I love using ProWritingAid. If you don’t know, it’s a program that helps with grammar, spelling, and word choice. It has done a lot to refine my language when writing. However, I don’t always take its advice, and this is why:
ProWritingAid asks me if I “could use a more vivid verb than this adverb.” Is ‘preternaturally’ not vivid enough? Really?
ProWritingAid consistently corrects ‘not even’ as ‘lopsided’. I’m lopsided kidding.
It just suggested replacing ‘happen to be’ with ‘are’ Here’s the sentence: “I happen to be interested in Sierra, not a nerd.” ‘I are interested?’
I’m sitting at home again today, cowering in the air conditioning because “it’s going to be another hot one,” in Midwest parlance. I’m listening to playlists that help me concentrate, hoping they’ll inspire me to finish the last three chapters of Carrying Light.
So far, so good. I wrote a 750-word breakup argument, which was a lot of fun. It’s a reminder that I need to get more of the relationship between Forrest and Sage into the book. Remember, I’m pantsing this book (aka “Flying by the seat of my pants”), which means I figure out what’s wrong in retrospect.
I only have four chapters after this before Carrying Light is done. I could happy cry. When I’m done, I’m going to put the novel into a figurative desk drawer to see if fresh eyes will find all the changes I need to make. And then what? I have a novel to re-edit for January 1 publication if I don’t chicken out. It’s a somewhat unusual novel with very different focus from the previous Hidden in Plain Sight novel Apocalypse. I have a couple ideas for novels, but I’m not happy with either one of them. Maybe it’s time to write more short stories. But about what?
People have suggested elven detectives in the manner of Howard the Duck, a battalion of squirrels, and a library run by sentient marmots. These will not happen.
I know I don’t talk about this often, but I am an associate professor of human services at Northwest Missouri State University when I’m not writing. My speciality is family resource management, or how families allocate time, money, and other resources to meet goals and deal with events. I deal with not only the specific actions they take, but the process to get to those actions.
Right now, I am writing about a decision that the collective Barn Swallows’ Dance has to make. Barn Swallows’ Dance has some special characteristics that make any decision-making harder — first, the fact that two trees beloved of Gaia distribute talents to the residents. The second is that some of the residents are not human, but are preternatural, energy-based beings and their offspring.
The question is “how do we deal with people in need who come to our collective?” This discussion happens during a time of turmoil and economic disaster. There are concerns of safety vs. hospitality, charity vs. the needs of the collective to support themselves. A discussion of who is “worthy” and “unworthy”, and who is an outsider. In other words, a discussion of how the collective will allocate scarce resources, which is exactly what resource management is about. Any American who was alive in the 80s will recognize arguments on each side of the welfare question in the US., arguments which persist to this day.
There are no wrong arguments among the people of the collective, because decisions there are made by consensus. Consensus decision-making requires that the decision not be made until everyone agrees, or at least nobody stands in the way of the decision. I have an idea of where the decision will go, but it’s fascinating watching the characters argue their positions.
I wrote an easy 2k words today (it helps that I was at Starbucks), and I look forward to the final decision at Barn Swallows’ Dance. In the meantime, I appreciate how my day job contributes to my writing.
I finally got 1200 words on the work-in-progress written today at home. It doesn’t hurt that l got a venti flat white Door Dashed in the morning. I also listened to good writing music. The most important thing is that I had an idea of what needed to happen in the story.
I should point out that I am self-published and relatively unknown. The big thing for me is the writing; although I really want people to read my writing, I have not mastered marketing the books.
If you want to read some, there’s the fluffy Christmas romances and the more serious fantasy stories. And all of them can be found Right Here.
I am writing at home today. As I’ve said before, it’s a bit of a struggle, and I’m troubleshooting what might make it less of a struggle.
First, upstairs vs downstairs. My office (upstairs) is too small, I’ve decided. I’m facing the wall. Three screens is distracting when I write, although I do well with all the screens for my regular work. If there was a way to rearrange the office, I would, but the size of the room means that the computer table will always be facing a wall. Facing a wall, I can definitively say, does not inspire my writing.
Writing in my living room nook works better. I have a window to look out of and a living room to look into. I have a stereo to put concentration music on (currently the Deep Focus playlist on iTunes). This provides a layer of distraction that allows me the flow of words. Most importantly, I have space.
I think it’s a shame I can’t write in my office. What’s an office for if you can’t work in it? For that matter, what good is a room if you can’t put an office in it?
I write better at Starbucks. It’s official. I’m at Bux and I’ve written 500 words without a lot of effort. Yesterday’s writing looks better. Apparently, it takes a hot lavender latte for me to get writing done.
Or maybe it’s the split mind thing. Part of my mind is paying attention to the activities around me. Two of my acquaintances are talking at a table to my left; a group of women my age or a little older are chatting behind me. To my right, the baristas are puttering around behind the counter. There’s some innocuous background music playing. While all this is happening, I am picking words and writing this. It’s so much easier when there’s noise in the background than it is in my silent home.
My phone is lavender, however.
Or maybe it’s because I’m writing on my road warrior gear. This consists of an iPod Pro, a Logi keyboard and mouse setup, and a cable to plug in for power. (All in lavender). The keyboard feels springier than my laptop keyboard, and the colors are more stimulating. And my setup can go just about anywhere (with the exception being someplace without a table).
I have to fix my home space to make it easier to write. I said this yesterday, but today it’s obvious that I write better out in public. Or at least at Starbucks.
I’m losing steam with this book I’m writing, doubtless because I feel like I haven’t enough stuff to write in the remaining chapters. I tried an old motivation trick and went forward to more interesting chapters, having written one chapter where shit hits the fan and the last two chapters. That means I have about 5 chapters where not enough is going to happen unless I figure out how to write them without introducing filler. To advance the story past the “boom”.
This happens when one is pantsing a book. I feel like free-writing without an outline (i.e. pantsing) promotes a chapter-to-chapter view rather than a big picture view. “What am I going to do with this chapter?” is more how I write when pantsing. Although I get continuity by extending themes and plotlines (and I feel there’s a surplus of those), I still feel like the plot is going willy-nilly. Until it’s not going.
The book will probably turn out better than I think. I’ve written books this way before and they haven’t turned out bad once edited. But I prefer my outlines, so I can approach the next chapter and say, “This is what’s supposed to happen in this chapter.”
I have trouble motivating to write in my house, preferring Starbucks and its optimal level of distraction. But, as the temperature outside is getting up to 94 today, I’m stuck at home. I’m now working on how to make motivating space at home.
My writing nook is the loveseat in the living room, because our office is a claustrophobic experience with too many bookshelves and not enough room to think. The library table is right in front of and facing a wall. Even though I’ve put posters on that wall based on book covers my niece has designed, I’m staring at a wall. Maybe they’re too high on the wall, I don’t know. To the right is one of these posters; my niece is rather talented. If it weren’t for that? I still doubtless wouldn’t write well in the space, because it’s too isolated as well. I enjoy having people in my space, even if I ignore them.
The living room has its advantages. I have a table for my laptop that scoots up to the couch. I have control of my music on iTunes on my laptop and send it through Apple TV to decent speakers. I play modern classical and all the iTunes playlists that tout ‘focus’ and ‘concentration’. When my husband is around, I have that person distraction, and that helps. But sometimes there’s too much distraction, like when Chloe crawls all over me or tries to clean my nose.
I still feel distractions, though. I stare out the window less (my ‘thinking mode’), and slink off to Facebook and Reddit more, which cuts down on thinking time. If that’s the problem, I can focus my solution on staying on the current page. What would help me with that?
Or I could choose to do something else. There are promotion-related items I could always do. I could take a break from the novel to write a short story. Or I could just take a break. It’s Sunday, and I have the rest of my life to write.
I have written some pretty dark stuff lately. Riots with body counts, bombings, scenes that traumatize my protagonists. The United States is falling into disorder, and in two years there will be no United States.
I may write dark, but I don’t write unrelieved grim. There is always humanity. There is always hope. And there is always humor. My characters shine in small moments where humor peeks out, and sometimes I go from subtle smirks to full-out silliness.
Take, for example, Nephilim cats. One of my Archetype characters created a passel of immortal Archetype cats that teleport and procreate. Their offspring, like human-Archetype crosses, fly. They also get into trouble flying around outsiders. The beauty is that most humans can’t believe their eyes, and they ignore the obviously flying cats. But when the outsider recognizes this cat is actually flying, and the ten-year-old girls are scolding him for letting the secret out … a tense moment of an outsider knowing secrets gets silly.
I worry sometimes about my sense of humor. On the other hand, I worry that my writing can get too dark. I wonder if I have the balance right. I would love feedback on this, so if you’re one of my readers, please let me know! Link to my bookshere.
Words Like Me 