The Writing Process Blog Tour - TAG, I’m It!
If you’ve been paying even a tiny amount of attention to what’s going on in the authors’ blog world, you know that there’s a #mywritingprocess blog hop/ tour happening. If you’re not familiar with what this is, I’ll explain it: A blog hop/ blog tour is a cooperative marketing campaign (I’ll be posting a bit about marketing in the near future if you’re interested in how it all works and how you can help your favorite authors out), which (in this case) in a nutshell is a pass it around sort of themed blog pot luck, where a theme (in this case, the writing process) is chosen, a blogger or group of bloggers will write their post and then tag a couple more bloggers who participate by keeping the ball rolling and the whole thing has a domino effect where the interwebs get soaked with posts for the tour. For the writers, the purpose of a blog hop or blog tour is to generate buzz regarding their work and this happens in a couple ways- first by the blog itself, and also by the previous blogger who tagged their blog and passed the baton (and by the subsequent bloggers who tag them back, etc)- it’s a form of audience sharing which increases exposure for all of the bloggers. What you get out of it is cool insight into the writers’ process and their projects, and possibly even introduced to new (or new to you) writers whose work you would probably enjoy. A win for all, really.
SO! I was tagged by Diane Marina, author of ‘Landslide’, ‘Imperial Hotel’, and the upcoming release, ‘How Still My Love.’
1. What am I working on? Actually, I’m working on a few different things, and I’ll make those announcements as is appropriate. In regards to my upcoming novel (wt= Blindsided), admittedly, that’s been stalled out by other projects, other areas of my life took precedent, etc and that’s been on the back burner for a while. It has been stewing and brewing the whole time, but very little forward momentum has been made on that. You can read more on what that is here.
2. How does my work differ from others in the same genre? The easy answer to this is that my work differs from others’ work in the same genre (I’m going to say Lesfic, which is pretty broad-spectrum) in that it is written by me, with my unique perspective and style infused. My tastes influence my work, in that I have an eclectic palate, and that will eventually show up in my body of work (hard to demonstrate with only one novel and a small collection of poetry out there so far). Hopefully this is how I bring something fresh to the reader- it’s not necessarily WHAT happens in a book so much as HOW it happens. One could easily boil every book out there to the basic elements and they’d all be pretty much the same- it’s the HOW things happen over the course of the story that sets them apart from each other and we’ve all got a unique slant on that. I find that, at least in the writing of the how, the WHY is a paramount factor; without why, what and how don’t always make sense. The why adds a necessary dimension and adds depth- even if it’s not immediately apparent to the reader (why usually requires some thinking).I try to tell the entire story- all the gory details, without a lot of sugar coating- or at least, the parts that are important for moving the thing forward while giving an accurate picture; I want my work to reflect the grit and the rawness of real life, the way a painter might create images in photo-realistic (hyper-realism) ways, to show something beautiful and real in a way that leaves the onlooker stunned and thinking, and questioning whether it’s a painting at all and not a photograph. That’s a skill I’m still honing. Changing Shape was a work entirely of fiction; it was inspired by things in my periphery, but fiction, nonetheless- I think I got it right with it, and if the feedback I’ve gotten is any indication, the readers (for the most part) agree. My biggest hope now is that I can meet or exceed that with the upcoming one!
3. Why do I write what I do? Simply, I write what I write because it’s what I would want to read. Yes, I sell my work. Yes, I want people to buy it. But in the end, if I wouldn’t read it or give it a good review, I don’t want to write it and I don’t want my name on it. Also, books are one of the ways that people learn things- by living vicariously through the characters and their stories, so for me, I want to write things that maybe give people some insight and perspective into things without them having to endure them themselves- and ultimately I gain a deeper perspective and insight by mentally walking in those shoes. I don’t know about other writers and how they create characters, but for me, I’m very ‘method.’ I wear the metaphorical skin of the characters I create as I’m writing them and that’s how I’m able to see and relate what they’re feeling, etc.
4. How does my writing process work? LOL- I wish I knew- I’d do more of it that way!! LOL- I’m just kidding. As with pretty much everything about me and my life, I’m a trial and error, figure it out for myself kind of girl. I don’t really look for how other people are doing things to see if that’s the way that would work for me and am generally unaware of most established methodologies in this field, save for a couple brief mentions by a couple authors onFb naming their method and me asking, ‘What’s that?’ LOL I try to be much more organic in what I do when creating…I AM finding that, for me, I have to plan the whole thing out – at least the major elements (all the what, why and who bits) and then fill in the blanks with the how. I was so pumped up on the momentum of Changing Shape that I sprinted headlong into Blindsided without giving it enough thought. That was enough to derail it (for a bit) but then life happened and that’s why it’s been delayed (NOT CANCELLED!). I have some serious problems that need to be solved and some real decisions to make….that part is coming along. The actual writing of it won’t take that long at all probably- if Changing Shape was any clue.
A lot of writers can work with the TV on or music, etc- I require absolute silence and solitude. Or at least a quiet room with a door that locks. And NO DISTRACTIONS! Mostly I distract myself, though. People in my life generally respect my need for space to work; no, my distractions come mostly in the form of all the other things that I should be doing in order to make my life work the way I would like it to. It’s also why I generally have a hard time sleeping (although that’s gotten a lot better lately) and hardly ever take vacations. I blow off steam in my other creative endeavors (the ones that don’t require much thinking).
When I’m writing poetry, it’s a much more spontaneous thing. I think about something, words come and I write them down and play with them… Play with the rhythm, the intent, the layers of meaning, etc and that’s it. Very different from writing anything else.
OK- So now it’s time to pass the torch on this Blog-a-thon and I picked Syd Parker and Kelli Jae Baeli for your enjoyment :)
SO! I was tagged by Diane Marina, author of ‘Landslide’, ‘Imperial Hotel’, and the upcoming release, ‘How Still My Love.’
1. What am I working on? Actually, I’m working on a few different things, and I’ll make those announcements as is appropriate. In regards to my upcoming novel (wt= Blindsided), admittedly, that’s been stalled out by other projects, other areas of my life took precedent, etc and that’s been on the back burner for a while. It has been stewing and brewing the whole time, but very little forward momentum has been made on that. You can read more on what that is here.
2. How does my work differ from others in the same genre? The easy answer to this is that my work differs from others’ work in the same genre (I’m going to say Lesfic, which is pretty broad-spectrum) in that it is written by me, with my unique perspective and style infused. My tastes influence my work, in that I have an eclectic palate, and that will eventually show up in my body of work (hard to demonstrate with only one novel and a small collection of poetry out there so far). Hopefully this is how I bring something fresh to the reader- it’s not necessarily WHAT happens in a book so much as HOW it happens. One could easily boil every book out there to the basic elements and they’d all be pretty much the same- it’s the HOW things happen over the course of the story that sets them apart from each other and we’ve all got a unique slant on that. I find that, at least in the writing of the how, the WHY is a paramount factor; without why, what and how don’t always make sense. The why adds a necessary dimension and adds depth- even if it’s not immediately apparent to the reader (why usually requires some thinking).I try to tell the entire story- all the gory details, without a lot of sugar coating- or at least, the parts that are important for moving the thing forward while giving an accurate picture; I want my work to reflect the grit and the rawness of real life, the way a painter might create images in photo-realistic (hyper-realism) ways, to show something beautiful and real in a way that leaves the onlooker stunned and thinking, and questioning whether it’s a painting at all and not a photograph. That’s a skill I’m still honing. Changing Shape was a work entirely of fiction; it was inspired by things in my periphery, but fiction, nonetheless- I think I got it right with it, and if the feedback I’ve gotten is any indication, the readers (for the most part) agree. My biggest hope now is that I can meet or exceed that with the upcoming one!
3. Why do I write what I do? Simply, I write what I write because it’s what I would want to read. Yes, I sell my work. Yes, I want people to buy it. But in the end, if I wouldn’t read it or give it a good review, I don’t want to write it and I don’t want my name on it. Also, books are one of the ways that people learn things- by living vicariously through the characters and their stories, so for me, I want to write things that maybe give people some insight and perspective into things without them having to endure them themselves- and ultimately I gain a deeper perspective and insight by mentally walking in those shoes. I don’t know about other writers and how they create characters, but for me, I’m very ‘method.’ I wear the metaphorical skin of the characters I create as I’m writing them and that’s how I’m able to see and relate what they’re feeling, etc.
4. How does my writing process work? LOL- I wish I knew- I’d do more of it that way!! LOL- I’m just kidding. As with pretty much everything about me and my life, I’m a trial and error, figure it out for myself kind of girl. I don’t really look for how other people are doing things to see if that’s the way that would work for me and am generally unaware of most established methodologies in this field, save for a couple brief mentions by a couple authors onFb naming their method and me asking, ‘What’s that?’ LOL I try to be much more organic in what I do when creating…I AM finding that, for me, I have to plan the whole thing out – at least the major elements (all the what, why and who bits) and then fill in the blanks with the how. I was so pumped up on the momentum of Changing Shape that I sprinted headlong into Blindsided without giving it enough thought. That was enough to derail it (for a bit) but then life happened and that’s why it’s been delayed (NOT CANCELLED!). I have some serious problems that need to be solved and some real decisions to make….that part is coming along. The actual writing of it won’t take that long at all probably- if Changing Shape was any clue.
A lot of writers can work with the TV on or music, etc- I require absolute silence and solitude. Or at least a quiet room with a door that locks. And NO DISTRACTIONS! Mostly I distract myself, though. People in my life generally respect my need for space to work; no, my distractions come mostly in the form of all the other things that I should be doing in order to make my life work the way I would like it to. It’s also why I generally have a hard time sleeping (although that’s gotten a lot better lately) and hardly ever take vacations. I blow off steam in my other creative endeavors (the ones that don’t require much thinking).
When I’m writing poetry, it’s a much more spontaneous thing. I think about something, words come and I write them down and play with them… Play with the rhythm, the intent, the layers of meaning, etc and that’s it. Very different from writing anything else.
OK- So now it’s time to pass the torch on this Blog-a-thon and I picked Syd Parker and Kelli Jae Baeli for your enjoyment :)
No comments have been added yet.
