When bad writing is funny

http://frankgraham.blogspot.com/2007/03/when-bad-writing-is-funny.html

If you don't get these puns, it's time to go back to grammar school...

...or stop writing altogether. ;)

Betcha thought I was gone, didn'tcha?

I am in fact, still here. I've been busy of late (not writing, much to my shame) mostly with schoolwork and housework.

Today I'm committed to writing a good bit, so I'll definitely get some work. I've been having trouble with the ending to Nightblade, which is ironic, given that it's the one part that I've had written in my head for years... I know exactly how it's going to end.

I'm just procrastinating, I think.

Anyway, I'm still alive, still blogging, and maybe I haven't driven all four of my regular readers away.

Soundtrack for HackerDragon

I've got my soundtrack for Hacker Dragon. It's an industrial techno compilation, mostly, and it serves my purposes perfectly. Edgy, a little discordant, even a little angry.

Tonight, once I've finished homework, (only two more weeks left in the quarter... looks like I'm going to manage all As again this go-round) I'm going to go in for a major push to do at least several pages on Nightblade.

In other news, this is an APB for all you writers out there: you should be terrified. Epiracy on the same level as the massive amounts of mp3 thefts has begun, and you should be aware of the phenomenon. Kristin from Pub Rants has more.

Please spread the word that this is unacceptable; encourage your friends and family NOT to download these ebooks; we writers exist on the fringe of livability; unlike musicians, a few downloads are DEFINITELY going to hurt us; every book downloaded is one not bought, one not paid for, which ultimately results in lower sales, and can continue until the publisher drops an author.

I encourage you to complain to esnips, and report every copyright-infringing ebook you find. If enough complaints are filed, maybe esnips will pull that category. At the very least, the more that are reported, that'll keep their copyright department working overtime.

Into the climax

I've gotten past that awful chapter, and now am writing the climactic final confrontation. My heroes are making their way in the Bad Guy's stronghold as we speak.

I've already gotten to make some neat settings. There's a tower, but the Bad Guy isn't in the highest tier of it. In fact, he's under it.

I've introduced a third character who is unlikely to survive until the end of the book.

I need to get back to writing. :) Off to the notebook!

Eureka!

Just goes to show, you can always learn something, even when you think you know everything about something.

I've been struggling with stylistic concerns, lately. You may remember a previous post about conjunctions (or that might have been an LJ post, or even an email... it doesn't matter. Someone feel free to correct me, and I'll repost here for your benefit, if you're all that interested).

I've been struggling with the flow of my prose, how things sound. Since I've been doing the latest pages in Nightblade's Fury by hand, in a notebook, I noticed that hasn't been bothering me as much.

I figured out why.

I'm thinking too much about it. I'm concentrating so much on the technical aspects, that I'm losing my style. It doesn't MATTER if it's technically correct, what matters is that it flows. I need to focus on the story, and worry about the technical stuff.

What I may be perceiving as a problem may not actually be one at all; it will depend on what others feel about it.

Check out Orson Scott Card's writing class on style... this is what really got me thinking. He speaks of people so choked by their obsession with "correct style" that they couldn't write at all! You get so caught up in not using too many adverbs, or obsessing over showing-not-telling that you get away from what matters... the writing. It doesn't matter if it's technically correct by MLA standards if people like your storytelling ability.

I'm feeling more up to tackling Hacker Dragon, now. I was thoroughly intimidated, because that story was begun in a feverish haze of emotion and character, and I wasn't sure I could recreate the tone and intensity. Now I know that I can... I just have to stop worrying about HOW, and just write!

Breaking the wall

I finally managed to shatter the blockage. I won't call it writer's block, because I knew what I wanted to write, I just also knew it was going to be boring and suck horrific balls.

However, I broke out the good old fashioned way... a notebook and a pen. I wrote six full handwritten pages last night, a decent start on a very good action scene. If I can get past this chapter, I'll be into the climax, and it'll be time to kick ass and take names.

In other knews, I've also rediscovered an old tale I wrote god knows when... "Hacker Dragon". It's a sci-fantasy kind of thing, something vaguely reminiscent of the old RPG Shadowrun. I REALLY want to work on it, but I'm determined to finish Nightblade first. So I've decided that I'll hurry up and do that so I can work on the second. I may try writing on Nightblade first, and use the second story as a carrot to work hard.

Sorry for the long time since the last post. I've been so caught up with schoolwork and trying to get past this block that I haven't wanted to waste time with "can't update, nothing's changed" posts here. :)

Dictionary (Thesaurus?): Impossible

Just found a great writing challenge, from A Paperback Writer

Let's play Dictionary: Impossible.

Writers, your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to take out your dictionary and flip through it, then stop on any page at random. Write down the first word you see. Repeat until you have a list of ten words.

subculture
cemetery
excessive
steamroller
nag
cocktail
impute
underproof
borough
nonage

Level 1: Create at least three novel titles using only the words on your list (a, an, the, and other simple words can be added for style.) You have five minutes to complete this level.

Borough Cemetery
An Underproof Cocktail
The Nag
Excessive Nonage
Steamroller Subculture

Level 2: Create a story premise for the titles you've created from your list. If you get caught on this level, PBW will disavow any knowledge of you.

Borough Cemetery: Citizens of a fortified medieval city discover the victims of a strange plague won't stay in their graves.

An Underproof Cocktail: Farmer Bubba's miracle cherries were supposed to soak up the alcohol from the youngsters' drinks, not turn the teens into killer zombies.

The Nag: She knew he loved her; all he needed was a little half-hourly reminder to show it.

Excessive Nonage: How many times could one demi-goddess cheerleader turn sweet sixteen?

Steamroller Subculture: Homeboy heavy equipment operators battle a demon road crew paving the way to hell.

Level 3: Write an opening line for the title/story premises you've created. Should you decide to continue on with the mission, you have exactly thirty minutes to complete this level.

Borough Cemetery

The Baron would have blamed it all on the gravediggers, but theirs were the first bodies left in pieces outside the city's gates.

An Underproof Cocktail

Seein' pictures of that college fella usin' clay teabags to soak up poison outta bad drinkin' water were what gave me the original idear.

The Nag

She'd left him her phone number, written on his bathroom mirror in red lipstick along with a kiss-print and CALL ME LATER.

Excessive Nonage

"Diana Hunter made the squad?" Heather, who had not, turned purple under her crystal rose blush. "She only moved to town like two minutes ago."

Steamroller Subculture

Bodeen climbed down from the barricade truck and walked over to inspect the surveyor's mangled, bloodstained tripod. "Somebody let Julio back up the dozer again?"

Level 4: Write the story to go with one of your opening lines, premises and titles. You may take as much time as you need, but remember that any idea may self-destruct in as little as ten seconds.

Level 5: Write the stories to go with all of them, and you win Dictionary: Impossible.

Now, since I don't actually have a dictionary, I'll use my Roget's Pocket Thesaurus. It's not quite the same, but should be an adequate substitute.

My words:

1. laggardly
2. forward
3. regard
4. analysis
5. defiant
6. loyal
7. striking
8. concerning
9. profitable
10. trivial

Level 1

Laggardly Defiant
Striking Regard
Profitable Analysis

Level 2

Laggardly Defiant - A young heiress is quick to anger, but slow to forgive. When it comes time to stand up for her rights, she finally errs on the side of caution... and loses her family's estate as a result!


Striking Regard - A vain man is the idol of an entire country. One woman, above all others, wishes to make him her mate, regardless of his cooperation in the matter.


Profitable Analysis - A statistical analyst gets an entirely new job, serving as a pollster in a microscopic magical kingdom in his own back yard.

Level 3

Laggardly Defiant - My mother always told me that I needed to stop being so easily offended or I'd regret it; that's why I decided to hold my tongue when Baron Von Stuberhauser called me a flaming harlot.


Striking Regard - Jase never really wanted to settle down, preferring not to be tied to one woman, so his reaction to Bonnie's marriage proposal was understandbly vehement.

Profitable Analysis - "What have you been smoking, Abacus?" Marley exclaimed, his bright green eyes wide with alarm.

Level 4 - forthcoming

Scenes repeating...

It's amazing how reworking one scene can completely change the feel of it, and the characters reactions become more personal and intense.

In the first draft, there are two court scenes; one is the crucial scene where Nightblade learns that her former fiance is involved in an assassination attempt. The second is in her fiance's court, where a serial murderer is brought to justice, and is discovered to be a minion of the main villain.

Well, I decided that one court scene was quite enough. A second was boring. So, I decided to make the action more immediate. Instead of the trial after the arrest, I moved things back to when he is captured, and the body is still fresh. This makes Nightblade's violent reaction make more sense, and the ensuing action scene isn't a rehash of the first court action scene. Instead of an open court, like before, it takes place in a cramped jail. More opportunity for character injury.

Sometimes, the best thing you can do is take a step back, and ask yourself what this particular scene really adds. I've probably a lost a good 10,000 words in the first round of edit, but the story is much stronger for it.

Technical failure

Technology failed me today. I was happily pounding away on Chapter 5, when my laptop died, abruptly.

I searched for the source, and realized I had a pillow sitting on top of my power supply, and it overheated. I'm hoping and praying that it didn't destroy the AC adapter completely, nor destroy my progress.

I'm a stickler for backups, so if I do lose work, it'll only be about a chapter's worth (I generally backup up to disk every two chapters or so.

Ah, the hazards of working on an ancient IBM thinkpad.

EDIT: Good news! It was just a simple overheat. After some fiddling, we got it back. Then the floppy drive jammed, inciting another panic attack, but that was just a random broken bit of laptop that had gotten ramming in there at an odd angle.

Red pen is fun!

Well, many changes have been made to the novel. The main character isn't Shadowhawk, anymore. I've renamed her Nightblade. Still hokey, but at least it's not associated with a gay comic book character!

I'm up to chapter 6 in the red pen revisions, and chapter 4 in the actual rewriting. It's still not where I'd like it to be, but it's improving. The main problem I'm having is I can't get away from "and". In my effort to keep my narrative flowing (no staccato stops with too-short stops) my sentences have taken on a cumbersome rhythm with too many ands. Usually, the sentence is structured something like this:

"The character did this, and then turned around to to that."

It's not feeling natural, but I can't quite figure out an alternative.

Hmm. Methinks I might post an excerpt to Forward Motion for some good, heavy critique.

Editing

One of the most painful parts of the editing process is trimming the fat. YOu know what I mean; cutting out those awesome scenes that are only there because they're awesome, removing the blatant info dumping. My opening page dropped three full paragraphs of a character who was ruminating on his love life. Completely irrelevant to the main character, who kills him in paragraph four. And it would be death to someone who decided to pick up that book in a store... or on an agent's desk.

I've been struggling a bit with an old memory info dump. Basically, once you figure out who the assassin's old flame is, I do this huge chapter-long flashback that outlines their last two days or so together. Nice stuff, good and intense at the end...

But ultimately, only a few parts are even relevant.

So, I've whipped out the axe. I've cut 90% of the scenes from that chapter, and the rest will be dropped here and there as flashbacks, but only where it actually adds something to the story. I cut out two pages of detailed description of her bedroom. THAT, I blame on shameless NaNoWriMo word padding. And I'm going to have to work on that, because I'm still not happy with the results.

Editing is difficult. I've had to cut some really good stuff that honestly just didn't improve the storyline at all. There is one line that I'm quite glad to see go, though, and I'll share it with you because I think I must have been in that weird place where you're not really seeing what you write, but just writing. I certainly don't remember doing it, and I refuse to claim responsibility.

"There was death in her visage, and it showed, even to those who knew nothing of her true profession."

Eeew. Yeah. Editing is hard, but editing is good. I no doubt thought this was bloody brilliant when I first wrote it, but four years of collecting dust certainly changed my perspective on that.

I also cut this happy-fuzzy scene where she gets all buddy-buddy with one of the guards she has to train, complete with "You can come to me if you ever have a problem *hugs*" type dialogue. So out of character! So I switched it to her being her usual blunt, acidic self. Feels better.

The act of writing is such an organic, mystical thing for me. It's me and the keyboard, and words flowing from my brain to my fingers. Holly Lisle says it far better than me: it's an "almost-metaphysical fugue state where you're watching events in the story happen and typing what you see." Editing is far less intuitive, and requires thought, preparation, pens, more paper, and a lot of being honest with myself. It's no wonder that I, like most writers, put it off. It's work, real work.

Chapter One

Well, I've read over most of the story (it's missing about 50 pages... something I'm rather annoyed about. It's alright, I recall what happens, but it still annoys me.), and it's got a good, solid base, and the two main characters don't suck.

I've whipped out my purple and green pens , and have marked the first page all to hell.

I think I'm going to work this chapter by chapter. There's a lot of infodumping, so I'm going to have to streamline that a good bit, and some stuff that comes right out of a bad Mary Sue fanfic. I DID write this four years ago, after all.

It's salvageable, and I'm getting excited about the story all over again.

My basic Plot:

An assassin seeks to slay the man who destroyed her life, only to discover more dangerous quarry awaits. She stays her hand, and they work together to defeat a common enemy. She must face her demons... not only those that haunt her soul, but those who wear flesh and blood bodies.

It's a story of redemption and facing the past.

Cliche? Perhaps. I think it will work, though. After all, if I refused to write anything cliche, I wouldn't so much writing at all.

A foray into uncharted territory

Well, inspired by a recent Pub Rants Post, I decided to branch out into a genre of books I have reviled for ages as silly, ridiculous, and in general, not worth the paper they're printed on. My own form of book snobbery, my anti-romance stance (snerk).

So, I made a trip to Walmart to see what the big deal was. I found one with a dragon on the cover. It caught my eye, and I decided not to travel TOO far out of my comfort zone; I chose a romance in a fantasy setting. Dark Demon, by Christine Feehan. Vampire thing.

Dubious, but determined to go through with this experiment, I glanced at the cover. $9.99? For a paperback? Even reduced to $7 according to the Walmart price tag, that's still more than I 'm used to paying for a book. Still, I decided to give it a try.

It sat in my suitcase for the next four hours. After a climb into the North Georgia mountains, a long, irritating day with my family, and booking ourselves into a not-bad hotel room, we got the baby ready for bed, and I curled up and peeled the cover to the first romance novel I have ever read.

The first page was not impressive. Not even a little bit. I had expected tripe, but this cover proclaims Ms. Feehan to be a New York Times bestseller. Surely she could find an editor worth a damn? Adverbs abound, and the lack of description is appalling. 500 pages later (exactly), and I STILL don't know what the primary love interest looks like. He does have long hair (of course) and is apparently very warrior like and muscular, but don't ask me what the color of his hair is. I'm fairly sure that the main character has hair that likes to randomly "band" itself orange and red like a tiger or something, but I'm still not sure what her actual hair color is.

During the first few pages, she actually dons a brightly colored vest, which is described as such not once, but twice. No mention of what those bright colors are, only that they aren't the dark colors favored by the women of this village. This stuff literally reads like I used to write back in my middle school days.

The main character is a super-perfect determinedly strong warrior, and of course her lifemate (can't have a fantasy romance novel without some form of eternal love bond, now can we?) spends the entire book keeping her from being just that. And the main character spends most of the book denying their destined love. Naturally.

I'm really trying to give this stuff the benefit of the doubt, but I'm NEVER going to look at the word "channel" the same way again.

One question, if any of you are regular romance readers: Why is it that words like "velvet folds" and "tight channel" must be used to describe female genitalia in purple-y euphemisms (always preceded by the word "feminine") but there's no problem throwing in a random "scrotum" for your viewing pleasure? Why not the "tender mound of his masculine roundness"? Fits the formula, doesn't it?

I still don't get it. And all I have to say is this: if this chick can get on the NYT bestseller list, I'm writing the wrong stuff.

1st 50 printed

Only took about a minute on those industrial super printers at the school. I don't have my printer hooked up to this computer yet (massive motherboard failure on the other comp... thank goodness for backup) and this one doesn't have floppy access anyway, so I'm just printing out my rough draft on the school printers for now. Free that way, anyway. ;)

Debugging template

Apparently, thanks to the fact that I just got Firefox, I found out that the template I've been using doesn't work in Firefox, at all! BUT, I fixed the problem, thanks to the removal of a tiny snippet of code, so it should work now.

From the dusty archives

I've finally found the old 2002 NaNo (Shadowhawk's Fire - isn't that an awful title?) on disk. It's incomplete, but more complete than the hard copy I have printed out. I still know what happens (I did write it, after all!) so I can reconstruct the missing pieces with little trouble. I would like to know where the old stuff IS.

I've uploaded the original word document to my Gmail, since for some ungodly reason, the PC I use at home has a slot for a floppy drive, but somehow LACKS said floppy drive.

I've also downloaded OpenOffice, because I refuse to pay $200 for Microsoft Office.

My first goal: GEt this beastie printed out (yay school computers... I can probably print out 10 or 20 pages a night in the labs at school for nothing) and break out the red pen. Then, start with a blank document, and start rewriting.

I think the best advice I've received so far for editing is to leave a project for a year before editing. It really gives you distance, and lets me see the holes that I couldn't when it was still close, near and dear to my heart.

Writer's meeting this weekend

My NaNoWriMo group is getting together for a post-nano pre-critique group meeting. It's something I've desperately needed, to get my tail back in gear.

Another roadblock on the road to authorship

And it's called Final Fantasy XII. Ouch. I promise, I'll get back to writing soon! Heck, I have to finish my NaNo, because the deadline on the Lulu free copy thing is in January sometime. I haven't given up on my blog, dear readers, and now that the Christmas madness is done, and my repetitive stress injury has healed, I'm planning on getting back on track January 1. Maybe 2, depending on the hangover.

My New Year's resolution: to complete a novel and get it submitted. I'm not sure which one it will be; I think that Double Edged Sword may need a lot more work before it's ready for the polishing stage (a LOT more work) while the previous project I worked on is starting to tickle me. It is completed, but needs some serious reworking. The majority of it was written in NaNo 2002, and later finished. It's a story that I've liked for a while, and may be a little cliche in places (has the dreaded Obvious Romance that I hate so much), but the characters are very vivid, and it's a little less difficult a deal than DES is. It also has a shitty working title, Shadowhawk's Fire, which will be changed.

The more I think about it, the more I think I want to work with that. I just need to dig up the old disks. They do say that you should set a work aside for a while before editing it. Is four years enough? I need to label all of these posts before

Take that, Sean. ;)

Final Project for my HTML class

My final project for my HTML class is naturally to build a website. In keeping with recent obsessions. I'm making the subject of this project a website on my writing process, advice for writers, etc. Yeah, I know that as an unpublished author I am not qualified to give writing advice, but I like to think I know my craft pretty well, and hey, this is a school project.

I'll be posting it online for extra credit (you get extra credit for actually hosting it live somewhere) so I'll be linking it from here, just so you can see what I'm doing about it.

And hey, it's actually on topic!

EDIT: Here you go. I like my date thingy best of all, and I've decided that I adore stylesheets.

A short hiatus

I've been laboring under a short hiatus, but I don't want you guys to think I've abandoned my blog now that I've finished NaNo officially! Actually, I have about two weeks left in my school quarter, and I'm badly behind in one of my classes, so I'm going to work very hard on getting caught up there, and once I do, I return to writing in earnest. I have been writing here or there, and thinking about my plot, so my novel hasn't fallen by the wayside.

I'm thinking my original group dynamic (the priest and the convict alone) just plain isn't working. There's just not enough to go on about between the two of them throughout. I think it would work a lot better with a third character there from the start, perhaps another male, sent by the church to guard the priest. He would be the voice of reason, and give an extra layer to the Caedas's task of corruption, and make it all the more poignant when the priest falls. HEck, I could even make him madly in love with Salissa, and her naturally ignore him or not notice. That way, it gives my future ficcers some "ships" to work with, and a little more conflict to drive the story along!

I don't know. I'll finish the novel as-is and work on those changes in the re-write.

I will be joining a critique group in March (we're giving ourselves a few months to polish our novels) that is run by one of my wrimos, and which I am blissfully NOT in charge of.

I am also thinking of doing another NaNo perhaps in January or February. We'll see.