79,000 words. Two new scenes left to write, maybe three. Not with a bang, but a whimper (from the author, who’s continually surprised at how fucking emotionally draining it is to end a book!) Horrible things: how hard it is to write romantic scenes without slipping into Hollywood tropes. I haven’t had much practice, I guess… in my previous novel, there wasn’t a central love relationship, just a bit of dating. Beautiful things: getting one of those scenes right, I think! Also, some more bits with magic, always fun. Tonight’s homework: going through a year’s worth of notes from my writing group because I’m almost positive there’s a great suggestion in there about a specific missing scene I should write, and I can’t remember what it is. And being a very orderly person, I’d like to write that missing scene before I write the two final scenes, because once those are done I’d like to go celebrate, instead of messing around some more. Also, today’s win: Beyond Binary is nominated for a Lambda Literary Award! […]
Novel Enduro, Days VI & VII
I didn’t have time to post Monday because I had an urgent need for a pint with my husband at Bar Volo at day’s end. I did, however, hammer in another 2000 words, bringing that day’s total to just over 77,000. Sadly, it’s still there as of today. I put in hours of work to keep it there, too. I deleted several vestigial, useless or outdated scenes, and the new words I added were just barely enough to keep the total count on track. I don’t think this novel is going to be quite 90k, but it is still going to be done by the end of the week: I have about five scenes left to write, and none of them contain land mines as far as I can tell. I’ve also had a flurry of other writing-related activity, including both success and failure, which I can’t share at this time, and only mention in order to provide context for why today was another low-count day. I can see this being quite a time-sink for a full-time writer. As my own publishing history grows, and my involvement with the SF community with it, I find myself with a lot of […]
Novel Enduro: Day V
In the spirit of public accountability, I’m posting even though this day has NOT gone as well as the others. Today’s word count: 1263.Total word count: 75,250 of 90,000.Percent completion: 83.6%. Beautiful things: bike couriers, hand-pulled noodles at Pacific Mall. Horrible things: everyone wants you to talk about things and you just want to whack-a-mole every single thought that surfaces in your brain. Favourite sentence: “It was the voice he used on both Gavin and Asta, when they were sleepy or sick and had to be coaxed.” What went wrong with this day: Late start due to unavoidable obligation; rewrote the same scene four or five times before getting it even close; deleted another scene entirely, cancelling out a bunch of word count. Interesting note: judging by where I am right now, this novel isn’t actually going to hit 90k. I think I’m closer to the end of the action than that. Which is fine. I’ll just throw in some more sex 😉 […]
Novel Enduro: Day IV
Today’s word count: 3832. Can I just say how awesome I feel about this?Total word count: 73,987 of 90,000.Percent completion: 82%. Beautiful things: Martin, who is still hot; um, that’s all, the rest was pretty ugly Horrible things: zombie raccoon! Which explodes! I was so pleased with this I immediately put it on Twitter. So if there’s a rash of exploding zombie raccoons in your slush, you’ll know who to blame. Favourite sentence: “Gavin’s spirit mantled like a hawk, ready to rend.” Reason for stopping: eggplant. Fetishes: wooden ring on index finger: Bellwoods bottlecap necklace. Sustenance: soy maple lattes, a god-awesome sandwich with tempeh, kimchee and Baconnaise, a pint of Bellwoods’ Roman Candle IPA. Playlist highlights: Matt Mays, “Take It On Faith”; Cat Power, “Ruin”; Esthero, “Walking On Eggshells”. Warnings That Must Go On the Tin: Mum, you can’t read this book. Even if I forget and try to give it to you. It has too many zombie things which you would not like, plus bad driving, and ‘fuck’ at least once in every chapter. […]
Novel Enduro: Day III
Today’s word count: 3001. I really know how to nail that, apparently.Total word count: 70,126 of 90,000.Percent completion: 78%. Beautiful things: heartbeats; the Bentley Continental GT Horrible things: zombie sedan! Favourite sentence: “Painkillers didn’t kill the pain so much as put it on a nearby shelf, where it sat glowering over him until it could come close again.” Reason for stopping: Lapdogs pub night. Fetishes: South African bead bracelets, and pink shirt, because it’s Pink Shirt Day. Sustenance: white peach tea, olive bread, olive oil. Playlist highlights: Airmech. Again. […]
Novel Enduro: Day II
Today’s word count: 4295!Total word count: 67,175 of 90,000.Percent completion: 74.6%. Beautiful things: stair-spindles, winter grass, bright scraps, wallpaper flowers. Horrible things: Terrence’s people in hospitals, Terrence’s poor lungs. Favourite sentence: “His spirit saw it too: Chicago in all of itself, under the sun.” Reason for stopping: to write this blog post, because that’s what I felt like doing. Fetishes: South African bead bracelets. Sustenance: the rest of the corn chips, more grilled cheese, more Picholine olives, little tomatoes, soy maple latte. Playlist highlights: Airmech by Front Line Assembly. (Why does my novel about urban magicians require its soundtrack to be a concept album about mecha? I don’t know! The mysteries of creativity!) Bonus: although Tybalt mostly prefers the cat tree, he also napped on my copy of The Waste Land. Cute and literary! […]
Novel Enduro: Day I
Today’s word count: 3065! Right on target.Total word count: 62,880 of 90,000.Percent completion: 70%. Beautiful things: A crisp checked shirt. Corn pudding (maybe it is not beautiful, but I am hungry). Horrible things: Home truths. Coughing. Someone is watching “Cheers”. Reason for stopping: I need to wash the dishes. Fetishes: new yoga pants, Badger lip balm. Sustenance: corn chips, grilled cheese, Picholine olives, hibiscus-jasmine tea. Playlist highlights: Richard Thompson, “Pharaoh”; Red Hot Chili Peppers, “Pretty Little Ditty”; Wilco, “Reservations”. Bonus: the cats really like the new cat tree, and they stayed on it all day instead of messing with my desk! The laptop was only bitten once. […]
Public Accountability: The Novel Enduro Begins
Today begins a two-week writing marathon. My (rather ambitious) goal is to finish my novel-in-progress. Here’s a screen shot of my current stats (from Scrivener): 30,000 words to go; 10 business days to do it in. That means 3000 words a day. Folks, I’ve never written that much, that fast. But I have another novel lined up behind this one, which I really want to get started on; I’m thirty-seven and not famous yet; I’ve carved out this space from a demanding day job; and the only way out is through. Materials: Scrivener; my trusty Lenovo which I got at the end of last year’s novel enduro; a new pair of yoga pants; typing fingers; playlists. Plus a new cat tree, meant to keep the cats off my desk (wish me luck). Cuing up my playlists… pouring the coffee… wrapping a scarf around my neck… and GO. […]
Lilac season
Scent memories are hard to shake. Every street in my city has a lilac tree. Almost twenty years ago–God, can that be right?–I lived in a house in a hollow beside a railway embankment. The hollow was filled in thick with lilac trees and the scent mingled with the iron smell of the tracks and the dew at dawn. I had a bad time in that house. Every year when the scent comes around again I remember how I lived then. I wrote it into Scars of Kinship, like Alexander McQueen stitching human hair and fingernails into the seams of his garments. I don’t know how it feels to a reader, this half-secret weight. But I knew, when I figured out what this book was about, that it had to take place during lilac season. […]
Set ’em up, knock ’em down
…is the phrase my husband and I use when we’re being extra-productive. You know, those days when you clean the kitchen and take back the empties and get the dry cleaning and pick up cat food and go to the gym and finish a story and send it out and then take a break for lunch. It amuses the hell out of me that I’ve apparently used it on this blog, too, because it was one of the search terms that appeared in my stats this week. Sometimes I write like that: I know what’s got to happen and I pound away at it until it’s done and I’m all full of righteousness. Most of the time, though, I chip and pick and retread. The word counts I post in a day are what most writers post in an hour. I rewrite the same scene four times before moving on to the next, and then I get to the end of the chapter and throw the whole thing away. I don’t think, at this point, that a reader could tell the difference between the things I’ve written in painful little dribbles and the things I’ve written with a firehose. Even […]