What Inspires You?

The last story is done and posted. Thirty-one. One for each day - a true marathon, second only to November's manic pace.

Some are good, destined to be enlarged into books and some are... not so good; okay, they'll probably never see the light of day again.

The stories are either fantasy or sci-fi, a change from two years ago when some were set in the modern age. I'm guessing it's because I've been reading lately.

Grandmaster writer, Anne McCaffrey, once said a writer's style is based on fiction reading material. A new writer will take elements of their favourite authors and blend them into a new, personal style.

When I was younger, Anne McCaffrey was one of my idols, though I don't think I've ever written a story with dragons in it.

I've got different fav authors now, each one an inspiration and each one with different styles across a number of genres. What they have in common is they inspire me.

I'd read Marion Zimmer Bradley, Andre Norton, Patrick Tilley or Robert Heinlein and I'd have to set pen to paper; it was an imperative, an irresistible lure... like that last square of chocolate. Other writers in different genres had the same effect: Nora Roberts, Tess Gerritsen, Tami Hoag, Maggie Shayne, Dean Koontz.

Today, it's David Weber, S.L. Viehl, Rachel Caine, J.D. Robb and others. I still read all the others, but they all conspire to influence how and what I write. All manage to provoke imagination through creative use of language, of evocative imagery; to raise the question of 'what if' to another level.

Every writer needs to challenge and be challenged. For me, the story-a-day marathon and Nano does that. The May marathon in particular, because before I started my first marathon in 2004, I'd never written a short story, decided I couldn't because my focus was on much larger pieces and to write so much in so few words, I felt was beyond me.

I found I really enjoyed the work. Not just the writing, but the prompts. Some meant thinking outside the box - a significant object is an elevator; your story is set in the desert and is about vampires - or getting around historic fact - a diamond is important; your story is set in ancient times (diamonds were called 'adamas' in antiquity).

More importantly was I found I could write short stories. Some were even pretty good.

Challenge plus inspiration equals success; you don't have to be published for the equation to work, just have an open mind.

What inspires you?

End game

So I have two more stories to write to complete the Forward Motion marathon.

Now comes the hard part: what to write.

After nearly a month of generator-produced prompts, the two left have me in a dilemma. Like what genre I want to write in? How long? Character profiles and so on.

This is the part of the marathon I dislike the most. I'm always tempted to carry on, although I put off a number of things in real life I need to get back to.

Still, thirty-one new stories isn't anything to sneeze at (sorry if you have the 'flu, swine or otherwise).

As luck would have it, this weekend - like today - the forecast is for wet, windy and cold conditions; just the kind of days that beg to be huddled up in front of the computer and bashing away at the keyboard.

I'm going to think of something interesting to write about, something new... come on imagination, show me whatcha got!

Simplicity

Okay, so me and the desktop computer have reached an agreement: if I plug the keyboard into the right USB Port, it will work for me.

Quite simple really...

Late to the party

I'm no Luddite, but it's finally dawned on me to upgrade. But not in any major way.

So, I spent the morning trying to track down the scent of melting plastic that's been hanging around the desktop computer.

I duly unplugged everything and checked all the leads - did some dusting, too - and rearranged plugs and cables, all to no avail. I could not find the problem.

Defeated, I put everything back and fired up the computer to see if it was just the dust (you know how dust bunnies are: feral, belligerent, ferocious). Everything worked perfectly... until I tried to log into my main e-mail account.

Uh-oh. No keyboard. Yer... what?? Nothing I did would connect the damn thing - it kept asking me for the software. Now, I keep all my software CDs filed, but do you think I could find the blessed thing? No. Not. HAPPY!! At all.

I shut everything down and went away to think about it. Have coffee, will brainstorm.

The solution was simple: "Use the laptop, my young Padwan, yooose the laptop!"

So I've connected the laptop to the broadband and I'm somewhat mollified. Of course, most people I know have rid themselves of the bulky tower unit and separate monitor; not me, I like the beast, but I fear it's time is at an end.

Sure, I'll find the keyboard software, but is it worth it? The system is slowing - my guess, because I can no longer get the automatic upgrades I need - installing new hardware, like a motherboard, extra ram, memory, etc, will be expensive since it's been, oh, four years since the last upgrade, and I have a perfectly good laptop that's less than eighteen months old.

I'll be saving space, too, and power connections, and I have mobility with the smaller unit.

This means I'm catching up with the modern trend of the laptop and printer only on a desk. All I need do now is remove the files, and bookmarks, I need from the desktop unit and move them.

Bummer.

Oh, and the burned plastic smell? I'll be damned if I can find it!

The Quintessential Aussie

Marina over at Pecked by Ducks expressed puzzlement over what 'uniquely Australian' might mean.

I think I have part of the answer.

In today's edition of The Sydney Morning Herald is a story entitled: Wedgies and petty theft tie up consular staff.

To quote Tim Elliott's story:

Touching up a Singapore Airlines flight attendant, giving drinkers 'wedgies' at Oktoberfest and pilfering bar mats from Phuket bars. Australians love to travel and are, it seems, finding ever more unorthodox ways of extending time overseas - even if it means bunking down in the lock up.

"Australians go everywhere, and everywhere they go they get into trouble," a senior official from the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade says. "It makes you proud."

It's the last comment that made me smile. It's the type of innocent, carefree roguishness, otherwise known as larrikinism, that identifies an Aussie abroad. Such behaviour is rarely malicious, more filled with mischief in the pursuit of a good time. We are, after all, the children of a penal colony, like Americans are the children of Puritans. That essential beginning colours our upbringing in a societal way.

Not that everyone has ambitions of petty larceny here or that all Americans are prudes. No, it's the ideology that sinks in through osmosis. (Okay, that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it.)

But it's difficult to translate that type of persona onto the written page; that positively identifies a character as being Australian unless a writer states as much.

For example, a southern drawl anywhere else means Texas or Louisiana, a southern state. Here, it's Victorian or Tasmanian - and we do have subtle variations on our accents - though you have to listen carefully.

I've read a number of books with Australian characters, though not Sandra McDonald, and I've been vaguely disappointed in the characterisation and speech patterns. But to write about a true Australian character, and there are many, would render the piece nearly indecipherable to overseas markets.

It's not just words like car boot (trunk), torch (flashlight), garbage bin (trash can), flats (apartments), chemist (pharmacy) and other words, it's the phrases as well, the comparative lexicon: dry as a burnt chip, up and down like a bride's nightie (or fiddler's elbow, if you want to be polite), flat out like a lizard drinking, the frog and toad, a dog's eye and sauce, a dangler or a jiggler.

Not the old cultural cringe, either, but an evolution of language. An Australian is laconic, a master of the understatement and the bleedin' obvious.

No wonder I love this country, for all it's idiosyncrasies and the harmless, innocently funny behaviour of its' people.

Melting

I shift my work between a desktop PC and the laptop. One is attached to broadband, and the other to dial-up.

Lately, though, every time I turn the PC on, there's a faint whiff of hot plastic, as if something is about to have a meltdown. I don't think that's a good thing, is it?

I haven't had the opportunity to get under the desk to see if it's cord or connection or something else entirely, so I've been using the laptop and the dial-up. Not so bad, but I like the comfort of my desk and chair, of being able to lean back and contemplate what I've written.

The lap top is on a table, not surrounded by my reference texts and the chair is just plain uncomfortable - not conducive to writing.

Still, until I find the source of the smell, I can't do much else, though I know I could use the laptop down there.

I have another distraction, too, whose name is S.L. Viehl.

I thought to sit down and read, but... no new books (I'm economising, don't you know), so I looked in my bookcase. Ah, Blade Dancer and the kick-butt, don't-mess-with-me Jory.

So, of course, I want more! I'll have to settle (snicker, snicker) for the StarDoc series and try to concentrate on the rest of the marathon, work and real life, while waiting for Crystal Healer to come out in August.

New Store

I was interested to see Scribd now offers the opportunity to buy uploaded books.

According to the press release, posted on Marketwire, Scribd is offering authors 80 percent of revenue. A nice little earner. For example, Douglas Clegg's Afterlife, sells for $3.50, has been read by 31,000 people. That's $108,000 in sales and $86,000 for Mr Clegg (note: I don't know how long the book has been for sale at the store, so in truth, it may not have earned anything. I'm just working on the figures available, but you get the idea). Like I said, a nice little earner.

Scribd is the largest social publishing arena in the world, so it has a lot of clout. Immediacy and economy being the biggest two. An author doesn't have to wait months or a year for their work to appear on the shelves, readers don't have to wait and both enjoy the economic benefits: An author, because they will get a larger slice of the pie, and the reader because they don't have to fork out big bucks in an industry where the publisher sets the price to cover their own costs first.

It's environmentally friendly, too. No more tonnes of returned books for paper bleaching and recycling.

But... there's another side to the issue: the quality of the available works, for one. Anyone can upload documents - I do - and the editorial quality on a lot of works is dubious at best, shockingly ill-educated at worst (grammar and spelling seem to be a burden few wish to carry any more).

Then there's the periphery of the industry: the booksellers, artists, editors, copy-editors, agents, deliverymen. And book tours... think about how that wouldn't work.

As with book stores, how much you earn depends on how many people buy your work, but the potential is both spectacular for authors to take back their earning rights and disastrous for the standard publishing industry.

Is this the way of the future and what are book publishers going to do about it? What can they do?

Real busy

Tough day with some emergency baby-sitting. Four kids, under the age of ten, all excited to be together.

Still, I managed to get some writing done. Let's hear it for DVDs!

Pissy

I've spent some time this week shaking my head.

The budget came out and was a non-event. Nothing great and nothing too bad, but then, the Government has consistently followed that idiot in White House - except we don't have sub-prime mortgages and the effect of the so-called Global Financial Crisis hit the expected industries, like commodities and tourism.

But... that wasn't good enough for K-Rudd. He and treasurer Wayne had to talk down the economy, creating an environment where companies let staff go, closed down temporarily and cut production in an attempt to save themselves. All so unnecessary.

And the Government has done nothing for the newly unemployed, thus an increase in mortgage defaults, regardless of the fact that the property market has barely rippled.

But I didn't realise how closely the top bodgies followed the big 'B', until Wayne stepped up to the plate and mentioned, "shovel-ready projects". Hmmm... seems I've heard this term before. Oh, wait, Barack Obama used the phrase.

Oh, and the $57 billion dollar deficit we have to have? Well, 49 billion of that was spent on handouts to less than fifty percent of the population before Christmas and in April. That money could have rescued the ailing health system.

* * *

On another point, I was standing at the local Chinese takeaway for lunch today, and I had to wonder whether anywhere else in the world would have this:

Everything is labelled - spring rolls, peking chicken, honey prawns, etc, in nice large letters and yet... a man walked up pointed to the pale, round objects labelled Dim Sims and said: "I'll have a couple of those meatballs."

What's Up?

Yes, I know, I've been slack in posting.

But I'm finally up to date with the marathon. Two short stories today and nothing... untoward happened. You know... life sometimes gets in the way of creativity. I've also been doing some editing and, as you can imagine, it takes time. And focus, since it's not my own work... though that doesn't sound right does it? No, I don't think so, but you know what I mean.

I don't suppose the pressure will ease until the first of June - something will interrupt my schedule, so I'm thinking of writing a few extras, just in case.

For me, the object of the exercise is to have a store of stories. I'll pick the eyes out of the bunch, edit, revise and send off. Those that don't make it, or are rejected, are the ones that turn up on my Takeaway. Of course, there are those that will nevvuh see the light of day again.

But that's the way it is: for every five or ten stories you write, maybe, maybe one will be interesting enough, written well enough to find a market. At least, that's my experience.

And it's practice, if nothing else, on how to be concise in getting the ideas across.

So, what's up with your writing?

Connections

I'm one story behind already.

Yesterday was sucky, where nothing I planned worked out. So. I'll have to write two on the weekend; no way am I doing it tomorrow, I gotta werk.

But you know, I'm writing these stories, six in all, and there of different people, in different time frames, about different things, and I can't help but feel they're all connected.

Oh, okay, sure, the connection is me, because I wrote them. But I don't mean that. They feel connected. So I'm wondering if the last story I write does, indeed blend them all together. One massive more-than-a-short-story-less-of-a-novella piece.

Or it could be I thought of connecting them all before I wrote the first and the idea won't die. I tossed the idea, originally, because I didn't want to write a whole bunch of vignettes.

Anyway, today was a Necromancer, in the Arctic, and about the effects of alien contact. Tomorrow? Well... there's the peasant with uncanny abilities in a land where magic is forbidden and it's about surrender. Or... there's the bodyguard in the jail in ancient times and it's about acceptance; a word is important. Or how about the female brewer in a machine in the future, where a pot plant is important and the story is about illusion?

I'll have to think on them, try and come up with a nifty twist. One thing I can say about story generators: they sure come up with some strange ideas...

Name game

Story number four is done and I'm checking out the generator for tomorrow's piece.

One thing though: It's great to have the protagonist - gender and occupation - a time frame, place and an important item chosen for you, but names... that's where the problems lie.

I mean, think about it: thirty-one stories, three characters minimum (protag, sidekick and villain). That's ninety-three first names, 186 if you give them a surname. And the number grows the more characters you toss in.

But... I no complain. There are some wonderful sites out there in cyber space just waiting for me to use. 20,000 Names has names from around the world, so if you want something a little unusual, try one from a different nation and corrupt it.

Baby Names will give you the most popular names, celebrity names or there's the 'cool name lists'. You could choose a name from, say Shakespeare, a spooky name, biblical names, and so on.

The National Hurricane Centre has some nifty names too; storm names nominated by various countries.

Want to know about names? Their meanings and or origins, ancient or modern? Behind the Name can tell you; and there are buckets of names.

Of course, the Seventh Sanctum doesn't just deal with story prompt, it has name generators, too; a whole list of name generators.

So there you go: more names than you can shake a whippy stick at! All you have to do is match an exotic, or not so exotic, name to your character.

Slow start

It took me all day to write two thousand words.

I'd write a sentence or two, then get up and do something else. Not because I was distracted by bringing the laundry in, or making coffee, or lunch, or watching the teev or getting the papers, but because I couldn't think of what came next.

It all came together in the end, but it sure as hell took a significant amount of time! Much to my frustration. The generators are throwing up some real twisted prompts that require some deep thought to... defeat without violating the intent. Of course, it's the twist at the end that's causing the most difficulty.

Still, it's not all bad news, it's early in the story-a-day marathon, and I'm confident things will improve, be it in style or in creativity. Because that's what I like about the marathon, it gets the creative juices flowing.

I may be out of practice - given I missed last year - but practice will improve my skills, so take note young Padwans! Practice your craft, you must, if your destiny you will find.

Tomorrow will be better. If I chose something tonight, I can think on it overnight; that's the plan anyway...

Well, that sucks

Ech... sometimes it doesn't pay to get out of bed.

First up, I slept in. And while snoozing away, unwilling to leave my nice warm nest, the dog got up and promptly fell down the stairs. Her eyesight isn't so good and she took a mis-step right at the top. So I leapt out of bed to make sure she was okay. She was. Embarrassed, but okay.

Next up, the computer and lo, I discovered the broadband had been on all night; no telling what evil little bugs got in. Then there was the urgent download from Microsoft... that turned out not to be so urgent after all.

Then there was the laundry to do and the accidental blocking of the outflow pipe... sigh. Time for the clean up.

Since that took time, I managed to be late to work. Worse, a colleague of mine died yesterday quite suddenly and so I created a special edition of the newsletter I produce. Then there were the copies that took me way beyond the end of the day. I didn't mind. Daphne was special. To the Museum and to the staff.

But... on arriving home, I found the evening repast way behind schedule, since my aged parent wasn't listening when I gave instructions.

Now it's late - not time-wise - but in starting the Forward Motion Story-A-Day Marathon. So here I sit, writing this and plotting a short story. I like to think I can finish a sucky day with something positive, but don't count on it...

No superheroes here please

Yes, well, that didn't work at all.

I really, really do not want a 'super hero' ending to this trilogy and that's exactly where it was heading. Sigh. Guess I'm deleting five thousand words or so and starting again.

And that's the problem. I've been rushing... again. Before I can write 'The End' on this piece, I have to finish it appropriately. Yes, with the death and destruction and the resolution of misunderstandings and the solution to the trilogy-long issue, but without the Ex Deus Machina leaping to my rescue.

I don't need rescuing, damn it, I need control and focus... and something really sneaky. Something a reader will not see coming.

This, of course, is part and parcel of life as an organic writer, although I assume it happens to writers who outline as well. Even when planning a book, I'm sure some writers suddenly strike a problem with the end and it has to be rewritten.

I gotta wonder though, how other writers of fiction involving people with... different abilities, be it vampirism, lycanthropy, psychic-ability, whatever, get around the lure of superheroism. Or do they just ignore it, not think of it, deliberately avoid the issue?

Characters must stay true to themselves regardless of the internal/external conflicts, the plot must unfold in a logical manner and so the end must be appropriate. Nope, I don't want my characters to join an amorphous organisation dedicated to the protection of humanity. That is just sucky. I even know where it came from:

My cable television decoder died and, while waiting for the new one to arrive, I mourned the loss of the programs I'd missed. Including Torchwood. In re-reading what I'd written, I found I'd put the line "We are outside the government... Definitely an eye-rolling moment and the catalyst for me dumping the five thousand or so words I'd done.

It was a cop-out. I'm so anxious to get this done and be ready for the short story gig, that I just wanted this book finished. I'm ashamed of that. It's a great trilogy and I treated it with less respect than it deserved. No wonder my mind gave me something so... ewwwie, cliched and downright laughable.

So. I shall think more on it and be more professional. And I'll come up with a wow ending, too.

Not the End

...and I said, "What? What?"

When I opened this last book for editing, I thought 286 pages a nice length for a novel and proceeded to hunker down and... well, edit.

But... (insert ominous music) at the bottom of page 286, the story ended at the cliffhanger finish of the scene! Egad! The book is... unfinished. I have no idea what I was thinking. Not for the next scene, but in not finishing the manuscript.

I'm still kicking titles around, too, for the trilogy itself. I should pout... but I need to complete this book before the Story-a-Day marathon begins later on this week, and so have no time to sulk... damn it.

I'm not sure how long the piece will be, but I've given myself another, hmmm, forty pages to wrap everything up. Death and destruction, emotional anguish, a triumphal return, the solution to a misunderstanding and a happily evah after. All I have to do is write it. Ten thousand words or so in three days? Oh... two, since the outside world will intrude on Wednesday.

Yeah, go ahead, chastise me for ellipse abuse, but ellipses are useful... don't you think?

Now... to work.

Procrastination

Brr, it's a bitey and windy Autumnal... nay, Winter's day. Near gale-force (poor Gail) winds actually, that nips at any exposed flesh.

And that makes it perfect for staying indoors, all nice and toasty warm, and werkin'. And so I have been. I'm on the last of eight books I've been reading through and making editorial notes on.

Of course, it then struck me to wonder how much note-taking is enough? The current set are about half a page - double spaced - for each book. Some are minor, like re-checking eye colours (okay, that's pretty major, not minor). Others are things like checking topography, increasing the length of scenes and adding descriptions. All in an effort to make a readable book, more readable.

Well, yesterday, I was reading the paper - as you do - and came across a book review on procrastination. I can't remember the name and I'm too lazy to go upstairs to check, okay? But if you wanna know, I find it...

What struck me about this review is that goes into detail about the whys and wherefores, in particular, perfectionism. Ah, yes, the idea that It Must Be Perfect before anything else happens.

I think everyone has heard of someone else who's worked on a book for years, usually the writing of it, without ever publishing it because it's just not right yet. And it pains me to admit that I'm probably suffering from the same malaise.

I'm scrubbing and polishing and note-taking on my books to make sure they're as perfect as they can be, and still wondering if they're at a publishable level. Sometimes, not such a bad thing - like when I discovered I'd changed two characters around in a sequel - but not always a good thing, either.

What am I going to do about it? We-ll, I'm undecided, actually. Recognising you have a problem is the first step, right? And I suppose the second is to do something about it... post something on Scribd or is that a cop out? You tell me.

Lest We Forget

Today is Anzac Day.

On this day, way back in 1915, Empire troops landed at Gallipoli, Turkey. Over the ensuing months, thousands died. Most were British, or Canadian, or Indian, but for Australians, this battle marked the first time a large scale Australian force engaged the enemy in the service of the Crown. (It is agreed that a force of about 20,000 went to South Africa over the course of the Boer war, but this fight was the first for Australia following Federation.)

More than the Somme, Gallipoli represents a 'trial by fire' for the ANZACs. Yes, we lost the battle, but out of failure came the image of the laconic, irreverent, courageous Digger.

For many years, Anzac Day meant watching old men march and reminisce, of watching two-up games, of standing around in cool weather and wondering when I could go home.

Since University and discovering the citation of why my grandfather was awarded the Military Cross, that attitude changed - as it did when I found relative who rowed the troops ashore on that dark morning so long ago.

Today is different. We have found the HMAS Sydney, sunk by the German raider Kormoran and missing for sixty years; we have discovered a mass grave at Fromelles of Australian soldiers killed in action and soon to be identified and honour; and we celebrate the courage of SAS trooper Mark Donaldson, VC, the first Australian soldier to be awarded the Victoria Cross in forty years for outstanding bravery in the face of enemy fire in Afghanistan.

But today we not only remember those who fell during conflicts throughout our history, we also think of those still on duty in combat zones in distant lands, doing their jobs with humour and determination and continuing the image of the laconic, irreverent, courageous soldier.

The long of it...

I've been busily reading through/editing books this past week - more than half a million words, or five books. Which is why I haven't been around much. I didn't want to read through one, then go back to the beginning, so I continued reading the trilogy, correcting as I went, then a duology, and today I'm back to the beginning for a final check.

It's hard work, enjoyable, but hard. All those characters, the dialogue, the situations kept in the back of the mind. Reading as if it a movie was playing, stubbing my toe on the the little things like eye-colour or name changes.

Still, it's all practice and it's all a learning curve. Rare is the writer whose first book is published, rarer still is the author's first book who scales the best seller list... but it's good to have ambition!

I don't think any writer will say they've perfected their craft - and that's what makes this endeavour attractive: there's always something new to learn.

And now... back to the salt mine... Oh, and I still don't have a title for the latest Nano! It's beginning to piss me off...

What to post?

Yep, I'm busily editing various books, thinking about covers and wondering which of these epics to post as a freebie...

Maybe I'll just stick the titles into a hat and pull one out.

Curiously enough, I still don't have a title - working or otherwise - for my last Nano. I've got to come up with something soon or I'll miss the free publishing over at Create Space.

Something to think about... in the meantime, back to it...