Carving Out Time By Jared A. Conti (@oracularbeard)

I never expected to be writing a sequel of sorts to last year’s column.

With as problematic as writing a sprawling post-apocalyptic tale during a global pandemic sounds, it’s keeping a handle on the day-to-day that takes its toll.

I’d love to tell you that I’ve learned something or other in the last year tooling around writing The Great American Novel. 

What I’ve realized (much too late, as usual) is that these grandiose ideas are naught but chunks of marble to be chipped away at over time especially when I’m unable to see the masterpiece hiding inside.

I’ve just figured out that this is the first time I’ve sat down to write since June. Amid writing retreats, house buying, and child wrangling, perhaps what’s been gumming up the works this summer is that I’ve not taken the time to breathe. 

To sit and wait. Patiently, for that still, small voice.

As I sit here writing and revising this, it’s the little things that are getting my attention:

The spiders spinning webs, where they do and why.

The different grasses in our lawn.

The rotating airplane light gracing the trees at night. 

Bees making a hive in an actual tree.

The “writer’s block” that I think I’m suffering from? 

Those are just stepping stones with enough clearance to jump to each one as I cross that unfathomable chasm that is life.

That block I’ve been chipping away at? 

Those parts that I thought I didn’t need are discarded for a reason. 

I’m not sure what it is yet, but I’m looking forward to seeing the finished product. 

If you enjoyed this piece, please follow Jared A. Conti on Twitter @oracularbeard.

Writing is a Marathon, Not a Sprint. By Trey Stone (@TreyStoneAuthor)

I know this because I’m a writer – oh, and later today, I’m running my first official half marathon.

I never planned to be a runner, much like I never really planned to be a writer. At the time, it was just something to do. Though I wrote a few pages of fiction here and there in my youth, what really got the ball rolling for me was when I and a friend of mine had boring summer jobs as teens and we started emailing short stories between us. From there on, it just snowballed.

It was the same with running. Five years ago, I got interested in going to the gym and doing powerlifting in an attempt to have at least some semblance of physical activity in my life. If you’d asked me back then if I wanted to go for a run, I would have laughed you in the face. But as I got in better shape, nearing something that someone might even describe as “fit”, I started dipping my toes into this whole running thing. And today’s the day. Half Marathon Day.

When I started writing my first full-length novel, I didn’t really know what I was doing. I didn’t plan or outline it, didn’t set much of a course other than a very brief over-arching plot and a thrilling conclusion. Before this point, most of what I had written had been short stories and flash fiction pieces, few – if any – counting more than a few hundred words. But I’d managed to write those, so why not a full book, right?

When I ran my first 21 kilometers, it was exactly the same. I had started jogging four months earlier, so why shouldn’t I be able to run a half marathon, right? So I just put on some shoes and started the treadmill. Turns out, I wasn’t prepared at all.

But I’m glad I wrote my first book like that. With that naïve, positive onlook of “Why wouldn’t I be able to do this?” I think it made it a whole lot easier for me. I didn’t worry about plot consistency, character development, or logical conclusions. I just wrote. For that first book, I can’t remember even a single spell of writer’s block. There was no pressure, no expectations, because I didn’t know pressure and expectations even existed in writing.

These days, nearly 10 books later, I can find myself staring at that blinking demon-cursor at the end of a sentence, wondering why the hell it isn’t producing the art I know lives inside my head.

Running is much the same. That first half-marathon I did in training, was… Let’s just call it “the worst.” There was pain, soreness, and blood involved, and I remember having to lie down on the floor when I was done, because “something didn’t feel right.” But because I didn’t realize how awful it would be, I had no fear of it. There was nothing to dread because I had no reference point. I’m glad I didn’t know what I was putting myself through then because now that I do… yeah – I’m dreading it.

Of course, it won’t be the same. The books I write now are written faster and with less effort than I did that first one, even if I sometimes stop to make sure I know what I’m doing. Same with the running. The last training run I did, took just about as long as that first one, but with significantly less pain and exhaustion.

That’s the thing – even though in one sense it never gets easier, you get used to it. You get better at it. You learn. You’re more prepared. There’s this whole sense of “knowing what you’re doing” (weird how that happens, right?)

But when I said that writing is a marathon, I wasn’t just talking about writing one single book. I wasn’t just talking about one single marathon either. Because writing, as an art, and any other art or creative endeavor you might pursue is a marathon in and of itself. It’s the same with running and powerlifting. You don’t get better after one story, or just one run. It’s not about finishing that first book or race. It’s all of it – all the effort you put into it from start to wherever your finish-line is - that’s what’s going to make the difference. Every book you write becomes a lap in a longer run, a single chapter in your writing career.

I don’t know how many books I’ll write. I know I have a lot more of them in me, and I know that for now, I’m passionate to keep going. To keep running with it. I’m unsure about running though. I might do a few more races because it’s incredibly rewarding even though it’s awful at its worst. At the same time, I’m left with a feeling of having accomplished a goal I set for myself and being satisfied with that. (Since I started writing this, I’ve completed the run and I came in at 1:57 – which was above all expectations!) 

For now, I’ll stick with it a while longer, and I love that I now have the ability to “go out for a run.” It’s a great way to clear one’s head – and to think about future books! But more than anything, I’m glad I thought myself the importance of marathons. To stick with something, to keep going, to be in it for the long run. It’s a very useful skill to have.

Because a lot of things you’ll do in life is a marathon. So keep at it.

If you enjoyed this piece, please follow Trey Stone on Twitter @TreyStoneAuthor.

Cooking Up a Great Story By B.K. Bass (@B_K_Bass)

I have two great loves in my life: writing and cooking. I have spent decades honing both skills, constantly endeavoring to learn more about each craft and dedicate hours every day to practicing them. There have been successes and failures in both fields. Both amazement and disappointment have been part of the process. As time passes, the successes come more often. The failures fade. My confidence grows as one amazing meal, or another incredible story, takes shape under my hands. Then, I try something totally new. Something incredibly risky. And sometimes, it is awful. But I learn from it and grow. Next time, I know I will do better.

The learning curves of both writing and cooking are eerily similar. I suppose one might say that of any artistic endeavor, but these are the two I have explored the longest and come the furthest with. Brandon Sanderson discussed the concept of the cook versus the chef in a lecture, saying that writers should aspire to be chefs. He said that cooks know what a tool is and how it should be used, but a chef knows why the tools work where they do, then combines them in different ways to create something new.

As writers, we all should hope to create something new.

The cynics will argue that every story has been told, there’s “nothing new under the sun”, and so on. They’re not wrong, but they’re also not seeing the potential to shake things up. They’re looking at the ingredients, but not considering new ways to combine them.

Consider for a moment if you will: Jambalaya. We all are likely familiar with this dish. Any cook knows the basic building blocks: rice, chicken stock, tomatoes, and the Cajun “holy trinity” of onion, celery, and green peppers. It may have chicken, sausage, shrimp, or some combination of the three. Some other veggies might even show up, especially okra. And of course, Cajun seasoning.

There were a few key words in there. It may have various meats, and other veggies might show up. While the building blocks remain the same and are what makes jambalaya what it is—and not Jollof or Pelau or some other rice dish—no two jambalaya recipes are the same.

Making those choices between chicken or sausage and whether to add okra or something else are the beginning steps on the path to becoming a chef. And in writing, the first steps are selecting what elements to incorporate in our stories.

We know what our tools are and what ingredients we have to work with. The cookbooks showed us that our plot needs to have structure and our characters depth, we need a climax and arcs, we need resolution and payoffs. The tools are all laid out, and we know how to mix the basic ingredients. From reading countless books to see the results in practice, we know what a good story tastes like. But is that enough?

A cook takes all those tools and combines them into a forgettable narrative that brings nothing new or exciting to the table. The results might not be awful. It might even be good. But it doesn’t break new ground. Just like that Jambalaya recipe you found on Delish, it’s just okay. 

The chef, on the other hand, will study the recipe for a Victorian drama, then set out to do something new with it. They check the spice rack and add a pinch of the occult and a dash of mental illness. From the pantry, a scoop of murder mystery. They take the first-person narrative and shift it to a side character instead of the protagonist, taking something familiar to the contemporary audience and using it in an entirely new way. This all simmers together, and the chef creates Sherlock Holmes.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wasn’t a genius because he created some new idea to add to the literary world. He didn’t invent the detective, murder, mental health issues. He wasn’t the first to write stories that dabbled occasionally with the occult. Using first person narrative in the 1880s was commonplace. But he blended these elements artfully, changed them in subtle ways, and created something that has been renowned and loved for almost a hundred and fifty years.

Next time you make Jambalaya, mix things up. Start with the basics. Make sure the holy trinity and rice are there so it has a foundation of familiar elements. Instead of using a Cajun seasoning blend, make your own. Turn up the heat with more cayenne or the hit of herbs with more oregano. Pull some inspiration from Pelau and brown your chicken in brown sugar. Draw from Jollof and make a tomato puree with scotch bonnets instead. Add in some curry powder from both. In the end, you will have something entirely new, and it might be amazing.

Likewise, pull inspiration from various sources for your next writing project. Start with a foundation; let’s say epic fantasy. We know there might be a war in there. While swords and dragons can be fun, what about the actual cost of war? Watch military documentaries and read combat memoirs. Talk to veterans. Instead of the magnificent spectacle of dragons flying over the battlefield, explore just how terrifying it would be to the troops on the ground, trapped in the mud and surrounded by flames. Suddenly, your epic fantasy romp has become an exploration of post-traumatic stress in combat veterans. Both have been done before, but combined, they might offer something new.

There may be no new ingredients, but it’s our job to find new ways to use them. 

If you liked this piece, please follow B.K. Bass on Twitter @B_K_Bass.

What Brings Me Joy? By V. E. Patton (truedialogue)

Now, I know it might seem odd to take my Joy from The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows — John Koenig’s masterful collection of made up words — but bear with me.

All the words in the Dictionary are new, and this is important… they’re “not necessarily intended to be used in conversation, but to exist for their own sake, to give a semblance of order to a dark continent, so you can settle it yourself on your own terms, without feeling too lost — safe in the knowledge that we’re all lost.”

Writing fantasy brings me joy. It brought coastlines to the lost, dark continent of my life and allowed me to give it topography, mountains, valleys, caves, lakes, plains, flora, fauna, characters, and of course, magic. It allowed me to find my way in the real world and to create in my own made up worlds. After a little while, the creativity became more and more generous, taking over my real world too. Small, mundane things drew creativity from me. My mind discovered fantastic ways of being and doing. The portal between worlds became less of a doorway and more of a twitch of transition.

Sometimes when I tell people I write fantasy, I can see the question marks sprout from their heads like cartoon thought bubbles. They register the lines on my face and my grey hair first and a tiny frown appears, as if they wonder why someone my age would admit to reading fantasy, let alone writing it. Then they think about what they know of me: nurse, midwife, manager, CEO, business owner, facilitator, coach, wife, and mother, and they cock their head as if wondering whether I’ve lost the plot (pun intended). Then there’s a kind of polite ‘Oh, that’s [insert an inert word like nice or interesting here]’. And then it’s time to change the subject, their eyes sliding past me for saner folk.

And once in a while, people’s eyes will light up and they’ll want to know more. They, like me, are ringlorn. 

Koenig’s Dictionary describes ringlorn as “the wish that the modern world felt as epic as the one depicted in old stories and folktales — a place of tragedy and transcendence, of oaths and omens and fates, where everyday life felt like a quest for glory, a mythic bond with an ancient past or a battle for survival against a clear enemy, rather than an open-ended parlour game where all the rules are made up and the points don’t matter.”

I spent decades living an ordinary life. I let it be constrained by the made up rules of the parlour game. Work and grief hemmed me in until, one day, five and a half decades down the track, they didn’t. I began to hope, and I began to write.

Writing fantasy is tapping into that journey of transcendence, from ordinary to fantastic, from drudge to dweomer. Writing my stories is the ultimate coaching gig. Drawing potential from my flawed characters, helping them survive and thrive, outwitting the external villains while struggling against their internal monsters, all the while using the clues of oaths and omens to battle ogres and dragons — or to befriend them.

When I write fantasy, I feel I’m honouring the mythic bond of my own ancient path, paying tribute to past matriarchs and story tellers who’ve brought up their families against the odds, and instilled them with a love of stories, and a hope for a better life. 

For these, and for so many more reasons, writing fantasy brings me joy.

Image Credits Provided By the Writer:

• Header Image: Stefan Keller from Pixabay

• In-line Image: Peter Lomas from Pixabay

If you liked this piece, please follow V. E. Patton on Twitter @truedialogue.

I Owe Myself Joy By Gillian F. Barnes (@geezfresh)

A writer who says writing brings them joy? well, obviously, but for me, it really is that simple. Writing brings me joy in two ways; professional achievement and therapeutic.

Writing professionally has always brought me praise. Even as a student, I was able to earn high marks easily and win competitions, and these days it provides me with both full-time income as a part of my day job and side hustle cash. It's very real validation for something I find enjoyable. Validation of that kind makes me happy.

Personally? Now that one is a bit harder to explain, but it goes back to why I make art of any kind-I am processing my world therapeutically. Back when I identified as a primarily visual artist, I used my work to explore my innate loneliness. Even when I'm with others, and despite how I may present, I often feel outside of things. That same theme runs throughout my current work in progress. Exploring loneliness and less unpleasant emotions in fiction can hurt, but ultimately it makes me a happier person.

What I'm saying is that the art of writing about very real, raw scenarios, conjured or no, in a journal or in another longer form allows me to release some of the things I allow to hold me back, de facto making me happier. As of late though, I haven't been able to write in that way. I think about writing for me, and I simply can't. It isn't writer’s block, but rather there is such a buildup that it feels impossible to process. Part of me knows I must do it because, to be honest, I haven't been joyful much lately, but the rest of my being is screaming to go the ostrich route.

I want to get back to being joyful and I suppose telling you that by writing this down is the first step. If you don't see me writing-I will be doing it, but not all of the contents of my mind is fit for print. I promise to work through things-somehow. I owe myself joy.

What Brings Me Joy By Paulette Hampton (@PauletHampton42)

Nothing brings me joy.

Joy isn’t brought to me.

It’s already in me.

Deep within, under layers of worry and stress.

A lot of times I keep it in a dark corner, letting things like deadlines, arguments, and everyday irritations take center stage.

I can even ignore it by overlooking the tiny soft moments or someone’s kind word.

But it’s always in me.

It comes alive when I stop for a moment, when I’m still and quiet and notice the gentleness and awe of existence.

Joy leaps from my heart when it recognizes itself in the outer world.

But 

Only

When I take

The

Time

To 

Acknowledge it.

If you enjoyed this piece, please follow Paulette Hampton on Twitter @PauletHampton42.

Write for Joy By E. J. Dawson (@ejdawsonauthor)

When Gillian asked me if I wanted to post again for her wonderful blogging event, I had to go back and reread what I’d written the previous year. It left me very objective of what to post for this year, because much of the past blog post was six months into intermittent lockdowns, the desire for “it” to be over. I don’t even have to explain what “it” is anymore. 

And in this new world of normal, and in keeping with this year’s theme, I’ve kept my joys small.

The local juice place.

Reading all my old favorite books.

Getting through TV series from the 90s my parents never let me watch.

But recently I’ve had to learn to take a different path with my writing journey, and that’s writing with no intention of doing anything with the work after it’s done.

I’d lost myself in personal demands to have a project finished and ready to submit. To ensure this story went to my publisher, but another one I’d try to get into pitch wars and query. For certain books to end up in certain places.

It left me conflicted and confused about where to spend most of my efforts.

And while I’m still working on all those scripts, I decided I needed to do some writing too. I longed to get back into a couple of projects but found myself reluctant to work on them. Those had already put me off with the expectations I’d placed on myself for where those books should end up.

I’ve been writing long enough to know what books I’d probably keep to myself to self-publish. What books I think my publisher would be interested in. Other work that I’d see if it was high concept enough to pitch to an agent.

Because this year I spent some time on working on my craft, taking courses to become a dev editor. Became an intern with my publisher. I learned more about the querying process doing this than I ever had from reading all those “how I got an agent” posts. 

About genres, word counts, high concept, strong plots, relatable characters. All the things that made a book good or bad. During all this learning it had a huge effect on the way I wrote stories. The tone and structure, flow and effect, all better than I’d written before. My stories then had to have these tools I was learning, and I worked very hard to apply this newfound knowledge to my work.

It was interesting to compare current drafts to the polished book I have coming out on October 1st, Behind the Veil.

Because I’d written that book in twenty-five days with absolutely no purpose behind its creation.

I had an idea, wrote the first chapter, gave it to a friend who told me it wasn’t a short story, and by the time I finished it really wasn’t. But I had no plans for that book so the expectation of what it could be was entirely removed from me until after it was done. I decided, at the suggestion of someone else, to pitch it during a pitch event. Literary Wanderlust was one of the presses that liked the tweet, and later sent an offer of publication.

In preparation for Behind the Veil’s launch I’d realized something critical about the creation that went into this book. I’d written it in a break from the massive fantasy series that I had to put on the backburner due to self-publishing costs. I needed something else to funnel my creative energies into, had been watching an awful lot of Penny Dreadful, and I just wanted to write about the ghost stories I’d obsessed over as a teenager.

But this was something far darker, a scary story that was subtle, exciting and infinitely different.

When I remembered that feeling, that sensation of what it was to write the story just because it wanted to be written, I decided I needed to do it again.

Cue Beasts Within, a semi drafted retelling of Beauty and the Beast, and I can’t stop thinking about this story. I keep going back and adding more bits to it. To twist the characters through perilous times and utter angst.

And I have no idea what will happen when it’s done. Whether I’ll see an opportunity for it later or give it to a friend to read. I think it might just sit in the drafts pile and I’ll look at it in a year or so. But I’m not setting myself up for publishing or querying it. It has no other purpose than to bring me joy.

To indulge in bitchy witches.

To let me giggle over spiky verbal sparring.

To be here for me right now, in this moment, in all its angsty glory.

Writing is meant to be fun, it’s meant to be for you, first and foremost, but when you spend a lot of time doing it, the goalposts around who you’re writing for shift and change. Different projects end up in different places than you expect, but that shouldn’t mean we forget that we’re the ones who spend the most time doing it. We’re the ones who will create and create and have much less of what we envisage ever make it into a reader’s hands.

That’s why the joy of just writing what sends your heart fluttering is what matters. That not everything you do should be for a reason, because the story may never go as far as you expect. That there is no agent, zero editor interest, and no publication contract waiting for every project.

Because those things aren’t in your control. Anyone who does this will tell you that no matter what path to publication you pick, each comes with a lot of challenges, and it won’t always turn out how you envisage.

But those things are all what happens after you finish it. Nothing should take away the joy of just being in the story, writing it with heart and soul because time is precious. Writing is an escape, you are the traveler, so if you are going to do this, then remember to live in the moment.

Write for a joy only you can give to yourself.

E. J. Dawson on Twitter @ejdawsonauthor.

Word Count is the Boss of Me By Annika Barranti Klein (@noirbettie)

Last year I wrote a beautiful novel. I had a detailed outline and I wrote the novel out of order, so I had absolutely no idea how long it would be until I finished. It was, um. thirty-eight thousand words. I don’t know if you know this (of course you do) but novels are more like sixty to eighty thousand words; young adult (which this one is) can be on the shorter side, but the current trend is longer and certainly nothing is getting traditionally published at under fifty thousand words, let alone under forty thousand. 

And yeah, okay, I tend to write short drafts (I’m a flash fiction author at heart), but this was awfully short. It was a novella and I knew I could write novels. I had already written one the year before, a contemporary retelling of The Three Musketeers that had a fifty-one thousand word first draft and came out at just a hair under sixty thousand after revision. I couldn’t understand what had happened this time until it finally dawned on me: I had quite simply forgotten about B plots. I literally forgot they exist. Was it because The Three Musketeers doesn’t have a B plot so much as it has a whole lot of shit going on all at once? I don’t know. It didn’t really matter — the only book I was writing was this one, and it was too short. I was…frustrated, to say the least. 

I decided at the beginning of this year, while I took a break from my novel, that I was going to let myself write the shortest version of any given idea; I wasn’t going to push myself to make anything longer. In fact, with shorter work, I would aim for the shortest possible version. Why write a short story when I could write flash? Why write flash when I could write a poem?

This worked great…until it stopped working.

I wrote a seven-hundred word flash that was utterly perfect, and all I wanted to do was expand it into a longer story. So I did! It ended up being over five thousand words. It dawned on me then that I am not the boss of my word count; my word count is the boss of me.

I shouldn't have been surprised! I had written another story not too long before that I expected to be around six thousand words, maybe ten thousand max, and it ended up being over fifteen thousand. This summer I wrote a story I thought would be about the same length as that one, maybe as much as twenty thousand, and it came out to thirty-six thousand. THIRTY SIX! That’s almost as long as the too-short novel draft!

It’s time I came to terms with it: I have absolutely no control over what length my stories end up. I don’t mind it so much. I believe it will be okay. Somehow. 

Now, back to that B plot.

If you enjoyed this piece, please follow Annika Barranti Klein on Twitter @noirbettie.