bye-bye.

The next step is to remove the parts within each scene that do not advance the plot. This is slower and requires more delicacy with the delete key but in the end manages to reduce the narrative by another six thousand really good, but unnecessary words that weren't relevant to what I'm aiming for at the moment.  I can call back what I need from my earlier draft, if I have to, so nothing is really lost.

Once again I dive into the text and word-by-word erase excessive adjectives, collapse gerunds, and do all the linguistic house-cleaning necessary to produce crisp, clean text.  This arduous process removes another two thousand immortal, and now unspoken, words and produces what I believe to be a final draft.

But is it done?  Is this really as good as I can get it?  The question haunts me for a day and then, unsatisfied that I have really done all I could to improve it, I decide to make one more editing pass.  Just once more, I promise. Once more. In this pass I add some of the deleted material, although not necessarily in its former location in the text.  Perhaps another pass before anyone sees it, I think.

On an absolutely final, final editorial run-through I still find places where I can tighten the text.  For economy of expression I convert exposition to explanation, background to dialogue, dialogue to exposition - whatever I think it takes to reduce the density of thought and crystallize the narrative.  In the end I am left with a little over fifteen thousand words; less than half of all that I've written.

And what's left over is enough over for another story, I realize.

Frustration

It always comes down to this, the nubbins of the project where the parts are scattered about as you try to fix what's wrong and realize that you've screwed it up so bad that it will never be put together right again.

Let's jump back a step. I decided that the metastory should be continuous, with illuminating backstory thrown in as needed. I pulled out the one third of the narrative that contained the crucial scenes and rewrote/edited them as a single story. That went well. It was when i tried to stick the backstory parts into this framework that the trouble began. Parts no longer fit where they were before, the chronology suddenly turned wonky, and, and, and, . . . I despair of ever getting this together again, it is so screwed up. This has happened before and is probably a consequence of something my mind is working on but has not yet resolved.

The first thing I tried was putting everything back into a simple chronological sequence which failed again because all the important action comes at the end of a LOT of backstory. FAIL!

The next effort was to cull the story, a difficult task since I have an insane loyalty to my WAW (Words-already-written). Nevertheless I began the process of carving away any WAW that didn't support the main thesis. The result was a pretty bland story but lots of action and hardly any backstory at all. FAIL!

Frustrated I restored the full draft and once again turned to my faithful copy of Tobias's Twenty Master Plots to see if there is some approach that would stand a chance of success. As usual, I learned only that I had missed no opportunity insofar as plot points, but the story still lacked a pleasing structure. What to do next? What haven't I thought of?

Rather than beat my brains against this wall of blocks I decided to go back to work on a hard SF novella with the hope that working on something completely different would clarify my mind. As these things happen, a new approach popped into my head no sooner than I got into the rhythm of the new piece. Resisting the impulse to jump back I simply made a few notes, put them aside, and continued working on the novella.

It is so nice to think you are in control of the process.