Revision practice

Took a fantastic four-day writing workshop from Eric Witchey last month. Nearly a dozen of us listening to him expound on writing at high-speed for six hours a day. My head still feels full.  I'm still processing and trying to work what I learned into my writing and revision practice.

Eric believes strongly in practicing your writing skills daily -- a minimum of 15 minutes a day just for practice, not on any current work in progress. I don't do that daily, but I've been doing it far more often since the workshop, and it really does help train your brain to write better.

While I was creating a template to help with my daily setup for that, it occurred to me my biggest obstacle has been revision.  It's really hard for me to focus on overalls and specific issues -- I tend to slip into making the sentences pretty -- which is just rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic if the entire scene needs to be cut or doesn't make sense as written. So I've added a daily revision practice as well.

I'm still toying with the setup for it. You can't revise something you haven't written, so it requires I pull out a short story I've started. Thanks to the daily writing practice, I have plenty of unfinished shorts.

First I  try to find a core for the story, a reason for telling it. Sometimes that doesn't come until I've done some of the work below.

I look at the characters and jot down what I need to know about them to strengthen the story (which frequently translates into ramping up the conflict), and if their behavior and emotional reactions are  realistic, consistent and flow naturally from the events and thoughts given.

 I look at characters' emotional arcs and see if they're working properly. If the story isn't finished, or is broken as written, I brainstorm different possible reactions given what I know about the characters, or make notes on what I need to know about them in order to do that brainstorming.

I look at the setting and note what it could contain that would add or what it has that detracts from the story's intent, tone or theme.

That's frequently as far as I can get in 15 minutes, so I'll stop there and jot down any ideas about what the process has brought up for me about the story. Genre ideas, perhaps, or page numbers in Eric's workshop book for exercises I could do that might help the story. Then I go do something else.

Later when I have a number of those partial revisions I'll be able to start alternating that process with picking one of them up to do the actual rewriting. That will need its own setup and I haven't ironed that out yet -- it might vary from story to story.

Daily revision practice is something I'm still tinkering with. So far I like it; I get done with it and the daily writing practice and I am pumped to start on my work in progress. It's too early to see if it will actually help me focus when revising larger works, but it should.  I can't expect a capability to just plop into my brain -- every skill requires practice.

Different stories for different folks

Been reading quite a bit surreal and "weird" fiction, mostly of the science fiction variety. Some of it works for me and I enjoy it. Some of it ... leaves me cold and wondering What The Fandango I just read. Literally said that aloud at one point.

It's the emotional experience the story leaves me with, I think. If I'm amused by the turns of phrase or twists of bizarre, or if the emotion evoked is one I understand (even if getting there was by way of flying chocolate water bottle) then I can accept the story. But if the emotion evoked is mixed, there is no familiar ground, the references and allusions pass over my head (assuming they're there) and/or the story seems just ... pointless ... then I balk.  I get irritated because I want to understand and I can't. So I decide that it's not a story, it's not a mystery, it's not a puzzle, it's just a waste of my time.

WTF stories resonate with others or they wouldn't have been published. And that's a good thing.

After all, if we all preferred to wear green, clothing would get pretty boring after awhile.

Gratitude and Geraniums

The value of true gratitude is another lesson I keep relearning. One everyone should revisit from time to time, actually.

Late afternoon Friday I was in my yard attacking weeds, and one of the weeds won. A trip to urgent care and several days of rest, anti-inflammatories and *many* swear words later, I'm walking more-or-less normally. Sitting for any length of time isn't happening, and I dread my next car ride, but it could have been considerably worse. Much worse.

So I am grateful. Grateful I'm learning this lesson yet still ambulatory; grateful I have a calm boyfriend who helped me inside, took me to urgent care and insisted I eat; grateful I have friends who immediately offered assistance; grateful I have cats who curl up with me in bed (the comfort factor there is embarrassingly huge). Grateful the discomfort is tolerable, that I have internet that allows me to connect with friends and distractions, that I can do some of my hobbies while reclined in bed, which is the only place I'm comfortable staying still for long stretches. Grateful there's a position in which I can be comfortable. I know people with back injuries for whom NO position is comfortable. 

Last week I did so many things without even thinking about it -- picking up items off the floor, driving a stick shift, picking up a heavily loaded basket, cleaning the litter boxes, planting fall flowers in pots, vacuuming, even getting up from the toilet (toilet hygiene requires counter-balancing spinal muscle contractions I had not been aware of or considered until they made themselves highly known that first day). 

I thought about all those things this weekend, and most of them I didn't try. Getting off the toilet was the only necessary action, and a learning process about how to get up from a sitting position primarily using my legs, not my back. I'm grateful I can take time to heal. Going to a job in this condition would be both terrifying and miserable. Yet another thing to be grateful for: health insurance for everyone, finally, in the U.S.

Word to the wise: if you ever find yourself fighting geranium roots, dig 'em out. Don't pull. Those things are better attached and stronger than your spine.

Cooking creativity

I've been doing a lot of sewing and cooking, lately, domestic creativity as opposed to writing, although I'm finally getting back to doing that as well. In the kitchen, for the most part I've been following recipes for things I haven't done before: fruit leather, fish stew, and various vegetarian dishes as I've been trying to work through the lovely veggies we're getting in our CSA box.

Last week, though, I tried an experiment; totally off the cuff with flavors and scents that just sounded good.  

I took a thick pork loin, cut it into small cubes and marinated it for about half an hour in a bit of liquid from soaking dried chilies, some chopped fresh mint, and about 1 Tbsp. MILD harissa. 

Now, those who love harissa will scoff at this. Harissa appears to be a paste of reconstituted dried hot peppers mixed with garlic, caraway, cumin and coriander to either distract from or enhance the burn. I can't do the burn, so I mostly used the latter four.

Browned meat and then simmered it in more soaking juice (could substitute a 1/2 cup of red wine or broth) for 20 minutes. Added potatoes, celery, carrots, and corn (and scrapings) from two fresh ears. Minced a clove of garlic, add it and salt, pepper, 1/2 cinnamon stick and some ground cumin -- I probably used 1/2 tsp. 

Added just enough stock to simmer -- less than a cup -- and cooked on low until veggies were tender, about an hour.  Removed cinnamon stick before serving.

Mmmm. Tasty. I can do that again.

SF from 1989

Been working my way through The 1989 Annual World's Best SF, "Presented" by Donald A. Wollheim. In the intro, Isaac Asimov explains that DAW books was created by Mr. Wollheim, those letters being his initials. The things I still need to learn. 

Speaking of which, I'm aiming for learning one thing from each story I've read so far.

(edited)

I've read 

"The Giving Plague" by David Brin

  -- Changing expectations, so that the goalpost we think we're headed for is constantly moving. Interesting use of "you" -- protagonist addresses his adversary, a virus.

"Peaches for Mad Molly" by Steven Gould

   -- minimal setting details, but essential ones, create the tension here. That and the clear assumption of what the protagonist is doing without being told. Nice information feed without handholding.

"Shaman" by John Shirley

   -- Loved the antihero here, fascinated and repulsed by the bizarro world. Nothing made sense, so I'm having trouble pulling a learning bit out of this other than... not all stories have to make sense? No, actually, the use of details that evoked images I already had, dropped into this unfamiliar world made my brain cling to the things I understood or thought I did, and gave me visuals enough to carry me through. That said, I bumped against facetious names (the Fridge for a prison) because even though it made sense for locals to call it that, it jarred with the tone of the story. The prison-on-an-island concept threw me because all I could see was an Arthurian castle.

"Schrödinger's Kitten," by George Alec Effinger, (the reason Aaron loaned me the book in the first place -- I'd done a flash piece that attempted to show a person interacting/reacting to his alternate realities, and Effinger's much longer story is a brilliant exploration of that theme.) 

  -- Rich, textured setting does not have to be intimately tied to the *theme* of the story, although perhaps the Islamic setting and POV here, in 1989, was otherworldly for the average reader.

"The Flies of Memory" by Ian Watson

      - Fascinating use of POV and interesting exploration of memory as reality. We don't actually realize whose POV we're in until near the end of the story, nor do we even meet this person until we're a third or halfway through. Can't imagine anybody letting me get away with that, nor with the leisurely pace. Probably the story that makes clearest the changing expectations in literature in the ensuing 25 years. 

  

"Skin Deep" by Kristine Katheryn/Katherine? Rusch

  -- Good example of a quick-paced, high-stakes story. Isn't a four-paragraph sequence that goes by without heightening stakes or tension shifts of some sort.

"A Madonna of the Machine" by Tanith Lee
 -- Omniscient POV works here. Story reminds me of Ayn Rand, sadly, but Lee manages to write a story about a perfectly grey, bland, emotion-robbed world in which a machine, apparently, triggers a religious experience for its (human) tools. Arc is complete for one character; disruption in "utopia" (or hell, depending on your view) is implied but not carried out.  I wanted more.

"Waiting for the Olympians" by Frederik Pohl
 -- Self-referential alternative history can work. Exploration of alternative history used as a way for the author to make a statement -- The fall of Rome and the rise of Christianity is responsible for a fractured Europe, multiple wars and the end of slavery. The fact that that feels like a statement and not a mere theory of the protagonist results, I think, from the characters' unnecessary mental density. 

"Ain't Nothin' but a Hound Dog" by B.W. Clough
 -- Tacky kitsch as a common binding factor of  humanity strikes me as a novel concept to explore in a sci fi story.  Story is well grounded in reality and the actual sci fi part is limited to one or two essential paragraphs; nicely handled.

Still to be read:

"Adrift among the Ghosts" by Jack Chalker

Ripples in the Dirac Sea by Geoffrey A Landis

With luck I'll get it finished before tonight.

Still have to read and crit Tuesday nights' stories.

Vacation is awesome, even when it involves plumbing, irrigation repair and terrifying four-wheel-drive roads.

Now back to writing.

Ides of May

It's been a month and a half since I posted; "The Man Who Bridged the Mist" seems to have broken me. *lol* That was the hardest of the group to do. I loved that story,  wasn't sure why and didn't think I did it justice teasing it apart.

Perfectionism rears its ugly head? Probably.

I'll get back to the short story dissections soon. In the meantime, here are a few of my lessons from the last 90 days: 

* Classes keep my interest and motivation going. I signed up for Holly Lisle's "How to Write a Series (Expansion)" course because she's planning on taking the group through a six month, loosely-scheduled course in which she's rewriting and re-taping her teaching materials. I figured I couldn't get six months of motivation and accountability-to-self-and-others that cheaply anywhere else. So far (I'm about three weeks in) it's working.

* I am a cyclical being. Phoenix should be my middle name. Crash and burn is normal. So is rising from the ashes. *sigh*

* I need to be certain that I'm 100 percent behind my own goals. i.e., that I'm being honest with myself about them. That sounds like a no-brainer, but last season I had a huge set of goals I was trying to accomplish in three months. I spent two days making detailed plans so all I'd have to do is check steps off as I went... and stopped working on them after a month and a half. Life happened, but I *allowed* that "life" stuff to stop me, and I don't think that would have happened if I was truly committed to the goals I was trying to reach.

* Writing down what I do accomplish is essential, because I don't remember much of anything I accomplish beyond 24 hours. In that same three-month period, I *did* do many things ... it's just that few of them were on my Grand Plan. Had I not kept track of everything that I was doing, I would have thought I'd laid on the couch for 90 days, and crashed and burned even harder as a result.

* Asking a few basic questions clarifies what I'm thinking a lot. That's the benefit of having colleagues read something you've written, of having friends who'll talk you through your latest relationship snafu, of having a partner to talk through life decisions. Another brain on a problem is rarely a bad thing. It would be nice to be able to set up a way to do that for myself while I'm still in the idea stage to avoid future problems, or at least knock off the worst ones. 

How many of those are recurring lessons I keep learning? Oh, all of them. Although the tracking portion is something I've never stopped doing, and the cyclical knowledge is what keeps me going when the world opens up under my feet -- it's happened before, it'll happen again, I just  have to keep breathing.