Lilith Saintcrow's Blog, page 180
February 21, 2012
Nice To Be Back
After a four-day weekend, sending the kids back to school means I miss them all over again, plus the house is too quiet. Except for the cat demanding to be held–and I realized, while holding her this morning, that I was swaying back and forth, patting her absently as she was hitched up on my shoulder, just like I would soothe and dandle a baby. (And I wonder why my animals are all so weird.) Miss B, after a few days of not running, was pretty much ready to explode out the gate when I took her on a nice easy three-miler yesterday, and today she had mad thoughts of chasing squirrels, and seagulls, and cars, and basically anything that twitched. Including long grass and windblown branches.
Fun times.
Plus, I dropped my gum when I went to throw it away, and every animal in the house dove for it. I don't know what the hell they'd do with it, but they were Determined. Plus, they wanted my sweaty socks and my workout brassiere. I just don't even know.
So here I am staring at the new Bannon & Clare book. My wordcount goal for today is 2K–not a lot, but enough to prime the pump and get me back into things. There's a lot of interesting stuff coming down the pike, but nothing I can officially announce yet. (It just kills me to have to sit on some of it, but I am threatened with Dire Consequences if I open my big pie-hole.) I feel incredibly lazy because my wordcount dropped to around 200 a day, most of that tightening and toning other things; before the weekend it was revisions on the first book in the new YA series and some poking and prodding on the zombie-killing cowboy story. Which is, incidentally, in Bannon & Clare's universe.
Perhaps I have said too much. *evil grin*
I have part of a new SquirrelTerror entry drafted…but it mentions Sweet Tuxedo and Cranky Duck Cat, and I can't look at it without feeling the sick thump of grief all over again. So that's going to have to wait. I am sure I will have other Tales of the Backyard, especially in a few months. Big changes afoot here at Casa Saintcrow!
The rain is invisibly fingering the roof, the animals have settled in their respective favourite sleeping spots, and I am about to go use my brand-new Machine Of GREAT CAFFEINATION. I swear, the thing is just like a best friend–warms up quickly, always willing to lend an ear, and dispenses sweet sweet go-juice. I could sing its praises all day, but I'd also have to talk about its belching, and a certain dog's fear of its noise, and the howling song that has become traditional when the coffee grinder starts up. That story has got to wait, because I'm still giggling every time I think of it, and I need to concentrate to be able to tell it properly.
So, yeah. First day back at work. Quiet house. Lots of work-avoidance going on. Lots of starting up from my chair thinking it's too quiet, what are they into now? Lots of wandering around the house looking at things that need cleaning, sighing, and dropping back into my chair and staring at a blank page that needs word-monkey juice spread on it.
It's nice to be back.
Posted from A Fire of Reason. You can also comment there.
February 16, 2012
Sit And Stare, Productively
I'm a winter writer. Endless gray, rainy days suit me very well. I like to sit and stare out the window, watching the sky weep, my brain tuned to that expectant humming that the next sentence will bring itself out of.
Maybe this is why I have, whenever I could in my adult life, built time into each day for dreaming, and insisted that the Prince and Princess have unstructured time each day. I'm of the opinion that it's those moments of blankness that helps young (and older) brains catch up with themselves, and is also a necessary component of the creative process–the "creative pause."
When you're rushing to a solution, your mind will jump to the easiest and most familiar path. But when you allow yourself to just look out the window for 10 minutes – and ponder – your brain will start working in a more creative way. It will grasp ideas from unexpected places. It's this very sort of unconscious creativity that leads to great thinking. When you're driving or showering, you're letting your mind wander because you don't have to focus on anything in particular. If you do carve out some time for unobstructed thinking, be sure to free yourself from any specific intent. (Scott Belsky)
Part of why I prize that humming in my head so highly is because I've lived with people who have an absolute instinct for knowing when one's brain is approaching that cycle, and for some reason they want to disrupt it in any way possible. (WHY they do this is a whole 'nother ball of blog post wax. Let's carry on.) Of course, it could be that I am picky and hard to live with. (Who isn't?) But I've since become grateful for that harsh everyday annoyance. It was invaluable training in getting the creative pause in anyhow, triggering the blank expectant humming at a moment's notice, slipping myself into that interstitial space within an eyeblink. It takes practice, but it can be done–and often, I surface knowing What Comes Next in a story.
My point (you knew I had one, right?) is that your faculties might do their best work with a little bit of white noise. Not too much–then you just drool all over your keyboard, and this, while not incredibly expensive if one buys cheap keyboards, is still annoying and embarrassing. But finding a way to fit even five minutes of just sitting and thinking, or sitting and staring (not at the television, Christ, throw that thing out the window or at least only use it for films) into your day can reap you rewards all out of proportion, especially when it comes to any creative endeavor. And getting into the habit of protecting that time will help you develop the skills necessary to protect your writing time, tooth and nail, against all comers. Which is exponentially more important…
…but that's another blog post.
Over and out.
Related posts:
The Myth Of The Destructive Artist
It's Been A Good Ride So Far
Home. Blank stare. Home.
Sit And Stare, Productively
I'm a winter writer. Endless gray, rainy days suit me very well. I like to sit and stare out the window, watching the sky weep, my brain tuned to that expectant humming that the next sentence will bring itself out of.
Maybe this is why I have, whenever I could in my adult life, built time into each day for dreaming, and insisted that the Prince and Princess have unstructured time each day. I'm of the opinion that it's those moments of blankness that helps young (and older) brains catch up with themselves, and is also a necessary component of the creative process–the "creative pause."
When you're rushing to a solution, your mind will jump to the easiest and most familiar path. But when you allow yourself to just look out the window for 10 minutes – and ponder – your brain will start working in a more creative way. It will grasp ideas from unexpected places. It's this very sort of unconscious creativity that leads to great thinking. When you're driving or showering, you're letting your mind wander because you don't have to focus on anything in particular. If you do carve out some time for unobstructed thinking, be sure to free yourself from any specific intent. (Scott Belsky)
Part of why I prize that humming in my head so highly is because I've lived with people who have an absolute instinct for knowing when one's brain is approaching that cycle, and for some reason they want to disrupt it in any way possible. (WHY they do this is a whole 'nother ball of blog post wax. Let's carry on.) Of course, it could be that I am picky and hard to live with. (Who isn't?) But I've since become grateful for that harsh everyday annoyance. It was invaluable training in getting the creative pause in anyhow, triggering the blank expectant humming at a moment's notice, slipping myself into that interstitial space within an eyeblink. It takes practice, but it can be done–and often, I surface knowing What Comes Next in a story.
My point (you knew I had one, right?) is that your faculties might do their best work with a little bit of white noise. Not too much–then you just drool all over your keyboard, and this, while not incredibly expensive if one buys cheap keyboards, is still annoying and embarrassing. But finding a way to fit even five minutes of just sitting and thinking, or sitting and staring (not at the television, Christ, throw that thing out the window or at least only use it for films) into your day can reap you rewards all out of proportion, especially when it comes to any creative endeavor. And getting into the habit of protecting that time will help you develop the skills necessary to protect your writing time, tooth and nail, against all comers. Which is exponentially more important…
…but that's another blog post.
Over and out.
Posted from A Fire of Reason. You can also comment there.
February 15, 2012
Subconscious Gas Bubbles
So, I'm developing a girlcrush on Sarah Rees Brennan, for her Gothic Tuesdays. This week's winner was Collie Wilkins's Woman in White. (Project Gutenburg can hook you up too.)
LAURA: I'm going to tell Sir Percy Cruelpants that I will marry him, but I love another, so he won't want to marry me.
MARIAN: Well, he will if he doesn't give a crap about your feelings, though?
LAURA: Nonsense, I'm sure this will work out awesome. Sir Percy Blackheart, I love someone else and I don't wanna marry you. Still want to marry me?
SIR PERCY RIDICULOUSLY EVIL: Still rich?
LAURA: Yes.
SIR PERCY THE PERFIDIOUS: Then yes.
LAURA: … That did not go the way it did in my head. (Sarah Rees Brennan)
The whole thing is pure gold. You should also look at her Jane Eyre one.
Also, here's a free documentary on Haruki Murakami. I enjoy Murakami's work–frex, I read his latest, 1Q84, in a few long gulps. (No, LONG gulps. Nearly a thousand pages, OMG.) Seriously, you don't read Murakami for linear coherence just like you don't watch a David Lynch film for it. They're both harvesters of subconscious gas-bubbles. (Also, really fricking weird, and not too good with the portrayal of teenage girls, meh.)
And the Heart Attack Grill .
In other news, the first book of the new YA series is back with the editor for another revision pass. And the second Bannon & Clare book, The Red Plague Affair, is heating up inside my skull. Rest is overrated, don't you think? Plus there's martial arts for the kids, a four-year-old I'm watching for a few days, and a dog who thinks the Roomba is a demonspawn predator I need protecting from.
So…off I go. Be careful out there, Gothic Lady Sleuths!
Related posts:
While I'm Away…
David Eddings Is Gone
As Anna Beguine
Subconscious Gas Bubbles
So, I'm developing a girlcrush on Sarah Rees Brennan, for her Gothic Tuesdays. This week's winner was Collie Wilkins's Woman in White. (Project Gutenburg can hook you up too.)
LAURA: I'm going to tell Sir Percy Cruelpants that I will marry him, but I love another, so he won't want to marry me.
MARIAN: Well, he will if he doesn't give a crap about your feelings, though?
LAURA: Nonsense, I'm sure this will work out awesome. Sir Percy Blackheart, I love someone else and I don't wanna marry you. Still want to marry me?
SIR PERCY RIDICULOUSLY EVIL: Still rich?
LAURA: Yes.
SIR PERCY THE PERFIDIOUS: Then yes.
LAURA: … That did not go the way it did in my head. (Sarah Rees Brennan)
The whole thing is pure gold. You should also look at her Jane Eyre one.
Also, here's a free documentary on Haruki Murakami. I enjoy Murakami's work–frex, I read his latest, 1Q84, in a few long gulps. (No, LONG gulps. Nearly a thousand pages, OMG.) Seriously, you don't read Murakami for linear coherence just like you don't watch a David Lynch film for it. They're both harvesters of subconscious gas-bubbles. (Also, really fricking weird, and not too good with the portrayal of teenage girls, meh.)
And the Heart Attack Grill .
In other news, the first book of the new YA series is back with the editor for another revision pass. And the second Bannon & Clare book, The Red Plague Affair, is heating up inside my skull. Rest is overrated, don't you think? Plus there's martial arts for the kids, a four-year-old I'm watching for a few days, and a dog who thinks the Roomba is a demonspawn predator I need protecting from.
So…off I go. Be careful out there, Gothic Lady Sleuths!
Posted from A Fire of Reason. You can also comment there.
February 14, 2012
One, Two, A Million
So…yeah.
We were so mad when the Komen Foundation pulled its funding for breast cancer screenings at Planned Parenthood. "This is not fair," we shouted. "This is not fair to women, and this is not fair to the women who don't have a voice, and we will not allow it." We shouted it so loudly that Komen reversed its decision in three days. We forced the resignation of one of their top executives.
Planned Parenthood, no doubt, has a well-funded and fine-tuned PR machine, adept at galvanizing a population against a perceived injustice. They outmaneuvered Komen easily.
Does domestic violence have a less sophisticated PR machine than Chris Brown does? (Hello Giggles)
Why am I still on this? Maybe because I read the police report detailing what he did.
Oh, and speaking of Komen?
"I had just, just, signed up to walk again, and I thought, 'I'm never going to get support,' " she says. Fagerquist is focusing on donors who know about her personal battle with the disease. She says her feelings for Komen haven't changed.
"This isn't about politics for me. It's about finding a cure for something that's affecting 1 in 8 women, including myself," Fagerquist says. "And I have three daughters to worry about." (NPR)
It's not about politics? Fine. Tell Komen to not make it about politics. Until then, my money and goodwill is going to charities that actually spend their money on research, instead of pinkwash and stroking woman-hating conservatives' egos.
Some days, the fact that having ovaries puts you at risk to have the shit beaten out of you not only physically but also with self-righteous woman-hating right-wing money can get one down.
Related posts:
Oh, Louisa May. You go, girl.
One Cranky Pussycat
Mrph. Glrrg. Blrgh.
February 8, 2012
Crazy Monkeybrain Crack Dust, AKA, Writer's Ideas
Crossposted to the Deadline Dames, where there are new releases, contests, and all sorts of other fun and no-bullshit writing advice. Check us out!
Well, hello. It's Wednesday again. First, two announcements!
Yes, this is espresso and Bailey's in a mug that says "I am going to hex your face off." After I Tweeted that picture, I was snowed-under with queries about where to buy said mug. I got mine in 2006 from a CafePress shop (the shop's owner was "lalejandra2″) that has now gone under. At least, I can't find it. Which led to me putting a version of the mug up in my own shop, with no markup. (Because I feel incredibly uncomfortable with the idea of a profit, however tiny, from it.) It goes without saying that if I find the original seller, I'll change the links and direct everyone there. But I've dug and dug, and can't find her.
Announcement #2 is kind of vague. Remember that zombie-hunting cowboy trunk novel I was working on? The one I was just delighted with, and was sure would never sell? Well…paint me lilac and call me Conrad, it sold. I can't give any details, but I can say that I'm sort of…bowled over.
Now that's taken care of, let's talk about ideas. (WARNING: I am foulmouthed today. Read at your own risk.)
Chuck Wendig, in one of his absolutely hilarious and spot-on writing advice posts (if you're not reading Terrible Minds and Practical Meerkat, you're doing yourself a disservice) made a very interesting observation:
Ask a writer: "Where do you get your ideas from?" And the writer will reply: "How do you make yours stop?" Then he'll bat at his hair as if it's on fire. I can't walk ten feet without thinking of a new novel or script idea.(Chuck Wendig)
I am going to take a slight detour here. (It happens at least once a blog post, doesn't it.) It is ironic that I am starting out recommending collections of writing advice, since I tend to want to throw "writing advice" books across the room hard enough to dent the wall. (Kind of like how I feel about groups and workshops.) I read quite a few, back in my tender youth, and what stopped me was a cresting nausea. I won't point fingers, but I can clearly remember reading a Certain Book On Writing and getting to the umpteenth time the Precious Author bemoaned how haaaard it is to write, and I just…snapped. I put the book down, gingerly, as if it was full of something noisome I didn't want slopping out over the sides, and stared at it for a few moments. I was on lunch, and the food court around me was a blur of bright colors, customers (who were, since I was wearing my Retail Face, all Potential Enemies) and a flood of fried and processed pseudo-food smells. I stared at the book on the table next to the wilted salad I'd been forcing down.
And I thought, fuck that shit. I'd been mistaking the ersatz "work" of reading the damn books for effort spent refining my craft, but all I was getting was a big handful of "you must DIG and DIG to find inspiration" and "you must be PRESHUS! Like a DIAMOND SNOFLAKE!" and "if you need silence to create, then find a quiet spot," along with other "advice" that was, in the immortal parlance of my grandfather, useless as tits on a boar hog.
Now that I am older, I can pinpoint the source of my discomfort and anger. Those books saw writing as the problem; it was something that had to be unlocked and solved in order to massage the author's frail ego. To me, writing is the goddamn solution, and the few books I recommend for starting-out writers are firmly in the "this is the solution, and this is how it can work for you" camp.
ANYWAY. Detour (mostly) over.
Plenty of those PSRBs (Preshus Snoflake Riting Buks, I'm a little bitter, okay?) treat ideas as if they are Magical Fairy Dust sprinkled only over the Deserving and Self-Sacrificing once they have Performed the Magic Ritual and Danced the Magic Dance and Shook the Magic Handshake. Which is, to put it plainly, bullshit.
Ideas are a dime a dozen. The brain is built to come up with millions of them, jumping around like a monkey on crack. (Handy meditation tip: don't try to stop the monkey mind. Give it a coliseum of cheering voices while it does its acrobatics, and move the rest of yourself out to the parking lot, where it's a little quieter. You're welcome.) Not only that, but a writer should be in the habit of looking and wondering.
Often, when a new or young writer says, "I don't have any ideas," my reply is, "No, ideas aren't your problem. Your problem is twofold: first, you need to observe, and second, you have got to start taking your own imagination seriously."
Taking your imagination seriously partly means giving yourself permission to ask ridiculous questions. (It also means taking your writing time seriously enough to protect it, but let's not get distracted.) I know perfectly well that while riding along in a car and looking out the passenger window, thinking what if that guy was a secret agent coming home from work, where he's just killed someone with a frozen string bean through the eye-hole? is ridiculous. Totally, completely, insanely ridiculous.
But it's an idea. And when you start entertaining those Ridiculous Ideas, your speed in sorting and judging them increases fractionally each time. Observing is a skill, and sifting through your what-ifs and wherefores and I-wonder-whys (in other words, your ideas) is a skill too. After a while, the sorting becomes automatic, and when a Really Good What-If comes along (what if the Devil wanted to hire someone? what if there was this alternate Slovakia where Communism happened alongside a type of magic? what if there was this girl and the Goblin King took her baby brother? what if Billy the Kid had been a vampire? what if a prince suspected his uncle killed his father? what if fairies were real and their king and queen had a nasty fight? what if, what if, what if…) you can pounce on it like a bulldog on a piece of bacon.
You don't have to wait for the Idea Fairy to shower you with crazycrackdust. The empty space between atoms is jam-packed with frickin' ideas. What a writer must polish is observing and entertaining, so those ideas aren't just muttering to themselves in a back alley, covered in vomit and coffee grounds. You bring them in, clean them up a bit, and see if there's anything worth salvaging in them. The loonies and psychos and bores you throw out–unless they're really Juicy Good Material. How do you know if an idea is Good Enough? Simple: you don't, but with practice you get better at weeding out the only moderately juicy ones, not to mention the dry chafing ones. (I hate chafing.)
Ideas are not the problem, just as writing is not the problem. Writing is the solution, and ideas are merely a matter of opening your eyes and sharpening a few reasonable skills, harnessing your monkeybrain's innate jumping-around to a wagon and making that crazy asshole pull for all s/he's worth. It's a lot easier to ride the cart if s/he's providing some of the momentum.
Then comes the uphill part–actually writing the damn story. But that's (say it with me) another blog post.
Over and out.
Related posts:
Genre Reading While Genre Writing
The Synchronous Mailbag
Just A Few Things
Crazy Monkeybrain Crack Dust, AKA, Writer's Ideas
Crossposted to the Deadline Dames, where there are new releases, contests, and all sorts of other fun and no-bullshit writing advice. Check us out!
Well, hello. It's Wednesday again. First, two announcements!
Yes, this is espresso and Bailey's in a mug that says "I am going to hex your face off." After I Tweeted that picture, I was snowed-under with queries about where to buy said mug. I got mine in 2006 from a CafePress shop (the shop's owner was "lalejandra2″) that has now gone under. At least, I can't find it. Which led to me putting a version of the mug up in my own shop, with no markup. (Because I feel incredibly uncomfortable with the idea of a profit, however tiny, from it.) It goes without saying that if I find the original seller, I'll change the links and direct everyone there. But I've dug and dug, and can't find her.
Announcement #2 is kind of vague. Remember that zombie-hunting cowboy trunk novel I was working on? The one I was just delighted with, and was sure would never sell? Well…paint me lilac and call me Conrad, it sold. I can't give any details, but I can say that I'm sort of…bowled over.
Now that's taken care of, let's talk about ideas. (WARNING: I am foulmouthed today. Read at your own risk.)
Posted from A Fire of Reason. You can also comment there.
February 7, 2012
The Chili-Loving Mummy Of The Met
You guys. Let me tell you what my brain is like.
I dreamed I was an intern in a museum. In my dream it was called "the Metropolitan" but I am very sure, having visited the Met once, that it was nothing like this shambling pile of secret passages and crammed-together dusty antiques. (Well, at least, not the parts I visited.) Anyway, that wasn't the important thing. The important thing was the chili.
You see, there was a mummy-zombie thing roaming the back halls. The top front third of his head was gone and his teeth were stumps; there was just a hole and the hindbrain left, plus the ruined caverns of his sinuses. Which probably explained why he was shambling around with his hand-things in front of him, spindly fingers waving. He could smell the chili, but he couldn't find it.
You see, it was the interns' (I was one of a crew of six) job to find the mummy and feed him the chili so he would stop roaming, so he would settle down and wouldn't upset the patrons with his fleshless self. The trouble was, we were new interns, and nobody had bothered to tell us. So we had to figure it out, which we did, but somehow the security guys were new too and hadn't gotten the memo. So we had to save the poor mummy from the rent-a-cops in order to feed him his chili so he would quiet down. The problem was, we had to catch him first.
So I woke up, with a cat snoring in my ear and a dog snoring near my feet, and I thought it was the mummy. There was this moist breathing on my ear, and all I could think was, where's the damn chili? Followed by, dammit, I can't make this a book, there's not enough tension structurally to build it. Maybe a short?
So, yeah. Here. Go read Chuck Wendig on why writers are bugfuck nuts. I'll, um, just be locked up in my house. Alone.
Looking for the chili to feed to the museum mummy.
Yeah.
Related posts:
Discipline, Serenity, And Chili
Three Things You Didn't Know About Me
Home, Again
The Chili-Loving Mummy Of The Met
You guys. Let me tell you what my brain is like.
I dreamed I was an intern in a museum. In my dream it was called "the Metropolitan" but I am very sure, having visited the Met once, that it was nothing like this shambling pile of secret passages and crammed-together dusty antiques. (Well, at least, not the parts I visited.) Anyway, that wasn't the important thing. The important thing was the chili.
You see, there was a mummy-zombie thing roaming the back halls. The top front third of his head was gone and his teeth were stumps; there was just a hole and the hindbrain left, plus the ruined caverns of his sinuses. Which probably explained why he was shambling around with his hand-things in front of him, spindly fingers waving. He could smell the chili, but he couldn't find it.
You see, it was the interns' (I was one of a crew of six) job to find the mummy and feed him the chili so he would stop roaming, so he would settle down and wouldn't upset the patrons with his fleshless self. The trouble was, we were new interns, and nobody had bothered to tell us. So we had to figure it out, which we did, but somehow the security guys were new too and hadn't gotten the memo. So we had to save the poor mummy from the rent-a-cops in order to feed him his chili so he would quiet down. The problem was, we had to catch him first.
So I woke up, with a cat snoring in my ear and a dog snoring near my feet, and I thought it was the mummy. There was this moist breathing on my ear, and all I could think was, where's the damn chili? Followed by, dammit, I can't make this a book, there's not enough tension structurally to build it. Maybe a short?
So, yeah. Here. Go read Chuck Wendig on why writers are bugfuck nuts. I'll, um, just be locked up in my house. Alone.
Looking for the chili to feed to the museum mummy.
Yeah.
Posted from A Fire of Reason. You can also comment there.
