general life update, plus reading report

[edenfalling]

So. What I did the past couple days:

1) Outlined chapter 17 of "Apartment Manager." It will be the final chapter, and then there will be a brief epilogue... you know, one of those "A few months later..." sorts of things. It's kind of sad to think the story will be done, and I won't be playing with these exact characters again (the sequel, "The Guardian in Spite of Herself," is set a year later and doesn't involve all of the same characters), but it feels good (weird, but good) to look back and say, I wrote 65,000 words in under nine months, and the story's almost finished. I mean, "Secrets" is longer (nearly 90,000 words at the moment) but it's not quite 2/3 of the way through yet, and I've been working on it for three years.

2) Finished a scene in "Grace," one of my fairy-tale retellings, which laid an important plot point for later. Now I get to switch POV characters from Grace to Ricky, and start the quest portion of the story, and the nasty moral quandaries. After that, it's back to Grace, and things get really sticky. And I think I will close the story with Iris, the fairy godmother, just for symmetry's sake. Structure is not the only important thing in writing, but patterns can help add a sense of finality and resolution when they work right.

3) Twiddled a little more with "The Sum of Things," my original novel from last NaNoWriMo. I think Talin's sections are pretty much where I want them to be. Now I need to finish straightening out Ranna's scenes, and then I can start adding new story. (I don't want to add anything until I have a corrected base to build off of. Well, the next scene is Talin's, so I probably could write it without fixing Ranna first, but I'm a little compulsive about certain kinds of order. I'm not going to fight myself when I don't need to.)

4) Read a few books:

Orion Among the Stars which I read once back in high school and had mostly forgotten. Ben Bova does write entertaining stuff, even if I find his underlying themes somewhat trite and badly thought-out.

Jinian Star-Eye, the final book in Sheri S. Tepper's nine-volume True Game series, of which I have now read six books. Someday I will find the remaining three. They're extremely whacked-out in some ways, and somewhat shallow and facile in others, but you can see Tepper's driving themes and such emerging from underneath the awkwardness of a beginning writer. It's quite fascinating to watch. (Also, the story concepts are lovely in their own right.)

A Civil Campaign, by Lois McMaster Bujold. Okay, I'm convinced. She's amazing. I now have four more Miles Vorkosigan books checked out from the library, and am kicking myself for being too lazy to look into them years ago.

And a couple soupies, which were predictable as always. I have discovered that these days I tend to skim the sex bits (read one, you've read 'em all) and read more for locations, imagery, or the random bits of information about various jobs and such that give the better romances their gloss of verisimilitude. And then, occasionally, you find little pearls of truth in the middle of formulaity. I don't read many soupies anymore, though I used to go through them at ridiculous speeds in high school, but they're a sort of comfort food for the brain and heart. Not good as a steady diet, but nice now and then.

Comments

[erised1810.livejournal.com]

wow. it almsot soudns liek your'e doing architectual work first before youstart writing a story. ican't belive how much I jsut lethe string g oadn the bal lof yarn run free compared to al the plotting yo uneed to do firstadn hwo you get stuck as so nas yo uloose control over characters. robab ysay sosmethign about which styel fits best? am iright when I noticedor perhpas assume fomr jstu guessing adn reding throug hplannign stages that yousotmimes first also need to setthe rightt one or lok forht eright mood? It feels abit weirdn ow that stuflie ktaht seemst ocome so easily to me. I jsut..start. SOmeone starts narrating in my headand I"ll write.
o nthe other hand, i coudln' possibl ybe in the middle of liek six diffeent things adn ahve several otehrso nthe backburner. yoruedal those boks inthose two days??

[edenfalling]

Some stories I just sit down and write. However, if I don't have a structure or an outline, the characters either get completely out of control, or the words kind of peter out after a while. So for anything past a couple thousand words, I do a bit of planning.

Yes, I read five books in two days. Unless I deliberately slow myself to appreciate a writer's phrasing, or to be absolutely certain I'm not missing any nuances, I read fast -- which is as much a curse as a gift, because the books are done so soon, and then I have nothing left to read! (I think this is because I read for story first, and only secondarily for literary appreciation. It's kind of funny, since I can get very picky about little literary touches and symbols in my own writing... but even then, the story comes first. Some people are storytellers because they write. I write because I am a storyteller. Different emphasis, see?)

[erised1810.livejournal.com]

I almsto read' missing any mistakes' isntead of nuances. probab ybecaus iremidnedm sylf of my own tendnecy to betaread acuta lbooks. which isj sut oen warnign to you to nto read too much fici na day. it had me alarmed when Ifussed over asemicolon i noen of tolkien's sentences.
i don't se the differetn emphasis? wht doest it mean beign astory teller BECAUSE yo uwrite? is thta me or you? is tat whe nthe power of words comes first and the rest jstu falls to gether afterwards? is tha any of us at all?'
symbolism is another thing idon't do. I jsut get anidea and perhaps ad endingand write form here to there (but onl ywhen iknow who telsl the story or how it's narrated.)
and i forgotot say ifel voer when yo usaid 30.000 words of 'secrets'. is that nine chapters by now? icna't for the life of me THINK of writing chapters of more than 3000 words or so. 4500 wa the longest i think. o handan other wird thing i'm harld ytaking note of. 'i've almsot ___ words done so i jsut nednatoher >>> or so befori' mdone." 'It's goingto bej ust about __ words". idon't CARE. i wrote afic that was suposedto be about one night and it's over 50 kb i ndize. I" Mbeter with time limits.

[edenfalling]

Hmm. The distinction between writers and storytellers is a personal one, based on my experience as a reader, a writer, an an oral storyteller.

A writer is, obviously, a person who writes. A person who strings words together on paper (or on a computer screen). There are some people, it seems to me, who are mostly interested in words and the patterns they make. In the sound of words, in the elegance of language. They're stylists, for lack of a better term. For them, the story is not as important as the way they tell it.

A storyteller is a person who tells stories. I happen to tell mine in writing, which means that I am also a writer, and therefore interested in words and so on. But the story is the primary thing. Oh, the way I tell it is also important, and can give the story wings or weight it down with chains, but the story is what I care about most.

(I do oral storytelling too, and when I read stories out loud I tend to fiddle with the words and phrasing, because what works on the page doesn't always work in performance and I am always trying to make the story come alive.)

Yes, 9 chapters of "Secrets," at a little less than 90,000 words total. I have 5 more chapters and an epilogue to write, which should bring the story to about 145,000 words by the time I'm done. Scary!

[erised1810.livejournal.com]

I copletel yget it now. its' not asubjective as yotuhin k(at leato me, which perhaps makes it subjective anyway because i'me ust one person who sees it as objective/fact. are those the saem anyway?) ithkn an example of a 'stylist' lek ycoual them seems to be James JOyce. But it also seems to me ther'ssometiems a ver ythin line betwe nthe importanceo fhow to tell and the importane of what you're telling. Sometimes it's woven together. /unfinished thought
M yqeustion about words was more liek someone set arule for their chapters to be over 10.000 words long. in some casei almsot felt iwsa more importantto ahve that aomutn of words than to figure otu which scenes fix in one chapter. acutal i'ma hypocrit. i write whoel storieandwhei wantto devide them in parts i tak an amout of pages ad see ethr that bit ends on a suitable break. OR is that something comletel ydifferent?
jsut liek I have questiosn about explanatory notes, chatper/section titles etc I alwasy wonderedabout prologues and epilogues. the first few tiems iwrote afic, i saw aprologue and epilogue everywhee, not includign the introduction' onthe main page (which is abit liek the back cover text if yo uwill.( so what makes peple decide the first bit is more of aprologue? I've als oseen 'epitaph' first ,and hen five paragraphs of quotes form other people adn THEN aprefaceiwth notes and aforewroda and THEN a prologue andTHEN chapter 1 lol!
I have read some boks whe the ipro and epilogue almsot soudnedlike soen hastily wrote the mafterwrds. But liek I said before Pesonal yI' mstill goign from first writign down the story and then devidign it up (if it needs to). whch is apai nenough. special ywhe ni foudn out yo ucoudl devidei ti n halves, parts, sections (which seems smaller tha n'parts' but larger than 'chapters' OR smaler han chapters. I don't evne pla nscene 1. scene 2. scene 3. msot of the tiems idon't even have the paragraphs. I go forthe text first an dwritign down waht I want to say. I don't knwowhat category that puts me in though. probably 'sloppiest writers who ever walekd thsi earth?"

[edenfalling]

The epilogue is because I want to tie up a few loose ends, but they fall after the main plot and character arcs of the story are finished. That's why it won't be part of chapter 17 -- because it would dilute the focus of the story. This way, I really could just leave off after chapter 17, but the epilogue is... hmmm, how to put this? It's like an extended version of the traditional "And they lived happily ever after" sort of ending.

I generally have a rough word count estimate, but I am flexible about it if the chapter has a particularly good end point that makes it shorter or longer than my goal.

I divide into chapters and scenes for the same reason I divide into paragraphs: readability. It's visually hard to decipher an unbroken block of text, and it's also mentally hard to arrange huge chunks of information. So we break it down, leaving white space between paragraphs (or indentations, depending), and splitting the action at various points. It makes the story flow better, makes it easier for readers to track what's going on.

(Also, finishing a scene gives me a little jolt of satisfaction. Finishing a story is more satisfying, of course, but I like to have little boosts along the way, because writing a novel takes a long time, and without any rewards on the way, I'd get sick of it quite soon.)

[erised1810.livejournal.com]

Oh I dont' mean i never devide it inparagrasph, I jsut stat with al that stuff when I"m done writignthe story itself. I think I ust floatthorugh the road as I write adn then I lok it over and figureo ut where to break things. I'm more busy with how to convey it with words adn the kidn of style than withthe visual stuff. AT least for longer pieces.
I can see ther ight poitn of anepilogue now. I" mguesign the prologue is a way of opening the door?

[tjalorak.livejournal.com]

Hah! I liked Lois's books too. :) I don't like her fantasy books as much as I like her sci-fi books -- I like Miles as a character more than her stock angst hero -- but she's a good author nonetheless.

[edenfalling]

I plan to go through the Miles saga before I try any of her latest books, but I hope she'll find another character as engaging as he is!

[acechan.livejournal.com]

Yay Bujold! I've never seen anyone else who could pull off character-driven space opera (though the Vorkosigan series certainly doesn't confine itself to that genre). Her recent fantasies are also rather good, even if I do rather miss Miles. Also, i really like her that her stated way of coming up with plots (ask, "What's the worst thing that could happen to this character?") doesn't make her stories into morasses of angst.

Oh, and hi. *waves* I've been stalking your journal out of love for Apartment Manager (which I am sort of both happy and sad to hear is almost done), though the original stories you've posted here are also very interesting.

[edenfalling]

Hi yourself! Yes, Bujold's sense of humor and her action... choreography, shall we say, do leaven the angst quite nicely.