Story 2: South Western Flare Up??

My second story in the 52 Story Pick Up is a little odd bird about a girl leaving Arizona to find herself. What makes this a challenge for me is that I've never been there, so my trusted atlas which doesn't even have a cover anymore has been my best friend through it all so I can get the main character from point A to point B literally. I can't say the story is a failure just yet, but I never like it when my own interest is waining before I have a chance to figure out what it's about.

That's where the road trip came into play and I love that about writing. Here's the girl and here's her stuff and all of this sucks, so I put her in the car and she (and I) haven't looked back since. What was a painful "what is going on" kind of rocky beginning brought about some really good stuff and in spite of hitting the 2000 words count for the 52SPU (that's short for whatever the heck it is that I'm doing here) I'm still not done with this character now that she's crossing the border into New Mexico via my atlas.

We'll see where she goes, until then let the breeze of heat and sand flip your hair into tangles as you hang your head out the window.

Story 1: Dream Stealing?

I woke up with this dream stuck in my head that gave way to my first story in the 52 Story Pick Up. I don't know about you, but I have mixed feelings about writing from dreams. Most of the time you feel like you're working on a 100 piece puzzle with only about 10 pieces and this massive sense that the rest of the puzzle was really, really good. Other times I feel like writing from dreams is stealing from the part of my brain that hasn't yet rotted from too much chocolate or from never being able to get a bath uninterrupted since my daughter was born.

All of this is beside the point. My dream involved the following tidbits: four miniature giraffes, slapping floorboards with your hand, and magic. Oh, and a "bad" guy that favored the looks of the voodoo villain from Disney's The Princess and the Frog. Of course, when I wrote my story it was much more fabulous than these puzzle pieces and I never for a minute second-guessed the direction of my story. Yeah, right.

The crux of the matter is this: I wrote fiction again. I gave myself the much needed break from the bill paying freelance work and got to flex some of my more creative muscles again. I haven't titled the new story yet, which is odd because that's normally my first steps, but I'm not concerned. After about five rewrites this magic giraffe, floor slapping story might just be a good little read.

That funny feeling that death may want to meet you: the birth of 52 Story Pick Up

I turned 32 this past week. I didn't do anything special other than eat cake after every meal and take a little time off from my freelance work, but by the end of the day I found myself feeling, well, very mortal. I got this thing going in my mind that said, "hey, where in the hell is your life going?" And then the idea that I may die tomorrow flooded in and that my legacy I leave to the world would likely be a small one. Now that's okay, I don't expect grandiose things; I'm well beyond my college "conquer the world" mindset, but I want to leave something behind that reflects my work here on this rock. With this in mind, I created a plan...

A Swift Kick in the Pants

Life is what happens when you're busy making other plans. That's the saying right? Let me just say, a whole lot of life has been happening and nowhere near enough fiction writing. As I think I've said before, I do freelance writing as my "day job" and fiction on the side. This is proving a fatal experience for my spirit and as freelancing work rises, the lifeblood of fiction drops. My freelance job is draining me and there's been no recharge. This doesn't make one happy.

So, since I'm turning 32 in two days, I'm determined to get back on track (since I may die soon). I say this in jest, of course we all "may" die soon, but every birthday is when I kind of glance behind me and this year I was none too pleased at what I saw on the fiction writing front. That being said, I'm going to storm into my brain and give it a big shake down. I'm tossing out all the old furniture, turning the lights up, and cleaning this place from top to bottom.

It's like when I was little and my mom would clean the house and then say something like, "there are going to be a lot of changes around here because this house will never look like that again." Only I'm going to tell my brain that. I'm going to put myself on lockdown if I have to! In the next couple of days I'm going to come up with a plan for the year ahead where fiction is concerned and by God I'm going to hit my goals and flip off freelance writing when I need to. Not that freelance is bad, it's not, it pays my bills, but I end up writing about installing fence posts until midnight instead of working on my writing. This will be big and there will be casualties, but story writing needs to get back on the front burner. I'll let you know what I come up with asap. Any suggestions?

Quick Tip: Plotting Plots

A practice which can be best used "before" you start writing your story, but also helps if you've already begun the next great American novel is to plot your plots. Now, before you go googling for downloadable plot spreadsheets, let me tell you a little something. All you need is a piece of paper and a pencil. The other stuff is fine, and you may find a big worksheet that is perfect for how you like to write, but I will caution you to not get caught up in gadgets and gizmos or you may not be able to work as well when they aren't available.

The bare bones version is this: when you plot your plot, write down in order of appearance all of the major twists and turns of your story. Make note of huge revelations, the conflicts, the unexpected events that happen to your main character and what he/she does about it. Get it all on paper, to the best of your ability, exactly what it is that happens in your story and then look for problems. Search for holes in your plot as well as gaps of time in your story where you notice nothing really is happening between page 50 and page 100. Let this be your guide for adding more bulk or removing excess from your story.

Ants and Other Distractions

I sit down to write at my trusty laptop. It’s dark. It’s always dark (to me) in my living room thanks to the tacky 50’s era metal awning which covers over half the window. My solution during the daytime anyway is to open the front door and let the light pour in through the screen door. Light is a good thing until you see a battalion of mini-ants trailing from the corner of the door all the way to your daughter’s chair where she sometimes sits and eats snacks when watching TV.

Quick Tip: Saving Your Work

Never, never, never, never, never forget to save your work when you are doing your rough draft and revision writing on a computer. While you can save to your hard drive, to top that off, please, always, always, always, always, always save a backup copy of your work somewhere on a floppy disk (yep, I just dated myself) or a USB flash drive. I try to update my flash drive weekly, every Wednesday to be specific.

Want a little extra security? When working on a large project, like novel revisions or a collection of stories or articles, be sure to email yourself a copy of your work to an email address you have access to from any computer terminal. While I use a lot of email addresses, I usually send a copy of my big projects to my GMail account. That way, no matter what happens to my beloved laptop or flash drive, I can run to the library and log in to my email and retrieve my documents.

Floods and Dry Spells

A lot of authors will tell you they just sit in the same chair everyday and write for the same amount of time every day and the magic just happens. This isn’t always the way it goes for the rest of us. While I have no doubt that making appointments to write is necessary, helpful, and effective since you can come away from each writing session with a sense of accomplishment, that doesn’t take into account floods and dry spells.

Quick Tip: Timed Writing

If you're having trouble cranking out that masterpiece, one technique I like to use is timed writing exercises. Give yourself 10, 30, even 60 minutes where all you do is write without interruption or distraction. This may mean writing with the door locked, the phone taken off the hook, and your email alert put on mute. Whatever it takes, do it.

Try to make the environment around you disappear so you can focus 100% of your energy to the story, journal entry, chapter, or poem. Keep a piece of scrap paper nearby so when you remember you need to buy onions at the grocery store you can quickly jot it down and throw the thought out of your head, then get back to your writing. Time your writing and see just how nice it is to hone in on your creative juice.

Hunting Words

A while back I told you about getting your butt into the library. Of, course I’m certain you have done so, because I said so. Now that I’ve gotten you into the library and poking around my Dewey decimal buddy 808 (where the writing books live), I want you to step to the right toward 807.

I find it of absolutely no coincidence that just before the writing and literature section are the books along the nature of “Advanced Whitetail Hunting” and “Treasury of Sporting Guns.” Anyone that has been writing and revising for any amount of time should understand what it’s like to hunt for the right word, plot, character, agent, publisher, etc.

This shit is hard and other people (non-writers) just don’t get that.

They may make fun of you for going to library, staying up talking to yourself about your story, journaling about fake people that don’t exist to find out more about them. Ah, but Dewey gets it. Dewey puts the books about hunting down and killing wild animals for sport right next to the books about writing for a reason.

Writing is a painstaking task that requires more than loading a gun and pulling a trigger.

Writing requires waiting it out in the dark of morning, listening for cues that what you’re searching for is coming toward you, and waiting until just the right moment to strike with just the right weapon/words.

You must always remember that writing is an enjoyable challenge, yes challenge (even for the best of us), and if you find yourself breezing through your story without a hitch, then you’re probably missing something.


Kill any good stories lately? Share your tales of hunting words in the comments section below?