A hot iron under your butt

posted this on my blog today


Archive for Writing

The Tal war….
February 25, 2009 at 1:44 am · Filed under Game Design, Writing · Edit

this novel will advance the time line to the year 3505

It is finished, well the first draft is finished. I’d like to speak to you as a writer. Usually it takes months of planning and months of writing to get this done. Rarely a writer is hit with that hot iron. This is a hot iron that allows you to write from dawn to dusk, with no interruption.

I started this as images and scenes started to come fully formed in my dreams and waking moments. I heard Aidan Malthus and the rest of the crew inside my head. They were demanding to come out. These are rare, and as a writer if you suffer from this… go for it.

This said, this is purely crap.

I can hear it now, what the hell do you mean? Well, Hemingway once wrote that all first drafts are crap. And I agree. The main structure is there. It is missing chunks, side stories, side plot points. But the basic structure of the story is there. You could say this was my Nano month. I got a full novel (Well sort off) written in less than two weeks.

Now starts the fun part. Editing. Adding to it, adding description, adding side trips, adding complications, adding scenes… and chiefly making the language far tighter.

Now I will say this about this novel. It is probably a first in the world of gaming fiction. After all, the Future Nexus world is a world at war. This is an antiwar novel, exploring the futility that is war. There is more. People will go home, those that go home. But they will be forever changed like any veteran from combat. War changes people, and chiefly, war is no game.

But as I drove home I realized the themes of the poetry of the Great War entered into his novel, in strong ways. So there you have it. Once I finish and get ready to go to print. what you will have is an antiwar novel… for war is futile…

I have days - even several in a row - when I wake up at 3am with an idea in my head and can write straight through until ten or eleven that night. But I've never had weeks at a time. Color me jealous.

And, I agree, the first draft is always crap. There's a certain kind of freedom in that which lets you put down all your thoughts on paper. Leave tweaking the details and fleshing the story out for the second and third rewrite.

and that time I had a first draft in three weeks... or rather what I like to call a draft zero

I feel tired right now, but I know where it will get tighter, Oh and if curious as Nano says 50K words in 30 days, this is at 42K or so... add a scene here or there, it is there.

it is now over 50K as I started revising. Still have that hot poker there... and doing this well.

Damn adding side trips already and side plots

I'm sorta between projects. I've just finished a novel that's in the hands of non-professional editors as we speak. I should hear from them on Sunday. And I'm trying to work out the details for the next project while I start the marketing of the first. All of which is totally boring, I must say. I much prefer the actual act of writing than all the tertiary muck that comes with it. Doing my taxes is starting to look more appealing all the time.

"Writing is easy. Rewriting is hard."

You find it to be the opposite?

Good for you.

why first drafts are always crappy, as in real crappy

It is in the rewriting that the real work is done to bring this to standards

I may post a partial first draft of a chapter, or draft zero as I like to call them,

And then the same section on the first rewrite... (which is far from finished)

But that way people can see what I mean about fixing and all that

Hell, I already know my dummy dates are just that, dummy dates... not even in the 35tg century can people move that fast, or heal that fast

:-)

"... draft zero."

I do my editing in my head before I write, which is why I can throw down a thousand words in half an hour. Then I go away from it all and think about it. Employing the One Rule Of Writing my agent insists I follow (she got it from another client - Taylor Branch), I take out any word, line, paragraph, scene, chapter with which I have fallen in love.

You know the lines, etc. The ones that give you that "Look at me!!! I'm WRITING!!" feeling. They need to get booted.

I have no idea why this works, but it does. I've tried to fool her - my agent - by leaving in things I really intend to leave out, and she's always landed on them. Every damn time. I don't even try any more.

It works.

Good luck with your rewrite. Have fun.

:toast:

as is it usually takes five rewrites before I can even go, this is descent ...

Unfortunately I do this all (gaming industry) so I am responsible for the whole thing

It's a good one.

but if that sort of lesson helps someone to become a better writer, that's good.

The problem with it is that you have to be supremely confident in your work in order to employ such a device. And that's awfully hard for a lot of people.

Feel free to post it anywhere you want. It's not mine, never was.

Good luck.

You can find the differences in the Twilight series. Though Stephenie Meyer has been pilloried for her writing, there is an example of what her writing looks like when she's ready to present it to someone for a first read; and there is a remarkable difference.

There was actually, a fifth book planned called Midnight Sun which told the story from the Vampire's viewpoint. (The first four were written by the girl's point of view.) Stephenie sent drafts of MidNight Sun to five people, through e-mail. One of those copies were inappropriately published on the net by one of those well-meaning people. She, eventually, gave up on finishing it. But, the draft is posted on her website for her fans. It's unedited, and just keep in mind that she wrote it when the idea was already firmly planted in her head.

http://www.stepheniemeyer.com/midnightsun.html

Going on the side excursions and also now adding more description

I will probably put a couple paragraphs here from the same section, just for fun

My chapters start getting too long as I put in more detail.

Otherwise, I love writing every word.

you know I will probably go ahead and put a few paragraphs here, so people see what we mean... about editing

THis is the third book on what probably will be the last in a trilogy

The title came to me just recently...

The line of the famous poem from WW I

a the sweet lie, to die for one's country

I found where the chapter started moving, about four pages in. Then I flipped those four pages to create a second chapter. Now the book starts will a scene, and Chapter Two will provide the important background information. I'll have to rewrite it so it will flow better.

draft three, and this has taken on interesting twists, that I knew were there, but now they are there.

This is fun, since I have to make sure the time line fits

the main story has survived contact with the red pen... well will survive until the red pen

Next comes the printing of this... after a couple of weeks

What is amazing is that I have been going over this, over and over and over again, and I can find things to change, but fewer and fewer

So I know I am getting ready for that moment when we all have to print this, put it to the side, and wait...

I hate to do that, especially when scenes (some critical scenes) have changed so much

Now a tip to newbies... I have kept every major draft... so if I change my mind I can go back

That said, the working title for this will either be "So Sweet to Die for One's Country,"

Or "Descent into hell..."

Perhaps even Band of Brothers, but that's kind of taken...

So that will be funny. No I didn't even have a damn working title

but I learned a long time ago you need to print the stuff for the finer... ahem details, to show and register

So went over to Office Depot and had them print and bind the damn thing... and then first read it for consistence... just a read through... only marked the so obvious grammar nits that even I went... OUCH

Then went through it with a fine tooth comb

Here is one that we all do.. we fall in love with certain words... for the theme this was shame. I used that word five times in one paragraph... feel free to snooze

So crack open the thesaurus... and that is why you need to print the stuff

As to Office Depot... about the same it would cost to print at home... perhaps a couple bucks more... and having the damn thing bound is nice... very portable, if heavy... two thirds of a ream

Oh and also found some of those correctly spelled misspellings

:-)