Getting My Voice Back with NaNoWriMo

This year has been very stressful and strange for me. I'm separated and living in my own place now, but getting here involved a lot of work, tension, and pain, and I just could not write fiction for most of the year.

My NaNoWriMo novel cover.

CC image by J.K. Nilssen, with title added (no other modifications).

I had a few promising fiction ideas, but nearly every time I thought about writing, an awful feeling of emptiness would stop me from doing it. Then I saw friends of mine excitedly getting ready for NaNoWriMo, and I thought that maybe the speed of writing required, and the friendly competition, could get me to set aside my perfectionism and self-editing and really allow myself to write a ROUGH draft, an approximation of the story. Anything that I could work with later, because writing something is much better than writing nothing. So I'm doing it! I started late, on the third day of the month, and I'm up to 6,300 words so far. That's short of the target for today, but not by much, and I still have time for at least a couple more writing sprints today. I'm rewarding myself with bragging and chocolate every time I finish a sprint!

In the meantime, the Kickstarter for my next anthology is almost at its end, but not fully funded yet, so if you'd like to be a helper, please check it out and tell your friends about it! Not Our Kind: Tales of (Not) Belonging. 

Ten Books for a Desert Island

The eternal question: which ten books would you want to have if you were stranded on a desert island for the rest of your life? This is what I'm pondering, as I stare down summer (yesterday, coincidentally, was the last day of the school year for my three sons). I have not yet read and will not ever get to read everything, but for me, today, this is the set of books I would choose.

Your mission, should you choose to accept it: Take a look at my list and comment below with books you think I would like, based on the books I'd be willing to read over and over for the rest of my life. There are no wrong answers! Your opinion counts around here!

Story Collections

It's a challenge to write a short description of a whole book of short stories, so I'll tell you the things these collections have in common: excellent prose, very strange circumstances in every story, menace and conflict within and without the characters, and my total envy because those people wrote these stories and I didn't.

• Mother Aegypt and other stories, by Kage Baker.
• At the Mouth of the River of Bees, by Kij Johnson.
• Pretty Monsters, by Kelly Link.
• In the Palace of Repose, by Holly Phillips.
• The Bible Repairman and other stories, by Tim Powers.

Tips for Giving Useful Story Critiques

It's currently fashionable to give brutal critiques for fiction. The idea is that for a writer to improve at writing, she must receive the most blunt, strongly-worded responses possible from the people who evaluate her work. This will toughen her up. If she can't take this type of criticism, she is told, she will never, ever make it as a writer.

I'm not so sure that we need to be this extreme about critiques. A critique is a detailed analysis and discussion of a literary work. I think that, too often, people are encouraged to shift from a critical analysis of a story's merits and faults to being critical, or "inclined to find fault or to judge with severity, often too readily."

We speak English. We have so many words to choose from. You can clearly express thoughts about a story's strengths and weaknesses without being brutal, and without being too soft and fuzzy. There's a middle ground. For the purposes of this post, I'll think in terms of critiquing a short story, but this stuff should all be applicable to novels, essays, and even poetry.

On to my tips!

WisCon Book Haul

Over the weekend, I spent a lot of time at WisCon 37, socializing and doing my best to make sure other writers don't starve (also known as buying books, my favorite strategy). I feel the need to tell you what I selected.

Before and Afterlives, by Christopher Barzak. From the back cover: "These are tales of relationships with unearthly domesticity and eeriness: a woman falls in love with a haunted house; a beached mermaid is substituted for a lost missing daughter; the imaginary friend of a murdered young mother stalks the streets of her small town; a teenage boy is afflicted with a disease that causes him to vanish; a father exploits his daughter's talent for calling ghosts to her; and a wife leaves her husband and children to fulfill her obligations to a world from which she escaped." In case you were wondering what kinds of things I like to read about in short stories, now you know. It sounds like a great collection, and I have already enjoyed reading the first story in the book, "What We Know About the Lost Families of – House."

Seeing Things, by Kater Cheek. Description: "Coffee shop barista (and part-time treemaker) Kit Melbourne’s life turns upside down when her tea-leaf reading brother predicts that someone will rob her, break her heart and oh yeah, murder her. Kit suspects it has something to do with the priceless jewel she inherited from their infamous witch uncle. As the jewel’s powers begin to reveal the secret, supernatural side of the town of Seabingen, Kit realizes she has to uncover the mysteries of her uncle’s past, to find out which of his many enemies wants the jewel badly enough to kill for it." I've read enough of Kater's short stories to know that I enjoy her writing style, and I'm always psyched up to read about the secret, supernatural side of anything.

Trampoline: An Anthology, edited by Kelly Link. This book is not new—it came out about ten years ago—but I had been meaning to get this for a long time. It is a matter of public record that I'm a huge fan of Kelly Link's stories, so I'm certain that other stories she chose to put together will also make me very happy.

Scatter, Adapt, and Remember: How Humans Will Survive a Mass Extinction, by Annalee Newitz. From the book jacket: "In its 4.5 billion–year history, life on Earth has been almost erased at least half a dozen times: shattered by asteroid impacts, entombed in ice, smothered by methane, and torn apart by unfathomably powerful megavolcanoes. And we know that another global disaster is eventually headed our way. Can we survive it? How?" You might not know this about me, but this topic is something I fret about. A lot. I'm also curious about what other people have to say about it. Given the fact that Annalee Newitz is a particularly interesting person (and also fun to chat with!), I can only believe that this book will be just right for me, especially since it seems to be angled toward fascinating science and optimism.

Which books have you picked up lately?

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Disclosure of Material Connection: None! I have not gotten and will not get any financial compensation for mentioning these books. I don't do affiliate links.

WHAT day is it? My Best Reads of 2012

A bunch of lie-mongers are conspiring to tell me it's the day before the last day of January in the year 2013. RIDICULOUS. But just in case that might be possible, here's my list of the books I enjoyed most out of the fifty I read in 2012. Most of the books were not actually published in 2012, but I want to tell you about the ones I liked best. If I took the time to write reviews of each, you might see this list sometime next year or perhaps in 2015, so let's just keep it simple. I can stand behind these with complete confidence, so look them up if you want to read something good!

Novels

The Handmaid's Tale – Margaret Atwood

Thunderer – Felix Gilman

The Dead Zone – Stephen King

The Night Circus – Erin Morgenstern

Ready Player One – Ernest Cline

Story Collections

The Universe in Miniature in Miniature – Patrick Somerville

At the Mouth of the River of Bees – Kij Johnson

After the Apocalypse – Maureen F. McHugh

Eyes Like Sky and Coal and Moonlight – Cat Rambo

In the Palace of Repose – Holly Phillips

Anthologies

(I didn't read many of these in 2012)

Dark Faith, edited by Maurice Broaddus and Jerry Gordon

Brave New Worlds, edited by John Joseph Adams

Non-fiction

Steal Like an Artist – Austin Kleon

To Each Their Darkness – Gary A. Braunbeck

Adventures in the Screen Trade – William Goldman

500 Ways to Be a Better Writer – Chuck Wendig

Making a Good Writer Great – Linda Seger

November: It Happened. Get Over It (plus book recommendations)

Hello! I was pleased with myself for writing a summary of things I did in October, so I'm back to tell you all about my November.

For most of the non-holiday part of last month, I worked on two things:

1. My interview with amazing artist Todd Lockwood that is now part of the December issue of Clarkesworld Magazine.

2. A short story called "Quintuple-A." I wrote it for an invitation-only anthology, but it'll be a couple of months before I find out if the story will be included or not. I will let you know about that, of course. My first readers said the story was "Terrific!" and "FUN!" Luckily, I was aiming for terrific fun. :)

I read some great books:

Mother Aegypt - Kage Baker (re-read)

More Than Human - Theodore Sturgeon (re-read)

At the Mouth of the River of Bees - Kij Johnson

500 Ways to Tell a Better Story - Chuck Wendig

2k to 10k: Writing Faster, Writing Better, and Writing More of What You Love - Rachel Aaron

I have to say that Kij Johnson's story collection, At the Mouth of the River of Bees, should be required reading from now until human beings either go extinct or evolve into something else, and possibly after that, too. The link goes to the paperback version, but it's also available as an ebook. The only thing I'll get out of this recommendation is the hope that more people will read this book!

I've been doing a lot of re-reading lately. The idea to do that came from my realization that many books I had read and loved were not doing me much good just sitting on a shelf in my house, and that furthermore, I had forgotten the details about why I loved many of them in the first place. I'd rather be familiar with a few great books than just barely acquainted with hundreds of merely-good ones, but at the same time I don't want to stop discovering new books altogether. My plan is to do a combination of re-reading and new-to-me book discovery.

On to other entertainment! Last month I went to my second Amanda Palmer show, this one in Milwaukee. I loved seeing the way the band performed a similar set of songs in a different venue, under different circumstances. This time Amanda was dealing with the effects of bronchitis, but she was amazingly energetic, anyway, and I loved the show. The one in Minneapolis was more polished, but the one in Milwaukee was friendlier, I thought. This one guy in the audience kept yelling "Brian!" after every song, referring to the drummer from Amanda's other band, the Dresden Dolls, and eventually she brought the guy up to the stage to have a talk with him about living in the now. The band played some different songs this time, too, including one by the drummer's other band, The Few Moments, called "Magicfuturebox;" that has become one of my new favorite songs. You can play it, and the others on his new album, if you click the band link.

I watched a few movies in November, too. Safety Not Guaranteed is an adorable, quirky film about a journalist and two interns investigating a classified ad from someone seeking a partner for time travel. I saw Life of Pi in 3D. I recommend 3D if you're going to see it, because the movie's appearance was my favorite thing about it. I haven't read the novel (I hear that it's excellent), and I went into the theater with no idea what to expect. There were some powerful moments, but there were stretches when I fidgeted and wondered how much longer the movie would go on. I'm not sorry that I saw it, but I'm too ambivalent to really recommend it. The other movie I saw was an older one: Farewell, My Lovely (1975), a mystery thriller starring Robert Mitchum and Charlotte Rampling. I thought the dialogue was great, and the historical setting was done well. I'd watch it again.

This month I'm finishing a science fiction story I started to write a few years ago as part of a speed-writing exercise. It was interesting, but at the time I had other things to work on, so I set it aside. Now I have a promising outline, but I still need to decide how it will end. And there will be a long holiday for my sons at the end of the month, so I think that's all the fiction I'll write until next year.

There's always the chance that I'll blog again before another month goes by, but I'm going to go ahead and say "Happy Holidays!" right now. If you're someone who feels down around this time of year for any reason, know that I'm hoping good things for you!

Short Stories vs. Long Stories (and Flailing!)

This morning I started to write a post about science fiction and fantasy conventions, but I am so not in the mood for that post. Maybe it will have its time next week. Today I'm all bummed and aggrieved about the way my writing has gone this summer. I'm my own little maelstrom of drama and despair* over here. So let me tell you about my problem.

I WANTED TO WRITE A SHORT STORY.

Yeah. So I was starting to put together ideas for a novel (and I'm sure you'll hear about that at great length in the future, so brace yourself in advance, my friends. Brace). But then I thought, you know what? It's summer. The kids are home more than usual and the schedule is changing around because of their various activities and classes, and then I'm going to WorldCon in August and all, so why don't I just write a short story or two, just for practice, you know? Quick stories. Short ones. [Because this is roughly the way I talk to myself, in case you were wondering. Throw in some angst here and there and this is the real thing.]

And I sat down and used some of my nifty, obsessive lists that I've made for putting together ideas and what-ifs. These lists are truly a spectacle. I may try to explain them someday as well, but it may take a few posts to get into all that. Anyway, with the aid of the epic lists, I got a notion, worked up a character, and started to create a story throughline (as I like to do, given my outlining ways). It took me longer than I'd like to admit to recognize that I had a brand-new novel idea on my hands. Also, it was in better shape than the other novel idea I'd been thinking about.

So what went wrong? Time went wrong.

Looking back over my relatively successful short stories, I see that the two that will be published soon cover short time periods. The events of "Three Transformations" take place within a few hours, with most of the action happening within about fifteen minutes, and it's 4,700 words long. "Running in Wonderland" isn't actually a short story; it's a novelette. It covers almost exactly twenty-four hours, and it is 9,500 words long. The story that made me a semi-finalist in the Writers of the Future Contest covered a week of story time, with many time-jumps across summarized activity. What do these three stories have in common? They all exist only because I was invited to submit stories to three anthologies. The first two made it in, and the third one was short-listed before it got rejected, but then it did well in Writers of the Future. I had no trouble with the word counts of those stories, because I was following someone else's rules. The stories wouldn't be successful if they were too long, so I didn't make them too long. I follow guidelines given to me by other people. Evidently when I'm making my own rules for a story-to-be, I'm secretly open to breaking them.

I don't have all that much to complain about. I wanted a short story idea, but I got a good novel idea instead. I also learned that if I want to write a short story that stays short, it's a good idea to set limits on how much time the story's events will take. Finally, the most important thing I've gotten out of all this is that if I make a rule for a project, I need to mean it!


*I have been known to exaggerate. FYI.