Day Off, Day On
Apr 30, 2010 Daily Writing
Two early morning meetings for my real job put the brakes on any real progress yesterday, so I decided to take the day off from word creation. This represents the first day I haven’t created words in probably a month. I’m not sure, really. I should probably be tracking it.
Regardless, today I jumped back into the pilot sub-plot, and got it down to about the last thousand words. The basics should finish tomorrow–or maybe at lunch today if I get the right kind of break.
Typosphere.com. The world’s second most boring blog. [grin]
Zombies, Grass, and Other Fancy Stuff
Apr 28, 2010 Daily Writing, Life, Novels, Other Writers, Short Stories
I admit I’m not an expert in the field of zombie stories, but I’ve got to think Maureen McHugh’s The Naturalist is a really outstanding example.
For those of you who mow the lawn with self-propelled push mowers, here’s a little learning I had last night…when the self-propeller dies, those things are a pain in the tush to use. Yes, I passed up a trip to the gym yesterday after work in order to take advantage of the weather and cut the grass. I was actually bemoaning the fact that I wouldn’t get a full workout in, but the fates apparently listened. An hour’s work pushing along a 9,000-ton piece of equipment can totally kick your butt.
I know, my life is tough.
Progress:
I’m coming to the end of this little dalliance of mine to clean up my pilot sub-story–at least I’m coming to the end of this pass at it, anyway. I’m liking how the characters are working, but my spider-sense is tingling and I’m thinking I’ll need a later pass at it to make the rest of its message resonate at the book’s scope. Bottom line at this point is that I’m feeling myself learn again–which is great. Attempting to pull this bit into a stand-alone short story was a great decision, regardless of whether it ends up fully working or not.
Piecing Things Together
Apr 27, 2010 Uncategorized
I pulled all the threads of my “pilot story” together to look at them as a stand-alone short story. Strangely, they came up to–you got it–right at 9,500 words. I seriously wonder if I’m ever again going to write a story that doesn’t weigh in at something other than 9-12K.
This was an interesting process, though. It’s helped me see the ebbs and flows of it, and see even more places I need to file away a few rough edges. I’m going to work on this for a day or two, and I expect then that I may be able to move on.
Finally.
So, What Do You Hear?
Apr 26, 2010 Science
I hear “No Way,” which is a little disturbing given the explanation.
Recommended Listening
Apr 25, 2010 Daily Writing, Other Writers, Science Fiction
I’ve mentioned a time or two that I’m spending quite a bit of time at the gym the past few months, and that this has given me quite a bit of opportunity to listen to various podcasts. I thought it was only proper that I mention a few pieces that I’ve particularly liked.
If you have an iPod or other MP3 player of your choice (and, let’s face it, who doesn’t?) and a half-hour drive anywhere, you could do worse than listening to a few of these:
Rememberance is Something Like a House by Will Ludwigsen published by PodCastle.
This is a really nice tale of a house that takes a trip from Ohio to Florida–a premise that sounds funny, but is most decidedly not. Highly recommended.
The Next Invasion by Robert Reed published by TOR.com
Robert Reed is one of my favorite short fiction writers. Of course, since I don’t have tons of time I read mostly short fiction, so I guess I should say he’s one of my favorite storytellers and leave it at that. “The Next Invasion” is interesting in every way.
Progress Today (so far):
Now that I’ve got the basic story of my two pilots pretty much figured out and two-thirds of their story told, I took the morning to fix up the world around them. I also received a special gift of about 300 words that jumped into the last part of their story. I love it when that happens.
Assuming my brain is still working this afternoon, I’ll go back and see what damage I can do to their story.
