Day 9 - 21392 - lost a couple in editing

Just checked and Michael Brown is ahead of me - crikey Moses he's doing well because his writing is always all good and solid ... and his commitments considerable ...


I had a disappointing day yesterday - serves me right and teaches me that even with a wordy challenge it doesn't do to try and shoehorn extra, superfluous scenes in.   I'd added a couple of T10 pieces but they didn't really move anything along nor develop character so I wasted time, and didn't bother to update figures in the expectation that I will remove much of it.

Today I have woken with a 'proper' direction which might enable me to make use of at least some of what I wrote yesterday but I now need to get on with it ...

Day 8 - 21395 words

21395 words I have just posted.   This from yesterday's 'Holding steady 6' which is a transcription of scribbled conversation notes from a couple of months ago and a T10 piece, written to fit a prompt in which characters names Bud and Rose featured.

Knowing the contrived falseness of this latter piece I have earmarked it as something likely to be removed at a later date, but it may well be that I can rub off the intrusive bits and keep it.   We shall see.

And awake in the very early hours before sleeping again, and not waking until 6 has meant I have not spent time thinking over 'what next?'   So have gone straight to 6S and T10 - such a supportive group of friends whose responses make writing so rewarding.   And so many of them - Michael, Elliott, Lev and Jared in particular - also doing NaNoWriMo and fitting it around other commitments.

Day 7 - midday and 17920 words just posted

I started 'chapter' 5 yesterday, knowing that I had to deal with 1967 but having mostly a blank space as to how to do it, what to fill it with.  After several paragraphs of description - and although I know they are necessary they rarely give me the buzz that writing dialogue does - I finally got into the groove, characters took over and it went along nicely.

Added a bit more today and managed to incorporate some of the character notes I'd made, which I think is important because I have a feeling that the different characters, and their interaction is going to be one of the strengths, or at least important aspects, of this novel - hope so at least, if I can make it work.  Total word count for this section is 4375 - largest of the lot so far.

Next to 1968 - a MUCH more interesting year ... Oh no, I've remembered another T10 inspired plot line which was slotted in for 1967 ... and also a to-be-transcribed conversation, so 1968 in a day or two's time.

NaNo day 6 - 13429 words posted yesterday

Because 'Holding steady' is character-driven I needed to re-read what I'd written so far to get into the heads of my characters again, and much of the day was spent editing.   Not a problem, but the reason for the relatively small number of newly-posted words.   I also typed up conversation notes, mostly for things happening in 1968, but won't post these until I can slot them in chronologically. 

Today I hope to deal with 1967, but I have relatively few ideas at the moment and this is where I have to write, write, write from all the half-baked thoughts and scribbles and post-it notes and idiotic T10 prompt-driven tales.   Sooner or later I usually find a direction - fingers crossed it won't desert me today.

Day 5 - 12551 words posted yesterday

Yesterday I spent a lot of time editing and re-editing what I'd written before breakfast, and felt a lot calmer about the whole process. 

In the evening I 'treated myself' by typing up one of the conversations I'd made pencilled notes on some weeks ago;  one which took place a couple of years after the activities I'd been writing about yesterday, and when I woke this morning it was this conversation I had in my head, and the freshly-revived knowledge of what happened then has stymied* my ability to continue with the chronological 'official' account which I am trying to stick to so as to keep control.

I may have to do things differently, because in an hour I have added just 23 words.

*stymied - I used this without thinking, then thought to check it - apparently it derives from a golfing term and has to do with the necessary negotiating if an opponent's ball is in the way of one's own shot - I live and learn!

Day 4 - 10044 words posted yesterday

Yesterday a very solid day's writing - best part of 4000 words. 
The 6S post NaNoquandry - posted yesterday at four in the afternoon when I'm always at my lowest ebb - brought a huge amount of sincere and helpful comment from the hearts and minds of a wealth of talented and experienced writers for which I am grateful   In essence it boiled down to 'do what best suits, what comes naturally but remain aware that there might be ways to do it better', and above all 'do it with passion and enjoy it'

I certainly will do my best.   Thank you all

NaNo Day three - also on T10

So far today I've written about 3,500 words - a fairly high number compared to some but then I don't go out to work, and also Wednesday is my day off from the gym. I have been writing an account of a party, a big family party which has to contain a number of hints, several partially hidden factors which will indicate or influence future developments.

I am also concerned to make sure that the account contains more words than I would usually include, extra description of place and people would not go amiss but my normal style is verbose which I then pare down, needing to erase repetitions and meaningless phrases - 'seemingly' is one I am over fond of.for example.

What I have just realised is that I have written an account which contains mildly relevant but over-descriptive side issues, just to add words, and I really do not relish publishing anything this poorly edited.

[The Thinking Ten prompts are:  hidden, high, publish and erase]

NaNoquandry - also on 6S

It is stressed, and stressed again that the best approach to writing these 50,000 words is to just write, write, write.

‘Do not edit’ they advise, ‘do not re-write’ and even ‘do not re-read’ but my typing is not so good that I can refrain from editing – far too many red zig-zags.

Sentences do not always say what I mean because sometimes the meaning only becomes clear when I express it wrongly the first time, and sometimes I have to put in a wrong but closely approximating word, hoping to replace it when the right one emerges from the back of my brain.

I have to re-read because it is my characters who dictate what comes next and I need to remind, and surprise, myself, with what they have done already, before continuing.

And I hate typing reams of fill-in stuff which under normal circumstances I know I would re-write, would remove.

And where’s the merit in a novel full of drivel?

Day 3

Yesterday a day of dialogue, moderately successful.
And it is strange ... funny ... to find that the best relaxation after NaNo writing all day (ish) is to ... do some 6S and T10 writing.   Yesterday's T10 prompt gave me a plot direction but not necessarily one I'll use in full, today's looks more suitable for a 'Shenanigans' piece (I'm taking the easy option) but that'll happen later.
Glen is posting some wonderful prose, as is Leviathan, and this morning I find that, once again, I have not the highest word count - Kathleen having done 7000+.   Just as well I am not competitive.

I have a party to write ...

Day 2

It was the total uninspiringness of that first sentence that was so enervating / dispiriting ... but I got over that, and now I've Day 2 to negotiate. 

At least lying in bed musing since four had given me a direction ... and the NaNoWri Mo site has recovered enough for me to add Jared as a buddy and post yesterday's final total - 3243 (not so much as some buddies, better than others)

Hmm ...

Woke at four.
Remembered the date.
Refrained, without difficulty, from doing "A pinch and a punch" to my sleeping spouse.
Rehearsed my opening sentence.
And stayed in bed.
Oh dear.

NaNoWriMo Eve

Currently, probably over-prepared.
That’s what I usually do.
So that inspiration is beaten flat and lifeless – a pancake, a poppadom and not the plump chocolate-coated profiterole that promised so much a fortnight ago.
Bridie and Sean – mere cardboard cut outs, arms folded, gazing in opposite directions. Dumb, dialogue-less and incommunicado.
Fingers crossed, sooner or later, they'll get their act together ... they need to do a LOT of talking to get through 50,000 words.

Tomorrow ...

Back to GMT today so I don't know what time I'll wake tomorrow but do know I'll start NaNo-ing straight away ... I'm pretty sure how the first sentence goes ...

and today I've been reading the back story and making character notes .   Not altogether helpfully.

But it's very good to know there's about nine 6S people all about to take that first step ...

NaNoWriMo - Title and cover

OK since I can't get started on the writing I've been playing around with a cover image

 and come up with a (probable) title:  (quick fanfare!)   Holding steady

Coming soon!!

This is the image on the front cover of  'One that got away' - the sixteen episode story of Jenna and Eddie for which I have produced sixteen accompanying prints.   I have put it together using the Blurb.com site and will publish as soon as I receive permission from those whose comments I have quoted on the back page.

Countdown and messages

Three emails from various folks at NaNoWriMo and a FB post that there's only four days to go ...

Trouble is I've gone off the boil a bit, having been bursting with ideas a couple of weeks ago.

Heigh ho - no doubt it'll be fine once Monday comes.

Writing from New Orleans

Nine members of Six Sentences met in New Orleans at the beginning of September for what we hope was the first of many get-togethers of fellow writers, and although there is no doubt that the trip will continue to inspire us all for many more months, a selection of writings on our first, abiding impressions, has been gathered together by Mike Handley and this most wonderful souvenir produced by him..      http://issuu.com/pompetous/docs/hows_of_the_rising_sun


The book includes writings by Michael Brown, Teresa Cortez, Julia Davies, Joe Gensle, Jared and Mike Handley, Shauna McClure, Gita Smith and me.

Conversation on the summit of a hill - dialogue only

“Sean ... it’s just occurred to  me .. you’re not married are you?”

“Married?   Do you think I’d be behaving like this with you if I was?    

“No .. I suppose not ...”

“Didn’t your mother ever tell you I would’ve married you?”

“What?  My mother?   Marry me?  ... no, she’s never mentioned it, never  ... when? ... why didn’t I know about it?”  

“It was that morning I came to your house, just after the funeral, I was waiting along the road, hoping to see you, needing to know how things were between us and she came along and stopped and spoke to me.   I thought she was going to have a go at me, thought you’d’ve told her how I treated you .. but no, she said what a state you’d been in, crying in your room all the time, and that nothing she said made any difference, then said that seeing me would help get you out of it, because talking hadn’t helped ... I was totally knocked out at what she was hinting, couldn’t believe it at first ... but then she asked about taking precautions ... and I said no, I couldn’t do that ... so she said in that case it had to stop, she didn’t want you a mother at sixteen when you were too young to know what you were letting yourself in for.   And she was really fierce about that – if I’d tried to argue I’m sure she’d’ve stopped me coming to see you at all, and I was that desperate ... And although I knew it was far too early to suggest it, I wanted her to know I was serious so I told her I would marry you, but she said I was not to say anything at all to you about that.   And then she said “you’d better go and see her now to break it to her it’s got to stop” and said no-one else was at home, so I think she knew what would happen ...”

“And I made it so hard for you ... was such a selfish cow and couldn’t see reason ... oh god Sean, will I never finish being sorry for the way I behaved then?   But ‘serious’?, serious about me, enough to think of marrying me? ... I didn’t know, don’t think I ever thought that far ahead ...”

“There were times during those weeks when I didn’t believe you used your brain to think with at all.   I’d thought she would’ve told you later, but with you going on to university ... you’d’ve missed all that if we’d married, I suppose she didn’t want you finishing up with someone uneducated ...”

“No! – she’d never have taken that view, after all, Dad wasn’t ‘educated’ - my natural father was, but apart from his education he was not a lot of use to her, so she’d never say that ... but even so, I’d’ve liked to have been told ... liked to’ve been asked.”

“You would’ve said ‘yes’ like a shot wouldn’t you?  If it meant I could have you every day?   But if you had, we’d never be sitting here now – you’d not be looking so lovely and fresh, and I’d not be enjoying having a bit of money behind me, and the freedom to take a few days off work to climb a hill with you – we’d be struggling to make ends meet with four or five kids, in some rented place somewhere – and that’s why your mum was so determined I didn’t mention it to you then.   And I think she was right to do so, even though I knew you wouldn’t agree at the time.”

“So you were happy to just walk away? ... just to leave me without you? ... me not knowing that you cared that much?   Do you know how close I came to following Sophy’s example and throwing myself in the river – I  tried for months to get over you, thought I’d never manage to lead a life without you, it just got worse and worse because I thought you couldn’t possibly care if you were going with Caroline so soon after ...”  

“Only because you had Johnny ... she’d made the first move and I was using her to try and get over you ... I saw that Johnny had taken my place, that he was taking care of you – I was glad for you that he was, but I was going through hell, and of course I wasn’t happy but ...”

“But I didn’t have Johnny ... Johnny didn’t  have me, because I couldn’t forget you ... not that he ...  Look – Johnny’s my family, my cousin, my friend ... I love Johnny, he loves me, he takes care of me, I’d never have managed without him those first few weeks ... BUT ... but there is not, there hasn’t been, not since you, there never has been that extra ... that need for him that I feel for you.” 

“So we’ve got lust going for us ... is that enough? do you think that’s enough? enough to build a marriage on?”  

“ ‘Enough to build a marriage on’?  Is that a proposal?   No, don’t make that a proposal ... I’d say lust on its own isn’t enough, probably, but we don’t just have lust, there’s a lot more between us ... I know there is ...”  

“Such as?”  

“Such as honesty, such as respect – we always could talk to each other, I always trusted you, was always comfortable with you, but yesterday, coming to you after so long, I see just how ... how honourable a person you are, how strong and solid ... and trustworthy.   Believe you me, there aren’t that many people around as solid as you ...  and I think you must care for me to have taken the trouble to make me see what you made me see yesterday ... that you won’t be fucked around with ...”

“Don’t use that language – it’s ugly in a woman,“

“ ... you won’t be messed around with ... and you cared enough to forgive me for ... for going with Johnny first ...  I don’t think it’s just lust you feel for me ... any more than it’s just lust I feel ... Oh Christ, Sean, I can’t help it but I still love you as much as I ever did, all those years of trying to get over you, they haven’t worked, since yesterday, as soon as I saw you, it’s just as bad as it always was.”

“Just as bad?   Why bad, Bridie?”  

“Because ... because if I’ve got it wrong about you caring I’m going to have to learn all over again to do without you and I don’t think I can do it ...”

“Bridie, my darling, you don’t have to ... I do care, I want nothing more than to stay together ... but you must have plans already, a future already in place, surely?”

“Nothing I wouldn’t change ... “ 

“That’s what I’m afraid of  - you changing to be with me, and then finding it was a mistake, and being unhappy.   You have no more idea of my life now than I know of what you intend to be doing ...”

“Then tell me, show me what your life is ... don’t you understand – I don’t care so long as I’m with you ... so long as you ... want me ... you don’t even have to marry me if you don’t want ... just ...”

“Of course I’ll marry you, of course I want to marry you ...”

“Then why don’t you ask me?  Me instead of my bloody mother?”

“Christ, Bridie – you haven’t grown up at all have you? – you sound just like you did when you were sixteen – the only difference is that then you were demanding that I shagged you and now you’re demanding that I marry you!   You’re still wanting, wanting and unwilling to wait or to see sense ... but you’re going to have to learn to wait because I’ll ask you to marry me when I’m ready to, when I’m sure that our marriage will not fail, and not before.”

Honourable mention

Pipped to the post, deservingly, by Bolton Carley's brilliant sense of humour, Paul Phillips has selected my piece for an Honourable Mention.    Check it out at  http://jmprescott.blogspot.com/

The piece, posted above as submitted, is of course, a conversation between Bridie and Sean - main characters of my forthcoming novel.

Thursday now

All I've done this week is have thoughts about different facets of my characters, based on what went on with them in Reunion, and occasionally earlier.   These have been scribbled on Post-it notes and stuck into my notebook.   I like to use pencil but have noticed these notes do seem to get rubbed away over time - hope the words don't disappear before I get them typed up!

For JM Prescott's weekly Dare I've submitted a piece of dialogue from Reunion - part of the 'Conversation on the summit of a hill' - having removed all the extra pieces of description, and it still works fine, as far as I can tell.   In contrast, on T10 today Leviathan has posted an excerpt from a novel - Burn it well - and the detail there seems to add a great deal to the dialogue - I must re-read and work out how he does it.

Exercise is character-building

September 26^th :   a Thinking Ten Canvas plus a week’s worth of prompts, all of which are to be used  for the Capstone. 

Prompts always include a location, an opening sentence, three words which must be included, a ‘plot-thickener’ and a Friday ‘Member’s Choice’ which, in this instance, was the instruction to include a newspaper and two characters, named Bud and Rose.   A considerable challenge, since the Canvas was a Van Gogh drawing, and the opening sentence ‘He was the most extraordinary man I ever knew.’

I mulled it over - I had already used the canvas to the best of my ability, referred to my ‘extraordinary’ great-grandfather (stretching the ‘I knew’ just a little) and overcome the difficulty that, for a Brit, the name ‘Bud’ is alien.

The initial story does of course have to be written in ten minutes (no limit on editing time) and where possible I also set myself an additional challenge to use all prompts  as succinctly as possible.   Nevertheless I was surprised that I came up with no fewer than four characters with the potential for future development, and did it in six sentences – a vivid illustration of the benefits of just a month of daily mental exercise.

http://www.thinkingten.com/profiles/blogs/grieving-too-bloody-right-we

6S comment

"Yes - I know, I know the waking at three the words in the head the repeating and polishing and repeating until it is absolutely imperative that I get out of bed and go and write them down (type them out because these days that is where I have to write) and after that its too late to go back to bed.
And at the moment I am immensely frustrated because I have the words, the talking the conversation filling my head but am not permitted to write it down until the first of November.
Which is why you're getting this particular blast of words because I think you might understand.
At least, most of the time (only two haiku in my life) I'm not counting syllables. And I enjoy reading the result of you doing so"

A comment I made yesterday on Ron Lavalette's post (6x3): Two Small Threes by 5
one of a series in which he has been exploring, with wit and insight and poetry,  the difficulties of being a writer

Odd

Between 7.20 this morning when I went out for a paper, and 8.30 when I drew the front room curtains, a tent appeared on the grass bank opposite my house.

Not pegged down, it has blown, flown?, in from somewhere, some other direction to South where I walked earlier.
Black with re piping, it is unattached, its guy ropes dangling, rolling against the hedge.

As I gaze, amazed, a cyclist goes past, turns his head to wonder too.


But between starting to type this and now, (less than ten minutes - I am well-practised) it has steadied, it has turned, it has become grounded.

And three heads, youthful, male, peer out from below the unzipped nylon door flap.

NaNoWriMo preparation

Spidergraph, flowchart or the even better word my daughter reminded me of the other day which I have already forgotten, whatever you call, it can be a useful device for novel planning.

I drew one up for a particularly complex essay when I did my MA. A beautiful one, colour-coded boxes, lines, arrows both single and double ended and different colour texts, and proud of my efforts, I emailed a copy to my youngest son.

He was scathing: “You’d’ve been better using pencil and paper” he said, not understanding that the only way such a chart could be done on the computer was after a lot of scribbling and re-drawing, ultimately repetitive and frustrating because of the need to re-draw every correction.

I thought to resurrect it in preparation for my November novel, deleting the text which referred to seventeenth century parish registers and overseer’s account, kinship and bastardy, and substituting characters: Bridie, Sean and Christy, and plot lines: B + C discovered by S, big row between J + E, etc etc.

But all I currently have are a load of empty and irrelevantly coloured boxes, parked beside rows and rows of arrows, both horizontal and vertical, like spears awaiting battle.

[This piece originally appeared on 6S, 19th September, with many comments, including the words "Mind Map" which I had forgotten]

Post-it notes

This one says

'deserved

loved

supported yesterday

she wanted to acknowledge'

I hope I remember where I wanted to use these words

Another book

Yesterday I began reading David Lodge's 'Souls and Bodies' - an account of the lives and the impact of Catholicism on a group of people who were undergraduates in the mid 1950s.   This was recommended by Michael Brown in response to my request for help on 6S and is proving a fascinating - and extremely useful - read, reminding me of so much about life in Britain at that time, as well as enabling me to get a better idea of how Sean & Bridie might tackle the question of a Catholic marriage.

Re-reading Toby Hecht's blog 'Collaboration' on editorial interventions, and from thence considering acknowledgements, it crossed my mind that among those I list in my eventual novel (ha ha!) perhaps MDJB should be one - but really that seems not to be the point at all.   Are people whose list of those they feel obliged to thank for help runs to half a page or more (sometimes a LOT more) confusing perhaps the (maybe sycophantic for a purpose) acknowledgements necessary for a dissertation, where exam success rests upon a good mark, with the more grown up and individual production of a novel, or are they wishing to share the blame should it be a failure?

pessimistic

Last night I sat up late to finish Andrew Greig's 'Electric Brae' and now wonder if I have the language, the poetry, the experience to write anything which even approaches this.  I can but aspire.   Write what you know, and make it more so I suppose.   Twisted truths.   Yeah.

Dream on!

This morning I woke late, aware that I'd been dreaming about Sean or Christy - a warm and comfortable dream, of sensations rather than facts, feelings rather than words so there is nothing left, now that I've woken, which can be written down.   What a pity that some sort of plug-in hasn't yet been invented which could turn my dreams into written words.

NaNoWriMo - less than a month away

Fellow writers on 6S and T10 will know that I've signed up for National Novel Writing Month - there are eight of us altogether on 6S and I have been using the T10 prompts to experiment with plot lines.   I am, of course, continuing with the Bridie and Sean saga which began way back in April in response to a challenge from Absolutely*Kate, in which Bridie - as Bridget - made her first appearance, at the age of three months, along with her mother Jenna, and Eddie Burdock.   Originally entitled 'Not Sexy - the One that got away' since it wasn't my original submission for the challenge but something of a gathering, a rehashing, of left-over sentences, it eventually dropped the 'Not Sexy' and became a sixteen episode 'One that got away'.

In June, Bridie reappeared in 'Theme for a Summer' now age fifteen.   Sean quickly - and literally - 'made contact' with her and almost as quickly earned the wrath of Eddie - now married to Jenna and considered by Bridie to be the only father she has ever had.   This saga, which took place in the summer of 1961 and contained a host (too many) of other characters, ran to some thirty or so six sentence posts and came to an end with me expecting her and her cousin Johnny to Live Happily Ever After.

Sean and Bridie had other ideas however, and thanks to Christy, Sean's brother, the pair got together again in 'Reunion' and eventually, after fifty-eight episodes, agreed to marry.

My November novel, as yet untitled, will hopefully continue the story, but it is alarming to realise that all the foregoing - some three or four months of writing - comprises less than 40,000 words and I have to achieve at least 50,000 to qualify.   First thoughts are that plenty of plot, plenty of description - lacking in my 6S pieces - and plenty of back story will be required, along with the reintroduction of several characters from 'Theme'.

Three weeks and four days to go - I have a 'Timeline' drafted and lots of conversations going on in my head ... fingers crossed I'll remember them all when November 1st arrives - and be able to decipher all my scribbled notes.

Lunch on North Peters Street

Felix's Taqueria - Julia's choice of lunch venue - and while I sat on one of the stools at the small, high table, bags on the floor beneath my feet, she selected a plateful of pick and mix tapas to share between us, luckily remembering that my tolerance of chillis was a lot lower than hers so making a balanced selection.
While we ate we watched a window cleaner with the air of a madman, leaping and jumping to reach the higher parts of the windows, climbing onto the sill and holding on precariously to the fragile ironwork, spray container of water and sheets of newspaper for polishing off tucked into his belt ready to be used alternately. From the number of passers by who stopped and spoke to him he was well-known, however such were his antics that the proprietor was eventually forced to go and ask him to desist - or find something to stand on.
The oval mirror not only enabled us to watch him but also exaggerated the apparent darkness of the corner we sat in - the stained and ancient appearance of the plaster must have been intentional, as was the area of exposed brick, partly to retain the 'genuine antiquity' appeal of the French Quarter. Whatever the falseness we both felt ourselves immensely fortunate to have spent a week in New Orleans, and were sorry that this was our final lunch.