Living the Fictional Dream

This morning, when I checked my email, I found the proof for “Dinner for Three,” a story set in my superhero universe that is coming out in the next issue of A Thousand Faces.

There is something fun about looking over a proof of my very own story. It’s a little sneak peek as to what it will look like when it’s published. And a proof makes the acceptance real, at least to me. I may have had an email acceptance sitting in my inbox for the past six months, but now the story is actually here, right in front of me.

I also revised my bio, which was fun. I was able to mention my baby girl in it, which gave me a happy.

All in all, a very pleasant morning. I hope you all have some good news to brighten your day. And, hey, if you haven’t read issue 9 of ATF, click on the link above and check it out. There are some really good superhero stories in this issue, including one by my writing group mate, Stephanie.

Have you ever gotten a story idea that would be better in a different venue than your usual medium?

When I write, it’s short stories or novels, definitely prose. I wrote a screenplay once for a class during graduate school, and it was fun, but it’s not my usual thing. But every once in a while, I will get this “brilliant” idea that wouldn’t work well as prose, but would look great on screen.

I’ve had a plot bunny floating around for a year or so for a romantic comedy. The idea would be crap as a novel, but as a 2-hour movie, I think it would be great. It could star John Cusak and Amy Adams and pull the audience in with quick scenes and witty banter.

Too bad screen writing is such a crazy business. My understanding is that you can’t really break into it unless you’re in Hollywood and have an agent to book you pitch sessions with studios. And, also, probably more importantly, as I learned back in graduate school, writing screen plays is not really my thing. I’m not good at cut scenes, transitions, or even the really strict format that you have to use.

Also, I think horror is a really challenging genre to write. Not gross-out horror, but suspense. A lot of my favorite suspense and horror stories take place on the screen, where you have music and visuals to get that creepy feeling across.

Now, I’m not saying that horror can only be written for screen. The best sellers of Stephen King would prove me wrong there. But I guess writing horror is just not something I’m talented at. I can see this idea that I have for a scary story, but I don’t know how to write it as prose. It needs to have shadows that the watcher can see in the background and ample opportunity for the evil supernatural creatures to pop up for a big scare. It would make a great episode of a show like Supernatural.

The easy answer to this conundrum would be for me to try my hand at writing for the screen sometime. It might not go anywhere, but one never knows. And maybe while writing the screenplay, I would realize that I could actually write the story in prose instead and have my first best seller ready to go (yeah, right!).

If I had the time, I think I might do that. It would definitely be a stretch for me writing-wise. Maybe I could even do Script Frenzy, which is put on by the people behind NaNoWriMo. Sadly, the time for something like that will be a long time coming, though. If I have any writing time these days, it’s gotta be devoted to all of my regular writing. I don’t have enough time for that right now, much less random experiments.

However, it is fun to think about. And it is interesting when my brain decides to take a flight of fancy and go off in a new direction. I look forward to the day when I can follow that direction for a while and see where it leads.

Have any of the rest of y’all out there (oh, my dozen blog readers!) ever tried your hand at something really different from your normal style? Do you ever get the wild hair to write screenplays or poetry or just something entirely different from your writing bread and butter?

Poor little girl! She had to come with Mommy to the write-in last night. Poor Hubby was supposd to keep her, but he was not feeling well at all. I tried to find sitters, but to no avail. So, with me she came.

Bundled up in a car seat — not her favorite thing. Normally, she falls asleep in the car, but this time, not so much. She dozed on and off long enough for me to have dinner with Steph and Dauna and have some writing-type discussions (my favorite was a writing topic related to meatloaf… but I think you had to be there).

Then, just as I got out my laptop to, I’d hoped, finally finish revising the flash piece that my writing group critted for me back in August, I heard fussing. The baby wanted her own dinner (or is that second dinner, since she’d eaten less than 3 hours before?). For the first time since she was born, Mommy realized she’d forgotten to pack the bottle in the diaper bag. Luckily, home is only a 5 minute drive from the restaurant where we’d set up shop. Sadly, that meant I had to leave, writing undone.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I love my baby girl very much, and I will give up whatever I need to so that I can give her what she needs. But, selfishly, doing so last night was really hard.

When the baby first came along, it was full immersion and totally overwhelming. There was so much to do with the baby and she was so new that I didn’t want to do anything else but be with her. And it took a while to get used to having her, especially since she didn’t come home from the NICU for 3.5 weeks (she was a preemie).

These days, while the addition of the full-time job makes things more complicated, the baby care is getting more routine. Taking two or three hours off a couple of evenings a month seems a lot more doable than it did when she was so new and fragile.

Now, I’m really starting to miss writing. My fingers ache for the keyboard, and plot bunnies and characters are nibbling at my brain. Too bad there is never any time to give them attention!

Last night, I was so desperate, I tried to do some writing during my 4 a.m. pumping session (thanks to her time in the NICU, our little one spurns the breast, which means there are both pumping and feeding steps to do multiple times a day). Sadly, writing when I’m sleep deprived and dealing with baby care is not my best work.

Here’s hoping that next time (which will be the writing group’s NaNo planning meeting and kick-off party), babysitters will come through and I can have a tad of uninterrupted me time. I think my muse might rejoice if it happens… assuming she doesn’t leave me for more active environs in the mean time.

Wrimos all over the world are gearing up for the 2009 installment of National Novel Writing Month  (NaNoWriMo). It boggles my mind that it’s almost that time again already. Where did the time go? Weren’t we just doing that?

Of course, NaNo 2008 was the last big thing I did before finding out I was pregnant, so maybe that’s why it feels like it just happened. The time between here and there is a blur of nausea, labor, the NICU, having a newborn at home, and then leaving her at home as I transitioned back into my fulltime tech writer job. So, definitely some big events since last year.

My writing group is preparing to help our Wrimo members who will be competing in NaNo this year. It looks like we’ll have at least three participating. Go Wrinkers!

Sadly, I will not be amont them this year. Last year, I was able to juggle busy season at work and writing 50,000 words. It was hard and it aggravated my carpal tunnel, but I made it through. This year, though, doing all that with a baby in the mix? Yeah… there’s just no way.

However, I’m hopeful that I will be able to take advantage of at least a few of the write-ins that will abound in November to make progress on some of the stories I’ve been working on. I have a zombie flash piece that is almost finished. There is that rewrite request that I got, so I want to readdress that story. And some of my more recent rejections deserve a polish and another send-off into the world.

Lately, the only time I get to do writing-related things is when I’m at a writing group function (so, basically the monthly meeting and the monthly write-in). Those are the times when Hubby takes the little one and I can selfishly devote myself to my own interests for a few hours. I’m sure that will improve as the little one gets older and more self-sufficient, but that is quite a ways away.

Here’s hoping that the NaNo spirit will infect me in November and lead me to finish a few of my works- and revisions-in-progress. And I hope that my writing group mates, and any other Wrimos who might be reading this, have a great month full of thousands and thousands of words.

The premier of The Vampire Diaries on the CW this month led me to pull all my old L.J. Smith young adult novels off the back shelf where they had been collecting dust and give them a re-read for the first time since the ’90s. Strangely enough, I don’t actually own a copy of The Vampire Diaries book trilogy, but I have copies of what (in my opinion) were Smith’s better trilogies — Dark Visions, The Secret Circle, and The Forbidden Game.

It’s been fun to journey down memory lane by rereading these old books. I loved them when I was the right age for them. In fact, Dark Visions was one of several inspirations for one of my novels-in-progress.

But, reading them now, with much more writing experience (and life, too) behind me, I can recognize their flaws much more readily than I could back then.

I may come back and address other flaws in these books, as I can think of several, but today I wanted to talk about eye color.

For some reason, writers love to take liberties with eye color. Why have boring old brown or blue eyes when youre characters can have aquamarine, violet, or amber colored eyes?

Now, I will admit to having done this on occasion. One character in my urban fantasy ‘verse, a werewolf, has the distinguishing characteristic of ice blue eyes. Though, I did do some research — there are a few wolves who have blue eyes.

But these L.J. Smith novels take eye color way over the top. One heroine has pine green eyes. One hero has blue-gray eyes that, every time they are described, are comparied to the sea. A villain has eyes that are bluer than blue — described as the blue that you see when you close your eyes, an unearthly blue (though, he is a Shadow Man from an evil dimension, so maybe he has a right to crazy colored eyes). A villainess has eyes alternately described as amber and golden, which are paired with honey-colored skin and a mane of black hair. A supporting character is always described as having emotionless or cool gray eyes.

I think the lesson to be learned here is that character descriptions are a powerful tool for drawing your reader into your world and for helping them to remember a character. All characters really do need one feature that is uniquely there’s so that the reader can distinguish that character from all the rest.

However, that distinguishing feature does not always have to be the eyes. And if you use too many crazy eye colors in one story, it starts to feel absurd and/or cliche. Maybe just give one character unique eyes, and let other characters have something of their own — a unique hair color, thick eyebrows, unusual stature (tall or petite), large hands, etc.

Now I have the urge to revisit my young adult novel in progress and see how many crazy eye colors I put in there. I remember emerald green and violet off the top of my head. Uh-oh!

I recently received my first rewrite request from an editor. The story I submitted was a flash piece about a selkie. I would love to place this piece, so I will definitely attempt the rewrite. I wonder if I can get a first pass done before my maternity leave is over next week?

I appreciated that the editor’s request explicitly stated what they think the problem is with the piece so I know what needs to be addressed. And, I must admit, I agree with the editor. The basic problem is that the main character needs to have more at stake, more conflict, in the story. As it stands, the main character is more reactive than proactive — something I have to watch for in my writing. I did go back and try to give the main character in this piece a character change after her selkie encounter, but apparently that was not enough.

Now, I must ponder where to go next with this story… At least there is no restriction to keep it flash. The market in question accepts stories up to 4,000 words. I don’t plan to use that many, but adding more to the main character will probably require more words than I have left for it still to be considered flash.

Murphy’s Law strikes again. I haven’t gotten a story accepted in a few months (mostly because my submission and writing output have been down due to pregnancy and baby-related things), but, of course, during the time that our little girl has been in the NICU, two acceptances arrived.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m excited to be accepted, but, for one of them, the timing turned out to be disappointing.

First, though, let me say that a superhero flash piece that I wrote, “Frigid,” is going to appear in Every Day Fiction on August 21. And, look, my name is mentioned in the Table of Contents blurb. That’s a first! I’m excited to be back in EDF, as it’s one of my favorite short fiction publications.

The other acceptance didn’t work out so well. I won’t mention the name of the publication, but they emailed me on July 22 to accept my story for the August issue. To appear in that issue, I had to return the contract to them by July 29.

Maybe it’s just me, but what a short response window! Maybe I’m just used to most publications who accept you for months in advance? If only they’d accepted me for the September issue or something…

I won’t complain about their editorial policies. I understand, they have to do what’s best for their publication. And, I’m sure that they deal with story acceptances where they author disappears on them on a regular basis. I’ve read policies for dealing with that in many publications’ guidelines. So, from the editor’s perspective, I understand why they had to rescind their acceptance of my story.

On a personal level, though, I’m bummed. It’s frustrating that one of my few acceptances this year was rescinded because I was spending so much time at the hospital with my little girl that all my writing stuff (and most of my email in general) got left by the wayside. (Not that I would change a decision that I made — Summerlyn is the most important thing right now, and she’s doing really, really well. We’re hoping she’ll be home soon!)

The other thing that’s disappointing is the particular story in question that was rescinded. This story is cursed, I think. It was nearly accepted several times, but not. Then, the first time it was actually accepted, the ‘zine folded before they could published it. Now, it’s accepted again and then due to timing will still not be published. **sigh** Maybe I should give up on it!

While I have no hard feelings for the publication in question, I will say that this experience has made me appreciate EDF’s contract-on-submission method a lot more. It makes things so easy at the end of the process. There is no question that the story can be included in the issue in question and acceptances go off without a hitch.

In one of the SED stories that I wrote last week, my main character was the reluctant queen of a kingdom that was getting overrun by civil war. She and her daughter’s life were in danger after the king’s death.

For some reason, when I wrote this story, the queen did not have a name. I just referred to her throughout as “the queen” or by various pronouns. I don’t know why… maybe because it was such a short piece — under 1,000 words. Maybe I just hadn’t had enough time to get to know her yet and learn her name?

Then again, I have read some storie where the main character (sometimes stories where none of the characters have names) and I have enjoyed them. The technique lends a certain amount of mystery to the story. Not having a name is a barrier between the reader and the character, and sometimes that barrier can be put to good use.

But, sometimes I’ve read nameless stories and just been irritated by them. So, as with many writing techniques, it probably depends most heavily on the skill of the writer who created the story and character in the first place. What some writers can pull off, others can’t.

Ultimately, this is a choice that I would not make in too many stories. Overuse of the nameless technique would not be a good thing. Also, I think it’s something better limited to shorter stories. Too much “the queen” would get really old — in an 8,000 word story, no way! (Of course, there is an exception to every rule — I could see writing a longer story about some kind of anti-social character and not using a name because he doesn’t attribute one to himself. It would have to be well done and it would have to be a compelling character detail).

If I got back to this SED story, I think I will give the queen a name and move on from there. She has more of a story to tell, and I think she could be a very personable character given a chance (and a name!). But the idea of writing without one on occasion is intriguing.

…14 more to go.

I was thinking this SED contest required 14 stories total, then I realized, since we start and end on a Wednesday, it’s actually 15 stories total. Wowzers.

I’m just glad to have one written!

Six members of the group turned in a story for yesterday, which is awesome turn-out, in my opinion. Congrats to all of y’all!

And now I must find an idea for today’s story. There is something pecking at the back of my brain about a superhero ball, but I can’t quite suss out what the plot would be.

The sad thing is that I kept having these little story ideas recently, but I was saving them for the SED contest. But now the ideas all seem to have flown away. I knew I should have made a list! Curses!

I didn’t end up actually writing at my writing group’s write-in last night (hmm… how many times can I get a form of the word “write” into one sentence?). But, I’m pleased with the way I spent my two hours.

I dug back into my pool of rejected stories and found new markets to target them to. My writing group makes goals for writing-related tasks that we will hold each other accountable for accomplishing between meetings. My goal for the next meeting was to submit a story. I did one better last night and submitted two. Go me!

Lack of writing (be that because of work, the baby, or just a stellar lack of motivation) is one reason that my publications have tapered off so since January. But, the other reason is that I have not kept on top of my rejections. The best thing to do is get a rejection and send the story right back out again (or, if needed, revise and then submit again, depending of the story). It’s important to keep stories in circulation!

Add these two stories to the two that I submitted at the end of May, and now I have four stories making the rounds again. It’s definitely progress! Perhaps the end of the year will hold a few more publications for me than the beginning has. If one of the four were accepted, I would call it a win.

And, in the meantime, no matter what happens with those four stories, I do have two upcoming publications to look forward to. I will have a story (”The Last Ball at Concord House”) in the first issue of 10Flash later this summer, and one of the later issues of A Thousand Faces this year will feature a superhero short story that I wrote last year (”Dinner for Three” — a story that can loosely be termed a sequel to “Bridge Club”).

Oh, and speaking of superhero fiction, the new issue of A Thousand Faces is available, and it features an amusing flash piece from writing group mate, Jens. It is even set in Fort Worth! Give it a look when you have some time.

Happy writing and submitting, every one!