Done well, Things I Could Learn: This Is How You Lose the Time War

Hmmm. Just finished it this morning.

(MASSIVE spoiler alerts, do not read if you're going to read the book)

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If you're still with me, I assume you're not going to read it or you've finished it already. This is not a review, this is reading-as-a-writer for things I felt were handled well and techniques or skills I could use this book to learn.

Things done well AND things I could learn: Swift evocation of setting and scene and import -- felt like it only took a few paragraphs in each of the narrative sections to know what era, level of technology and slip-stream of time (or hint of it) that we were in. I wanted more, but the story didn't require more -- just a few intense details here and there, about things that mattered to the storyline.

Actually, the novella was a craft lesson in choosing telling, story-specific details. The china cup and its colors, the spiders (thematic; they were both trapped in a web). The lumber scene from axe to letter to wood slivers. The horrific seal puns.

Things done well than I don't necessarily want to learn: the casual violence and unending death, writ from two perspectives that oft viewed them carelessly as character traits. Necessary when crafting assassins, but difficult to put out there as a writer, for me. I get it was for a larger message of opting out of the struggle entirely, but still. The lesson, then, is making repugnant character actions real while still creating something of a sympathetic character.

Other things done well: Obsessive love, dear god, the unhealthy obsessive dynamic that yet evokes new and unexpected love for the reader. And that obsession blossoms (ha ha) and creates something hopeful? The unexpected Sleeping Beauty twist at the end. Roses. Thorns. The blood-tainted kiss. Ha. Thematics woven throughout, so tightly braided. Felt like it moved too fast and yet not a single word misplaced. So concise. DEFINITELY could use some conciseness in my own work.

Time travel: I've had trouble with time travel books before, but the time travel in this -- as a WAR concept -- felt so epic and the pace so lively that I didn't have time to object about the mechanics.

I was certain from the second reference that "the seeker" was one of the two of them, and my only annoyance in the book was that Red didn't consider that. I was unclear about which one it was. So Red's quest made total sense to me AND I was so snookered by the time travel premise that I didn't see it as a quest until she saw the "princess" on the hill and I went D'OH. Nicely snookered, hats off to the authors.

2019 Working Goals Review

Pretty pleased with myself in my writerly life (not discussing the other, considerably less pleased partitions of existence). I met nearly all my writerly goals this year. Not going to diss myself for not reading two novels a month given the number of novellas I read, but I am going to try to increase my reading in 2020.

Read 100 short stories, 16 novels, 11 novellas and change (various other works).

I *am* concerned that I utterly failed at my focused skill-building; not only did I NOT identify and practice a skill from each novel read, I only logged 24 skill-building sessions for the entire year!  I did do a lot of untracked revision skill-building in November during my spontaneous  personal "revision and submission" NaNo this year so I might try a tracked skill-building month early in 2020 to get the habit started. Maybe follow it with a revision-and-submission month so I keep those skills alive; that push was startlingly useful. I tripled my submission speed. A month on and I'm already slowing down as I revise.

The goals I met were:

• -X- A Deep but Modest Apiquai revisions honed by April 15 (finished June 30)
• -X- Track short stories read (aim for 13/mo)
• -X- Budget for and plan classes/experiences based on weaknesses
• -X- A Deep but Modest Apiquai on submission to 25 agents by Summer Solstice (took me until Sept 27)
• -X!- (work up to) 13 ss on submission by the 13th/ea month by W. Solstice
• -X- Writing Retreat this summer

Back up to 13!

Back up to 13 submissions in the mail! Yay!

Had a few rejections (and a shortlisting! yay!) So back at it. Three submissions this morning;  only took about 90 minutes, with a break, so maybe an hour, total. Getting faster at this.

Pulling back the veil

A week and change left in the year.

So far I've read 15 novels (three re-reads), 11 novellas, at least one novellete (I tend not to look at the length of the long short stories I read, sadly; one nonfiction book, at least one graphic novel and one author's anthology. My TBR pile is three times that size and clawing for attention.

I'm currently working my way through several "best of" anthologies, may or may not finish those. I've tracked 99 published short stories read so far this year. (I'd better read at least one more!)

Been trying to focus on SF and Fantasy, and read some of the classics I missed, but I think next year I need to broaden my reading as well; I'm getting *too* focused on genre. I miss knowing what's being published elsewhere. I'd probably be happier if I could double this tally next year -- I mean, 29 book-length works (not counting the novelette) isn't bad; that's one every two weeks. Half again to roughly 40-45 works would mean more time reading, but I could do it.

What I'm not doing is spending quality time picking apart how the authors do what they do well; how they created a "real" world, empathy and character/reader connection --  or how, where and why their worlds broke for me. The critical aspect of the reading that would enable the reading to *consciously* make me a better writer, in other words.

I picked up a reading journal (and plan to alter some of the questions to make it more useful to me) am going back through a few of the books I read this year, to see if I can improve on this.

How do you probe a book (as you're reading it or once you've finished) to unveil how the author created its magic? Any questions you ask yourself or practices you keep that help?

A Non-Traditional NaNoWrimo

I didn't have the creative energy to draft a new novel this November, so no traditional NaNoWrimo for me. I was casting about for another idea when a colleague began waxing lyrical about her short story spreadsheet, which she credits with part of the reason for her selection for Odyssey this year.

"I've got one of those someplace," I thought.

It had last been updated in 2015.

Ouch.

 I've long had trouble getting short stories out to markets, and it's hard to send stuff out when you don't know what you have. So I spent the first week updating my inventory, and the remainder of the month cleaning up short stories for critique and sending rewritten pieces out to market.

My goal was to send out 30 shorts to paying markets. I fell considerably short of that, but I'm pretty happy anyway.

I was doing pretty well at first, but as rejections began to come back, and as my limited market research ground into "I should read a few of their stories and figure out what they buy" I discovered that the older stories in my inventory didn't hold up to my current level of writing skill. And my current level of skill wasn't quite good enough for some of my favorite markets. Maybe if I re-wrote that story again...

In other words, I slammed into both sides of The Gap as well as Imposter Syndrome. Which was useful information but still frustrating. Even though I knew that was happening, I couldn't make myself send a story I knew wasn't up to par, and I don't have useful market research on second- and third-tier markets.

That said, I submitted a dozen stories 14 times (I submitted two twice, thank you to editors with quick turnaround times!), and took an additional 15 shorts (most of them flash) to Wordos -- wait, and two more to my other crit group.

So I only hit half of my actual submission goal (which was to get 30 stories to editors, not just critiquers) but I did hit 31 stories with other people's eyes on them. That feels... okay? It certainly pushed the bounds of how many characters, plot lines and settings I could juggle in my head at once.

Since 2019 had been a thin year for me -- I'd only submitted shorts for publication 10 times before Nov. 1 -- I more than doubled my submissions in one month. I'm happy with that. And I now have a PILE of crits to work through.

Probably the best payoff of all was the one I hadn't seen coming: my revision speed ramped waaaaay up during November. Given how painful I find editing and revision, I'll call that a win-win.

Reading Practice: Solar War 1 and The Raven Tower

Trying to get back in the habit of recording what I'm learning from reading.

Currently reading The Raven Tower (Leckie) and Eve of Destruction | Solar War 1 (Aaron & Cooper). (Turns out there are a LOT of Eve of Destruction titles).

Reading these two side by side (I'm literally reading a chapter of each before I go to bed at night) might not be in the best service of either. But it has been excellent practice for highlighting pacing and mood. 

"Eve" is a danger-laced Bourne-like thriller set in deep space, an explosively life-threatening (literally) blitz through several worlds. I'm halfway through, and every chapter the protag has been in so far, she's been in danger and has risked her life, from surrendering to repeatedly escaping.The authors show over and over again she's highly competent, skilled and tough as nails, willing to ask for help when she needs it, but only accepting it on her terms until other people's lives are at stake. And sometimes even then. It's a vastly complicated political world that I'm having difficulty keeping straight, but Aaron and Cooper are definitely keeping my interest.

 "Raven" is a moody, mysterious fantasy about a son denied his rightful "throne," by an uncle, and his refusal to believe his father -- for whom no funeral was held -- has fled, but the focus is on his mysterious aide, Eolo. Eolo's actions, as seen through the narrator's eyes, slowly build a picture of who Eolo -- competent, curious, smart and evasive. Raven is a slow grim build filled with foreshadowing and foreboding in an evocative world I want to know more about. I'm about a quarter of the way through, and I have enough of a shape to start making guesses about where the story is going. I'm missing descriptive flourishes I expect from fantasy, but I'm loving the mythology of this world, which is going to be crucial to solving the several mysteries baked into the narrative. Quiet but threatening events translate to a sense of a cold and brutal society that so far has required me to care more about the world than any one character -- because Eolo is a bit of a mystery, his boss is a small bit of a dick (less of a dick than some other characters, but that's not saying much) and the narrator is an unnamed god/goddess who talks only to Eolo. It's a lovely writerly challenge and Leckie is pulling it off masterfully.

The pacing of the two books could not be more different; and yet both have the those shifts in tempo, breather chapters, which are used for similar purposes--to fill in gaps, to explain, and to enrich the readers' understanding of how this world works. 

Eve's breather chapters come in the POV of a male hacker working from a safe room with his sweet cat. As the protag's hectic flight slows -- I stopped last night at the point where she's essentially arrested by her supporters (it's complicated) I expect his life is about to become MUCH more challenging. 

Raven's breathers are the god/goddess talking about how they came to be, came to understand their power, how they got tied up with and began to care about humans. Those are by necessity very quiet, nature-evocative snippet that I found thoroughly enjoyable.  Hopefully one of those asides will soon explain how they came to be where they are NOW, because that's the next story question that's burning a hole in my mind! 

Anyway. That's what I got from what I'm reading so far.

The agent hit a plot snag and rewrite quandary

Well, the agent who requested the full manuscript declined to offer representation.

She said my writing is strong and my characters leapt off the page (there's a compliment I need to staple to my forehead) but her love did not extend to the novel's plot.

I knew the plot was going to be a hard sell, but it's important to me so I'll keep querying. I've queried 26 agents now, which is barely scratching the surface (one of the reasons I was so excited to have a request for a full so soon). Only have eleven queries still out there in agents' inboxes, so I need to get busy querying again.

Also got a request to rewrite a short, which was exciting. But I am having a surprisingly difficult time re-envisioning the story. The character questions I've asked to fix the issues have revealed deeper cracks in the story logic that I expected.  A really nice challenge, but my brain is tripping on it right now.

Ah well. Onward.