Category Archives: Writing

The Bad News, Balanced by the Good News

The Bad:

Last week I got the sad news that my sweet little sewing machine is going to cost about a hundred dollars to fix. It was exactly what the man who took it in suspected: the timing has gone on it. A lightweight machine like this one isn’t designed to sew anything heavy, and that’s pretty much all I’ve sewn with it. The repair shop was impressed that it had lasted eight years, but the man warned me that to fix it would likely not be worth the money it would cost. His phone call last week confirmed it. He told me that even if he fixed it, I’d likely run into the same problem within a year or so if I used it for the same projects.

Now that I have a functioning printer of quality, my original plans to buy a new one no longer apply. I think that when the cheque for the first project I finish at the US publisher comes through, I’ll use a bit of it to treat myself to a new sewing machine instead. One with a bit more oomph, a little more weight, the design to handle heavyweight material and projects, and maybe a range of speeds that embraces more than bunny/turtle.

The Good:

I had an hour-long chat with my editorial contact at the US publisher – the imprint specialist is a go, with the contract being tweaked before it’s sent down to me. The series proposal is being fleshed out as I go. This is becoming more and more of a full-time thing, a real career. I’ll be going down to Boston somewhere around the end of February to pitch the proposal and meet everyone, and possibly one of my authors as well. There are the fall bookfairs to think about too, where publicity for the new imprint might require me to be on hand for talks and info session with buyers.

Yes, I’m still stunned.

I’ll need new clothes. Jeans and t-shirts (beloved uniform of home-based freelancers everywhere), however fetching I look in them, are just not going to cut it in a conference room or a marketing sales floor.

Here And Gone

So now that I’ve got this bulletin board, very cool-looking with lots of important story assignments and ongoing projects pinned to it (have I mentioned that I got a postcard from Neil Gaiman?), I am experiencing writing blocks the size of Stonehenge.

No, actually, I’m not. I’m exeriencing computer aversion.

Yes, there’s a difference. Last night I went to bed early, curled up in candlelight with cats, and began to work through a Great Canadian Novel issue that had been dropped by the wayside a while ago. Yes, all two of you out there who’ve read the GCN, I refer to Ben, poor guy. Yeah, he kind of vanished, didn’t he? I’m certain my protagonist would like him to stay vanished, but that just can’t happen.

I have never been a fan of the concept of jacking into some sort of computer system, but ye gods, if there were to be a method created for authors to allow ideas to pour straight from noggin to file, I’d be all for it.

And, of course, when I woke up this morning… gone. This is even worse considering that I’m one of those people who urge others to write down their ideas in order to encourage the creative subconscious with positive reinforcement (which, as t! pointed out to me last week, is simply another term for brainwashing). An evening of work, lost due to being warm and comfortable and sleepy. (And speaking of t!, yay for regular posting!)

As others in my general artistic circle are realising, writing without a regular schedule is just asking for problems.

One of my thoughts last night was about the idea of outlines. I had a rough chapter-by-chapter outline for my 2003 NaNo novel, and it worked. Not only did it work, I added stuff in-between. Now, I also enjoy working in a discovery-type fashion – no outline, no idea, just sit down and whee, where’s my protagonist going today? The GCN is written like that, and in general it works really, really well (the problem of the disappearing Ben aside), because the novel is about the protagonist discovering herself.

I used to write in a very episodic fashion: I’d have an idea for a scene and I’d write it. This meant I’d have a pile of scenes that I could play with like a jigsaw puzzle, or – even better example – a Tarot spread. How do these scenes relate? In what order do they appear? How can I tell a story that connects them all and have it make sense?

I’ve recently revived an old set of scenes written like this about a decade ago. They’re good; I like the characters. I know what order they come in. Now I just have to write the stuff that connects them all, which means – yes – an outline of sorts. And for some reason, I’m really resisting the outline idea right now. Probably because I know it’s Good For Me.

None of which, of course, even remotely connects to the computer aversion issue. Which is, quite simply, the fact that I don’t want to sit at a computer to write. Don’t tell my creative subconscious, but I’m going to outwit it by going back to pen and paper for a while. I might even buy it a new notebook and pen to lull it into complicity.

Shh. We mustn’t spoil the surprise.

Double The Fun

After witnessing my side of a phone call from Boston yesterday afternoon, Ceri and t! tried to convince me that I’d been offered not one new job, but two. Deep in the state of stun, I tried to argue to the contrary, but they eventually swayed me.

Today’s phone call with the acquisitions editor of the publishing company for which I freelance just sealed it. Yep. One definite new contract to be signed, making me the official imprint specialist. The other… well, let’s just say that in two weeks I need to have a rough draft for a proposal, vision statement, and sales pitch for a new series of books featuring inspirational real-life stories, that would be mine, all mine, to call for and collect submissions, accept or reject those submissions, collate, edit, and hand the product over to them for publication. Editor. Not consultant. Editor.

This second job is different. It assumes that I’m, er, a freelance editor for hire.

Which means that I am.

When did I become what I wanted to be? I must have missed the memo.

Hmm

Yesterday was one of those frustrating days where I spent hours and hours editing three different projects, and only finished one of them. I hate days like that; I feel like I’ve accomplished absolutely nothing. Yeah, yeah; I know that I invested x hours of work that brought me that much closer to the finish line; but I didn’t hit that finish line. So I’m goal-oriented. Sue me.

I re-read Balsamic Moon last night. Anything that makes me laugh out loud at parts has definite potential. I’d done my first edit, which usually consists of spelling and prettifying the obviously awkward prose, and as usual, I missed things which I’ll have to pick up on the second edit which should be late this month or early next month. It needs a bit of expansion, and a fleshed-out ending as opposed to the current two-page final chapter and single page of summarized postscript (hey, it was the evening of November 30, and I hated the novel by that point; I passed 50K and that was all that counted at the time), but all in all, it’s a solid piece of work with definite potential.

I’ve discovered that lately, all I want to read is occult-based fiction, and there’s not a heck of a lot out there that I haven’t already read. The obvious answer is that I’ll just have to write it, which is fine, as I’ve already started with my two NaNo novels. And the more published crap that I read, the more hope I have that my stuff is marketable. The dreck out there is really lowering the bar.

The kittens are bouncing off walls this morning. It’s a full moon tomorrow; evidently they’re celebrating early!

Out Of Whack

One of the worst things about the holidays is one’s perception and understanding of how the week is structured gets all messed up.

For example: today I am firmly convinced that it is Monday. I keep thinking that I have nothing scheduled for tonight. This misperception is further supported by the fact that a new gaming group gathered yesterday, and has chosen Sunday nights to meet. If we meet on Sundays, yesterday must have been Sunday, and today, perforce, must be Monday.

In fact, today is Friday, and I teach a class tonight.

The crazy thing is I thought that it was Monday last Tuesday as well. As Monday technically signals the beginning of my weekend, this suggests to me that I’ve been working too much. Freelance writers don’t get paid vacations, however. Nor do freelance teachers. And in the midst of rearranging and end-of-year cleaning I still have to fit in a final edit of three chapters given to me over a week ago by the publisher, a first edit of a new teaching workbook, and those three book reviews, all before Monday, as well as teaching four three-hour classes.

No rest for the weary. So naturally, I am work-avoiding by blogging and doing web work.

Rewriting Shortcuts

I moved a whack of books around last week, putting my music and art books up front in the bay window alcove (you know, where I actually play the cello) and bringing my Craft books into the office (you know, where I write/edit Craft-related stuff and have an altar). It makes a heck of a lot more sense. I also somehow ended up with an empty shelf and a half left over when all was said and done. I’m not questioning that particular miracle, because I might wake up and discover that it was all a dream. When HRH came home that day he looked at it and remarked that I’d better buy more more books to fill them, because they look awful. I have a wonderful husband. He may mock me, but he mocks me with words I can twist to my own ends.

Anywhats. Point is, I moved the books. I evidently still haven’t updated the shortcut in my mind, however, because when I need a Craft reference I’m still getting up from the computer and walking through the living room, all the way into the front alcove, only to stand and blink at the case of music texts. Then I kick myself and walk all the way back into the office. I moved things to make life easier and more efficient. So far, I’ve succeeded only in confusing myself and making myself feel stupid.

Things will improve.

I’m currently twisting my husband’s mind by playing the Matrix Revolutions score, Tori Amos’ Tales of a Librarian, Radio Sunnydale, the Metallica-playing cellos of Apocalyptica, and the Return of the King score on random. I can hear the radical shifting of gears his brain makes when the shuffle function engages. For some reason, though, the player is inordinately fond of RotK, which is partly disappointing, and partly amusing, because it really lulls HRH into a sense of complacency subsequently exploded by something antithetical.

New Office Equipment

I now have a bulletin board by my desk. It’s pinned with story mission postcards dating back from last summer, and index cards with what I’m certain seem like random words to my husband (such as “Ben?” and “Good Book”). Projects with deadlines are written on pink index cards (for example, the three book reviews I’ve agreed to write that are due next Monday – argh).

It helps.

Have I mentioned that I love my new printer? Apart from actually printing (a definite improvement over the last one), it’s quiet, and it doesn’t consume mass quantities of ink for no reason. It does indeed print on both sides of the page, by printing every second page then instructing you to flip the stack over and re-insert it in the paper feed in order to print the alternate pages on the reverse side. Smart little thing.

Balsamic Moon was, of course, the first thing that was printed. And By Many Other Names was the next project. The colour title pages I designed for both novels was next (the balance of the colour inks seem a bit odd, but I can deal with that), as were the winner’s certificates. Then they were both taken downtown and bound in hardcover. I was warned not to open them for at least 24 hours to allow the binding to cure, and the suspense is killing me. They’re currently shelved between my thesis and the three-volume anthology of short stories on a common theme written by me, t!, and Tal.

And… Ceri’s Yule gift is now complete. Muah-hah-hah-hah. Hey, better late than never. (And no, Ceri, it has nothing to do with my printer, or hardcover binding. You’ll see.)