PurpleCar

One of my characters likes to collect antiques. What does this say about her? Characters with a collecting habit can be pretty interesting. The plotline can go so many different ways.

Writing is an art. Time-worn cliches about suffering for art aside, as writers, our particular brand of suffering is twofold: being misunderstood and fighting against the clock. Writing isn’t seen as an art by the general public. When someone uses paint and canvas, she is easily identified as an artist. The word “serious” is tacked onto “artist” to connote a painter who sells their work or has reached a minimum level of critical notice. When we call ourselves writers, people “write us off” unless we can spout out a long list of glossy publishing credits, three best sellers and a prize-winning book of poetry. It’s as if writing isn’t permitted to be classified as a legitimate pastime. If you write, people think you must do it for money. If you haven’t earned any money (or at the very minimum, a publishing credit) you’re a hack wasting your time. Poets especially garner the disdain of the “show me the money” public.

As if bad image wasn’t enough, writers fight against time. We can never have enough. The overwhelming majority of writers have other jobs and families that deservingly demand their time. Any artist must be a personal time management/development genious by knowing where the line is between obligations to others and obligations to yourself. Second, any artist must be more disciplined than cloistered nun. When life gets in the way of writing, our judgment in these two vital areas gets clouded. Am I being a bad mother if I send my child to a babysitter so I have time to write? Forget time! How much money should I spend on this? Is it a hobby or am I looking to publish and switch careers?

Today, like everyday, I am juggling many obligations and desires at once. My social media habits of Twittering and IM are (important!) distractions enough. Pile on top the desire to get some journalism bylines and a lucky offer of an on-line article, then throw in some Saturday family time and the need to actually eat, you wind up with a measly 198 words of fiction for the day. Today I’ll catch up, but I’m still under deadline for that potential article (I’ll post a link if it happens -I’m very excited about it). I’ll have to make some decisions on how to spend my precious writing time.

We suffer for our art, just like every artist or artisan in any medium since the beginning of time. It is the human condition. It is part of what makes art profound, what makes it necessary for us to have as a species. As an artist, you have a talent for insight into human behavior that others don’t have. Use it, cultivate it, legitimize it. I give you permission right now to say “I’m a writer.” The only thing you have to do to fulfill that promise is to sit down and write. You are allowed to take time to do that. Write for your future generations. For the world. But most importantly, for yourself. Writers write. Do it today.

My background is in psychology. Now I’m a writer. And I blog. Why not bring those three interests together? Introducing WACKO WEDNESDAYS!

Every Wednesday, I’ll introduce a personality trait/disorder writing meme. Use the info to add interesting facets to your characters. We all have little behaviors/beliefs/superstitions/pathology that make us unique. Your characters are the same way. Make them memorable, give ‘em a small disorder or related personality flaw.

Since it’s raining here on this chilly Fall day, let us start Wacko Wednesdays simply with Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD).

I’m sure you’ve heard of SAD. In a nutshell, it is depression in the winter months. Experts debate on its causes, origins, treatments and whether or not it should even have a name other than “depression,” but SAD has been publicized enough that you can write it into your novel and assume most readers can follow along (the controversy can help make things interesting, too).

Here is an academic article explaining SAD. The article goes into detail about the symptoms and behaviors of a person with SAD. Here’s a link from that page that leads to an end-user pamphlet explaining SAD, which contains enough information for you to get the gist, including this:

Not everyone with SAD has the same symptoms, but common symptoms of
		  winter depression include the following: 

A change in appetite, especially a craving for sweet or starchy
			 foods

Weight gain 

A heavy feeling in the arms or legs 

A drop in energy level

Fatigue 

A tendency to oversleep 

Difficulty concentrating 

Irritability 

Increased sensitivity to social rejection 

Avoidance of social situations 

Symptoms of the summer depression version of SAD are poor appetite,
		  weight loss and insomnia. Either type of SAD may also include some of the
		  symptoms that are present in other kinds of depression, such as feelings of
		  guilt, a loss of interest or pleasure in activities you used to enjoy, ongoing
		  feelings of hopelessness or helplessness, or physical problems such as
		  headaches and stomach aches.

Symptoms of SAD keep coming back and tend to come and go at about the
		  same time every year. The changes in mood are not necessarily related to
		  obvious seasonal stressors (like being regularly unemployed during the winter).
		  

Simply write these things into a character’s profile, and have the character (and plot) act accordingly. This type of research for personality quirks can be done easily on-line. A developmental or adolescent psychology textbook also has a wealth of information that can help you build believable, “real” characters.

Do you have any questions or suggestions for the WW meme? Please comment here or email me at yahoo(dot)com with username ccp6867.

Come back to PC on Wacko Wednesdays for the next personality quirk meme!

Some of you writers out there may not be familiar with the social media world. There are now things called “book videos.” A book video is like a short movie preview for an upcoming or newly released book. In this month’s The Writer magazine, journalist Beth Bakkum writes a short blurb about book videos. Here it is with my added links:

PROMOTIONAL BOOK VIDEOS CATCH ON

In the age of YouTube and MySpace, publishers are looking for new ways to connect with the Internet crowd. Promotional book videos are their latest endeavor to do just that. Simon & Schuster launched a video site that features 40 writers; Hyperion Books, HarperCollins and Penguin Group also use book films, as does Oregon bookseller Powell’s Books.

The videos aren’t intended to be Hollywood slick; rather, they’re short, informal clips to help the reader get to know the author and learn about the book.

“I don’t know if we’re reaching people we wouldn’t otherwise be reaching, but we are reaching people who are not necessarily reading book-review sections, or always watching a TV show,”Sue Fleming, Simon & Schuster’s vice president and executive director for online and consumer marketing, tells the Associated Press.

Brian Murray, president of HarperCollins Worldwide, points out the success of the book video made for the bestseller The Dangerous Book for Boys by Conn and Hal Igguiden. “It was such a good piece that the Today show picked up on it and aired the whole thing.,” he said.

Author Marianne Wiggins recently made a video for her novel The Shadow Catcher. “I don’t know any writers these days who would say that it is beneath their dignity to make a video. Sales have been flat for publishers and I want to find readers. If my publisher suggests something like this to me, I’m certainly going to go hand in hand with that endeavor.” -Beth Bakkum

Most book videos now contain a short explanation of the story with an interview with the author. The majority of book videos concentrate on promoting the author more than the book. Robin Mizell of the blog Treated and Released has a great article about how we as authors and artists can take this one step up. Robin outlines how creative a book video can be, has links to some contests, and outlines in detail what an author should do to create and distribute a book video themselves. Check it out and learn up – this is where book selling is going.

I’d like to make an added suggestion for those of us who are working on their first project: Make the book video before the book is finished. Heck, perhaps even before you start writing. Why not use video and audio media to help you with your planning? As with writing a logline for your book, making an amateur book video in your own home can help you define your characters and hone in your plot. If you don’t have your logline written, a longer, more drawn out interview can help you get down to the bare bones of the storyline. If you can’t get anything out of it, show the video to a friend and have a discussion about your friend’s impressions. Watch a couple of book videos, do your own, act like a “real” author. This could go a long way in boosting your confidence, streamlining your project, and building enthusiasm to write. Two caveats: 1. Don’t show or publish the book video to anyone but your closest first readers/friends. You wouldn’t want interest to bubble up in a product that isn’t produced. 2. Think twice about sending your homemade book video to publishers along with your transcript. Whereas some may be intrigued by it, others may see it as a gimmick. Do some research first before submitting a book video. Those caveats aside, I think a book video can be a great way to start a project. I’m working on the script for my book’s video today.

Please tell me what you think of book videos and using social media as a creative spark generator.

I’m teaching myself the art of fiction, so I expect a learning curve. Plotting BEFORE one writes is probably easier than what I’m doing, which is trying to fit a commercial plot onto what I have already written. This month I’m determined to outline the plot I’ve been working on for my novel.

My plan is to have a solid and very detailed outline of the novel before November 1st, then I can spend National Novel Writing Month writing the needed scenes. Officially, I think NANO encourages working on a new piece of work, but they mean that you must start the month with zero words and then [hopefully] finish with 50,000.

I have more than 100,000 words written for the novel, but most of them are not usable toward a finished product. Character and setting development came out of those words, so they aren’t “a waste.” A very tight, forward-moving commercial plot is what I’m after, not a long, drawn out, stream-of-consciousness mess that a lot of my 100,000+ word work currently is.

Novel writers usually fall into one of these two categories: outliners and typers. Some don’t write a word of their novel until they have an outline of the plot. Other writers concentrate on just getting some words and characters on the page and letting that stream of consciousness develop. I started this novel at NANO in 2004. I reached my first 50,000 words then, but as I kept adding to that pile, I realized my story and my plot weren’t coherent nor forward-moving. Taking part in NANO again without a detailed plot line will give more more disjointed writing. Some interesting developments may come out of it, but stream-of-consciousness gives diminishing returns after 100,000 words. If I keep writing, the story will veer so far away from my original plan that I will have to scrap it all. Already the story has to be reigned in. Hence, my need for a solid outline.

I’m running into two major problems: Being self-taught, I really don’t know how to plot, and being a full-time parent is my current occupation; it lends few opportunities for chunks of hours that I need. Changing the way I work, almost changing my whole personality, is proving to be my major roadblock. Writer’s block I don’t have, discipline-block I do. I must write in 5-minute snippets, have a palm pilot or paper handy for those small strikes of inspiration, keep the characters and their lives in my head at all times, etc. etc. A published novel and a writing career is my dream, and all of this is the tough personal work dreams require. It’s like running a marathon alone, without having trained and without even a single cheering fan. I ask myself if it is worth it everyday. There might not even be a finish line for me; publication isn’t guaranteed. But I’ll forge on. This isn’t a dream that I’m willing to give up.

  "You cannot dream yourself into a character; you must hammer and forge yourself one."

James A. Froude (1818 - 1894)

 

Since attending podcamp philly, I’ve come upon a bunch of cool new sites lately, like BlipTV, Viddler, Upcoming and Twitter. One in particular is quite fun: StumbleUpon. Stick in the types of websites you’d like to surf to, download a toolbar and click. “Writing” is a category, “Poetry” is a category. How cool is that? I wrote this poem at isnoop after “stumbling” upon it. I call the poem “Weaving.”

It reads:

as the first build

changes

your world,

grow one country on the net:

write words

ripe and needy and

stand with every

sentence

in life two.o

(my little nod to the phenomenon we all call Web 2.0)

As most of you know, fridge poetry must be constructed out of a very finite amount of pre-set words. Instead of restraining creativity, this actually brings out extraordinary inventiveness, sometimes producing great poems. There have been entire books published in the regular mass market with amateur poets’ submitted fridge work.

I’m not saying my poem is publish worthy, but making it was fun! StumbleUpon’s “directed” surfing can bring you towards your creative center, be it fridge poetry or free code. Don’t waste time, spend it!

-PC

Science Fiction and Romance genres should never, ever meet

Cafe de Nihara: Why Science Fiction and Romance don’t go together…