Author In Progress

[ninjawolf]

Hello

I have written a few peses most kinder short
Working up to writing something longer at the moment
in a state of continues improvement

[Geekviking]

greetings peoples of the interwebs, tis I, Nik, ruler of far away undigitized lands.

the best way to describe myself I guess (in the context of this particular forum) is an aspiring writer, with firm emphasis on aspiring. I love stories, I love plot lines, I love seeing how characters work their way through their troubles like some sadistic god. I love watching a story weave its way in front of me whether it be a book, a movie, video game, graphic novel. Sadly my attempts at weaving my own story threads have left much to be desired. a few half hearted attempts at fanfiction and one piece of original fiction that I crafted when i was in high school and only recently remembered that I had. its on fictionpress if anyone wishes to gaze upon it (just ask and I will provide a link) but I wont torture the unwilling.

I am here to mostly gain inspiration from my fellow writers as a will to work and the focus to see my work through is something that I sorely lack and maybe, just maybe I might learn something too. anything is possible.

toodles

[The Deposed King]

greetings peoples of the interwebs, tis I, Nik, ruler of far away undigitized lands.

the best way to describe myself I guess (in the context of this particular forum) is an aspiring writer, with firm emphasis on aspiring. I love stories, I love plot lines, I love seeing how characters work their way through their troubles like some sadistic god. I love watching a story weave its way in front of me whether it be a book, a movie, video game, graphic novel. Sadly my attempts at weaving my own story threads have left much to be desired. a few half hearted attempts at fanfiction and one piece of original fiction that I crafted when i was in high school and only recently remembered that I had. its on fictionpress if anyone wishes to gaze upon it (just ask and I will provide a link) but I wont torture the unwilling.

I am here to mostly gain inspiration from my fellow writers as a will to work and the focus to see my work through is something that I sorely lack and maybe, just maybe I might learn something too. anything is possible.

toodles

Greetings young Earth-mod.  This is your friendly neighborhood The Deposed King here to bestow tuppence upon the masses!  I hear your struggles with writing and I empathize.  I too was a struggling young writer who simply couldn't write.

I shall bestow upon you two of my favorite bits of fortune cookie wisdom.  In secundus you must be aware that it takes many authors 4-6 full length books before the they are worthy of publishing.  And In Primus the most important bit of wisdom I shall depart is also the most difficult and useless to thee.  For it is this: you must give yourself permission to write the stink bomb.  The words wafting off your pages will and must repulse you with every word you write.  Yet without cease or fail you religiously return to pound out more onto your word processor.  You must solemly vow to never go back, never edit, never delete!  These words until you reach the end of your manuscript (that way when you do go back to work on stuff before you're done, you are 'sneaking' around for a few words instead of giving yourself permission to look at how terrible the stuff is) .

Then an Geekviking a Jedi-writer will you be!




The Deposed King

[Anei]

And In Primus the most important bit of wisdom I shall depart is also the most difficult and useless to thee.  For it is this: you must give yourself permission to write the stink bomb.  The words wafting off your pages will and must repulse you with every word you write.  Yet without cease or fail you religiously return to pound out more onto your word processor.  You must solemly vow to never go back, never edit, never delete!  These words until you reach the end of your manuscript (that way when you do go back to work on stuff before you're done, you are 'sneaking' around for a few words instead of giving yourself permission to look at how terrible the stuff is) .

I've heard this, in variation, from at least a dozen different writers and teachers, and still I can't seem to force myself to live by it. I have a hard time not getting bored with my own crap writing long enough to turn it into something useful.

[Paynesgrey]

"An' you best take them as preachin' words!"--Finnienne Fenn Finnegan

That first pass is going to be drek.  You're just getting the story-- ideas of scenes, sketches of conversations down on paper.  I've come to accept it.  It's the second or third pass where you'll be able to look at those cludgey paragraphs or jumbled sentences, and distill from them the line that really snaps and sings.  Those redundant lines, the cludgey bouts of exposition serve a purpose.  They're raw materials, like ore or an over-saturated solution that the clarified idea emerges from.

[The Deposed King]

Writing is a lot like stacking lumber off the green-chain in a saw/planner mill.  Its hard work.  Its unlike stacking lumber as you have to keep your brain functional during the whole thing and can't let your brain space off while your body goes on automatic but the hard work principle is the same.

We start writing because its fun and its something we look at and say hey!  I could do that too!  Or you've got this killer story circling around in your head that you just want to release.  However we finish a book because we're able to look at writing like a job and keep writing even when its so awful, terrible and worst of all boring that we want to quit and do something else.  When you still won't stop.  When you can look at it like a job in the nursing home, where you had fun for a while helping out gramas and grandpas get out to breakfast, lunch or dinner but now fun time's over and its time to change some diapers and still keep going.  Then and only then young padawan a Jedi/writer you will be.

The sad fact of things is that most people can't write a terrible 1st draft.  Note I didn't say write a good book or write a good draft.  Its worse than good or great or just okay. 

Most people can't even write a terrible piece of garbage they'd like to wipe their hind quarters with after using the toilet.  So when you've got a roll of already been used toilet paper that's already large enough to qualify for a novel, you know you've finally arrived.  After getting a full length anything I guaran-blasted-tee you that it'll be a lot easier to go back and edit the bajeebeeze out of it and turn your skunk flower into an awful purdy flower.  Sure its work to get help with your manuscript.  But if you've got a 1st draft in hand, its a lot easier to say, I'll help you with yours if you help me with mine!

Writing a book is like that first week in college.  The whole class room is full to bursting.  by by the end of the week you've had a big turn over as people bail on the class and new people, the ones who really want a shot at the class, fill the newly opened spots.

Be the guy who wants it more and its like anything, you can do it.  Writing doesn't take genius level intelligence.  It takes a basic level of intelligence, imagination and so long as you've got that basic level, all you need after that is the work ethic.

It sucks but that's the way.  Now lest you think I'm being unsympathetic, I spent about a decade funning around the slush pile over at Baen's Bar, reading free indie stuff and writing the occasional chapter when the urge was undeniable.  Over there I (a one language, english speaking only, guy) got complimented on how well I was doing with english being my second language.  A real ego deflating experience let me tell you.  I didn't get much writing done for the year after that.  But you know what.  When I finally got serious and said this is do or die.  I cranked out a novel in one month.  I a guy who'd never written more than about 15k in my longest novel cranked out a 120k book in the month of january.  Life was hell, I was about to have to leave my wife and kids and go back to the states and work for at least 6 months.  I finally wanted it bad enough and so I just did it.  Writing that book didn't save me.  I wasn't able to stay, I had to still go back and work.  In fact it took me about a year before I got enough fans to be able to earn enough selling my (by then two books) to be able to even dream of writing supporting me here with my wife and kids.  But you know what?  Right now I've got 5 novels and 2 novellas for sale on amazon and I'm 86k into my 6th novel (the 4th book this year alone!).  If you're writing full time 4-5 books a year as your 8 hour 9-5 job is doable.  Other guys (like I was last year) do one to two books a year and a full time job.

Like they sing on the Frog Prince cartoon, you've just got to dig a little deeper, and work a little harder.  To me writing is like running your first mile.  The first time it seems impossible.  The second time is hard as hell.  But if you keep after it before long its just a groaner when you start out, after the first belly aching complaints of the day, you settle down and pound out the distance.  Pretty soon you're at the point you can do more than one mile.  Whether or not you chose to do so.

Sadly I will say again that writing is work.  You start writing for fun, you stop because its hard/boring/terrible and that instant of 'hard/terrible/boring' is what separates the men from the boys.  It separates the athletes from everyone else.  The c-squad from the varsity.  When you reach that point and you push through it, not because its fun, because its the very opposite of fun, its hard work that you hate! that's the point that you've decided to become a writer.  However let me say, you start writing the fun scene, you want to stop but don't and slog through this hard work terrible stuff you're forced to write because you're going to hit your word target for the day, that after a couple thousand words of drek you'll find yourself back to writing something fun!  You just have to have that stick-to-it've-ness!

Go get'em tiger!



The Deposed King

[King Shisa]

OK, so... this is me.

More than 10 years ago I wrote a novel-length horror manuscript. It sucked. I went back and did two rewrites before realizing the truism about polishing a turd, and moved on. I did a second novel, a paranormal mystery, and wasn't happy with it so I went and did a prequel to it (I loved the characters). I tried to hook an agent with it and came darn close (had a lot of exchanges with one who ultimately decided to pass because it "wasn't quite good enough" - words that have more or less become branded on my soul). Broken, I filed them all away and tried to forget about them for the last six years.

Late last year, upon urging from a friend, I gave the manuscript to him to review. I took his notes, did a quick edit, and gave it back for perusal. When I get it back I'm going to try to get it going again, hopefully with better results. In the meantime, I've dusted off an old idea and am about to embark on yet another round of tribulations. I don't know if my heart can take it, though, but a dream never chased is a dream never caught.

Thanks for hearing me out. I kinda DO feel like I've been to an AA meeting.

[deindeverse]

I started writing a book 2&1/2 years ago.  I got 70,000 words in to it, and wrote a very emotional chapter.  So emotional, in fact, that I had to stop.  I doubted my ability, and my right, to write something so emotional about something I have no experience with.  Two months ago, I resumed, and finished the first draft with over 200,000 words.  I'm halfway through second draft edits and additions.

For the 2+ years I spent not writing, I constantly thought of ideas, and I now have rough sketches for two sequels.  But my intention is it write both sequels, each possibly exceeding 200,000 words each, before I even attempt to get published.  As I write, the story changes, and I want the tale to complete.  I don't want to change my mind about something, only for it to be too late to change.  So I work at editing volume one, knowing that it will be ages before I finish.

I'm not writing to publish.  I'm writing to get the story out of my head.  But its addictive.  Not only do I have the two sequels planned, but I've had rough ideas for three different prequel trilogies.  That's nine more books, although each nowhere near the length of the primary books.  And I've got a completely separate series in mind, which would span 5 stories.

I'm afraid that it will never end.  Or worse, I'll finish, only to be told it's not good enough.  I have no-one in my life that would be a beta reader for the story, so I have no concept of how others would feel about the work.  I have friends and family that could read it, but the subject matter isn't something they'd be interested in.  For all I know, I could write 600,000 words (mostly consisting of 'uh' and 'um') and finally send it off, only to be told that its not worthy. 

So I'll write it for me, and take solace in the fact that it's good enough for its intended audience.

[The Deposed King]

Personally I write in order to put it up on amazon and make money.  Some books/series do good, others are more than a little flat.  The important thing is to just keep going.

In fairness I would have put the first and the second book up regardless of whether I made any cash.  But I might have stopped on 3 or 4 if that was the case.  And just puttered around at one or two books a year and worked.  I do like to write and have all sorts of stories bouncing around in the head.  On the other hand I love to read and that's means that writing is really only about 1/30th as much fun as reading a book is.  I can read a book a day but best pace I can only write one book a month.

That's not to say that I am writing a book a month but there you go.




The Deposed King



The Deposed King

[ToniVA]

For me it started with my sixth grade teacher when she gave us a writing assignment. Afterward she pulled me aside once she'd graded them and told me I might want to look into being a writer. Those words have stayed with me over the years and I ended up writing a novel. As with many writers it was garbage, but it certainly gave me the drive to pursue writing courses and keep at it with a different concept.

Right now I have a novel idea I'm still working on the specifics for, and should be able to begin work on it soon. Until I get more of the details hammered out, I've been posting my short stories to a blog; because otherwise they might never see the light of day.

I believe links were okay'd for here:

http://lotwordsmiths.blogspot.com/

[The Deposed King]

I always thought it would be an impossible dream to become an author.  But the more I read and then played D&D both as a player and later a game master, the more I wished it were possible.

Then I found Baen's Bar and got to read free exerpts from actual authors and saw people, aspiring writers, putting up free stories in the slush pile.  I looked at it and said that isn't too hard, wrote my first couple chapters and promptly fell on my proverbial face.

A decade of doodling around, stopping and starting, later and lo and behold.  I sat down and decided it was do or die time.  I would either write the novel or give up the dream.  A month later out popped my first novel.

2 years later, after the first one was published, and I now have 10 books up for sale on amazon and living as a full time writer/author.

And all this from a guy who in his early days of writing was asked if english was his second language.

keep after it, ToniVA,



The Deposed King

[ToniVA]

keep after it, ToniVA,

The Deposed King

Thank you! 

[JasonR77]

Hi all.

I've been writing in some form since I was a teenager.  My friend and I came up with some ideas and even though we went our separate ways, I stuck with some of them and began incorporating a few into plans for two different series.  I've completed three manuscripts for one such series, and tried self-publishing one of them.  Fortunately, that experience led me to give my manuscript to a friend, the very friend that got me into the Dresden Files, and through some harsh but justified criticism, I realized I needed to rethink everything.  So three of those manuscripts are flushed, and I've engaged a total rethink for those characters.  I'm now writing an urban fantasy series which takes place in Detroit (where I'm from) and features a former Detroit cop (which I'm not) being sucked into the world of the supernatural after taking on a case in which three men have been murdered by a creature that no normal means can identify.

I'm nearing the end of my first draft (much later than expected due to a hard drive crash), and plan to hand it over to my same friend for editing immediately after I'm done.  It is called Wings of Death and I hope to link it here soon, probably through Smashwords or something.  My only other surviving manuscript, The Liberators, is a sci-fi alternate universe number that probably needs some tweaking for technology since I wrote the original in 1998, but I have hope for it.

[The Deposed King]

Keep those original manuscripts and come back to them someday.  You'll be able to do a line item edit and revise and expand one day.  Even if you have to revamp most of the conversations.

Regardless, great work on your latest effort.  I hope it works out for you!




The Deposed King

[Paynesgrey]

Keep those original manuscripts and come back to them someday.  You'll be able to do a line item edit and revise and expand one day.  Even if you have to revamp most of the conversations.

Regardless, great work on your latest effort.  I hope it works out for you!




The Deposed King

What he said.  Never throw anything away.  Whether it's a story that doesn't work or just a scene that didn't fit, never throw anything away.  I've salvaged some good shorts and novellas from things that made for a narrative lump in the primary WiP.  Or you can find a way to salvage a broken story's key concept or characters and work them into something better later on.