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18 January, 2010 5:39 pm

Do you admit to being a writer?

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by Deb    in NonFiction Writing, Random Writing Rambles

shy catPhoto by The Marmot

I read something, somewhere, about the need to define yourself as a writer both inwardly, in your own mind, and outwardly, when talking to other people about what you do.

I used to think that was probably right. Note the ‘probably’. I’m not so sure anymore.

If you tell people you’re a writer, the next question you have to answer is ‘what do you write?’, followed quickly by ‘will I have heard of you?’.

Unless both answers are in the extreme positive, in that you’ve carved out a well-defined niche for yourself along the lines of Bill Bryson or Lee Childs, say, or you can tell them you’re regularly published – like on a weekly or monthly basis – in a national publication that everyone and his dog has heard of, my thoughts now on the subject are that a little secretiveness is probably best.

There’s that probably again.

Truth is, I alternate between two extremes on this issue. One day I feel that telling everyone is the way to go, and the next I’m convinced it’s best to shutup about it. Unless you enjoy endlessly justifying what you do and why you do it, and are willing to put up with the ‘oooh get you’ looks.

Today I’m having a ‘shutup’ day.

Tomorrow I’ll probably be back shouting from the rooftops. (Are cliches allowed in blogposts? Who cares, seeing as today I’m keeping silent about writing I don’t need to worry about whether or not I’m being original.)

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9 January, 2010 8:45 am

Writing? Why?

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by Deb    in Fiction Writing, NonFiction Writing, Random Writing Rambles

Sometimes it feels like writing is more of a curse than a blessing.

Not that writing really is a curse, of course, but sometimes it feels like it.

You know what I mean. You get up in the morning and know you need to write something, but it all seems like too much trouble and the little thought sneaks in – maybe you won’t bother today.

Then you remember that writing’s your job. Doesn’t matter whether you want to do it or not, if it’s your job it’s got to be done. Like any other job.

Here’s the thing. There’s a very seductive aura that hovers around ‘writing’. Around ‘being a writer’. Any kind of writer, whether it’s fiction in the form of short stories, novels or novellas, whether it’s nonfiction in the form of news stories, features, travel articles – whatever. The idea that you get paid for your words (and by implication the notion that your thoughts are loftier than the next person who doesn’t get paid for them) somehow lends ‘the writer’ an importance that I’m not sure they deserve.

But it’s the arts, isn’t it? Like musicians, painters, sculptors, designers of all kinds and people who ‘create’. There’s magic in creation, and even more magic in getting money in return for what you create. Money equates with success. You don’t get money for it? You haven’t reached success yet.

Trouble is, when you do get some money for it it’s not long before you start wanting more money for the same thing, and then success recedes again until you’ve achieved that little bit extra.

That’s the point where the curse aspect starts creeping in. What used to be fun becomes work. And actually, it can be pretty boring work. And repetitive. And mind-bendingly hard at times too.

Writing is no walk in the park. So why do it?

I don’t have the answer.

All I can say is, in the words of one of my favourite fictional characters, we do it because, ‘it’s what we do.’

And because, having written, it’s just the best feeling in the world.

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19 December, 2009 1:25 pm

The Importance of Pens

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by Deb    in Random Writing Rambles

Does anyone else find they can’t write with certain pens? I don’t mean the basic scratching of symbols on paper; I’m talking about creative writing,  whether it’s fiction or nonfiction.

I can’t write at all with blue pens. They have got to be black.

There’s just something icky about blue that means my words won’t root themselves. They float around on the page and make no sense, have no weight or value and certainly no depth. Put the same words in black ink and somehow the deeper meaning of whatever I’m writing, whether it’s actually got a deeper meaning or not, starts to unfold. Black words are anchored words. Blue words are flotsam.

Same with the nib size. It can’t be too fine, or too thick. It has to just be medium or it doesn’t fit my handwriting, and size matters. Small writing becomes insignificant, regardless of the content, and big writing is peurile. It has to be the right size, my right size, or I’m too worried about the look of the page to concentrate on getting my ideas across.

I also can’t stand splotchy biros. Nor can I stand roller balls that run too smoothly.

I like a pen with a little resistance on the page, something I can push against to get the tactile feel of ink transfering to paper, of nebulous thoughts and notions transformed by brain magic into words in my mind and from there mechanically, physically being shaped by tools into symbols on paper. The process has to meld seemlessly, and for that to happen everything has to just be ‘right’.

Black ink. Medium tip. Bit of resistance on the page. No splotches.

Oh, and colour and style. I like my pens to be functional rather than pretty. I can’t be doing with feathers and flourecsnet stripes, or little ships the sail back and forth along the length, or have little nodding heads on the top. And I like metal bodies best too. Something with a bit of weight and balance, but not top heavy.

Fussy? Yeh.

PS – I went through a pencil phase once, but even they had to be propelling pencils with a certain size of lead. There’s no hope. At the moment I love the little Zebra pens for carrying around with me. They tuck very nicely into the rings of my notebook. Haven’t been able to find them in Spain though.

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17 December, 2009 9:25 am

When is a man not a man?

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by Deb    in NonFiction Writing, Random Writing Rambles

When he’s a woman.

I don’t suppose I’m either the first or the last to assume that we no longer live in times where it’s necessary for a woman to assume a male identity in order to get on. May I be forgiven for assuming that in the 21st century we all treat people as people, judging on ability, intelligence, knowledge, education, experience, qualifications, fitness for purpose (vile though that expression is) and just whether or not we like the person and are on the same wavelength?

Have we really progressed so little that gender plays such a big part in assumption and expectation?

I’m disappointed with society, but if I’m completely honest I’m not that surprised to have the evidence laid before me in what has got to be the revelation of the year – for me at least. I was surprised at the award of the Nobel Peace Prize this year, but not as surprised as I’ve been this week.

I’m talking, of course, about James Chartrand, a writer I’ve admired for quite a while now, along with the rest of the team at Men With Pens.

I’ve been forced to re-evaluate my own assumptions and judgements. Would I have enjoyed James’ writing so much had I known all along that he was a she? I’ve got to be honest again, and say I really don’t know, but I think so. There are a couple of women writers that I read just as avidly, and the reading of them involves nothing to do with gender. I like the attitude, the philosophy, the wisdom and wit and I enjoy the often no-nonsense, uncompromising assertion of opinions. Gender has little to do with it – I don’t think.

But learning about James Chartrand has stopped me in my tracks and forced me to ask myself some big questions.

We do have an inequality in society, and maybe we always will. Our language is riddled with it and we accept without question certain modes of behaviour that seem perfectly normal until you switch the gender roles and imagine the reverse was happening. Take the simple gesture of guiding a person with a hand in the small of the back. Do you ever see a woman doing that to a man? No, that would seem odd, and frankly out of place.

So it’s all surface then, this equality business? Something that exists in law only, but is so deeply entrenched in the phsyche of society at large that to be a woman is a huge disadvantage? How sad.

But, apparently, how true.

And I suspect that with this revelation there might be a quite a few online social experiments being put into force.

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4 December, 2009 3:46 pm

How to Win NaNoWriMo

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by Deb    in Fiction Writing, NaNoWriMo, Random Writing Rambles, Writing Diary

nano_09_winner_120x240There’s no doubt that nanowrimo is a hard slog. No matter now determined you are at the beginning of the month, by half way through you’re flagging, and by midway through the 20s of November you’re beginning to wonder how to win nanowrimo and if it’s really possible.

At least that was my experience. But I did win. Yeh!!! Last night I romped home with 16 words over the 50K finishing line, and reckoned that was good enough. I got a huge kick out of seeing that winners page flash up and realised yep, I managed to win nanowrimo. Very satisfying. And now, after a good nights sleep, I’m looking back and wondering how on earth I did it.

It was easy enough to start with. The story was fresh, my characters were not much more than new-born babes with all their potential still untapped. My shiny new outline seemed infallible and all I had to do was write in order to win nanowrimo. That was the first week.

By the second week I could see the cracks beginning to appear, and the first realisations that if I was indeed going to win nanowrimo I was going to have to do more than write. I was going to have to come up ways to skirt round gaping plot holes (no time to mix the replots that would fill them in) and tame misbehaving characters who, as they started to grow up, wanted all their own way. I started jumping around in the story, writing the best bits first rather than dangling like carrots to write towards. Better to get 2000 words of a tempting scene than 500 of one I was fighting with.

The third week saw me resorting to writing in ten minute bursts. This wasn’t new to me, and I knew once that timer was set and running I’d write until it pinged. Sometimes these spurts took me in unplanned directions and often they were good directions. When the words were coming and I could see how they could be tied into the earlier part of the story, even if they were unplanned, I started believing I could win nanowrimo.

Determination played a big part. I held a huge carrot in front of my face with the promise of Mac laptop if I made it. No words, no mac. That easy. I’m sure it helped.

The final week was pure slog. My story stopped making sense to the extent that I became convinced every word was total dross. Even if I did somehow manage to win nanowrimo, the words I’d written would be useless and every one would have to be discarded. I became certain I’d wasted a perfectly good month on worthless wordy rubbish. But so close to the finish, I couldn’t let it go. So, ten minutes here and there. Jump into part two of the novel before I was really ready and deal with the final stages of part one in flashback. Move forward, always move forward.

If a part of the story got stuck, I wrote the next part, even if I couldn’t see how to get the two ends to meet.

But I did win nanowrimo, and guess what? My story is not lost in a sea of worthless words. My random scenes and abupt switches between acts do make sense, and I have a much stronger novel that I first anticipated. I’m surprised. And pleased.

I’m not finished with this novel yet, as I plan it be around 90K words. But having put it through the nano mill I feel it’s really kickstarted and I’ve got something solid to work with.

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