April is Poetry Month!

It kind of snuck up on me.
The last two years I've been gun-ho excited to participate but for some reason this year I didn't even realize it was poetry month until a few days in!

Because my head is very much into fiction at the moment, I'm finding it hard to think about poetry as well. For sure, I will still be writing poetry. I want to at least attempt to write one poem per day. (I need to catch up!) But I won't be posting them here. I figured since my head isn't in the game, I'd spare everyone from having to read my less than stellar poetry.

But by all means, head over to Robert Brewer's Poetic Asides blog to check out his poetry prompts for each day, to read hundreds of poems his readers have posted, and to participate yourself.

Have fun!

The War Continues

Every time I sit down to write now, I end up splitting my time between my two novels. It usually goes like this:

Sit down, drink tea, open project 1.

Smile at my darling novel, begin writing.

Get frustrated, close project 1, realize my dreams of being a writer are unrealistic.

Drink tea, open project 2.

Smile at the novel that's better than the other one, begin writing.

Get frustrated, drink tea, pet cat, get hugs from hubby, sit down, open project 1.

You see my dilemma? Oh, you don't see it? It's right there in between the fact that I'm managing to write something every day.

The truth is, I kind of like this. Even though I feel like I'm not getting anywhere, I am writing. And I'm writing even in the midst of getting frustrated at a project.

This is just more evidence that writer's block doesn't have to exist. All you need are several other writing projects to go to when you get stuck on one. That way, you'll always be writing no matter what.

Hang in there if you're frustrated or impatient for your novel to get done. And maybe go drink some tea.

Compulsive Beginnings

It turns out Unsubscribe day is more like unsubscribe week. Some places take ten days to unsubscribe you from their system. I don't like it, but I guess that's the way it is. Hopefully by next week I will have a much slimmer Inbox.

Which is important because I just started my new job and every week I get about 40 e-mails from my fellow co-workers. :D I love it. It makes me feel like I'm needed.

With the start of my new job, I haven't done anything with my WIP for three weeks. Which felt strange because that's the longest I've ever gone without working on it since I started almost two years ago.

But for the past three weeks, I was writing. I didn't have a chunk of time I needed to devote to my WIP to get past a major barrier, so instead I started a different novel, one that I could add to in bits and pieces a few minutes at a time.

Now I have a pleasant conundrum. I'm still in love with my WIP, but am really excited about my newest novel. Which do I work on?

It reminds me of when I used to play Civilizations and Age of Empires. They fascinated me and were a ton of fun, but I found myself addicted to fresh, new beginnings. It was rare I ever finished a game because every time I'd sit down, I would want to start something new. A blank slate with no mistakes on it with all the possibilities of becoming a successful game.

My WIP is almost done (done? Is there such a thing?) so I'll probably stick with it until I reach that next satisfactory step. But I have no doubt I'll continue to grow my newest story here and there, squeezing it in around my schedule.

Have you ever had more than one significant story going at the same time? How many? Are you a compulsive starter of stories? Or does a blank page scare you?

Unsubscribe Day

Today I designate as Unsubscribe day.

It may take only a few seconds to delete that annoying newsletter you signed up for because they gave you a free pizza.
You might think you'll order something from that e-zine in the future when you have more time for hobbies.

But those few seconds add up. Especially if you managed to get a free pizza, free pen, 10% off at a dozen places and a few free books for signing up, like me. This morning I had 60 e-mails in my inbox that were not personal or work related. And I just checked it yesterday. (Note that this is the e-mail address I keep for such purposes. Anything that sounds risky or spammy, I use my alternate e-mail.)

I'm of the opinion that it's ok to sign up for free e-zines and stuff, especially if there's a promotion for doing so (i.e. free stuff). But today, I'm unsubscribing from all the regular e-mails I never read. That includes things like my subscription to the Origami e-zine. Sure, I'll probably order more Origami paper from them in the future, but when I do, I won't need their e-zine to do it. And no amount of sales or special offers from them will make me place an order until I have the time to actually fold Origami.

So here's to more time for writing. More time for living. More brain space for the e-mails that actually matter.

Happy Unsubscribe Day!

Writing on hold

Sorry, guys. I've been putting all my writing on hold until I finish training in at my new job. It's bee a busy couple of weeks, but I hope that once things settle down at work I'll get right back into the blogosphere/write-o-sphere.

Hope you all are having a good time!

This Week

Started a new job this week, so I'll be busy as a bee learning new things. Real blog posts to resume next week. ;)

I am the Voice

When I first learned about Pandora radio, I looked up a station that had one song consistently in its playlist. The song was called "The Voice" and was very repetitive musically. It also made no sense. The entirety of the lyrics can be summed up in four words "I am the voice".

There's no setting to show us where the voice is coming from, or to whom the voice is speaking. Why is the voice speaking? We don't know. Why is this voice important and how can it be the voice of everything, and does it matter?

It was a classic case of stringing together words that sound nice but don't make any sense. The writer of the song clearly thought they were saying something profound, when they were really just feeling profound.

So when I hear writers talk about voice, I can't help thinking of that song and saying to myself "The voice needs context in order to become important."

This past week I've been exploring what it means to discover and write a consistent voice in my work. I thought I'd try writing the first paragraph of my novel in four different ways to see if a different voice emerged and if I liked one of them best.

But when I clicked back to my first paragraph, I realized it already had voice without me knowing it. I thought I had left the first paragraph a flat, murky string of words with no real feeling. I was pleasantly surprised to find, though it contained flaws and clear inconsistencies in the voice and flow of the story, it had something.

I've never heard voice defined in any satisfactory manner, (which might be why I think of that song: they're both ambiguous,) but I saw it in my first paragraph. I can't explain it, but it felt right. I could see where I had written with complete authority and been in control. And now I remember how I eeked out that first paragraph. I did two things: got inside my character's head and knew before I started writing what I wanted to emphasize.

The character was my villain. I already had his character nailed down so I knew what he would do if he was reluctant. I knew how he would act and along what lines he would generally think if he was uncomfortable or undecided about something.

In the scene, I knew I wanted to show he was reluctant to go into a building. I could have shown it in many different ways. But the way I chose was consistent with his character. That in itself is not voice. That's characterization.

However, the reason I call it voice is because when I went back to read it, I was totally drawn in to what was going to happen next and I found myself feeling sorry for the villain, (the effect I intended to produce).

If I, a writer bent on red-pen-editing-destruction of a story, can go back to my first paragraph and NOT analyze it to death for narrator flaws because I was distracted by the character and setting, I have to think the voice was done correctly. I successfully removed myself from the audiences' view.

I'm quite sure I'll discover there's more to voice than that. But it was a nice surprise. Now if only I could duplicate that magical alignment of the stars that made correct voice appear (or rather disappear) in my first paragraph, I'd have a pretty good book on my hands.

For now, I'll just keep using my red-pen-of-death to ex out sentences that are just nice words strung together.