E.E. Montgomery's Blog, page 7

The next story

I started writing a new story a few weeks ago. In fact, I started two.

http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/
store/index.php?cPath=55_518One of them is the sequel to Just in Time that came out at the beginning of February. In it we'll see how Mark and Liam make a new life together but it's really Jonathan's story. So I started it.

And then I stopped.

I stopped because Jonathan has been physically and emotionally abused by his partner for ten years. He's out now - just. He left hospital and decided he wasn't going back to the house he'd called home for ten years except to pack up his things and leave. He's going to build a new life for himself and build a sense of himself because he doesn't have one anymore. It was destroyed along with his confidence. He doesn't know who he is anymore and doesn't know what he wants in his life. The only thing he knows for sure is what he doesn't want - to be treated like he's been treated for so long. He has no idea how he's going to work it all out. Right now he doesn't feel anything. He's numb and just going on with things because that's all he knows to do.

So far, so good, except when I try to put it all on paper, Jonathan feels plastic. He's suppressing his emotions, which is normal, but nothing is coming through for the reader. When I read it, I know it's there. I know what he's doing and why, because I've done similar things myself. I just have to work out how to make the emotion still come through, even though Jonathan is suppressing it so much he's not even feeling it himself right now. He's living in an emotional bubble at the moment. All he has is automatic physical reactions to people coming close to him.

I'll let it sit for a while and then go back to it.

I started another story to give my mind a break. It's a mystery and opens with a dead body that's been there long enough it's not recognisable. I've drawn a pretty convincing picture of the investigating detective and his on-again/off-again boyfriend although we don't meet him. Then I got to the stage where it was discovered there was a link between the detective and the body and I froze. My mind was inundated with possibilities. Who was the dead person? Who killed him? What role do the other two characters introduced play in either the murder or the detective's life? My favourite scenario gives me a villain I think is cliched.

I've written character profiles to help me clarify things but I need to go deeper. I'm going to need to plot this one before I write it. I always shy away from indepth plotting for a story. Every time, without exception, that I've plotted a complete story, I never finish it. Once I know how it's going to end, I lose interest. Why continue writing if I already know exactly what's going to happen. Having an idea of where the story is headed and basically what's going to happen at the end is fine, as long as I don't know that right from the beginning, but indepth plotting is always the death of a story for me.

I'll let it sit for a while and then go back to it.


Source: http://oxsite.com/blog/2012/05/24/
aliens-the-truth-is-out-there/spaceship/ So that's two stories put aside. What do I work on now? I can't do nothing and it seems ridiculous to begin yet another one without finishing those two. I decided to pick up a SF I'd written a couple of years ago but got stuck right at the end because things didn't come together the way they needed to in order for the story to feel finished. I've read through it and still love the story so it's worth working on. I've changed things twice so far this year. I'm on the third run and have suddenly worked out what the problem at the end was. The dynamics between the three main characters is all wrong. I originally had it ending with a threesome but Starr is too damaged for that to work for him. Then I changed it so he ended up with Lonnar but, with his background, he's going to be very wary of men. This week I worked it out. Regardless of the fact that Starr prostituted himself at ten, he's not gay. He doesn't even know what gay and straight mean. His childhood wasn't one that allowed labels beyond 'live' and 'dead'.

So last night I began rewriting the personal scenes with the three of them, changing the roles they each play in the relationship, and it's working a lot better. Starr is totally freaked but he can't work out why because Freema can't hurt him the way he's been hurt all his life. I'm loving it.

So that's what I'm doing this month. I'm editing this SF story with the plan to submit it somewhere before the end of April. That gives me plenty of time because it's basically finished, I just need to rewrite several scenes.

By the time that's done, hopefully I'll be able to go back to one of the others I've begun and finish them.http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/store/index.php?cPath=55_518

I thought I lived in a nice neighbourhood

[image error] Image from:
http://dustbowlseed.com/catalog/index.php?
main_page=product_info&products_id=163
accessed 14/2/13I don't grow tomatoes anymore. Or potatoes. I used to. The front garden was overflowing with tomatoes and potatoes - not too close together because they don't like each other. The tomatoes were those huge ox-heart ones with the rich, syrupy flavour. I'd check them every afternoon to see if they were ripe enough to pick - I love vine-ripened tomatoes. They're much better than the ones you have to ripen on the kitchen bench. The flavour is fuller.

I'd decide that one more day had to pass, and I'd pick them. When I came home from work the next day, they'd be gone. At first I blamed the possums and fruit bats. We have them around here so it's not unreasonable to think they'd be raiding the garden.

Then, early one morning, I happened to look out the window to see my neighbour (not the neighbours from hell, but one next door) leaving my yard. In her hands were cradled four of my tomatoes and a couple of potatoes.

I grow chillies now. She doesn't like spicy food.

Writers' Retreat

This weekend I'll be on a writers' retreat. It's something I do every year with this particular group. We leave on Friday and come back on Sunday afternoon. The weekend is spent writing and socialising and attending workshops we each create.

The workshops are fun. They're always different, even if they are always focused on writing. One of our favourites is a plotting workshop that is designed to give us ideas for new stories. How that particular workshop operates changes each year because different members of the group run it, but the end product is always something new and exciting.

This year we're focusing on a some activities one of our members created after attending a lecture by Simon Higgins. Other workshops will be on Writing in Three Acts, and Conflictin Characters. I'll be doing a short workshop of the Elements of the Short Story, complete with short videos I've created.

There are hours and hours slated for writing time. I always laugh when I look at our program and think about what it would look like to a stranger.

Picture this:
A three bedroom apartment at the beach. Six people sitting in the living room of the apartment for most of the weekend, in front of computers. Every so often one of us will get up and walk out to the balcony and look at the ocean then suggest we should go for a walk later. The other five look up, blink owlishly, and agree. By the time the balcony-wanderer returns to their computer, everyone else is back in their world of make-believe. End of discussion.

Some time after lunch, or more likely before dinner, we'll all go out and walk on the beach for an hour. Some of us will get up early in the morning for another walk. On Saturday night we'll go to a restaurant for dinner. We eat all other meals in the apartment. Conversation happens over meals, but stops abruptly when the computers are turned on again.

It's fantastic.

The neighbours from hell

I have the neighbours from hell. I’m sure they’re not as bad as some other neighbours but for this area, they’re pretty awful. I’m woken every morning to the mother screaming obscenities at her children. Terms like ‘fucking idiot’ and ‘bugger off’ and ‘stupid bastard’ abound, and this is just her entreaties for them to get ready for school.
The children are not nice children. They scream and swear and throw things to get their own way. I wonder where they learned behaviour like that would work?
I also wonder how these children can possibly concentrate when they’re at school. They leave home still on a negative emotional rollercoaster. By the time they’ve calmed down enough to focus on their school work it would be after lunch, by which time they’re hungry again and tired, and wouldn’t be able to concentrate anyway. I know they’d be hungry because one of the things I often hear in the morning is, “I don’t care if you’re hungry. Get out and go to school.”
Then the mother comes out to the front balcony and screams into the phone, “He won’t put his socks on.” I assume she’s talking to the father who left for work an hour ago. There’s more screaming and then, ten minutes later, they all troop out to the car, the mother in the rear, calling out, “Did you put my handbag in the front?” Can’t the woman carry her own handbag?
In the afternoon it all begins again, in reverse. Now the screaming is about doing homework. I’ve never heard her offer to help with homework, or encourage the kids to sit somewhere central so they don’t feel banished. It’s always “Go and do your fucking homework before I slap you.” I’ll bet the homework never actually gets done.
Oddly enough, when the father comes home from work, everything goes quiet. It’s not that he never yells at the kids. I’ve heard him a couple of times, but I think that’s more because one of the older sons has taken to spying into the parents’ bedroom. The father takes the kids out to watch them as they ride their bikes up and down the road. We’re in a cul-de-sac so it’s reasonably safe. He watches them as they play ball too. It’s only when he’s away that the shit hits the fan.
I wonder what it would be like if he was the one getting the kids ready for school. Perhaps the kids would be calmer when they arrived, had eaten enough and be able to concentrate enough to learn something.
I suspect a good education is the only thing going to get them out of the situation they’re in now. Without the critical thinking skills, they won’t even realise there’s an alternative way of living.

I've been gardening

Thyme and parsley Thai basilI used to have an extensive garden. At one time, I had planted seventy-two different herbs. I used those herbs in cooking, but I also made all my own shampoo, soap and lotions. There were always herbs hanging from the ceiling to dry or steeping in oil, alcohol or water. 
Mint. See how large the
leaves are after the rain. Sweet basilThen I moved and my life took a different direction. At a couple of houses, including this one, I attempted to keep a small garden but it usually only lasted a couple of months. I'd get busy, have other demands placed on my time, often to the extent I'd forget to water the garden and everything would die.

So far, this garden is doing well. It's small, and it's not in the best position sun-wise, but there's been regular rain (sometime torrential rain) and the plants are doing really well.



Blue Moon rose. It has a
gorgeous purple flower
and rich, sweet scent.
My favourite rose. Teeny rose I keep forgetting
the name of. Not much
fragrance but a prolific
flowerer.Before the really bad storms we had over the last couple of weeks--storms that flooded a significant part of Queensland and New South Wales--I'd been watering every couple of days. The plants were growing but they didn't look as happy as they do now, with real rain on them.

Now I have fresh herbs for the kitchen again and roses just beginning to bloom.

With the heart-breaking devastation so many in the state are suffering now, it's nice to see there are some good things to come from it.

I'm incredibly lucky and feel very fortunate.
Chilli bush with sweet
potato behind it.

How quickly things change

I recently had the opportunity to listen to interviews of some original pioneers of the Proston area in Queensland. Each of the men described an aspect of their first years in the area and the challenges they faced. I was amazed at their accents. The recording was made in 1963. The men interviewed at the time and the children who interviewed them had all been born in Australia, yet they all spoke with an identifiable English accent, very different to what is heard today. Just the slightest lengthening of the vowels was the only thing that distinguished them from English-born accents. The Australian accent has changed so much in just fifty years.
It was really interesting to hear about all the different kinds of animals that were abundant at that time (1905+). We certainly don't see flocks of wild emu there anymore, not even the wallabies. Others, like the snakes, we do see around, or at least know they're there, but from the interviews, it was clear there were LOTS of them. They mentioned death adders, brown snakes, red bellied black and carriage snakes among others. There were possums, scrub turkeys and wonga pigeons which were very good eating. Koalas were plentiful.

The land was full of bottle trees, crows ash trees, iron bark gums and hoop pine trees. There were scrub orchids and lots of stag horns, indicating a wetter climate than they have now - probably because there were more trees then. Now the land is cleared and you only see trees along creek banks or roads.

It makes me sad how much has changed, and not always for the better.

I spent two days on a farm west of Maryborough. It was so dry you could almost feel the despair growing with every day without rain, but there was space and peace there too: the inevitability of life and calm acceptance of it.

I don't notice how the city is because I've lived here for a while now, but going out to the farm, I do. No sooner did I step out of the car than I had to take great gasping breaths of the silent air. By the second day, I swear my heart was beating slower and the habitual tightness around my eyes and in my throat were gone. My head felt clear of the clutter and white noise it usually lives with. A smile kept creeping onto my face.

Next time I visit, I'll go for longer, take some walks over the hills and sit on the verandah and stare at the horizon.

Publication miseries

Just in Time (release date 6 February), will be my fifth story published by Dreamspinner Press. I should be becoming blase about the entire process. You'd think, anyway. I'm not. If anything, I'm becoming more antsy with every publication.

The pressure is on to perform. I'm trying to keep writing the story that's in me, and not worry about what other people want, because I know that will produce my best work, but I can't do that. I'm in the business of writing - emphasis on the word 'business'. My stories are a comodity, a product, and that product has to appeal in order to sell.

I enjoy writing every story I write and I work on the stories until I can read through the entire thing and finish with a smile on my face because, to me, it feels finished and good. Not everyone will agree with me, and that's fine, but I'm beginning to worry about it before I even finish the damned story and that's slowing me down. I'm second-guessing myself.

I'm hoping all this angst will make me a more careful and better writer, and not shut me down completely. No, it won't stop me writing. It can't. You wouldn't like me when I'm not writing.

Character reprisals

What happens when you've written someone's story, think it's done, and then the character jumps up and says 'hang on, there's more to my story than that'. Of course it's too late. Not only have you finished the story, you've sold it and it's been published. Done and dusted.

I have a tendency to finish my stories as early as I can. I don't enjoy reading chapters and chapters of seemingly unrelated plot-line after the characters have decided they want to be together. I don't need to read through the whole 'getting to know you'-type scenarios just to get to where they're both comfortable with their future together. Once they've decided this is the one they want to work on, I'm happy, so I stop.

Then I write the next story in the series - the next interesting person's life as he meets the man who's going to be the one for him, whether he wants it right this moment or not. Because the characters from previous stories have a connection to the characters in the new story, they are back in my head, and I begin to weave them into the plot. It's as though I have no choice in the matter. They're there, and they want me to see how far they've come, that they're still together and becoming happier every day because, just once, they decided 'this is the one I want and I'm going to keep him'.



Daron and Rebel from Just His Type, went through some tough times, at least until Rebel moved on and Daron pulled his head out of his arse. Then, in Just Like a Date, Rebel met Jeremy and Daron met Peter and, suddenly, they knew what they'd been looking for all along was possible. They just had to find the right person to do it with.

When I began Just in Time, it made sense for me to open it with Daron, and Jeremy in the background. Jeremy is Mark's ex so he was a good starting point to show how Mark is moving toward the next stage of his life journey. Mark's previous, lukewarm relationship with Jeremy also provides a terrific contrast to his reaction to Dr Liam Watson.

There's also a lot of angst in this story, so Peter and Daron's relationship and the way they interact provides some light relief. Of course, Rebel is, as ever, the voice of reason.

Writing difficult topics

Just in Time, due for release 6 February 2013, wasn't an easy story for me to write. It didn't start out that way. To begin with, I was just having fun and challenging myself to think of something different in Mark's past that he had to deal with. I came up with the theft of his designs and that worked really well.

By the end of the story, though, Mark's history had become deeper and richer in my mind, as had the histories of the other characters, and suddenly I was writing about something darker and farther-reaching than theft. I was writing about long-term domestic abuse.

I know people who profess compassion for those living in abusive situations but who always, at the end of a conversation, say "Why don't they just leave?".

If it was that simple, no one would be living in an abusive situation. Everyone would get out of it the first time someone hit them. Unfortunately, quite often it's a sad fact that by the time the physical violence begins, the emotional and mental abuse is so entrenched, the victims don't even realise it's not their fault and they certainly can't see a way out of it. Often it's the emotional abuse that causes most of the long-term damage. I have some small experience with this - I know exactly how difficult it is to get out, stay out, and then build something different. I know how long that process can take and how bad it sometimes has to get before all other choices are removed.

In Just in Time, Mark has been there, and Jonathan is living it. Liam is trying to help but can only do so much. In the end they're all almost too late.

New artwork, and new release on the horizon

Just in Time is due for release Jan/Feb 2013 and I've just received the new artwork for it. Isn't the cover striking?

Just in Time is the third story in the Just Life series. The other two stories: Just His Type and Just Like a Date were released in April and July, 2012, respectively.

I have to say I like Just in Time better than the previous two. I enjoyed writing both those stories and think they both do the job I was aiming for, but they are both very specific vignettes, showing only a segment of the lives of the characters. Just in Time is a little longer so we have time to get to know the main characters a little better. We also see Daron, Peter, Rebel and Jeremy from the other two stories, and I always love revisiting old friends to find out what has been happening in their lives.

Just in Time is Mark's story. Remember Mark? Jeremy's ex? He's actually a nice guy - we just didn't know any of his story in Just Like a Date. He's been treated badly but has come through it and thinks he's over it after so long. He's wrong but doesn't realise it until his past comes back and bites him. Tall, dark and brooding Dr Liam Watson is the one who brings the past back to Mark and he's the one who has to help him deal with it.