Today I...
Woke up, made a pot of tea and finished reading Hidden Warrior. And yes there really was a point to reading it, I'm just not sure what that is at this moment...Oh yeah, sometimes its good to read books you don't really "care for"* all that much so you can see how and why and what the author did so you can either emulate or avoid this technique. Next time I'll try to find a book that I don't really care for that's under 600 pages, however.
It wasn't that it was a "bad" book -- actually lots of the elements were really fun, and the premise was pretty stinkin cool. Plus it had a young adult feel (youthful characters) with a definite edge (complex relationship, sexuality questions and blood n guts). Me gusto. I'll probably pass it next to Kamilah, who I'm sure will like it. It was just too 'epic' for me, it went ON AND ON AND ON...and it aint finished yet. Kinda like the Wayfarer series was. Actually like a lot of the "sword and sorcery" fantasy stuff I have read which I generally like, but find it confusing, drawn out and hard to read in multiple sittings.
... Suspiciously like my own first-novel-in-a-drawer. Hmm...
I've decided that my problem with fantasy books has a lot to do with the fact that I am a cover reader. Guilty as charged. I pick books by titles and cover art. Okay not all the time. But a lot of the time. Especially if I'm a used bookstore with a lot of books to go through...or I'm in a hurry. If I have the time I pour over the first and last chapter then take it or leave it.
If not...okay I pick up this awesome looking book with a neat title "Hidden Warrior" and this cool art of an androgynous looking warrior on a horse staring dead at the reader. And I'm sold.
My second downfall is that I have a HUGE grace period for a book to work out. 100 pages is a bit excessive. I would NEVER make a good editor. This is due to two factors: sympathy and my defective "I believe" button. Sympathy: its hard to be a writer. Damn hard. Especially after going through Clarion West I know its REALLY DAMN HARD. To be a professionally published author seems like some kind of epic quest of its own. Which leads me to #2. Anyone who actually makes it in print gets my big fat "I believe" button shoved in with a stick.
The funny part is, I'd never sat down and analyzed my reading style before CW. I've suffered through lots of books I didn't care for and it always seems as though finding a good book was this hit and miss endeavor. Now I understand my own sensibilities, and I can retrain myself. Life is too short and there are two many fantastic books out there for me to dawdle a 100 pages on something -- especially when CW proved to me that I am not NEARLY well read enough.
No offence, to Lynn. The book was fun. Glad I went there. Can't say the same for lots of folks that have made me want to jab a stick in my eyes after reading if only to keep it from aiming at my "I believe" button the next time a cool cover sashays by...
My vow to self. No more judging the book by its cover. If I don't have the time to do my first/last scan, I will not buy the book. I will also work on reading the recommended lists from my cites and authors. Okay so once in a while I will allow a cover to grab me (that's what good art is for, right?) but I will be far more discerning overall.
(Why does this sound like I'm giving myself relationship advice?)
So this brings me in a very roundabout way to what I did with most of the rest of my day. Inspired by what I don't want my book to be, I grabbed my manuscript, a pair of scissors and two sharpies (red and black)...Oh yeah and a pencil and a regular pen for outline notes. I attempted what I never have had the courage to do with any work of mine -- cut it up. Literally.
This serves two purposes:
1. To get rid of the crappy sentences, phrases and scenes that suck anyway.
2. To remind myself that nothing written, including my own stuff (no matter how much I love it) is gospel truth. Not even the gospel for that matter -- but that's another big mouthed woman writer opinion. It can be hacked, erased, lined out and hopefully, rewritten BETTER than before. But you gotta let go of the crap first -- even if it takes prying it out of cold dead fingers.
This was an up and down process. Initially I was a savage editor, red pen and all. Then I got to a scene I REALLY liked and got all soft. I had to back up half and hour later and re-read cause I realized I'd put my machete down and started cuddling the little darlings. Damnit!
I took a break, ran to the beach with Echo and came home. For fortification I opened a bottle of wine, poured a glass, toasted Michael Swanwick and then grabbed the red pen and the scissors.
(yes I still have all my fingers, pinkie swear) Three hundred pages later I sat back, satisfied and let myself rest. And it was good.
Important things I realized:
1. Essentially my book (beloved as it is -- and I love reading some it too. I love the sentences. I love the paragraphs. I am my own biggest fan.) is a big epic lump of malformed exposition about nice people who do nice things, fall in and out of and in love and live happily ever after. Okay granted there is a sprinkling of shitty background, a few flirtations with dangerous bad people and by the end a few of them (good and bad) die. But in the end, everything is ROSES. Not good.
2. There are some pretty stinking cool characters. There is a reason I keep coming back to Gabriel, Azazael, Nahum and crew. They have great interaction, fun chemistry, cool relationships and really human flaws but right now there are lots of loose ends, misplaced or absent motivations and "Eddie ex machina" induced conclusions. With those resolved, this *might* be a pretty damned interesting story.
3. Lots of great things happen, even some of the bad things are neat, they just don't LAST as long as they should. There's actualy a neat world underneath all the killing time and space I spend on shitty dialoge and ocean metaphors. I will have the courage to build it!
4. #1-3 aren't the end of the world...Just Clarion West making itself worth the tuition, the heartache and the time in Sorority-Land.
So it begins.
*clearing throat* as Heather would say..."Here's your machete and stay to the right."
For the next few weeks I will hack. Then I will rewrite. I will make bad things happen to good people. I will get this incredible world out of my head and onto a piece of paper. I will make sure tension is sustained. I will NOT let my characters get out of trouble so easily. And I will still love them and take care of them and make sure most them them turn out alright in the end. Somebody hold me to it -- use all the arm twisting necessary.
Of course, that leaves me with lots of spare time to work on some new stuff -- I have a flash type item I wrote inspired by that crappy movie Troy and I'm finally feeling ready to take on the grownup version of Kamilah's once bedtime story, working title: The Good Queen's Daughter. Oh yeah and the three Clarion stories to unpack and rewrite. That will leave me with enough time to eat, sleep and to go to work...and that's about it. Life IS good...
*I hate the term 'like' mostly because I'm from California and find it sneaking into my vocabulary far too often for my own comfort -- especially when I'm, like, particularly ampt about something...Oh damn there I go again. As far as use of "like" and "dislike" I hate the both because they're vague and don't really say anything, plus I'm the sucker kind of reader that finds most of the books I've read "likeable" on some level so I'm making a conscious effort to use better words than like -- as in -- I don't "care for..." Which implies some sort of personal investment or lack thereof.
It wasn't that it was a "bad" book -- actually lots of the elements were really fun, and the premise was pretty stinkin cool. Plus it had a young adult feel (youthful characters) with a definite edge (complex relationship, sexuality questions and blood n guts). Me gusto. I'll probably pass it next to Kamilah, who I'm sure will like it. It was just too 'epic' for me, it went ON AND ON AND ON...and it aint finished yet. Kinda like the Wayfarer series was. Actually like a lot of the "sword and sorcery" fantasy stuff I have read which I generally like, but find it confusing, drawn out and hard to read in multiple sittings.
... Suspiciously like my own first-novel-in-a-drawer. Hmm...
I've decided that my problem with fantasy books has a lot to do with the fact that I am a cover reader. Guilty as charged. I pick books by titles and cover art. Okay not all the time. But a lot of the time. Especially if I'm a used bookstore with a lot of books to go through...or I'm in a hurry. If I have the time I pour over the first and last chapter then take it or leave it.
If not...okay I pick up this awesome looking book with a neat title "Hidden Warrior" and this cool art of an androgynous looking warrior on a horse staring dead at the reader. And I'm sold.
My second downfall is that I have a HUGE grace period for a book to work out. 100 pages is a bit excessive. I would NEVER make a good editor. This is due to two factors: sympathy and my defective "I believe" button. Sympathy: its hard to be a writer. Damn hard. Especially after going through Clarion West I know its REALLY DAMN HARD. To be a professionally published author seems like some kind of epic quest of its own. Which leads me to #2. Anyone who actually makes it in print gets my big fat "I believe" button shoved in with a stick.
The funny part is, I'd never sat down and analyzed my reading style before CW. I've suffered through lots of books I didn't care for and it always seems as though finding a good book was this hit and miss endeavor. Now I understand my own sensibilities, and I can retrain myself. Life is too short and there are two many fantastic books out there for me to dawdle a 100 pages on something -- especially when CW proved to me that I am not NEARLY well read enough.
No offence, to Lynn. The book was fun. Glad I went there. Can't say the same for lots of folks that have made me want to jab a stick in my eyes after reading if only to keep it from aiming at my "I believe" button the next time a cool cover sashays by...
My vow to self. No more judging the book by its cover. If I don't have the time to do my first/last scan, I will not buy the book. I will also work on reading the recommended lists from my cites and authors. Okay so once in a while I will allow a cover to grab me (that's what good art is for, right?) but I will be far more discerning overall.
(Why does this sound like I'm giving myself relationship advice?)
So this brings me in a very roundabout way to what I did with most of the rest of my day. Inspired by what I don't want my book to be, I grabbed my manuscript, a pair of scissors and two sharpies (red and black)...Oh yeah and a pencil and a regular pen for outline notes. I attempted what I never have had the courage to do with any work of mine -- cut it up. Literally.
This serves two purposes:
1. To get rid of the crappy sentences, phrases and scenes that suck anyway.
2. To remind myself that nothing written, including my own stuff (no matter how much I love it) is gospel truth. Not even the gospel for that matter -- but that's another big mouthed woman writer opinion. It can be hacked, erased, lined out and hopefully, rewritten BETTER than before. But you gotta let go of the crap first -- even if it takes prying it out of cold dead fingers.
This was an up and down process. Initially I was a savage editor, red pen and all. Then I got to a scene I REALLY liked and got all soft. I had to back up half and hour later and re-read cause I realized I'd put my machete down and started cuddling the little darlings. Damnit!
I took a break, ran to the beach with Echo and came home. For fortification I opened a bottle of wine, poured a glass, toasted Michael Swanwick and then grabbed the red pen and the scissors.
(yes I still have all my fingers, pinkie swear) Three hundred pages later I sat back, satisfied and let myself rest. And it was good.
Important things I realized:
1. Essentially my book (beloved as it is -- and I love reading some it too. I love the sentences. I love the paragraphs. I am my own biggest fan.) is a big epic lump of malformed exposition about nice people who do nice things, fall in and out of and in love and live happily ever after. Okay granted there is a sprinkling of shitty background, a few flirtations with dangerous bad people and by the end a few of them (good and bad) die. But in the end, everything is ROSES. Not good.
2. There are some pretty stinking cool characters. There is a reason I keep coming back to Gabriel, Azazael, Nahum and crew. They have great interaction, fun chemistry, cool relationships and really human flaws but right now there are lots of loose ends, misplaced or absent motivations and "Eddie ex machina" induced conclusions. With those resolved, this *might* be a pretty damned interesting story.
3. Lots of great things happen, even some of the bad things are neat, they just don't LAST as long as they should. There's actualy a neat world underneath all the killing time and space I spend on shitty dialoge and ocean metaphors. I will have the courage to build it!
4. #1-3 aren't the end of the world...Just Clarion West making itself worth the tuition, the heartache and the time in Sorority-Land.
So it begins.
*clearing throat* as Heather would say..."Here's your machete and stay to the right."
For the next few weeks I will hack. Then I will rewrite. I will make bad things happen to good people. I will get this incredible world out of my head and onto a piece of paper. I will make sure tension is sustained. I will NOT let my characters get out of trouble so easily. And I will still love them and take care of them and make sure most them them turn out alright in the end. Somebody hold me to it -- use all the arm twisting necessary.
Of course, that leaves me with lots of spare time to work on some new stuff -- I have a flash type item I wrote inspired by that crappy movie Troy and I'm finally feeling ready to take on the grownup version of Kamilah's once bedtime story, working title: The Good Queen's Daughter. Oh yeah and the three Clarion stories to unpack and rewrite. That will leave me with enough time to eat, sleep and to go to work...and that's about it. Life IS good...
*I hate the term 'like' mostly because I'm from California and find it sneaking into my vocabulary far too often for my own comfort -- especially when I'm, like, particularly ampt about something...Oh damn there I go again. As far as use of "like" and "dislike" I hate the both because they're vague and don't really say anything, plus I'm the sucker kind of reader that finds most of the books I've read "likeable" on some level so I'm making a conscious effort to use better words than like -- as in -- I don't "care for..." Which implies some sort of personal investment or lack thereof.
posted by Eddie at 5:11 PM
1 Comments:
Good luck with your novel! Let me know when/if you want a reader. :)
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