navel gazing

[erastes]

Kurt Vonnegut - Eight rules for writing fiction:

1. Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted.

2. Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for.

3. Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.

4. Every sentence must do one of two things -- reveal character or advance the action.

5. Start as close to the end as possible.

6. Be a sadist. Now matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them -- in order that the reader may see what they are made of.

7. Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.

8. Give your readers as much information as possible as soon as possible. To heck with suspense. Readers should have such complete understanding of what is going on, where and why, that they could finish the story themselves, should cockroaches eat the last few pages.

This link (found on heart_set_afire's LJ) really helped me this morning.  I've been wallowing in something akin to self pity for the last month or so. Reason being I sent the first page of my new book to a couple of friends  - simply because I was pleased that I'd written it - and neither of them liked it. Then yesterday I sent chapter 1 of Junction X to a brand new critique group attached to The Macaronis and had a few hard truths there too.

 I don't find critiquing easy - I'm a LOT better than I used to be, before I came out into professional land, but I still find it hard to take.  What I need to realise is that it's hard for readers to "get" a character on one chapter and they aren't going to like someone if he's behaving like an arse and they can't see the reason for it.  However, there is the fear that if I then give them more than one chapter they might continue to hate him.  But - as Kurt says, you've got to have one character for the readers to root for, and I think they'll warm to Edward once Alex comes on the scene.

But I think that critiquing is vital even if it hurts me; it makes me think hard about what I've done and how I can make it better.  I'm definitely going to take the prologue out, and shove it out to more agents today.  I was rejected twice yesterday which is probably some kind of record.

I particularly like "rule" 5. I was having real problems with starting the new novel, and the more I fiddled with the start, the further BACK in time it went  - my first instinct was to start it with the Keepers (of the lighthouse) in a boat setting out for the light - but then I wavered and back in time I went, not once but four times... Now I've decided to ditch it and stuff them back in the little boat.

Number seven is also pertinent.  Critique is valuable, but you have to, at some point, believe in your own work. You can't please everyone. I have seen writers changing their stories after every critique session, after every agent's comments.  If you do that and continue to do that - in the end the story won't be the story you set out to write. 

I needed this kick in the arse today.  Kurt - thank you, sir. I'm going to print these out in big letters and put them over my desk next to Heinlein's rules for a human being.

I don't often have such terrible self doubts, so please allow me this wibble of confidence.

I have new babies. Don't let them die.



ETA: "Psmith in the City" is on the radio. I may have died and gone to heaven.

Comments

[the-sea-to.livejournal.com]

*hugs*... hope it gets better. though you sound v. motivated and positive about it!

[catsintheattic.livejournal.com]

*stops for fly-bye comment*

Thank you for sharing the rules. I especially like 3, 4 and 7.

Good luck, happiness and success with your writing!

*rushes out*

[marquesate.livejournal.com]

I love love love love love those sets of rules. Vonnegut rules! (oh the pun, oh my eyes).

I think I need to repost this. :-)

[aigooism.livejournal.com]

Critiquing is hard to accept. I know I am! Just when you think you wrote a brilliant piece of work, and then someone finds something wrong with it X_X;;

And Kurt Vonnegut rules are awesome. And I agree with #8. I just like to TELL IT ALL. I also like Jack Kerouac's.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

I'm very grateful when people take the time to tell me what they think, I do the same when I can - so they probably feel as bad as I do.

I don't know if I like number eight, so much - because for this book I can't tell it all in one lump, as it's got a mystery element about it. If I did that, it would more like Columbo!

:)

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Thanks - I feel positive about it, just flailing that I'm not actually WORKING. It seems such a waste of time.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Thanks hun! *watches you whizz off again*

[erastes.livejournal.com]

I've headed my printed sheet up Vonnegut Rules! :D

[aigooism.livejournal.com]

Ah but I like Vonnegut's unique way of using that rules in his book by letting us know the major plot detail in the beginning, hahaha. And I especially found it amusing when I read one book where he put an asterisk next to the character's name of who were going to die. XD But that's just Vonnegut-ism right there!

[the-sea-to.livejournal.com]

Calm. If you want you can come and pretend to be me at work. If you can sit in a chair, talk a lot of nonsense, and upload files to webservers- apparently you can be an architect too!

[finneganthepoet.livejournal.com]

Its nice to speak of fiction as if someone famous and or dead, could actually be the motivation for your own need to write. I always try to do things as clean from conventional wisdom as possible, while at the same time, attempting to be practical and informing. The thing is, at the end of the day, if you do have what it takes to write, you will, end of story. no matter if you are successful and famous at it or not.

For me writing is totally a process of discovery. I dont always know whats going to happen when I sit down to work, but I do have a general idea. Sometimes, I have no clue at all, and I sit back and leave it alone because I cant think clearly, or else the environment I am in is simply too poisonous or unstable for me to work in.

On a good day, I am pleased because I know I have chipped away at something immense inside me, which I am delighted to be rid of from my mind at long last

I like these rules, but I also like to listen to my owm instincts about writing. I am not just a blind fan and worshipper of good fiction, but a student participator of the craft. and for the ideas in my head, this takes great patience and discipline. Those are good two, you know...

F i n n e g a n

[lareinenoire.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much for sharing those. And your conclusions about critique -- at the end of the day, it is your story and nobody else can write it for you. I should now print those out and put them up on my wall.

[megleigh.livejournal.com]

hmm odd, I am a member of the critique group you mentioned and I hadn't received anything from it. *ponders*

I like the rules you posted. Might have to print them out too. (and or steal them for my blog hehe)

Will go look at the group now.

[lee-rowan.livejournal.com]

They're mostly good rules, though I don't see that writing to please anyone besides the writer is going to get the best story. And in a couple of those rules, he does say "as possible." If revealing something too early will wreck the story, then it just ain't possible.

What is the dragon-egg thing about?

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Oh the eggs are a sickness. I do apologise, but I suppose I can blame it on not doing "swap cards" when I was a kid and only having marbles. These are like marbles that hatch.

I've seen people do it though, try to please everyone who has a crit about their book and they'll change it to up the pace, and then the next agent will say it's too pacy!

[erastes.livejournal.com]

There's only been a few messages, perhaps they got spammed?

[erastes.livejournal.com]

They are on my wall right now!

:)

[erastes.livejournal.com]

I haven't known with previous books where I was going - other than the ending of course, as in the main, I write romance - but with this latest bout of writing, I simply don't seem to be able to start, my fingers aren't leading me further into the story and it's very worrying.

[megleigh.livejournal.com]

No, I found them. They had gone to my yahoo mail. I'm reading through atm.

[lee-rowan.livejournal.com]

I've been clicking on the little devils, but the clicks don't seem to register. What do you do with them when they grow up--put 'em out in the garden to eat slugs? (I just spotted a praying mantis on our fencpost yesterday--now there's a useful garden dragon! I hope there's an egg case somewhere in the yard.)

[finneganthepoet.livejournal.com]

You just havent realised your characters yet. You will. I have every faith your muse requires every bit of coaxing and calling upon as mine does. Just be patient with the process, it will happen if you let it

F i n n e g a n

[tammylee.livejournal.com]

Good advice!

[essayel.livejournal.com]

Good luck with it. Writer's block is a horrible thing to get around but I'm sure you will. Once they are redy those characters will demand to be written.

[markprobst.livejournal.com]

I once submitted the first scene in my book to a critique group on writersdigest.com. I got a few useful criticisms, but for the most part the members were just putting on their amateur-critic hats and looking for shit to pick apart. I took note of the useful comments and simply disregarded the nitpicking.

Mark

[lee-rowan.livejournal.com]

I notice grey egg's parents are Flaming Night and Flaming something or other. Maybe the baby will be Flaming Queen?

[alex-beecroft.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry to have contributed to your gloom. It is miserable, I know. You have to go away and lick your wounds for a bit before you can start working out whether any of it is useful, and if it is, what you can do about it. (Which may be deciding that it's not valid at all.) I should be able to give you a chance to take revenge in about a week, finger's crossed :)

Can I have a look at the new book? I must say, I love the way you come up with some really unusual settings and times. Lighthouse keepers? Now you've mentioned it, it's really romantic, but it would never have occurred to me.

(PS, I think we expect the world from you, but only because we know you're capable of it.)

[erastes.livejournal.com]

It will be now! I get to name it!

:)

[erastes.livejournal.com]

No no no - you didn't really contribute. It's just - I know that I can do better than I'm doing right now - I was pleased with the writing in much of Junction X - and Hard and Fast - but since then I seem to have lost the plot.

I was inspired about Lighthouses when we were driving around a few weeks ago and saw the Happisburgh lighthouse on the horizon - and I thought.. mmmm. "Three men... I think, if they were to have 8 hours shift each... in a lighthouse.. it would have to be out on a rock lighthouse so they could be cut off, and it would need to be before electricity for the same reasons.

BUT OMG. The research! I thought it would be easy! WRONG!

[erastes.livejournal.com]

This was very helpful - and kind! I did belong to a group before that did that too, but as you say, the best way is to sieve the useful stuff out.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

I'm not exactly blocked - I've got a ton of ideas, but the writing seems so bloody dull.

:(

[essayel.livejournal.com]

Oh dear. It is one of the really lonely jobs. *hugs*

[erastes.livejournal.com]

I think that's very true. Usually I DO start with the characters and I need to get to know them a bit more - Thanks Finn!

[erastes.livejournal.com]

And I'd be happy to share the new book! I've written less than a chapter so far, though. *glum*

[girluknow.livejournal.com]

Does Edward have to start out behaving badly? Will he give us even the teeniest glimpse of sweetness deep down? A little spark that hints we could learn to love him madly later on? Dang, now I feel sorry for Edward. I'm a sucker for a character who seems absolutely unredeemable. Those are the guys who are the most endearing when you finally crack open their shells.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Oh he's not unredeemable, hun. He's not a bad man - he loves his wife, hard as that is to see in the first chapter. He doesn't equate what he does with Phil as anything to do with his marriage. Neither he and Phil would admit to be homosexual or bisexual and they'd probably be offended if anyone called them that - Phil definitely. Phil just uses it to get a blowjob because he wife won't do that. But I hope that when he starts to fall for Alex, that the readers will really start to hurt for Edward. The irony being that he thinks he knows what love is, but until he meets Alex, he finds that he hasn't a clue.

If Alex hadn't have come along, Edward would probably have remained married but his inclinations may have come out in another way, perhaps become a connoisseur of art of Tuke, perhaps.

[alex-beecroft.livejournal.com]

When I started writing 'Wages of Sin' I felt exactly the same. I thought 'what's happened to me?! God! I can't write any more! This is dull and flat and lifeless. How have I managed to forget how to write?!' You probably remember the 'can you have writer's block without being blocked' post I made at the time?

But I carried on, even though it was rubbish, and gradually the characters started to come alive and I started to enjoy myself again. And suddenly the writing didn't look too bad either. I think it's just the pre-flight jitters.

On the other hand, I hear you about the research!

[alex-beecroft.livejournal.com]

Is this the one intended as a follow-up for Perseus? I find it very hard to write, knowing that you've already got someone in mind to pitch it to. There's an extra level of pressure there which you didn't have when you were just writing for yourself. It's intimidating.

*g* And I've got to finish two other things before I can think of starting another big book, so you're way ahead of me there.

[girluknow.livejournal.com]

No subtexty hint in Chapter 1 as to why he's like he is?
It's brave to write a character that way. Some readers will stick with to find out what makes him tick, some won't.
I've gotten more than two rejections in one day, so I really empathize. Cake was the only answer. :hug: