Category: Work in Progress

Haven’t done the writing group update yet, seeing as I’m supposed to be plugging away at “The one with the mask” (which may actually end up being titled “Masked”). I gave them my 1,000 words, and I got the following back…

The Good

• I wrote a scene where the protagonist referred to a past hospitalization (the implication being that it was a psych hospitalization), which was seen as a “realistic depiction.” In the interest of full disclosure, I’ve worked in the field, so I know how these things go.
• People appreciate the humor. Again, it’s shocking. I know I write funny bits in my stories, mostly in the form of character thoughts or dialogue. They’re the ones being funny, not the story itself. But the group seems to really enjoy that aspect when it’s there. I suspect, though, that it maybe has more to do with my reading (we read our pieces out loud to the rest of the group) than the prose itself, but I could be wrong.
• No one really had any nits to pick about the prose itself. Again, it’s kind of like the tone of my rejection letters: “Great prose, but the story blah blah blah…”

The Bad

• I was afraid that I’d included some extraneous details in this section, although I didn’t exactly know what would be extraneous until after I’d finished. The group concurred on both counts.
• I’d inadvertently altered the voice of the protagonist. One person noted that he had a “sweetness” to him in the beginning that disappeared. I wish I could say that I did that on purpose, because there were some darker themes to the section I wrote, but the crit was right. The truth is, there’s a noticeable jump in the protag’s voice between the first 1300 words and the next thousand. And the themes really stay at a certain level of darkness.
• The same critiquer thought that I was wandering from the main thrust of the story. Again, she was right. Although I think I can fix that with some serious editing.

The Ugly
Again, no real “ugly” to speak of. Heck, one person in the group said she didn’t have any crits to give.

Afterward, we had the usual kaffeeklatch that went pleasantly longer than it typically does. I talked about how I psyched myself out by presenting a portion of the story last time that got such rave reviews that I was freaking out that I had to come up with something that would garner as much praise. Apparently, I’m not the first person this has happened to, which is the reason for the prevailing wisdom that one should only bring finished pieces to a writing group. I’ve always been in 100% agreement. It was just that all I had for last time was the start of “The one with the mask,” so that was what I brought. I guess you can call it my self-imposed consequence of not having something finished within the alotted time.

Deadlines, people–the reason I hooked up with a group to begin with.

I managed to hammer out just over 1,000 more words for “The one with the mask” for group tomorrow. I’ve had two weeks to do this. I did 300 a week ago, and came up with the rest today.

Yes, I’ve been writing other things, which is a blessing and curse. One of the things I need to do is work on the ability to focus on a project. It’s hard when ideas come flying at you, left and right. But I finally realized that each page in the notebook fleshing out a random idea could’ve been one page of this story. I’ve been editing other stories, one of which is ready to send out. I dunno, time management’s always been a problem for me. Although it’s usually not a matter of slacking vs. working. It’s a question of what to work on, and when there’s no particular deadline you’re trying to meet, I feel like I can, for the most part, write what I want to write on any given day.

Which is why I finally buckled down and found a group. I promised the group more of this story, and by God I was gonna give it to them. And I did, banging out and editing 700something words, proving to me once again that (a) there’s something to be said about deadlines and (b) the proven technique of sitting the fuck down and just writing something!

Part of my problem was that I psyched myself out over this story. Each instance where I sat down with the paper file and computer file open was painful. I had to force myself to do it, and I didn’t know why at first. It seemed like the basic problem I had with other stories, where I knew where Point A and Point Z are, and even a decent idea of where Points C, D, N, and U are…but no idea how to connect them. I couldn’t break through, despite the copious notes I took and the various techniques I’ve tried in the past to beat the block.

Finally I realized (a) I gotta come up with something with all the material I’d put together and (b) I’ve been putting mounds of undue pressure on myself. The pressure came from the fact that the first portion I submitted for critique got such a positive response that a part of me was like, “Oh shit, where do I go from here?” I wanted the next portion (okay, the rest of the story which I wanted to have finished by today) to be just as good.

See, that’s bad. I have to remember that this is still a first draft. I know I’ve probably written some extraneous material, but I won’t know it’s extraneous until I’m done.

Anyway, I’ll print it out once more and give it the once over, and then I’m going to call it a day. I’ve got 1000 words to submit tomorrow, and it’s all good.

That’s what I’m doing on “The one with the masks,” since I’ve got less than a week now to come up with something to present to the writing group this Sunday. It’s been rough, trying to keep the home in a semblance of order since the wife’s away. Any writing on this project has been done using Steven Barnes’ strategy of creating “plug-ins” that I can generate in one sitting, crammed into whatever time I might have.

The progress (now on the sidebar, since Zokutou works again) speaks for itself.

My newest project, “The one with the mask,” got generally good reviews from the crit group today. No, it’s not on the sidebar yet, as Zokutou seems to be down. As much as I was loath to bring in an unfinished piece, the group seemed to understand and I got exactly the sort of comments that were appropriate for a piece in the stage it’s currently in.

The Good

• People found the protagonist to be sympathetic.
• No one found fault with the use of flashback, thus far (though someone made the comment that the prose might need tightening, depending on the story’s final length).
• Most importantly, they wanted more!

The Bad

• The relationship between the two characters shown thus far needed to have been specified up front, maybe with some dialogue.
• Someone stated they would’ve liked more dialogue in the beginning because they didn’t get a sense of the protagonist’s voice. This one actually disturbed me, because the critiquer was right–there wasn’t a clear sense of the protagonist’s voice, partly because I’m not sure I know what it sounds like yet.
• The secondary character needs to be the reality anchor. The story’s a contemporary fantasy joint, you see, and there needed to be a stronger sense of the general whereabouts of “reality.”
• I referred to the secondary character by a real name and a nickname. I should’ve picked one or the other.

The Ugly

There didn’t seem to be an ugly this time around. Of course, I was only five pages in, so there’s lots of room to fuck it up. Speaking of which, no one mentioned being as bothered as I was that I somehow managed to cram more swearing into five pages than I have into some of my other stories.

Anywho, like I said, I’ve got most of the beats worked out. And, during our post-critique chill-out Kaffeeklatsch, a fair amount of interesting details came to me that I just had to get down. Remember the King quote from the other day? Eh, I’m sure they all understood. They’re all writers.

One of the reasons I wanted to hook up with a critique group is that I wanted a reason to regularly produce stuff. For the group. Oh, I’ve produced stuff since last time, but nothing the group (because of its parameters) would be interested in reading.

I’m not bitching about how and why I couldn’t. You can read the other blog for that. That’s not even the point.

The point is that instead of furthering work on the various unfinished projects I have listed on the sidebar today–well, okay, only one of which is suitable for the group–do I pull those out and work on them? Hell, no.

What I did was delve into the journal and reworked some pages I wrote one early morning during our camping trip last week. It would’ve been last Sunday, around 7-ish, sitting with my back to the sun, facing into the treeline surrounding the area where we had our campfire.

I’ve got five pages of the best “shitty first draft” I’ve ever written. It’s not a complete piece; hell it’s not even all of Act I. But I’m pretty happy with the progress. I just wish I could shake out a little more of the story, but I spent a fair amount of time working out some of the major beats. I know exactly what the story’s about and how it’s going to end (more or less).

Maybe I’m not so unprepared, after all.

I reset the counter for “The one about the angel” as I’m about to start the third draft, now that I read the crit group Act III of the story. Lots of good suggestions were offered. Not just pointing out story problems, but offering alternate ideas, some of which I intend to implement once I work it out on one of my canary yellow legal pads.

I’m basically starting from scratch, which is exactly what I need to do. It’s just the thought of going through the same turf again doesn’t thrill me. But I’ve got to get this story off my plate and back out there. There’s really no reason not to, especially when I have little doubt that by the end of the story, it’s going to be that much closer to publication.

Taking a deep breath…aaaand, here we go…

0 / 4,420 (0.0%)

Today, I had my first story critiqued by the writers group I joined two weeks ago. “The one about the angel.” God, it was exactly what I needed! A lot of the criticism mirrored some of the general feedback I’d get when I’d submit it: “Good prose/writing, nice concept, but…” They gave me a lot to think about, and one or two things I hadn’t even considered.

Because of the length limits, I only brought in the first 2/3 of the story, picking a place that was somewhat of a cliffhanger. I figured that if I did my job right, they’d be interested in the end. Despite some of the problems they pointed out, most of the group–the ones present, despite Fathers Day–did want to know what happened next, which was pretty gratifying.