No Net
Posted on August 15, 2006
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I’m happy to report that “Futures”, a feature of Nature magazine, has agreed to publish my short story “Picasso’s Cats.” It’s a fun little piece that I wrote one night at the Writer’s of the Future workshop. Much fun.
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The collaboration with John is coming along. It currently stands at about 6K words, and is back with him. This leaves me with the specter of deciding what to do next. My original intention was to jump into writing something new. I’ve managed, however, to convince myself that this is not the wisest course of actions. Instead, I’m looking at my novels. Yes, that’s right–I have novels that need to hit the market.
A few of them are technically still on the market. By that, I mean I have previously sent them to editors and have not heard anything from them. I think, however, that after three years I can enact the statute of editorial limitations and assume I’m free to submit them elsewhere. So I’ve been looking at my inventory the past day or two.Novels are such different beasts from short stories. Working on one feels different. I look at the screen and see some 200 words, but I feel the weight of the work’s entirety. It’s daunting in a way. A couple weeks ago, Lisa and I visited Chicago’s Art Institute. Her favorites are the impressionists–Renoir and Monet are her Led Zeppelins of the art world. [grin] It’s an amazing feeling to be standing up close to a masterpiece, to see the individual brushstrokes and the choice of color, and to realize that the painter–at arms length–could not actually “see” the piece. But as he stepped back the entire thing fit into place. I can imagine Monet’s sense of satisfaction as he found things that worked.
Writing a novel is like that, except there’s no way to really step back and take in the whole thing at once. A novel is a messy piece of reality that way. As an “artist” (nice pretentious word, eh?) you’re working blind and without a net. You apply your keystrokes up close and you hope they work. No. You don’t hope. I don’t think a real writer hopes their stuff is working. I think a real writer knows it works.
Right now I’m a real short story writer. I know pretty much when I’ve written something short that works. I also know scene-by-scene if something is working at a novel length. But still, after writing drafts of what–seven different novels?–I would be reluctant to say that I really understand what makes a novel work.
I said above that the novelist is working without a safety net. That’s true, I think. But as I sit here thinking about it, I see this is faulty thinking because it’s incomplete. Writing is like life. There is no safety net. To think otherwise is, perhaps, to have already lived at half-throttle.
Anyway.
It’s time to get them out there.
So I will.
Nano Problems
Posted on August 14, 2006
Filed Under Life | Leave a Comment
Brigid got me an iPod Nano for Father’s Day, meaning that I’ve slowly been pulled into something closer to the modern age. I’m a real Renaissance Man. Of course, I rn into problems with it last week. It … er … died–as in the screen went blank and I couldn’t get it to operate.
Three hours on the Apple site gave me several ideas on what to do next. I explored all the easiest options, but none worked. My issue was such that after that point, all the options required me to start with a drained battery and then recharge. Seeing as the process to drain a Nano battery takes many hours, I’ve spent much of the last week performing a troubleshooting tip each morning, then (when it failed) leaving it to drain for 24 hours before starting all over again.
The good news is that as of this morning, it appears that the Nano is working.
But, needless to say, this was a little frustrating and more than a little bothersome.
It makes me double-clutch when I think of all those Mac/PC commercials that Apple is running.
Half the Way There
Posted on August 11, 2006
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I apologize to you few who are out there reading, but I just didn’t get time to improve on my weak-bottomed entry yesterday. Sorry.
Not that today’s will be much better. [grin]
I’m working heavily on the Bodin collaboration right now. John’s done a bunch of work getting it to a spot, and now I’m trying to take it a bit further before doing the tag-you’re-it thing. The problem is that where I want to go has required me to go back and tweak a bit of what John wrote–we do that a lot…two steps forward, three back. Whoever said collaborating was double the work for half the pay wasn’t far off.
But, honestly, you collaborate for fun. Or, at least that’s what I’ve done in the past, anyway. And John’s a fun writer to work with. He’s a idea pack-rat, and full of interesting tid-bits. I never know what he’s going to get around to.
On the other hand, this story has been a bit more messy than the other two we’ve done. It hasn’t been as focused, and we’re discovering the plot as we go. This is a hard way to write as an individual, and requires even more patience while collaborating.
Regardless, I think we’re about at the halfway point.
Have a great day.
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About Ron
Ron Collins has appeared in Asimov's, Analog, Dragon, and several other magazines and anthologies. His writing has received a Writers of the Future prize, and a CompuServe HOMer Award. He holds a degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Louisville, and has worked developing avionics systems, electronics, and information technology.
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