Backup?

Backup!

I zip the text file and send it to myself as an attachment in Gmail.

If you don't backup your stuff - the irreplaceable stuff - then I don't want you here.
Don't want you reading my blog.
I want you to go very calmly, but without further delay.
Find yourself a mental institution, preferably an old fashioned one.
Seek out those who are of your variety.

And remember that a white coat means friend!

Your best friend!


Shoo!

Poetry

Poetry as a means for writing better fiction.
My teacher holding the poetry sessions is very enthusiastic and inspiring and had me convinced that poetry is actually important stuff. I have not thought much about poetry before, and have thought even less of it.
The last thing I'd call it would be important.
What ignorance. One reason I've ignored it for all this time is that there's so much of it. I blocked it out like I have with so many things I know nothing about. Where do I start? I have more than once been advised to check out Manga, to write scrips for a market that is bigger than ever. It's probably good advise. But I have had dreams where I see a ship coming in at the harbor. It's ten kilometers long, with a million containers packed with Manga. And I open one of the containers and I get buried by an avalanche of books. All in Japanese. Then I wake up. Haven't had nightmares about poetry but you get the idea.
There is one of book of poetry in the reading list of the course so now the problem of choosing one to get started is solved. It's called Staying Alive. 
And no, I'm not buying the 'higher power' or the 'destiny' stuff. It's not interesting whether it is for real or not. But I'll come back to the issue some other day.
Poetry is important for the same reason science fiction is. It makes us see the world from new perspectives. It keeps us awake. This guy is very much alive so I know he's right. I need this poetry stuff to come back from the dead and to write. I write some lines everyday now. Little notes about anything.
It's a little like when I write lyrics but the lyrics took months to get done, cause of the boundaries of the music. The emotional state of the subject has to fit that of the music, and the scope of it has to be right for the length of the song. And it's the number of syllables in every line, it has to be singable, it has to rhyme to make it easier to remember the lines, and the lines might need to help the melody become clear. And as I had the idea of become a songwriter not a singer/songwriter the lyrics had to be impersonal.
Anyway, writing lyrics was not a means for clearing up my thoughts on the world around me. I used to postpone all ideas and commentary stuff for an imaginary essay on 'The Subject'. I have this notion that everything is connected to everything else and all boundaries are artificial, unnecessary and even evil, and that leaves us with only one subject, The Subject.
The world doesn't need an essay about absolutely everything at once. And I don't need to write it, like if I ever could.
And my novel doesn't need to be cluttered with a lot of stuff that doesn't belong in it.
I write poems instead about the stuff that is personal, private, or just stems from the thoughts the ADHD-engine in the brain keeps producing, endlessly, continuously, no matter what. Poetry help sorting it out. My brain has no gland that does that on automatic like the rest of you seems to be blessed with. "Oh another fruit fly!"
A poem is done in a matter of minutes or hours. No need to postpone it. No need to make everything a project for the future.

I catch a thought on a piece of paper
Don't care if it rhymes or will ever be read
At least, at last, it's out of my head

Fantastic invention this, poetry.
Is this the stupidest the thing you've ever heard? Of course it is. But as I said, being ignorant is punishing the ignorant the most. So no need to rub it in, right?
Don't worry. I am not giving up on the novel to become a poet.
Actually, the poetry is a cornerstone in getting it done at all.
Funny thing also is the character in the story, the legendary Miguel, whose poetry is the basis for the existence of the Oasis, the movement that becomes the resistance to the tyranny, which is the actual story.
Subconsciously I have already decided more than a year ago to write poetry at some stage as this was the first character I invented. I have ignored him ever since. But the time has come to write his poems. Maybe The Premise will reveal itself when I do.
Another thing about being a writer is that you can be as crazy as you like and always say: 'Oh I'm just trying to see the world from a characters viewpoint.'
So this week I'll be the legendary Miguel who died some centuries ago, fifty light-years away on a planet named Quira, where life was much like it is on Earth but were society was going in a direction it hopefully isn't here...
I wonder if the poetry of Miguel would be Science Fiction Poetry? Oh yes, there is such a thing! Has been around since the seventies.

Give Them Hell

That is, give your characters hell. Don't take them for a joyride. Unless it's an adventure you're writing. I find this difficult because I like the characters and because I'm in their heads. And giving them hell is a bit like exposing myself to terrible things. I've got a post-it-note on the computer with HELL written on it. It's still difficult. But I'm getting better at it.

Today I'm putting my main character in a plastic bag, destined to be dumped in the ocean, so I have to imagine what that would be like. It's very tempting to watch some television instead. Or even do the dishes. Should sort out the laundry too. Put the shirts on hangers and the sweaters in the drawer, and pair up the socks. 

Pair up socks? 

No I'd rather be forced into a plastic bag by a couple of lobotomized  cops...

The Premise

Without it, you're not going anywhere. That's in all the how-to-write books I've read this far.

Obviously it's important. But I don't get it. And I don't get my story's premise. Maybe I shouldn't get it, but decide. I'm not good at deciding. I know that it's in there already. I ignore the matter for now and keep writing. I have to keep that up. The most important aspect of the project this far is to keep the writing going. The critic lurking in my head has been very active lately, and I don't want that beast growing to strong.

I promise I'll come back to the mysterious premise...

Today I'll just write.

Keep it Clean

Well, I'm not saying you shouldn't use any dirty words. No, it's writing properly from the beginning. Clean the text up continuously. Don't postpone this even if it just the first draft. It's easy to think you could leave this for later, but you will be sorry.

Because sitting there with hundreds of pages with grammatical errors, misspellings, and half finished sentences can be the final straw that keeps you from ever finishing the story.

And you can't get anybody's opinion about it this far because it won't be readable.

And you don't get any faster as a writer if you don't practice getting the grammar and the spelling right - continuously.

I'm using an application called Grammarian for the grammar and the spelling. It has a couple of bugs, and it isn't perfect. But it's much better than the built in grammar and spell checking on the Mac, and it's better than the one that comes with Microsoft Word.

Read, read, read...

When you compose music, the rule is simple: don't listen to music while you're at it. If you feel as though you have to, at least choose music that is fundamentally different from the stuff you're composing.

When you write prose: do read a lot. You aren't as likely to unconsciously steal stuff as you are with the abstract melodies and harmonies of music.

I find this part of the process to be quite time-consuming, but I don't get anything done without it.

I'm reading stuff that I can compare to my story in one way or another.

And I have made a list of the novels I've been reading since I started on this project.

I have written a few notes with each book; they are not really reviews but comments as how they connect to my story, why I read them and what I learned from them.

It's mostly science fiction, but some are as far from science fiction you could possibly get.

I devoted a page of it's own for this.