Are You Listening?

I've just finished an epically long chapter in a novel of epically long chapters, 18k+ words from one of my three main perspectives. And to celebrate, I've been watching the British drama Broadchurch. Why is a gritty stone-who-done-it a celebration? Why, because of David Tennant, of course.

Oh rilleh?

The Land of the Rising Sun: An Introduction

A Little History

I began studying Japan late in college, when my then-bf-now-husband told me of his dream to teach English in Kyoto after graduating, simply out of a desire not to be left back in the States, dateless. I took a crash course in Japanese for ten weeks at UC Berkeley, and immersed myself in the early-modern history, too. The culture I had relative headstart on, having been interested to a non-serious degree in anime and manga since I was a kid. The considerable gaps in my East Asian education were filled in by said reason-for-going, an EAS major, nearly fluent in the language (and half-Japanese to boot). Long story and one hemorrhaging national economy later, and our dreams of Nippon were tabled indefinitely. That is, until we received the money to book tickets from my generous in-laws, and took a three-years-belated honeymoon of 18 jam-packed days. These posts, tagged Progress, are the tale of that journey, one that expanded the horizons of this novice traveller and renewed our commitment (now much older and wiser) to a future in Japan.

Watchmen and Me

Some of you may recall that, in a long-ago era known as 2009, the movie Watchmen was released in theaters. At the time, I was a senior in college, hellbent on expressing my passion for adaptation, cinema and comics in an academically-fruitful manner. I still remember the first time I saw the trailer, with its wrenchingly atmospheric visuals and haunting Smashing Pumpkins whine, and I had just read the graphic novel for the first time the summer before (and probably at least twice in the interim). Something exquisitely anticipatory happened in my chest when I gorged on those few perfect minutes, like a giggle trying to escape through my tightly-closed lips and humiliate me in my desire like an erection in skinny jeans. But I didn't see the film when it was in theaters. I didn't see it until last week, in fact. Why not, what I saw when I watched it and what happened when I did are not a mere review, but tell a story that is as much a part of my life and personality as film, comics and this comic in particular are the influences on my creative work.

Inertia is a Property of Matter

After finishing my first book back in January, I had a disturbing thought that (naturally) turned into a burdensome worry: It had been more than a year since I'd started The Wide and Burning World, and I didn't remember how I'd done it! 138k words is the most I've ever written about any single thing, and while it flowed out fairly smoothly, I simply couldn't recall the way I'd actually set forth to make a story that long. What if I couldn't do it again? There are two books left in the trilogy, Salt Spray and Fine Things and Pulling Colors from the Sun. How would I write them, if I couldn't remember how I'd begun in the first place? Was this going to be like so many other projects, doomed to incompletion? It couldn't have just happened, with no method... or could it?

Recently, a feeling I know has started creeping in at the cracks. I'm starting to think plot again, to draft pages when inspiration comes, to repeat wording that I like to myself. This is it! A book is starting to happen. Which sounds dumb, I know, and which of course isn't all of it. I'm becoming increasingly practiced at crafting narrative, inventing characters, researching and editing, and without those skills, I wouldn't be writing. But the way it starts is in embracing the momentum. This book's like a boulder at the top of a hill: I could put my back into it and push it until it rolls or I can be glad the earth is shaking. Now what I've got to learn is to trust that it will happen when I need it to... and that I can put my shoulder to my project if I need to. Let's roll.

The Male POV

I used to worry a lot about writing things that I hadn't experienced. The "agony of release" that is the male orgasm, for example. That is until I received some mind-changing perspective on the matter (of writing, not orgasm): No one feels anything the exact same way. If a story/description/idea resonates with one person, it may not with another, no matter if I crib the whole thing word for word from life. This wisdom freed me to rethink the way I gauge my own inspiration, and I do a lot more work with my full conviction.

My fiction is my domain. If it resonates because I've managed to reveal and portray some sliver of genuine human experience, then it doesn't matter if I have a cock or not.

Cat Box

This morning, while making a dent in the post-holiday detritus, my husband discovered our cat, Lilu, hiding in a box. But, not just any box. It was a shoe box with an attached, hinged lid, lined with foam padding. The box says "ta-da!" on it, and was a snug fit for Lilu (a truly big-boned gal). This box was special. It's her box. She loved it to pieces when it was in the living room, got it so filthy with her fur-leavings that we tossed it in our recycling pile months ago. Now that we've collected enough other boxes to reach critical mass, it was one of many, at the bottom of a vast heap. She could have had any box she wanted. And, well, I guess this was the one.

This is a cat we're talking about, and this is more than the concept of territory or ownership. This is attachment, a deep and primal feeling. We long for what's absent, we hold on to what is dear, what we like, what makes us comfortable. There's nothing terribly extreme in it, no agressive defense. She just likes it best of all. Taking it away left her looking for it, and in the cat-to-human translation we didn't notice the signs. Talk about a priceless insight into character-building. So often, we focus on the key needs and objects that pertain to a character, Lasche's blades, for example. But it's equally important to comment on the fact that he's really attached to his boots, and for no better reason than that attachment is essential to the soul.

(We're letting Lilu keep her box, of course...)

Golden Beam from the Darkness

There's nothing like a sudden hit of inspiration. Usually mine comes from my drive to improve things, either my own work or the execution of others'. This time, the ball was in my court, deflated and moldy from being left in the rain too long. Time to pump it up with some perfect words in their perfect order!

The brunt of my classical training in creative writing is in poetry, and it just wouldn't due to publish (yes, someday, I'm getting to it, shut up) Orphans with a poem-fragment in it that wasn't, you know, good. The poem I refer to is one that must evoke a sense of worldliness and a distinctly masculine sexual viewpoint. My placeholder is:

Stretch’d before my eyes,

the radiant tie of your heart to mine.

In the palm of this hand

blood. In the other,

a puddle of pearls.

Tomorrow brings naught but crimson.

But tonight the moons are up

and you are beautiful.

Okay, yeah, there's the reference to the plural moons for an "it's not Earth" nod, and the goofy semen image. But "stretch'd?" Who talks like that? Stilted, randomly archaic and dumb.

Yesterday this occurred to me, instead: 

Launch a ship from my harbor heart
Fleet and fine.
Solid, sleek. Mast and plank
Drenched, adrip but never sinking
And all sails full beneath the sun
An arrow in the sea between us.

If that doesn't make you want to have passionate, urgent sex with the person who wrote it, I don't know how many moons orbit the planet you come from. Such yearning! Such lusty saltiness! And best of all, its author has never been to the ocean or seen a seafaring vessel (in the book, not yours truly, that would be silly).  Success!

And Now For Something Completely the Same

Well... that was complainy. And it was almost a month ago. During that month, I moved on, almost made my original deadline, didn't, but didn't care. Now I'm here, and it's time to share.

And by share I mean give some huge spoilers for the next two books of... well, that's the thing...

Due to the sudden, recent death of a friend's father, I have once again had my little aminal brain collide with mortality and the concerns thereabouts. I suddenly realized as I thought about the death of a stranger that superficially touched my existence, that I am, once again, writing a story that heavily involves {spoilers coming}

It's Always the Quiet Ones

I didn't become a writer. Silly as it sounds, I was born with the bug, and have always been writing in one form or another, the subconsciousness of the action as validating as the act itself. Now I talk about it, proclaim it as part of my life-boildown.

How long might it have taken me to embrace it, without the encouragement of those around me? Not forever, but a long time at least. And now I have that same power, the gift of "You should write more."

Here is where I got my breath stolen away in surprise. I didn't know he wrote wrote, you know? I don't think he really knows it either. Not yet, he doesn't. But someone should tell him.

Credo

When the weather changes, sometimes it's time for a little "poetry." Poetry without the caveat is how I started writing, after all. True fact.

It's going to rain again
Get grey
Monday's the new Friday, but Tuesday's always next
It's raining again
Don't think too much about it
Gut punch, fever-pitch
Swallow back the snot
I must not stop.

What You Don't Know Won't Hurt You

10% hardline facts 

20% wiki-research

>5% references

<5% personal experience 

60% imagination

This is how I roll, especially when doing established-setting-based writing (you say fanfic, I say to-mah-to). You want to know enough to not come off as a n00b, but not so much that you get beholden to others' ideas. If I'm inspired to write a piece directly based on something existing, it's because I'm interested in an idea of my own, set in a particular context. Get inspired and don't let outsidership stop you. Embrace it. Originality comes from innovation.

The Review Process

I've been thinking about how to put my own little touch on the movie reviews I'm slated to start writing for this blog. That's the "Opinion" part, you know, reviews of things. I've been trying to pick a rating system and a structure. Then I realized I don't want to write reviews.

That's not really what my training has made me good at. Academia teaches us to hunt for evidence, and to use it to either fashion a context or support a claim (or both). Each text is an opportunity to enrich the catalog of experience--both critical experience and vicarious experience. I love these experiences, crave the challenge of contextualizing and the pleasure of the immersion a good narrative experience offers equally. So I'm not going to review. I'm going to illustrate what the evidence inspires in me, be it the frustration of a poorly-constructed character or the delight of a well-crafted visual vocabulary (Or the sexiness of sex/maniacal laughter of watching stuff explode. It's not all snooty CS BS).

There's very little that I consume that I don't at least respect. Even trashy things. It can take just as much integrity to admit that something's enjoyable because it's cheesecake as to analyze high literature. Sometimes I find lessons in "what not to do," but others' mistakes have a lot of value. It's not fair to say something's terrible and not say why, but I intend to go a step further, if I've got something negative to say. If I read/watch something that's broke, I'll try to offer my fix. It's a rare case, I find, that is unfixable. "What if" is a sick game to play with your own work (once it's complete), but it's a productive analytical tool, when looking at someone else's.

Once you know what you like and why, you can start making what you like. And when you make what you like, your audience will feel your passion. That's what I'm all about.

Slow Cooker

About a week ago, I got the go-ahead from Nick to get my hopes up about a project I've been cooking since August. We're planning to start layout and armatures in May, so I've got until then to get it written and polished up.

Working title: Tightrope, with The Illusion of Height in close contention
Length: Either one two-part book or two small books, 300 pages total

"What's it about?" they chirped eagerly.

Okay, here's were things get messy. I'm on a roll with the writing, but I don't have my nuggets ready to go.  I'm struggling to come up with a boildown and a tagline.

I spend a lot of my professional time doing copy writing of this kind, so I'm feeling doubly-stumped; not wanting to devote the energy and surprised at how much energy these little piece seem to want to take up. Sometimes it's hard to remember that the marketing aspects of a piece require inspiration, too. It'll come, it'll come.

I'm not letting it stop me, though. I finished the first draft of the first act last night and act two's on the block this evening.