INK meeting.

INK meeting tonight, the last one before RadCon5 A! Panel reviews, upcoming workshops, treasury audit, new name, info packet progress, perhaps even time for Writers Round Table. If not, Scrabble is always good for the wordiness of a writer's soul.

Storm

Hey, what did you all think of the storm that blew over us yesterday evening?  It went right over our house.  The hail tore the plants to heck and the lightning was intense.  Rory and I watched it come in under the deck gazebo and then came in when it started to get dangerously close (as in wow, that lightning hit right there close.)  A few minutes later the hail started, and we had sheets of rain, lightning blasting directly overhead and terrified dogs.  Everything smelled like we were in the midst of a logging clearcut operation.  We brought all the dogs in (after a little drama with Finn) and gave them all baths and they got to lounge about the house until about 2am.

I thought, gee, Carole must be writing on a great story idea even as we speak.

I sent off for info about the Dean Wesley Smith/Kristine Kathryn Rusch and guests seminars in Lincoln City.  I've heard nothing but great things about these seminars.  Yes, they're expensive, but not when you consider that you have a place to sleep on the coast (woot!) and instructional time with masters of the industry.  If I could scrape together the funds I'd be all over the master's course held in spring 2009, but I think that's out of my reach financially, even if it was possible for me to get in based on my writing.  I think I'm better off staying out of debt by taking the novel and the short story courses, with the accompanying less time off of work factors (assuming I'm still working retail then.)  

My writer's demon is bouncing up and down trying to get my attention and squeaking, "that's what credit cards are for, dope!  C'mon, let's go!  You've always wanted to!"  Yes, well, I've always wanted a horse, too, but you don't see one grazing out on the acreage, do you?  "But this might be just what Masks needs to become saleable!  You can pay off the credit card with your advance!"  You know, that--I don't even know where to start.  I don't think that's even worth a response.  "What?  Aw, man!  Please?"

Pardon me while I stuff him back into whatever dimension he slipped out of.  

Thanks for the heads-up from our friend, Jeff!  And you can totally snag a ride with me to the coast, assuming I can get into the class.  Just get yer kilted butt up here to the Pac NW and we'll head out toward the sunset.  Road trip!

INK Meeting Update

INK had a great meeting with guest David D. Levine last Friday. David talked about how he writes and answered questions. He had wonderful advice for us. I'd go into more details, but I can't find my notes. I may have left them behind, so more on that later when I reconnect with them.

What I do remember is David emphasizing persistence. Have to keep writing, keep editing, and most of all, keep submitting.

He spoke about endings, too, in how to get to them and what to do when an ending doesn't work. It makes perfect sense, too, that it isn't the ending not working, but something in the middle that is throwing the ending off, so look to the middle of the story for the problem.

He encouraged us to continue working on short stories, since they are a condensed form of the writing process. Most of us have dived into the short story pond, and now I think the last of us is ready to get her feet wet, too. So it will be interesting to see what comes across the critique table in the next few months.

I believe most of INK will be attending David's reading and signing at Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing. If you are in the area, come join us. It's tonight at 7:00.

At the risk of repeating myself, I wanted to write about critiques in general and specifically what a wonderful group INK is and how privileged I feel to be a part of them.  

Steve is a picky reader, especially when it comes to internal consistency.  When he has trouble with the logic of a particular scene, I listen very carefully.  I don't want to become that author who writes about characters that do stupid things because it serves the plot.  I especially don't want to become that author with implausible happenings, ridiculous solutions and character motivations that make absolutely no sense.  He is also our only man.  I hope he doesn't start to suffer from estrogen poisoning at our meetings, because I really need that testosterone perspective, particularly since lately I've been writing male pov characters.

Carole is my eye-roller reader.  She doesn't technically 'do' fantasy, or to look at it another way, she prefers dark fantasy and magic realism.  She's my oh puke reader, and if I'm not making her puke there's a very good chance my writing could reach mainstream readers.  She's also a detail reader.  She's done so many jobs and been enough different places that she has tons of facts packed into her head, while having the valuable skill of being able to discriminate between what I mean versus what a reader who is unfamiliar with said item will hear.  For example, it never occurred to me that a reader would think that even the leaves on a bougainvillea vine would be red when I'm talking about papery carmine bougainvillea vines.  Not only did I assume everyone had seen them but I also looked like an idiot if someone had seen them (like CS) and thought I hadn't and had mis-described them from ignorance.  BTW, Carole, I have a baker character in the next book.  I'm looking forward to your impression of him and his workspace.

Carissa is my form and function reader.  If it has no function, she suggests eliminating it.  If the form is flawed, she catches it.  She also helps with things like details and character motivations, but where she really shines as a reader is as a surrogate editor.  She has read so much fantasy (and continues to read fantasy regularly) that she'll catch it if I'm falling into cliche'.  She also gets impatient with my writing in many of the same ways that editors get impatient with writing.  Their time is valuable.  As a rule they don't like excess wordage, extraneous scenes, scenes that go on too long, characters that have no purpose, expository lumps, etc.  No matter how carefully I disguise them (even from myself) Carissa catches them.  If a description passes muster with her, I'm confident that it'll pass muster with darned near anyone.

I had a really good critique, as always, on Masks with INK this last meeting.  I learned that I'd butchered what probably had been a perfectly fine fight scene before I 'streamlined' (read, took out too much for anyone to follow the action) it, that I'd turned my intelligent character into an unsympathetic hormonal mess, that I'd removed too much calculation in a character's reasoning and turned a dark scene into a mini-buddy movie that lacked chemistry, and many other things.  I also got some great brain-storming ideas that will have repercussions across two, maybe all three of the trilogy that Masks begins.

I sometimes worry that you think you're playing second hat to the Lucky Labs (who I'm also very, very grateful to,) so here's my note of appreciation and reassurance.  You're great readers, and you are all so definitely going to be in the acknowledgements.  Without my readers, I'd be a much less effective writer, no doubt about it.  You also have the horrible job of checking every blessed little tiny scrap of crap I write.  From my bios and cover letters to synopses and outlines, nothing goes out without an INK okay.  You also listen to my endless yammering on WIPs and bleeding characters and plotlines.  We've become more than a critique group.  We're a team, a business venture, and I'm very glad to be a part of you.  Thanks, INK!  You're the best.

Using INK

Since one of my unwritten goals is to submit for INK Critiques every meeting, I'm using INK submission Fridays as a deadline to meet. It's nice, having an outside deadline. It keeps me working when I might slack off.

And since I have more and more projects needing revision, I'm alternating between each meeting on what will be submitted. So for the next two weeks, I'll be revising one of my new short stories. After it is submitted, I switch right into revising a novel. Then back to short story, and so on.

I even know what novel I'll work on next. The Trinket Box, which has already had some transcription time. The group has seen The Inkwell Cult recently, so I'm going to hold back on it a little while (I think the six month time limit for review will be up after February). Work on plotting it out a little stronger before diving in to the edit. Fix the major plot flaws and character gaffs and try to work a way of not getting stuck in the bloody hotel again.

During it all, I have my 3 pages a day, which are going well, my poem a week, which is more difficult than I expected, but I managed to churn out a decent poem yesterday after staring at a blank page for far longer than I thought I could. There's the Reven read, which I'm looking forward to, but must be paced so I can take decent enough notes not to have to read back through it again when we start on that edit (huh, nother revision to add into the mix). But it is all doable if I planned what needs to be done when and make a list!

But a close second to list-making is the INK deadline. I love that we've established a deadline for submission. It's going to be just the push I need to keep me honest.

I'm going to learn a lot this year, thanks to INK. Deadlines, five minute critiques, bio writing . . .

Bring It, Nano!

The regiment of daily medication is pushing me back into the realms of the Healthy; the in-laws have left us after five days of grandparent fun. Between illness and in-laws, I was fretting about being even the little prepared for Nanowrimo that I had planned, but that all changed, thanks to an ethusiast author signing and a little e-mail from Chris Baty.

The author signing was preceeded by a reading (of a short story) and a Q&A session. I came away enthused about the craft I'd chosen and ready for daily writing again. But moreso, I want to enjoy the writing. I get to dreading Rough Drafts to the point of paralysis. This nano I get the chance to Get Over It, Already, and just have fun writing.

Chris Baty's e-mail reminded me that writing is all about opening doors and seeing what's on the other side. And I want to open those doors! I want to see where they go!

So no outlines for me! No synopsis! No long, drawn out, pre-planned plot! I'm going into Nano this year with just a handful of colorful characters: a sufi dancer named Argent Rose; her wise-cracking bodyguard, Saia; Rinker, the tinket-box maker; the red-coated homeland guard and their Visigoth adversaries. There might possibly still be a convent of rebel nuns and a witch with a penchant for making golems. At this point, I'm leaving all the doors wide open.

I have no idea what the landscape will look like on the other side, but I am looking forward to the voyage there!

Motivation From the Car Muse.

Watching the evening news tonight, a story about the severe drought in the U.S. south perked up my ears. Lake Lanier in George is drying up if you haven't already seen the report. My eyes went to the manuscript before me. Lake Lanier. Yep, there it was. One of my secondary characters in my car novel comes from a wealthy family who builds communities around the usually beautiful Lake Lanier area. Hmm, that information may have to be adjusted in the final draft depending on the situation down there.

Last week, I was in Barnes & Noble bookstore; not a local one but one across the river in Oregon. As I browsed the markdown book aisles, I ran across the obligatory 'exotic automobile' area and, I'm not kidding here, the exact second I picked up a book on Super Cars, the music on the store's speakers switched from some pop ditty to "Lil Darlin'" by The Diamonds. It's a tune from 1957, a favorite amoung some car enthusiasts, myself included, and is featured briefly in my car novel. I've gone years upon years without hearing that song anywhere but my own music library, yet there it played, out of the blue in Barnes & Noble...but only, I'm convinced, after I touched that car book.

Things like this, little things that make me think of a piece of writing I'm usually involved with at that time, happen a lot to me. I've got a list of other coincidences that relate to the current novel I'm working with but the two above are the ones that come readily to mind. And rather than think of them all, as odd or unusual as they might seem, as nothing more than coincidences, I can't help but see them as motivational pushes from my muse. It's odd but works for me.

Go on, Car Muse. I'm listening.