The Art of Writing

I haven't written much about the mixed-media project I've been working on. I've posted a lot of the completed works, and I introduced the concept back when I started working on it, but the process is something I've wanted to share with you. It's been such an important part of why I've enjoyed working on it so much these past few months. 

Being a visual project, the images are extremely important. It's the biggest visual art project I've worked on it years and I've been loving this new outlet. But the writing aspects are equally important to me. I've been employing a cut-up technique in the writing part. I search though batches of text for a word or string of words that infuse the story portrayed in the image. Sometimes a string of words end up on my "thinking board" and inspires the selection of images that will be pieced together.

I've arranged the text into piles of small, medium and large font. Once I make a word choice, I dig into the corresponding font pile and search for completing pieces until the phrase captures the theme. I never try to force it, and never for look for a particular word (with the exception of a conjunction or article). There have been some times where I've spent as much time on the word puzzles as I did on the picture puzzle.

I use this title as starting point for the stream of consciousness pieces that follow. It's a kind of free writing style that I used to do all the time, and it's been great revisiting it without having to worry about coherency and plot structure. At the same time, there is a plot trajectory within the project as a whole. Each spread or page are pieces designed to borrow from the "hymn" structure of the book I'm altering.

The original book was hymnal and the poems in my project are meant to follow that genre or storytelling. They are little vignettes of a vast fantasy about the evolution of imagination as a magical power in children, and the empire of science and brutality attempting to destroy it. It is the fantasy of the main character in a novel I'm in the early stages of working on. 

I realized early on that I needed to transcribe the words before putting them into the book. Often they become illegible once I incorporated them into the artwork so that the words become part of the visual. There are at least two completed ones that that I don't know for sure what is written. Now I write the stream of words on a piece of a scrap paper, trying not to think too much about them.

We All Dream of Human Hybrid Mutations

 

"We all Dream of Human Hybrid Mutations"

 

Iridescent fins sweep the sea . . create the waves

and spread the disease of imaginary beings.

We are better than pure in our new forms . .

we are free . . through the act of creation

we reproduce and get dirty

creating a new race of alterations.

Some Heavenly Theme of angels with butterfly wings . . 

of boys with horse half things and girls with scaly fins . .

of cyborgs and other contolling beings.

 

Rejoice!

 

But know you've done a very seriously bad thing.

You dared to dream.

You dared to dream.

You dared to dream.

You dared to dream...

A Story of Ghosts

 

I wanted to give a little writing update, something I haven't done in a bit. I've been working on a Middle Grade ghost novel for over a year. It's a complicated story and I've been consistently interrupted by life, but have continued to work on it nonetheless.

This week, I had a bit of a breakthrough. I'm currently writing a pivotal scene where the action is going to turn. There are two schools of thought when it comes to writing these types of passages. One is to get the idea down and push through, then go back and make it perfect. The other is to suffer through carefully and make sure the tone and details are solid. I fall into the second school of thought. For me, getting the tone right here will set the style for the rest of the story. Getting it wrong can lead to the wrong trajectory and ruin a story.

The other night I was perfecting an encounter and once I nailed it, a burst of what was to come hit me. I love these kinds of breakthroughs. The trick is to harness them into momentum.

Fiction Friday (100)

One of the fun things about working at a library is the random book encounter. This comes from checking things in, glancing at the return carts, or skimming the shelves. Last week I came across this little gem in just such a fashion. I was curious about the small trim size, removed it from the shelf, and recognized the wonderful artwork on the cover. This translated French novel is a Mommy Dearest for the contemporary teen and a kindred spirit to my own books written during the same time.

Like a Thorn by Clara Vidal
(Delacorte, 2008)

Mélie has always believed she has two mothers; rosy mother and dark mother. One kind, one cruel. Since she was a little girl, she has been certain of this duality though no one else seems to see it. She believes it is up to her to ward of Dark mother and begins develop rituals to ward off her mother's harshness, rituals that grow more complicated and all consuming.

The brevity of this book is where it finds its power. It is an intense read, a painful read, a read that makes you feel for the main character, makes you want to be the one who is there for her when no one else is. To be honest, Mélie reminds me a lot of characters I've created in my books. She could be soul mates with Elizabeth (from Tomorrow, Maybe and Thief), with Lacie (from Perfect World), with Sabrina (from Life is But a Dream). 

Mélie was written with the same kind of intensity, and therefore, I'm not surprised to see reader reviews similar to those of my books. Basically, some people are turned off by characters like this. I'm not one of those readers. This is a book that really struck me and will stay with me. And if you are fans of any of those books of mine that I mentioned, I highly recommend reading this.

The Story Continues...

It's been some time since I've posted about writing, but I've actually been making real progress on the latest manuscript that I've been working on for nearly a year. I'm currently writing a chapter that I feel is the clear half-way point in the story and as I write it, so much of the story is becoming clearer. Anyone who has ever written a novel knows the joy of that feeling. 

I've always found that story creation contains many phases. There is the initial inspiration where the buds of the story sprout. In that early stage, there is so much excitement as to the possibilities that may arise from the idea you've committed to. There is a first burst of pages that seem to spew out, but after a bit you find yourself in the mire of the story. You're doing a lot of technical work, a lot of map reading trying to figure out where the hell you're going.

For me, I find that by the end of the first third of a story, I'm muddling around a little. I've introduced the elements that will come into play. I've started to weave them together. But then there is that moment where you have to make real choices in order to provide direction. You have to take the lose threads you've left dangling and tie them together And just when it begins to feel hopeless, the clouds part...at least, if you're lucky they do.

The clouds have began to part in my story and the view is clear. It will get muddy again, but for now, I will plow ahead into the daylight.

When Reality and Fiction Meet

As I mentioned a little while ago, I've been working on a new manuscript for the past two months and have shockingly been making progress on it. It's a story set in my own house, using elements from my own life, which is always the easiest place to start and embellish.

The idea for the story came to me over the winter. I was lying in bed and had nearly fallen asleep when I heard two pronounced footsteps in the attic above my head. They were not the sounds an animal would make. They were human sounding footsteps. Only two of them. Two footsteps that started and ended in the middle of the room. I would've thought I was imagining it except that my faithful cat, who was lying beside me, also looked up at the sound, confirming that the footsteps were not some half-dream hallucination.

This past week, I finished writing a scene where a bird delivered a message to a character in the attic. The attic in the story is my attic. Oddly enough, two days ago, a bird mysteriously showed up in our attic a day after completing the scene. The bird was one meeting the description of the bird in the story. There seemed to be no way the bird could have ended up in there, but my wife clearly saw it at the window when she was outside. Even more puzzling, when she went to free it, it wasn't there.

These are the kinds of events that give me the encouragement to continue. It's the kind of thing that reminds me how art, and the creation of art, exist in a strangely connected way to life that is a mystery worth exploring.

Going Somewhere...Maybe

A few weeks ago, I posted about a project I'd begun and my decision to change the perspective from first person to third and how refreshing that felt. Two weeks later, I'm still loving that choice and have continued to progress on the story in a way that I haven't in quite some time. 

In the past, I always put pressure on myself to write a certain amount either per day, or per sit down. As I try to break back into this world of story creation in a legitimate way, I've abandoned that approach. I don't want to set artificial goals that honestly are not important or really motivating. And though I've been keeping notes, I have not attempted to outline the story yet because I want to let it evolve more organically, as I used to do back in my early days. 

I feel good about this one...I feel like I'm enjoying the process for the first time in a long time.

Change of Perspective

About two weeks ago, I began a new project that I'm pretty excited about. Over the past few years, I've had some trouble keeping momentum on a writing project. This was largely due to scholarly obligations, which ended this past September. Over the course of the fall, I tried to pick up manuscripts I'd begun while working on my Master's degree, but I've always found it hard to get back into something that was an idea once upon a time. 

I had a new idea recently, and it excited me. I started working on it, and it was going well, but it was still a struggle. I found myself writing the same character I'd written before, and that was dampening my momentum. Then I had the idea to try it over in third person rather than first person. (Cue light bulb over my head)

Instantly I found writing to be FUN again. I think because I haven't written a ton in third person, there was something new in it. New ways of expression. New perspectives. New momentum!

In-Progress

At the beginning of the month, like the beginning of the past two Novembers, I set out to complete the novel challenge. And like the previous two Novembers, I failed. But unlike the last two years, I haven't had to abandon projects due to other obligations. And unlike the previous years, I split my time working on two projects, which didn't contribute to accomplishing the goal. However, progress was made on both and both continue to move forward, which isn't something I could say when the calendar flipped to December before.

Sometimes, I think we need to look at accomplishments in increments. Progress is, in itself, an accomplishment.

Eight Spinning Planets

Eight Spinning Planets is a  book that I wrote several years ago and one that I'll admit that I've thought little about since I wrote it. Not that I'm not proud of it, I think it's a very fun and informative book for young children, but I simply sort of forgot about it. 

Recently I've spent a lot of time thinking about it. It just so happens that my daughter LOVES this book and has me read it to her frequently of late. It's the first book of mine that I've been able to share with her, along with Easter Bunny's On His Way (which she also loves). It's been really special to share this book with her, and has created a new sense of self-appreciation for work that I've done. 

Another way this book has crept into my consciousness has to do with me logging into my Twitter account a few months for the first time in years. There I found a message from a teacher who shared this video. I've been so involved with other aspects of my life over the past couple of years that it's been easy for me to forget that I ever wrote anything of impact. It feels good to be reminded otherwise.

The Sounds We See

As I wrote yesterday, I've been insanely busy this past month with grad school, and honestly, for the past year. Given that I also have a three year old, and a full time job, my time for writing has been limited to say the least. Despite this, I've written a few times over the past half year or so that ideas have been gestating and the itch to get back to writing has grown more severe over the past few months, an itch that grew last night during a concert I attending.

I went to see Langhorne Slim in Woodstock last night, and while he was amazing, this post is about the opening performer, James Wallace of Skyway Man. There was something about his songs that created intense images in my head, images involving two of the stories that have been gestating in there. Music has always acted as a fertilizer for my imagination, but every now and then I encounter something that acts like Miracle Gro. 

He was selling his album between acts and as I was the only one there, we chatted a bit and I got him to sign the record. I can't wait to have a little spurt of time to listen to it and let it inspire me some more.

Wandering Through Imagined Lands

Over the past several months, or maybe even longer, I haven't written much about writing. That's mainly because I haven't been writing. It's not that I don't have the desire to write or that my imagination isn't active. It's more that my imagination is so full of stories that are fighting to come out that I can't seem to make them stay in line. Coupled with the fact that my time is pretty much spoken for, what with an active toddler, working full time, and going to graduate school.

Recently I've been able to shuffle some of those ideas into line, bullying some farther to the back and keeping a small crowd gathered near the doorway. They are fighting for position and I'm trying to keep them in line. My approach is to keep a little notepad like back in the old days. Put down some ideas and possibly build them into one. 

Soon...soon.

The Sound of Something Clawing Through

With a short break in the graduate school season, I've had some time to get back to work on writing. The new novel that I began a few weeks ago has turned into a nice stack of pages, which means the structure is now calling for me to get into the really crazy parts that I imagined when I cooked up this insane journey through the tortured imagination of my adolescent self. That's not to say there isn't insanity to be found in the existing chunk that has already been written, but the truly surreal is yet to come and I must admit that I'm excited for it.

Thoughts on the Future that Come from the Past

Moving is a headache! There's no doubt about that. There's lots of boxes. Putting things into boxes. Taking things out of boxes. Disposing of said boxes. But it's also a chance to ferret through the collection of stuff that one has acquired during their lifetime. 

Three years ago, when I moved out of my home of a decade and into what I knew would be a temporary rental house until we found a place we wanted to call home, I had to give up having a full office and settled for a nook. As a result I had marked several boxes from my old office as "DO NOT UNPACK." These brief time capsules have recently been opened as I once again find myself set up in an office of my own. 

In these dusty musty boxes, I came across notes on many, many half-started and abandoned writing projects and have begun thumbing through their contents. The new manuscript I've been working on is structured in such a way that it should allow me to include these fragmented elements in some way, shape or form. Though currently inconclusive, I feel that my hoarding has not been utterly useless.

Journey Through the Pages

Just over a month ago, I wrote about a dream I had venturing through a day in the Interzone and I talked about how it inspired me. A few days later, I began work on novel. This is the first bit of writing I've done in about four years where I feel as though it's the best thing I've written after each session. It's one of these books that takes place during one day in the summer of my imagined youth. Thirty pages in and the story is still very clear and present in my mind for at least the next fifty to a hundred pages. I haven't been this excited about writing in a long time and just wanted to share my enthusiasm. That is all.

Sailing Off to Storyland

I've been packing up my office over the past week or so in preparation of moving to a new house. In the process, I've been coming across snippets of stories written long ago, ones that I came across almost three years when I last moved. I remember being inspired by them then, and that feeling came over me once again. Coming across all of these old fragments of imagination always seem to spark new ideas, as well as a nostalgia for imaginary worlds previously visited.

The Unseen Playmate

The other night, I was reading A Child's Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson to my daughter before bed and came across the "The Unseen Playmate." The first two stanzas may be the most terrifying thing I've ever read:

"When children are playing alone on the green,
                     In comes the playmate that never was seen.
When children are happy and lonely and good,
                    The Friend of the Children comes out of the wood.

Nobody hear him and nobody saw,
                    His is a picture you never could draw,
But he's sure to be present, abroad or at home,
                    When children are happy and playing along."

It instantly conjured images from Pinterest Dark Imagination board and got me thinking about a story I had been envisioning while creating that board. I'm currently working on something else, but this passage has certainly inspired me to revisit the horror story I had been thinking back a few years ago. Be afraid...be very afraid. 

Carefully Worded

A school assignment this week got me thinking about writing and word choice. The assignment was to think about the differences between the words vision, mission, goals, and objectives. It pointed out that these words are often used interchangeably though they have very distinct differences. While I know the difference between these words, primarily that vision and goals are more aspirational, while the others are more focused on tasks, I also know that I often use them interchangeably. 

Most people think that writers wouldn't make these mistakes because they think of writers as being very careful with their words. And that is true, as a writer, I am very careful with my words. But for me, it's not careful in the sense that I try to be exact with language. I'm careful to use words that fit best in the sentence, in the character's voice, and in the narrative style of the text, and let definitions and exactness fall by the wayside. 

I've always been a stylistic writer, for better or worse. The art and sound of words is more important to me than the clarity of their meaning.

Living in Alternative Worlds

Last week I wrote about my itch to begin work on a new story. Over the last few days, that itch has turned into a rash spreading across my imagination. Given that I also had a bit of a slow week for once, I'm happy to report that I dove in and started breathing life into that story. So far, I'm enjoying my time in deep space on a journey to a new star. I haven't worked on a story so distantly connected to real life in a long time and I'm excited to be living in this alternate world for the time being.

Write On!

I made provisions the other day that will allow me to carve out some more time for writing over the next ten weeks. I have several stories that I need to cull through and figure out what I'm doing with them. I also have a new story that I'm itching to work on. My overachieving goal is to work through several of these projects now that I have nothing to hold me back...except for an active toddler, who also happens to double as inspiration. Wish me luck.