The struggle and the glide...

[elfs]

Yesterday, on the way into work, having been deprived of my bicycle by an errant nail or shard of glass or something, I had an opportunity to write. And I struggled with it. I couldn't get it to go. This was in my 19th Century European Fantasy series. The setting was simple: Kasserine and Gerard are being set up to... what? In the 40 minute I had, I got maybe 500 words, not any of them terribly useful.

On the way home that afternoon, however, it was completely a different matter. I sat down to write a Journal Entry. I had one line as a seed, and no ideas at all. I picked it at random from my list of silly ideas that i keep in my Wiki. The line read:

"Do you like my shoggoth?" she asked.

In forty minutes I had two characters, a setting, a complication, a plot, some wonderful description, some pretty nifty dialogue, and a thousands words of advancing characterization. Both characters were new, the setting is a whole new world with an interesting past. One of the characters had a whole slew of alien characteristics that made her interesting. It all came so naturally and easily to me, like speaking my native tongue.

I need to get out of this comfort zone. The Journal Entries universe is now officially too easy to write in. I virtually live there.

---

1. What was your favorite breakfast cereal when you were a kid?

Frosted Flakes! They're Grrrrrrrreat!

2. What is the best toy/prize you ever got in a box of cereal or because of sending in UPC's?

I don't ever remember anything that really took me away like that.

3. How do you take your eggs (scrambled, over easy, egg beaters)?

Scrambled, with cheese, and enhanced with either Sriracha sauce or Worcestershire sauce.

4. What is your favorite breakfast meat (bacon, ham, sausage)?

Iiiiiiit's BACON! Bacon baconbaconbaconbacon.

5. What is your favorite spot (local or chain restaurant) for breakfast and where is it located?

The New York Bagel Shop on 1st Avenue, downtown. That or the Crumpet Shop right next door.

Comments

[zonereyrie.livejournal.com]

I love Sriracha!

Nice Beggin' Strips...

[jenkitty.livejournal.com]

Mmm, the Crumpet Shop. I used to eat there for lunch quite a bit when I worked downtown. Fell in love with red tea and French lentil soup.

[kengr]

The Journal Entries universe is now officially too easy to write in. I virtually live there.

Well, have you ever considered doing an RPG supplement for it?

After all, if Casey & Andy can have one (see here) why can't you?

[antonia-tiger.livejournal.com]

It isn't necessarily bad that the Journal Entries seem to be too easy to write. There's a lot of stuff on the subject lurking in that head of yours, ready for you to make connections.

It's not whether you feel it's easy that matters. It's what the readers think. And, alas, there are plenty of professional writers who have been able to get their work published with minimal editing.

Some of the oddments I've had published, they have gone off in directions prompted by my knowledge. And somebody else was able to edit, and persuade me to cut things back.

But being an editor for the Journal Entries... That looks difficult.

Still, as long as you're writing better dialogue than George Lucas....

[pixel39.livejournal.com]

Mmmmmm, bacon...

Seriously, though, there's nothing wrong with the Journal Entries universe, since you seem to have a reasonably healthy attitude towards your writing. As opposed to someone like, say, Anne Rice, whose golden prose is not to be touched by mere editors, or, for that matter, Mercedes Lackey, the quality of whose output is inversely proportional to its volume. You're not afraid to look at a piece and say "Y'know, that's pretty lame" and then you go and do something about it. So, if it's a good story, tell it.

[elfs.livejournal.com]

Well, I like the JE's because they're mine and I can muck with them. Following a thread on the recent pagans vs. judges case, I came upon the saga of, well, a rather defensive young man who becomes highly abusive when his work is critisized. I may just try to provoke him, for fun.

[pixel39.livejournal.com]

People who paint big shiny targets on themselves *deserve* to get them poked.

[(Anonymous)]

On the topic of comfortable writing I'm attempting to write a short lovecraftian horror story, but I know almost nothing when it comes to conventions, plot arcs, maintaining tension, etc. You constantly speak of such things in your posts, and I trust your knowledge on the subject of writing implicitly. Do you have any advice or links that might help me get some direction and flow to my project?

[elfs.livejournal.com]

"Conventions" are what makes as story, in your case, Lovecraftian. The narrator is often first person for Lovecraft short stories and many of his novels, and "words must fail" to describe the horror he is encountering. That's what a convention is: somethnig that the reader recognizes as part of the genre. Lovecraft is a unique genre with some unique conventions. It takes someone like Charlie Stross to take the conventions and do something fascinatingly unique (http://www.infinityplus.co.uk/stories/colderwar.htm) with them.

A plot is just that: a problem the main character has that must be resolved by the end of the story. It's entirely possible to have a story without a plot, and some Lovecraft stories are like that: the reader gets a sense of the immensity of the struggle that the narrator can never overcome. "Arcs" are collection of scenes in a story that tell a mini-story while furthering the overall tale. If you have multiple viewpoints in a story, the scenes that make up an arc don't have to be congruent, and so forth.

[(Anonymous)]

Well thanks for the responce, and as useful as the information was I think I'm more confused then ever :) Not your fault though, it just shows that I really need to sit down and do some studying on how all this is supposed to work...