Borderlands Writers Bootcamp

I'm in! It's been a crazy couple of weeks. I know my last blog entry detailed how I had decided to put my Black Knight Towing novel to rest, but it wouldn't let me. Trevor Galloway kept coming back to me and demanded to be written about.

With the deadlines for the several arts grants looming, I buckled up on wrote up 3 chapters, about 40 pages of the novel and whipped them into shape for submission. I used the same writing sample as my submission to the Borderlands Writers Bootcamp. Earlier this week I received an email telling me I was accepted! I did a little happy dance.

Now, my attention has turned to what I need to do to prepare for this bootcamp. For September 1st, I need to provide: 

• up to 35 opening pages of my novel 
• synopsis or chapter outline of remainder
• brief but encompassing list of major and secondary characters and their biographies

It's going to be an exciting and busy summer!

Knowing when to stop

There's a point you reach when you realize that you're no longer making any forward progress. I've reached that point with my latest novel endeavour, Black Knight Towing. I've spent the last few months trying to pound out a story, but it's just not happening. Last year for NANOWRIMO I had used it as my subject and I ran out of steam with it as well. Maybe that's telling me something.

I know the general advice is to finish what you started, but it just isn't working. I'm spinning my wheels and I feel like I'm wasting the precious time before the World Fantasy Convention in November.

What the hell do I do now? Good question. Perhaps refocusing on what I want to write about. More reading, I know that with all the craziness in my life, the reading side of things has diminished, so that's an area I'd like to focus a bit more on.

Taking a few days off to write

Imagine that! With the renos and life in general getting in the way, I'll be taking three days off next weekend to write. I'm hoping to make some serious progress on my novel. Ideally by the middle of June, I'd like to have a couple of polished chapters that I can use for multiple purposes. Those purposes are the Toronto Arts Council and Ontario Arts Council grants, as well as my application to the Borderlands Writing Bootcamp. Wish me luck!

Still spinning my wheels...

I'm at a bit of an impasse. Lately, I've been turning all my attention to writing my novel. However, I've been having a lot of problems trying to plot the story. It really feels like I've got too many ideas for one novel and need to refocus. I'd also like to create a serial character, but the main problem I'm running into is where to start. Do I start with his origin or do I start with him as an experienced monster hunter?

Then the idea of creating a couple of chapter books surfaced and that actually seemed to work as I could create a chapter book of his origin and then one of a mission as an experienced monster hunter.

However, yes another however, I'm also eager to send in an application for the Borderlands Press bootcamp and they require the first two chapters of a novel. Sigh.

I guess I could pull the first two chapters from either of those chapter books to use as my writing sample. And actually, that might just work. The two chapters I send in don't have to be from the novel I want to workshop in the bootcamp. Just have to make sure that those two chapters are the best that I can produce.

Impasse overcomed. Now off to get some writing done!

Getting back on the horse!

Hey there. It was a crazy April that didn't see much writing get done. We're living in the main floor of a house down the street while our house undergoes a major renovation. Moving out this past weekend was crazy, simply crazy. I'm getting old. Still sore and tired from the two-day move. We're getting pro movers when we move back in.

I'm trying to get back on the horse and get some writing under my belt, but it's tough. I'm tired and don't feel like doing it. And I have more excuses, but that's all they are. I'm going to give myself a bit of slack, but I want to try do a bit of writing. I think my goal for tomorrow night is to look over what I want to get done for the month of May. I've got a lot of writing commitments and need to clear those off my plate before I can get to my novel writing.

However, I'm definitely more inspired to write about Trevor Galloway. I've stopped worrying about how to shape my novel and will try to break down the ideas I have into more digestible parts and write those. Right now I have two main story chunks, Galloway's origin as the Black Knight Tow Truck Operator and The Wendigo.

If you're reading this and are a writer, you might have run into something similar. How did you get back on the horse? Any advice?

Some great advice from Chuck Wendig

Chuck Wendig's novel, Blackbirds has recently been published and he shares some lessons he's learned along the way. An advance warning for the language that Chuck uses, it's raw...

http://terribleminds.com/ramble/2012/04/24/25-things-i-learned-while-writing-blackbirds/

- The book isn’t real until it’s done. It’s perhaps the most important lesson: before you can do anything else, before you rewrite, edit, query, publish, whatever, you have to finish your shit
-  Sometimes to fix a broken pipe, duct tape won’t do. You gotta rip that shit out. You gotta put in new pipe. I destroyed Blackbirds to save Blackbirds.
- Writing — and querying, and publishing, and marketing, and loving, and hating — a book takes a lot out of you. It feels in some ways like a great gym workout, in other ways like a weird (not bad, not good) breakup. You’re left flapping in the wind, your little book-baby all-groweds-up, out in the world doing things without you. You can only hope the book doesn’t embarrass you.

Finding the motivation

It's such a strange thing. I feel compelled to write. I have stories racing around in my head that itch and wiggle and squirm until I put them down on the page. But, why is it so easy to find an excuse not to do that. It's work. Being a writer is fun, but writing is still work, hard work. We have an upcoming renovation where my wife has told me to lower my expectations in terms of my time to write, which is fair, but also give me an excuse. That's an excuse I don't want to use. I still want to strive to get something written each day, even if its nothing, at least it keep the writing muscles limbed.