How I learned to stop worrying and love the blog

In ninth grade, we had to pass a state-mandated writing test. Every student submitted a 5-paragraph essay on the same general topic, and they were graded on a 6-point scale, 3-5 being passing and 6 being extraordinary (or the result of a grader's pen slipping, I'm still not sure which). I was one of those obnoxious teacher's pet types who thrived on those extra little notes of praise that came back in the margins of my papers, and I looked forward to the state essay test for weeks. I was going to destroy this test. The graders would have to raise the high end of the scale to account for my superior 5-paragraph essay writing abilities. My incredibly boring English teacher would throw her hands up and cry in her monotone voice, "That's it! I can't teach you anything! Class, Nicole will be your teacher from now on."

Never mind the fact that I hadn't written much besides English assignments and Dragon Ball Z fan fiction. Those margin notes on my class assignments had filled me with the ego of a god. On the day of the essay test, I walked into the cafeteria testing area with a swagger, sure of my imminent victory over the English language.

The subject of the essay was "Write about a time when you learned something." I wrote about learning how to draw in anime style, and I went through every element of the essay carefully - introduction, three supporting paragraphs, conclusion - writing exactly as my English teacher had told us to write. Transition sentences to link paragraphs. Restatement of the point in the conclusion. Impersonal tone with no "I" voice. I wrote the most by-the-book 5-paragraph essay any kid has ever written about how to learn to draw in anime style.

I scored a 3 - just passing.

My best friend wrote about a time when she learned how to walk across a log without falling off it. She scored a 4. Another kid I knew wrote some bullshit about learning to pilot a spaceship or something, and he scored the legendary 6.

Looking back on that essay, I understand now why it was just passable. First off, have you ever tried to write about drawing? Without context or personal stakes, it's about the dullest subject in existence, short of writing itself. Second - and this, I realized years later, was the big one - writing about something as personal as art without a personal voice doesn't work. I wrote my essay like an instruction manual, impersonal and redundant as the instructions my English teacher gave said to do. I eliminated the personal voice that had gotten those comments from my instructors, and all that was left were clunky statements of fact and redundant sentences. My friends who scored better had bucked the rules, used the dreaded "I" voice, and written what came naturally to them.

Now that I'm at the graduate level in writing, every text I read on how to write an essay encourages the "I" voice and the natural style of writing. Tell a story, they say. Give the reader something personal to carry them through even if the topic isn't in their field. Plunder the 5-paragraph essay format for structure tips, but otherwise, fuck it.

And further, "Don't alter your voice to fit your subject," writes William Zinsser in On Writing Well, a book I'm reading for class right now. It wasn't until I came across this sentence tonight that I realized I've been making the same mistakes as I did in that stupid essay test, right here on this blog.

I've been blogging here for a little over a year, and I've never gotten comfortable with it. I came to Blogger after parting with my 6-year-old LiveJournal blog, which was mainly about life stuff because mostly just my friends read it. I loved that LJ. It gave a relatively accurate view of who I was during the years that I kept it, because I wrote what came naturally and I didn't censor myself. But it became just a social tool for me, so I left the site to make a proper project blog, like all these knitters and writers I admire had been doing.

So I set up this blog, aiming to write about writing and crafts and art and only those things, without writing about myself. And I promptly fell into the same pothole I hit in ninth grade: writing about art (or writing or knitting) on its own is boring. Just posting "Here is a thing I made. This is how I made it," like I've been doing for the majority of the last fourteen months, doesn't make me excited to update. I've been slowly starting to write posts that don't bore me to tears, but the project-centric nature of the blog makes me feel limited to posting only on certain topics.

Meanwhile, on my fandom blog, I've taken to posting almost every day, when I have time. That blog has become a much better depiction of who I am, and a more interesting read, because it's uncensored. I'm not worried about how I might come off to random internet stranger over there, so the voice is 100% unadulterated me, and the topics range from inane babble to creative work to academic rambling. It reads like I actually sound, while most of this blog reads like a watered down, project-focused, scarcely nerdy version of myself. Hopping between these two blogs is jarring.

So I'm taking Zinsser's advice. This marks the end of me censoring myself, in terms of both language and content. I'm an open book elsewhere online and in person, so I'm going to aim to be more open here. (Not to the point of confessional poetry, but y'know.) I want this blog to be a reflection of who I am, not just what I make.

Here goes.

I ate a Dorito off the floor earlier.

...Okay, probably not what Zinsser was advocating, but I'll work on it.

Where do story ideas come from?

Well, I'll be watching Torchwood with Kiah, and...

Kiah: "Why are cannibals always country bumpkins?"

Me: "I don't know. They should be in the city sometimes."

Kiah: "They should be hipsters!"

Me: "YES! 'We spent too much money on jeans, so we couldn't afford food.'"

Kiah: "'Why are you doing this?!' 'Because we don't have money for food!' 'But we just went shopping for jeans!' 'Exactly.'"

Me: "And then they eat their friends!"

Kiah: "'We ate Henry because he was really loud.'"

Me: "'And he didn't like Sigur Ros.'"

Kiah: "'He was always playing Top 40 hits.'"

Me: "...I really want to write a story about hipster cannibals now."

The creation of stories is a mysterious process, you see - almost spiritual. Collective unconscious, muses, the genius in the walls, etc. Very weighty stuff. Difficult to explain. *puffs pipe*

A letter to 2010, with visual aids

Dear 2010,

Where is my flying car? I was told by now there would be flying cars, and so far you have disappointed me. Hell, I'm not picky - a hoverboard will do in a pinch. But something needs to fly me to work.

Especially since 2009 left this in front of my door:


I'm not even going to show you what's on the stairs.

I don't mean to speak ill of your brother, 2010, but you've gotta admit, he had kind of a jerky sense of humor. I mean, trying to trap me inside my apartment with a layer of ice on the welcome mat, just days after Christmas? The welcome mat. Come on.

And before that, when 2009 killed the hard drive on my laptop in the middle of a semester, in the middle of several writing projects? And then, less than six months later, when he killed the logic board while I was in the middle of a novel revision? I had the same instructor both terms, so I couldn't even use "my computer ate it" as an excuse without looking like a liar.

So many people I know labeled 2009 the Year of Suck, I can't even count them all. And parts of the year really sucked for me, too. But there were upsides, especially in the realm of projects.

2009 was the year that I finished my first novel that wasn't about Tiern. It was the year I designed my first knitwear pattern (and the second, which I swear I'm still working on!). It was the year I started spinning and bought my lovely wheel, Mal, who's still one of my favorite things I own. It was the year that rekindled my love of fan fiction, which in turn brought a weird sense of balance to my writing. It was the year I got my own apartment, which immediately filled with wool and notebooks.

2009 was also the year I met scads of friends online - most notably on the Very Longest Thread on Ravelry, an epic chat made up of people so friendly and accepting that they made me feel supported in everything I did. (Here's to a millionth post in 2010, Fredizens!)

So, 2010. I think we need to sit down and make some agreements.

You see this shiny little MacBook Pro? His name is Tony Stark, and he's less than a week old. His external hard drive (not pictured because the stacks of CDs I've been importing into iTunes are hiding it) is Jarvis. Please keep them in good condition through the following year. 2009 was a total fucker to me regarding technology. Don't be like him.


This is the manuscript I finished in late 2009. This year, I want to clean it up to the point where I can send it out to literary agents. I realize that whether or not it piques their interest is totally not up to me, but maybe you could give them a little nudge? This is the first time in my life I've had what feels like a genuinely salable novel in my hands, so if ever there was a time for me to have stunningly good luck regarding the publishing industry, this year would be it.


In 2010, I'm going to finish a couple of different novels. One is a this young adult fantasy thing that shouldn't take long - maybe January and February.


The other is the final book in the Fantasy Series What Ate My Life (not pictured due to sheer bulk). I've got a couple other projects I'm interested in writing, but these are the main two. If I get them done during you, 2010, I'll be ridiculously pleased with myself. Please don't prevent me.

I'm going to finish my Sylvi coat during you as well - preferably before it gets warm again. It's been sitting on my desk so long that apartment wildlife have begun to view it as a natural part of the landscape.


Now, 2010, I'm not going to bog you down entirely with major goals and pressure.

For instance, can we just agree that spinning is awesome and should continue unhindered? I won't make any goals for spinning in 2010, because I want nothing more than to keep enjoying it.


And mittens! I'd love to finish these Cotton Reel Mittens I've been knitting, but I don't actually need them until maybe next fall. Also, they don't have to be of any particular quality, since I'm new to colorwork, the yarn is all scraps, and I kind of love the idea of having a pair of idiosyncratic but adorable mittens.


And I would like to DIG UP A DINOSAUR! But that's not a major deal, either, as you can see.


So far, 2010, I don't think you have anything to worry about. You've been doing a pretty good job. I kicked you off at an awesome New Year's party, dancing to ridiculous music and wearing a fedora. I've gotten a lot of sleep in your first few days, and even so I managed to catch the sunrise yesterday morning. I watched The Princess Bride with the Fredizens and started reading the book aloud to Hobbes (something I've been meaning to do for years).

And there was doodling!


And a great discovery!


(Dunking the cookies in Nutella cancels out the ridiculous "health" notion they advertise and makes them totally NOM.)

So, 2010, I think you'll be fine. Keep being laid back and fun. Don't let anything major break. Be kind.

And for the love of all that is good and holy, don't listen to 2009. He's a bad influence.

Love,
Nicole


P.S.

Wait for it...

I haven't seen Avatar, and I don't really intend to (at least not unless someone tells me something about the story or characters that piques my interest, which hasn't happened yet). But I'm finding the early critiques of it fascinating, so I've been browsing Avatar-related articles all afternoon. I've seen lots of arguments about the movie being an environmental allegory, a replay of the "white guilt" narrative, a metaphor for the Bush Administration (whut), and scads of other things.

And in a New York Times article that rounded up several of the arguments, I read this question:

Why do you think science-fiction and fantasy films like “Avatar” — not to mention “Star Wars,” “Star Trek,” “The Matrix” and many more — lend themselves to so many interpretations?

So I've been sitting here - a student of fiction, specifically genre fiction - flailing my arms and gnashing my teeth at the monitor, going, "Do you really not get it? This is how genre fiction works!"

Genre fiction lives in Ambiguous Metaphor Land. Genre fiction and metaphor are like YouTube and cat videos. Like Wisconsin and cheese products. Like Like Barney Stinson and "It's gonna be legen--wait for it--"

Metaphor is what genre fiction does best.

(Quick note: I use the phrase"genre fiction" to mean genre books, films, and anything that's both genre and fictional, because across mediums, the function is the same. Also, it's way quicker to write and I'm lazy.)

This is my big peeve as a genre writer. While a certain type of books get held up as capital-L Literary and a certain type of movies get the Oscar nod for their deep themes, by and large people tend to shrug off all genre fiction as "just a fantasy novel" or "just a space movie" and treat them like they have no deeper meaning.

When really, writing these kinds of stories is trickier than writing the typical Literary stuff, because you know what? It's all meaning. All of it. To write good genre fiction, your wizards or zombies or whateverthefuck have to stand in for bigger real-world things. You need the symbolism - if it's not there, you have to figure out a way to tweak your wizards or zombies or whateverthefuck so that someone will see them shambling through a mall and say, "Ah, I get it. Consumerism." And to write good and successful genre fiction, your wizards or zombies or whateverthefuck should be open-ended enough as symbols to stand in for more than one real-world thing.

This is the point at which I'd like you to think of a few of your favorite scifi or fantasy books, and consider how much research and world building went into those. On top of all this. This is why I think genre is trickier to write than literary fiction. Of course this doesn't hold true for every single novel - there are literary novels that take epic amounts of research and genre novels that don't - but by and large, if you're going to write a novel, you'll probably spend less time bowing to the gods of Google and sweet talking your local librarians if you choose to set your novel in Nebraska instead of a moon colony. And your Nebraska novel is less likely to be called "mindless escapism" if it doesn't pull double-duty as a metaphor for issues of colonization.

Maybe this is the English major in me speaking, but the best stories are the ones that you can read on multiple levels: I can enjoy Lord of the Rings, for example, on the level of Damn Good Story, but I can also enjoy picking it apart as a critique of industrialism, a lesson on friendship, a sexual metaphor (it's in there!), and so many other things. Don't get me wrong, I love me some mindless escapism - especially during a hard semester - but the stories that stick with me? They're all layered like this.

Good genre fiction sticks around not just because of memorable worlds and characters but because it means something. Many somethings. It starts conversations. It makes you see an issue in a new light. It opens a box full of questions about real life, dumps them out on the table in front of you, and says, "Take what you need." The best genre fiction does this without its audience noticing until they've finished the story.

Because we need to ask questions. And sometimes the real world is too dense and angry and politically charged a place to ask them, so we do it through aliens. Or wizards. Or whateverthefuck. That's what genre fiction exists for.

That, and mindless escapism. Sometimes.


"--DARY."

Mostly ravioli, it turned out.

A while back, after not having bought groceries for a few months, I made the mistake of going grocery shopping without a list. I didn't have any recipes I made on a regular basis at the time, so I didn't have a starting point from which to toss things into the cart. The idea of gathering everything I needed to feed myself seemed like a staggeringly huge task, and after so long without having shopped for my own food, I just couldn't remember what I usually bought. I wound up roaming the frozen food aisle wide-eyed, wringing my hands and going, "What do I EAT?"

My former roommates remember this. I clung to their sleeves and cried, "You should know this! What do I EAT?" and they said, "Uh...food?"

This is about how I feel right after finishing a big revision.

Tonight I finished the second draft of Or Your Money Back. It's now 81,835 words long (over 11,000 words longer than before), more fleshed out in a lot of ways, and well on its way to being a finished book. I saved the finished draft, went out celebrating, sat down to write again...and stopped.

What do I WRITE?

You guys! You should know this! What do I WRITE?

I have a list somewhere, I think. Maybe I should go dig that up.

And hey, if all else fails, I can just throw some things in the cart and see what sticks.

A list of ten things from a long ten days

1. Since I last posted here, my computer has died. It's well past the expiration of its AppleCare plan, it's not really worth attempting to salvage, and getting it fixed would cost as much as another computer, so it's currently sitting in its messenger bag on the floor. Poor old Sophie. She had her hard drive die and half her insides replaced in March, then she was forced to take notes on subcommittee meetings and surf fanfiction all summer, and now it looks like her logic board's gone bad. It's been a rough year for the old girl.

2. I'm currently using my 2004 G4 desktop as my primary computer. It's running OS X 10.5 and is hooked up to a 22" monitor and a 500GB external hard drive, so it's kind of like Number 5 trying to hang out with Cylons, but y'know, it works.

If anyone got that reference, please let me know so we can arrange a high-five later.

3. Partly because of the computer issues, I haven't made much progress in anything except knitting lately. And thanks to daylight savings, which ensures it's already dark out when I get home from work, I don't have any pictures of my recent knitting.

4. One piece of writing advice that's always stuck with me is something Neil Gaiman blogged about: "You never learn how to write a novel," Gene Wolfe once said to him. "You just learn how to write the novel that you're writing." This is absolutely true. I struggled with the first draft of Or Your Money back because all the longer stories I'd written before were installments of the Series What Ate My Life. I knew how to write those novels, to let epic fantasy plotlines sprawl across the page - what I didn't know how to write was a quiet coming of age romance with no explosions or psychic eviscerations. By the end of the first draft, I sort of figured it out, and I was so proud of myself for that.

I got cocky. Now I'm learning that you can't learn how to revise a novel, just how to revise the novel you're revising. The novel revisions I've done before have focused on hacking down massive forests of text - upwards of 50,000 words - but this revision requires small bits of pruning and a lot of new additions. My chainsaw of revision is useless here. I need shears and potting soil.

5. To further earburn Neil Gaiman, I'm already at the point in the revison where his NaNoWriMo pep talk feels appropriate to re-read. Substitute the "writes" with "revises" and you've got my mindset exactly. I get the "This is the worst thing I've ever written, maybe I should quit writing and become a lawyer/florist/sherpa" thing during every first draft and every major revision.

6. What did the hot dog say when he won the contest?

(Answer: I'm the wiener!)

7. I have a whole drawer full of candy leftover from Halloween. Most of it is Laffy Taffy.

8. My Christmas knitting is starting to move along. I'm sure I won't get it all done in time for Christmas - especially taking breaks to knit stuff for myself - but I'm pretty sure I can finish what I need to finish for the people who actually care about it being on time.

9. I've finally figured out an age/maturity level test for whether a person is old enough for me to date. If I say "DuckTales" and they respond with "WOO-OOH," it's cool. If they stare at me blankly, they're too young. Or they're not that into TV, in which case I'd probably drive them nuts, anyway.

10. I'll take and post pictures of WIPs when I can.

This happens too much between major projects.

Dear Muse, Powers That Be, or Creativity-Inducing Whoever,

I hate to be ungrateful for the sudden-onset rush of creative mojo, but I'm at work right now. If you could maybe send me some creative mojo while I'm not at work, that would be fantastic.

And also, if you could send it for a project that's not fan fiction, I'd appreciate it.

Oh, and not for a project that I don't currently have on my to-do list, either. That means both those currently in some stage of existence and those that haven't yet been put to text. Like, say, the Fantasy Trilogy What Ate My Life? That's in hibernation. None of that. And don't go poking me about sequels to Or Your Money Back, because unless a publisher picks that up and asks for more, I'm not doing them.

So, to recap, bad things to send me include:

• fanfic
  
• sequels for things
• ideas for hibernating projects
• strong urges to ditch everything and write between the hours of 8-5, Monday through Friday
• everything you have been giving me, basically
  

Good things to send me include:

• short story writing mojo
  
• OYMB revision ideas/motivation
• better time management skills
  
• chocolates

Are we clear? Good. Thanks for your time.

Love (potentially),
a writer

One last question

Or Your Money Back has been a test run for me in a lot of ways - Can I write a novel that takes less than 100,000 words? Can I write a stand-alone? Can I write something with a romance plot at the heart of it? The answer to all of these so far seems to be "Yes," but there's one more important question that I'm just getting to the bottom of, a week after putting down the first draft: Can I finish a book?

It's not the same as "Can I finish a first draft?" That I know I can do. I've done that three times now. The thing I wanted to know most, going into this project, was what happened when I put a story down for good. I've never done that before - not with an involving, novel-length thing. Prior to OYMB, what I'd written were installments of a fantasy trilogy (AKA The Beast That Ate My Adolescence) that I'd been working on for upwards of a decade. Because there was always another novel coming next in that series, I never had to really say goodbye to the characters. So I'm doing that now, for the first time.

I've lived every day with Seb & Co. for the last three months. They were welcome, quiet roommates, and now that I don't have them to focus on, I feel very slightly lost. You know that moment after you wake up from a really nice dream, when you're reaching to catch onto it but it's already gone, and you're a little disappointed? It's like that. Which is fitting, for this particular dreamy little book.

Apparently the answer to "Can I finish a book" is: yes, I can. I'm waking up from this book, stretching, scratching, yawning out morning breath.

So, new day. What's next?

Mmm, fresh manuscript.

Fresh beta reader first draft copies are sitting on my desk.

They're currently pristine, neatly bound packages with a lovely heft and a crisp paper smell.



In a few weeks, they'll come back to me marked up, dog-eared, and probably - knowing one of my beta readers - stained, with pieces of the binding missing.

I can't wait.

I kind of like this book.

This has been the view at my kitchen table for the past two days:


The first draft of Or Your Money Back is done, with the following statistics:

69,536 words
12 chapters
191 pages, double spaced with 1" margins

Lots to celebrate tonight. And I'm celebrating with bargain pinot noir, chocolate stout, Alias, and cracky Supernatural fan fiction. Y'know - like a grown up! Courtesy those things and Kiah's camera, here is my new dust jacket-esque photo:


Cheers.

(Oh, and happy 100 posts to this blog! Thanks for reading.)

General update

Eyeballs-deep in work and novel WIP right now, so I might not have a proper entry here for a bit. Here's the gist of my current projects:

Writing: OYMB first draft is coming along nicely. This weekend I smacked a character in the head with a baseball bat and got my protagonist into a car on the way to Climactic Plot Events. Current status: 52,481 words, 9/13 chapters. I've got a couple days' worth of pay saved up, so I'm going to take two days off in the next week, lock myself in my apartment, and plow through the end of this book Misery-style. (But with an elderly terrier instead of Kathy Bates.)

Knitting: OH DEAR GOD. I can't work on any one project for more than a few minutes without getting fidgety like mad. It's infuriating. I've gotten a few inches done on the back of my Sylvi coat, a few rows on my Garter Yoke Cardi, a little bit of a scarf, a little bit of a sock, a little bit of another sock - and the list goes on. I've never been terribly project monogamous, but rotating a small army of knitting projects every five minutes is just ridiculous. Maybe it's because I've been so project monogamous in my writing lately, and my brain is staging a creative coup.

Spinning: Getting better. I've got a handful of little finished projects that I don't have pictures of. Here's one back when it was on the bobbin:


Also, I think I managed to infect my friend Lisa with the spinning bug, and I've got a pound and a half of bulk fiber en route to my apartment right now. Some of it has tencel in it. I'm excited.

Art: What? I've been doing art? Holy crap!


False alarm, I'm just dicking around with my oil paints.

Domesticity: I've been doing a ton of stuff in this realm lately, so I figured I'll count it as a project thing. In the last couple of months, I've been learning to cook and bake, and I've been decorating a little (the Supernatural motel room themed bathroom is on hold until I find the proper shower curtain, if you're wondering).

This weekend, my former roommates moved in downstairs, so I finally got my kitchen table back and completed my kitchen! Am unreasonably pleased with my doofy 50's-tastic table and its classy DIY decoration. (The flower is fake, the vase was a hand-me-down from a former roommate's mom, and the table runner is a modified obi from a costume I wore to an anime con a couple years bac.)


I've learned to make a couple of tasty recipes. The tastiest by a wide margin being Blueberry Boy Bait, which I made for a second time yesterday. Here's Kiah demonstrating how awesome Blueberry Boy Bait is.


And the finished Bait.


And that is what's up with me.

Research

In between other things today, I've been doing research for the novel WIP. Among the things I've learned today:

* Most baseball bat related deaths are due to either intentional attacks or pitchers getting hit in the head by high-speed balls.

* In Taiwan, you can buy baseball bats made specifically for self-defense. It's illegal to own a gun there, but you can own a "home defense bat."

* According to Texas Penal Code, you can't be prosecuted for assault with a deadly weapon for beating someone with a baseball bat - baseball bats do not count as "deadly weapons" because they were not designed for that purpose. (The Taiwanese man on that self-defense forum might disagree.)

* Controversy surrounds metal baseball bats and law suits have been had against their makers, but no official studies have been produced thus far to prove that they are, in fact, more dangerous than wooden bats.

* Aikido can be used to subdue an attacker with a baseball bat. (And look really badass in the process.)

* I am not the only writer on the internet looking to kill or seriously injure a character with a baseball bat.

By the way, for those playing at home, the current novel stats are:

Chapters: 8/13

Words: 46,879/70,000 (and starting to think this may be a shorter novel than planned, which is new for me!)

August 9th, 2009

I took the day off my WIPs yesterday to hang out with an old friend. (My true dork colors are about to let loose, so shield your eyes.)

August 9th is sort of a personal holiday for me. It's the birthday for Tiern, the protagonist of the fantasy series I've been working on since I was fourteen. Some years I celebrate it with ice cream cake and friends and readings of horrible high school fiction, some years I just hang out by myself and reflect. It's not really a birthday celebration for the character himself - although last year there was a splendid duck-themed cake that would've just killed him. For me, it's a day I set aside to celebrate writing.

Writing makes me happy. It often makes me flail my arms and squeal like a teenage girl. It's a thing I want to spend the rest of my life doing, whether I eventually get paid to do it or not. I figure something that brings that much joy and meaning (not to mention opportunities to act like a doofus) into my life is a thing worth celebrating. So every year I celebrate it on the birthday of the character that got me into the craft in the first place.

I had put Tiern's story down in May to focus on the current novel WIP, and it was refreshing to get back to him for a bit. I spent the day eating foods with too much ketchup, knitting, and giving myself free reign to work on whatever story I liked - which, at the end of the day, got me one weird little vignette from Tiern's POV and three pages of notes for a massive revision for his entire trilogy. Apparently having these few months away from his story gave me some perspective. Even though I won't be getting back into that project for a while yet, I'm more excited about it than I've been in years.

In short: I'm a dork, big revisiony things are in the works, yesterday reminded me why writing makes me flail about, and here, have that vignette thing.


An Inventory for World-Saving, by Tiern Sqiiks, age 19

If you’re planning on saving a world, you’re gonna need a few things. First off, music - music is vital. Have you ever seen an epic battle scene in a movie go down without music? Shit, no. Music sets the mood. It swells in your chest, reminds you you’re alive, and gives you a beat to move to.

What I’d recommend is investing in an mp3 player with a long battery life. Preferably something with snug-fitting earphones - the last thing you want is to have to adjust those while you’re in the middle of things.

You could team up with an Audio Illusionist, of course, but they’ve always got their own agenda for their psychic soundtracks. Do you really want to save the world to Queen’s Greatest Hits? (If you do, I know a guy who’d be happy to help, but you should know that “Don’t Stop Me Now” loses its energizing effect after four or five times around.)

Next, you need comfortable footwear. Don’t wanna be crunching over the bodies of the fallen in boots you haven’t broken in, right?

I’m kidding. Not about needing good shoes - because you really do need those - but about walking on the dead. If someone falls in the fight, I don’t step on them. I’d recommend you not do that, either - it’s disrespectful. If you gave your life for a cause, right or wrong, you wouldn’t want someone tromping all over you in their nasty hand-me-down hiking boots, would you? Thought not.

And I do recommend hiking boots. They’ve got about the right balance of ankle support, treads, and material weight for any activity. ‘S why I hardly ever wear anything else.

You need a good bag, of course. This should be a given. What you put in it is more a personal preference.

I pack my laptop. I don’t need to, really, and I’ll probably never have the time to go online, but it’s a matter of comfort. I know it’s there if I want it. You might be the same way. Maybe you’ve got a book you like to read once in a while, or a sketchbook or something. If it won’t weigh you down too much, if you can fit it, bring it with you. It’s okay.

You’ll want to bring a toothbrush and toothpaste. Trust me, it’ll help.

You should also pack some kind of multi-tool. If you don’t already own one (and why wouldn’t you? Look, if you don’t, just go out and get one right now, because they’re damn useful), you can pick one up at any hardware store. Pliers, knife, and bottle opener functions, at least.

Which reminds me - beer. You should really have some, for the night before. You can substitute a cola if it’s really not your thing, but I highly recommend a beer. Don’t think the choice over too much - even if it’s that cheap piss they sell at the gas station, it’ll still be the best thing you’ve ever tasted.

Anything pertinent to your world-saving plan can be kept in your bag. Maps, notes, walky-talkies, whatever. I’ve only got a sacred book, held together by duct tape and kept in a gallon freezer bag next to my laptop in case of rain. Freezer bags are a good idea, but get the kind with the color-changing zipper. No store brand crap. It’s not like you’re gonna need your money, anyway.

A weapon is a necessity, obviously. Something to defend yourself with until you’re really in the thick of things. If your multi-tool has a good, lockable knife on it, that might do. I keep a handgun in the pencil pocket of my backpack, just to be safe. It’s weird, carrying something like that on you when you’re not used to it, but honestly, it gets to be a comfort.

Now, here’s where somebody else would tell you to bring a change of clothes. Personally, I think that’s bullshit. Bringing a change of clothes is like tempting fate. It tells the universe that you think you’re such hot shit you’re gonna pull through this needing nothing but a fresh pair of jeans. If you’re packing a bag for this sort of thing, you should know the universe’s sense of humor well enough by now to know that’s not a good idea. Bring a full change of clothes, and you will die, bloody and screaming. Bring just the underclothes and shirt, and you’re still leaving yourself open to an ironic death. You can maybe get away with socks, but I wouldn’t risk it.

I’m sure you’ll want to bring pictures of loved ones or mementos or something. You might feel ridiculous packing those, but don’t. Almost everybody I know does this - even the ones who make a family field trip of saving the world. You need something to ground you to that life behind you. Plus, you don’t want to be left out when everybody’s sitting around the night before the big bang, reminiscing over who they’re here protecting.

You don’t want to be that guy who’s brought nothing with him. I know that guy. He’s filled with strategies and plans - and you need those, too - but his heart’s hollow. That’s one thing you can’t have with you, if you’re planning on saving a world: a hollow heart. You won’t make it. You’ll fall and get a face full of some asshole kid’s hiking boots.

And you need to want it. The whole package deal: dying for the sake of others, losing everyone you love in the process, seeing the ugly underbelly of the world you’re trying to save, all of it. You need to want it more than anything.

This is where most of us fail. There’s the occasional crazy bastard or hardcore masochist who’s all-in, but aside from them, we’re doing this wrong. No one wants to lose that much. Most of us would rather hang out with our families at the end of the world and die loved. Stories talk about champions who step forward in times like these to willingly give everything for the greater good. I’ve never met one. You’ll never meet one. They don’t exist. There’s just you and me and our worn out boots and our bags full of personal artifacts. So if you’re not a masochist or a crazy bastard (or, I guess, one of those fictional champions), you’ll want something to pull you through this. Nurture a vendetta. Sell your soul. Get a death wish. Lose everyone early on so the choice is easy - or hell, I don’t know, grow up watching too many cowboy movies and build yourself a nice cozy delusion of heroism.

Anyway, the point is, you need things. You can’t just go rushing into a world-saving scenario without taking a proper inventory. Grab some scrap paper and write all this down. Put ticky boxes next to the items. Assemble a proper to-do list.

And if you really don’t have the time to prepare for this? Then at least grab your boots, a photo, your music, and your tooth brush. The first two will keep you moving, the third will keep you sane, and the fourth - well, dental hygiene.

So do what you can. Fight as best you can. If your best isn’t good enough, at least you’ll have clean teeth and a proper soundtrack when the world ends.



(Happy birthday, Tiern.)

Permission to Write the Damsel in Distress

I've been thinking a lot lately about female characters - specifically, how difficult they can be to get right. I've always had trouble with this aspect of writing, probably because I've always been interested in reading feminist perspectives on literature, so I've wound up with every criticism of popular characterizations of women I've ever heard playing on repeat in my head. The moment I start writing a scene with a prominent female character, the chorus strikes up.

Portraying a female character as weak is demeaning to women.

She should kick ass and not need anybody's help.

But she can't kick too much ass, or she's obnoxious.

And she can't have too much sex because that makes her a temptress.

But she should own her sexuality because women's sexuality has long been repressed in literature.

But she can't actually need men, because that would make her weak, and portraying a female character as weak---

Lisa needs braces!

Dental plan!

Around it goes. Critical voices are eager to put limitations on what you should and shouldn't write about female characters, because female characters in fiction are held up as representatives of their non-fictional gender, the world's view of women, and/or the author's gender biases. It doesn't matter if they're in an everyday high school setting or hurtling through space in a bio-mechanical spacecraft: female characters get picked out as symbols for real-life gender issues. Male characters, on the other hand, are largely left alone to be read in the context of the story.

If I were a fictional character with a vagina, I would be pissed. I'd be marching about with signs reading "My bits don't dictate my characterization" and "I am not a stand-in for your societal issues!"

Author Sarah Rees Brennan has an excellent post, "Ladies, Please!", that deals with the balancing act of making a kickass female character. (It's well worth checking out even if you're not a writer - the woman is hilarious.) I do love the sort of female character she describes - strong, capable, and kickass without overshadowing the rest of the cast - and I've taken that entry to heart on previous projects.

My problem right now is, I'm working on a story where the most important female character is distinctly not kickass. She's living sequestered in a house by a man who basically owns her, legally, she has almost nonexistent independence, and in the end, she will very likely need honest-to-god Prince Charming style rescuing.

I love this character. She's smart, sarcastic, creative, and manipulative in a way I admire. But she's a Damsel In Distress, so everything I've read about writing as a feminist dictates that I shouldn't be writing her. I should be writing a character who's stronger, more independent, who can break herself out of the cage that's been constructed around her.

Every time I write a scene with her in it, I think, Is it enough that she wants to get out? Is it enough that she's got her own interests and strengths in spite of her lot in life? Will they take away my feminist card if she's not the one with the baseball bat in her hands when her oppressor takes a hit to the cranium? In essence, I've been asking myself: Is it okay to write a female character who doesn't kick ass?

And some might disagree with me, but after debating this with myself and the chorus for a few months, I'm gonna say yes. Because as much as I would love to present to the world a novel with an ass-kickin', name-takin' heroine who can be held up as a literary feminist icon, that's not this heroine. And that's not this book. This book is about characters who need help. They've been abandoned, abused, and misled, and they have to learn to rely on each other to make things better. Everyone will have moments of personal strength, but Luca, hiding in her basement, will never come out swinging the literal or verbal battleaxe, ready to dispense justice.

If this post is windy and muddled, it's because this is one of those issues that I'm still not sure quite how to address. It frustrates me deeply that I feel like I have to ask my own permission to write a character who makes sense for the story I'm working on, just because of her gender. This is my attempt to write it out so I can stop the Chorus of Conflicting Opinions from ringing out every single time she shows up on the page.

I'm writing a female character who doesn't kick ass. And I'm cool with that.

The interesting part will be watching how other people react to her.

The "I'm technically off work but here's a quick blog post before I go anyway" post

Knitting status update: Working on this scarf in Bex's gorgeous handspun:


And I finally finished the first of the pair of socks I started the week I moved out of my old place.


Lots of other fiber projects floating around. Enough that last night I sat down and took inventory of all my WIPs, stash yarn dedicated to particular upcoming projects, and undedicated stash yarn. I decided to knit strictly from my stash for the rest of the year (except for gift knits) after buying my wheel, and now I don't feel like that will be even a little bit of a challenge.

OYMB status update: Wrote 8500 words in the last three days, including finishing two chapters. Today I start a new chapter that involves alcohol, vandalism, and a monologue I've been looking forward to since before I started writing this draft. The character who gets the monologue has just informed me that he wants to do it while plastered, and that is just peachy by me.

And I'm off.

State of the Manuscript

I've been meaning to post about this for a while, but I always remember when I'm at home, and as I think I've previously said, I am currently an internetless hermit type. Anyway. About that novel.

Or Your Money Back currently stands at 27,136 words and 5 complete chapters. I'm expecting it to hit somewhere in the 70,000-80,000 words range, and after plotting, re-plotting, and ruining my aunt's 1994 nature calendar with a set of markers, I finally have a solid working outline that spans a total of 13 chapters.

This means the first draft is about 38% done as it stands. It needs to be all done by September, when I start an independent study course to revise it. I'm a little nervous about having less than half the draft done this late in the summer, but I've set myself some firm rules that will make sure I reach my goal. They're actually taken from an old set of rules I set for myself (and followed for six months successfully) in my first year of grad school.

The Rules:

1. Write 2,000 words a day, minimum. Keep a log of wordcounts in the back of current writing notebook. Only words in Scrivener count, but words written in a notebook and typed up will count the day they're typed.

2. Taking a day off is okay, but aim for no more than one a week. Two, if the week's wordcount has been extremely productive.

3. Days when less than 2,000 words are written count as a zero, but the words written can be counted toward the next day's 2,000.

There are lots of little footnotes to these rules, most of them involving caffeine and chocolate intake, but that's the gist. It works pretty well for me, especially on days when I hit the 2,000 early - then I start getting competitive with myself, pushing for a new record on daily wordcount. I think my personal best still stands at 5,500, from February 2008 when I spent a day plowing through the climactic chapters of Core powered by a one-liter of Dr. Pepper.

At any rate, I wrote 3,300 words last night and another 1,100 when I got up this morning, and I'm ridiculously happy with this draft so far. I just hit the point in the novel where it launches itself out of setup (which I don't much like) and into PLOT, so now every scene I get to write is something I've been looking forward to. I'm surprised cartoon hearts haven't been following me around all day.

Since I got my spinning wheel my brain has been defaulting to "Is it time to spin yet?" whenever it has idle time. As of this morning, the switch has flipped to "Is it time to write Seb yet?"

And yes, actually, it is!

Or Your Money Back: The Soundtrack

There's one central part of my writing process that I've never seen suggested in a book on fiction writing. I know it's not uncommon - at least two other writers I know do this. It's a fun exercise that helps me keep a story percolating between writing sessions: I make soundtracks.

The list of playlists I've made in iTunes betrays my epic nerditude for story soundtracks. I have a few playlists that a normal person might've made, like "Songs to sing along to" and "Songs for road trips," but the vast majority of my playlists are story soundtracks. I make one for every novel I write. And every short story I work on for more than a week. And occasionally just for single key scenes I need to write ("Tiern/Rowyn FIGHT" is a romping good mix, IMHO). Making soundtracks helps me sort out what I want a story or scene to feel like, and sometimes what direction I want it to take. And it plays into my obsessive nature, which is a bonus.

I've been listening to my Or Your Money Back soundtrack a lot lately. The two songs that got me started building the mix are Queen's "Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy" and Incubus's "Drive," which represent pretty damn accurately where I wanted Seb to be as a character at the beginning and end of the book.

The soundtrack:

Queen - Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy
Fresh out of the box lover boy idealism, confident and upbeat. This is so Seb it hurts.

Vertical Horizon - Everything You Want
"I'm everything you want/I'm everything you need[...]/But I mean nothing to you and I don't know why." Seb's relationship with his dreamer, in a nutshell.

Kristin Chenoweth - Hopelessly Devoted to You (from the Pushing Daisies soundtrack)
Like Olive, Seb is the sort of character who might have a lovesick musical number while closing up at a pie shop. If he worked at a pie shop.

The Coral - Dreaming of You
"In my lonely room/while I'm dreaming of you/oh what can I do/I still need you but/I don't want you now"

Dave Matthews Band - Crash Into Me
Tender. Tactile. Stalkery. That's my boy.

Wreckless Eric - Whole Wide World
Here for tone/message more than literal lyrics. Seb is fixated on there being one person for him.

The Killers - Mr. Brightside
This song is in two of my story soundtracks at the moment. I don't know what's up with my protagonists wanting people who are taken.

Jimmy Eat World - Sweetness
A budding sense of jadedness, set to cheery music.

Kansas - Carry on Wayward Son
This ends up in every damn soundtrack I make lately. I blame Supernatural. (It does have an appropriate theme, though.)

Foo Fighters - Learn to Fly
"Fly along with me/I can't quite make it alone/Try to make this life my own."

Snow Patrol - Chocolate
"This could be the very minute/I'm aware I'm alive/All these places feel like home." Another self-discovery song - and probably my favorite music video of this bunch.

Asia - Heat of the Moment
I have no shame. I just love this. It's the sort of song Seb would sing along to at full volume while driving.

Snow Patrol - Crack the Shutters
Very tactile first-person protagonist. Fleshy times with love interest. Lack of shame will probably serve me well.

Incubus - Drive
Seb's second character song - independence, subverting authority, taking responsibility for himself. The lyric "When I drive myself/my light is found" plays heavily into a monologue one of his supporting characters has. Like "Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy," pretty much perfect for the character at this point in the story.

Coldplay - Don't Panic
Seb's biggest strength is probably his ability to see the beauty in things. Even months after his creation, he looks at the world with a sense of awe. He probably drives the people around him nuts.

Foo Fighters - M.I.A.
The tone I'm aiming at for the ending.

Heartache, love, and self-discovery, set to cheery tunes. This is what I associate with Seb. Listening to it while I'm walking home lets me crawl inside his head a little. It's pretty good writing music, too.

Feels like survival

I've spent most of the last week with my dad, aunt, uncle, and second-cousins (or cousins once removed, or cousins squared? I can never keep up with those labels). Sunday and Monday, my dad and I slept in a tent outside my aunt and uncle's house, which is currently in a process of major renovation. Tuesday through Thursday, the lot of us packed up and went camping at Little Girl's Point, a spot on the Upper Michigan end of Lake Superior.

I finished this the first day of the trip:


It's another Verity beret, this time done in my own handspun (my first project in it!), for my aunt Suzy. I had promised her one of these hats ages ago, started one and frogged it, and then woke up a few days before my trip and realized that the skein of handspun hanging from my bedpost was the colors of Suzy's favorite costume from when she was a belly dancer in Alaska in the 70's. It's even a little shiny because of the bamboo content - it's not sequins, but close enough!

I love the way the colors came out when knitted up.


So that was my first finished thing of the vacation, wrapped up in my aunt's cozy living room. The next thing was finished here:


That's my dad's spare tent. The one he and my mom honeymooned in, oh, thirty years ago? And no, that big pale canvas flap isn't original to the tent. It's glued and pinned in place as a makeshift front door because that little bit of zipper action you see in the photo is about as zipped up as the original front flaps get without prayers and human sacrifices.

Also, it has a worm hole in the bottom. And it leaks from the seams. And it's constantly trying to pull away from the ground. It was like sleeping in a really flat-bottomed moon bounce. But it beat sharing the new tent with my dad, who goes to sleep hours before I do, snores, and emits gasses unfit for discussion in this delicate internet. So he got a tent to himself, and I shared with my sixteen-year-old whatever-cousin Abi, who has a sleeping schedule similar to my own.

And HA to my dad. We got the view.

That's a drop-off overlooking Lake Superior, five feet from the front of the tent. At right: anti-wendigo device. (And yes, the mesh is actually zipped in that shot. Sacrifices were made. But whatever-cousin Jacob was ten and loud, so nobody will miss him that much.)

The first night at the campsite, it thundered and poured. Abi and I were up most of the night, laughing nervously about how the leaky, bouncing tent was going to either flip and crush us or drown us in our sleep. The weather gave us one short window to make a midnight run to the restrooms down the road, then rained diagonally in our faces so hard on the trip back that we almost couldn't find the campsite.

I think it's worth noting at this point that I had not been camping since childhood, when camping was one of my most loathed activities. Having survived tenting in my dad's ghettofabulous tent a thunderstorm, I say again: HA.

Speaking of survival, I had an enlightening conversation with whatever-cousin Jacob over the campfire one night. We were cooking hotdogs, and when his was done, he held it up and announced, "I like cooking my own food. It feels like survival."

"Really?" I asked. "You're a great survivalist?"

He nodded. When I pointed out that his hot dog had been bought by his grandfather and stored in an RV freezer, Jacob just said, "Well, I could hunt a wiener pig all by myself if I wanted."

"A wiener pig?"

"Where hot dogs come from."

Oh. Well. I did not know that.

So, there you have it: the true origin of hot dogs. Wiener pigs. By the way Jacob describes them, it sounds like they're running rampant in the wilds of Upper Michigan. Be careful hiking around Little Girl's Point, or the wiener pigs might get you.


Lake Superior is a pretty good place to get some writing done, improbable wildlife aside. I finished chapter three of Or Your Money Back while sitting on the rocky beach, looking out over the waves. Even though I'd just slid down a small cliff on my butt to get to the shore, it was very peaceful.


I'm not sure I like camping. The lake was freezing, it ate my flip-flops, and it tried to bowl me over with big groping waves when I tried to wash my hair, but it was so very pretty. And sleeping in the tent--well. My first night back I had a nightmare about the tent flooding and flung myself out the tent door, only to wake up as I fell out of my loft bed. Bruises everywhere.

It seems like my regular life is a tad more dangerous than camping. But at least in my apartment, I don't have to hunt wiener pigs for food.

(By the by, if any of you knitters are ever in Superior, check out Fabric Works on Tower Avenue. We stopped there on the way home, and even though I was in gross post-camping garb, the ladies there were nothing but friendly.)

What I'm doing and where I've been

The problem with not having internet in my apartment is I've been neglecting this blog. The upside is that you, reader, have not been inundated with the posts I've been typing up in my head and then forgetting. Posts like "Eating an olive sandwich is oddly liberating" and "OH CHRIST A CENTIPEDE" and "Muppet-dog is judging me again." You will never have to read those posts. You're better for it.

As an apology for not having any content here for almost two weeks, here are some snapshots of what I've been up to.

First off, the yard.

I've never had a yard I loved this much. It's a little bigger than an average St. Paul back yard, entirely fenced in, with fruit trees, a huge lilac bush, and a border that only touches one other neighbor's yard. I've been spending a lot of time out there, just sort of basking.

The pear tree is laden with fruit already, all its branches bowing under the weight. There are hundreds of pears, slightly bigger than ping-pong balls.

The concord grape vines along the back of the fence:

The two apple trees have dropped a lot of their fruit already, but some of them are still growing. They're about this big now:

The muppet-dog in the yard, looking uncharacteristically heroic:
He spends most of his time out there snuffling around for apples to chew on and barking at the neighbors across the alley.

Next, knitting.

Owls sweater, knit up to the armpits:

Garter Yoke Cardi, about five inches from the body being done:

Sylvi jacket so far:
I've also been doing a lot of spinning lately.

Playing around with spinning Corriedale wool in lace weight - the most consistent thing I've spun so far:

And my favorite thing I've spun:

That's a full 4 oz of 60% superwash merino/30% bamboo/10% nylon, spun into lace to fingering weight. It's currently sitting on my ballwinder, waiting for me to get home and ply it. As soon as I get done with this shift at work, it is on.

Lastly, writing.

It's a little hard to take pictures of writing. So here are some things on my writing desk.

This is Harold. I bought him at a garage sale last week, and so far he's been an excellent supervisor.

Stone trinkets, feathers, a candle that smells like Christmas cookies, and my outline for the chapter of Or Your Money Back I just completed:
OYMB is currently in its third chapter. It took me a while to get into the groove of the story, but now it's cruising along nicely. And I seem to be bonding pretty well with the narrator. I have an odd history of my life imitating parts of my POV characters' lives. There have been instances with my long-time fantasy series narrator, Tiern, where I've written something in his life and then had a similar thing happen to me in the next week, unexpectantly - things like small injuries, particular bits of news from friends, mood shifts, even getting rejected. The more involved I got in Tiern's story, the more this happened. (Thankfully, the deadly psychic powers, major character deaths, and epic war plots have stayed firmly in the realm of fiction.)

Anyway, to the point. Over the weekend I wrote Seb getting blisters from his too-tight loafers. Yesterday I wore some sandals that usually don't hurt much...and got big whopping blisters on my feet, in the exact number and locations of my narrator's. Cue the spooky music.

I'm not going to show you a picture of my blistered toes, though. (You're welcome.)

A weekend at the Crow's Nest

The Crow's Nest is what my landlords call my apartment. The name fits - it's got wood paneling in places that resembles the sides of a boat, giant curtains like sails that separate the bedroom and living room, and a deck from which you can see the rooftops of nearby houses. In the proud tradition of seafarers, its tenant may also be contracting scurvy, but that's more an issue of my own poor grocery trip planning than the apartment itself.

After a hyper-social Friday night, I spent most of the weekend at home, knitting and unpacking. I was project monogamous all weekend, working on my Ishbel shawl until it was done. It's my first completed shawl - shawlette, if you wanna get technical - and I love it!

I'm wearing it wrapped around my neck like a scarf, and it's both cute and practical in my chilly office. The lace pattern is addictive, so I'll definitely make another eventually.

Most of Sunday was spent organizing my art closet and my notebook shelf. I'm a creative pack rat, so every sketchbook, painting, colored pencil piece, copper print plate, and writing notebook I've ever worked on is in my apartment, begging for organization. Organizing the art closet was fairly easy. The process went like this: Flip to next sketchbook page/loose piece in portfolio. Laugh like a lunatic over something I drew six years ago, surely confusing the downstairs neighbors. File the piece away at random or throw it in the "too good/awful to be stuffed in a closet" pile. Pieces from the latter will either be displayed artistically on walls or stuck to the fridge.

First thing to go on the fridge?


She is, you know. (This makes total sense in the context of a comic I'm never going to finish.)

The big project, though, was the writing notebook organization. It's still in progress, only about 20% done after two and a half hours of work last night. I've saved every writing notebook I've used since eighth grade, which amounts to...well, I don't have a number, but when I was moving it took one large, expanded rolling suitcase, one large duffel bag, and two messenger bags to cart them all over.

A sane person would take this epic pile of notebooks and toss them on the shelves where they landed. But me? I want chronology. I've been going through these notebooks with tape and Sharpies, making color-coded date tags. It takes some detective work, because pre-2007 me wasn't so keen on writing down dates. I've had to identify some notebooks based on events or teachers who are referenced in to-do lists in margins, or in a few cases, what part of my first novel was written in a given notebook.

My favorite part of this process is that the detective work almost inevitably turns into re-reading my horrible old writing. I don't just save my old notebooks to show myself how far I've come; I save them because they're freaking hilarious.

I got most of 1998-2002 sorted last night, and y'know what I found? Scenes from the very genesis of my first novel! Bad art! Dragon Ball Z fanfiction! Interviews with characters! Really, really bad art! Angst, angst, and comic-illustrated angst! Those notebooks are a veritable minefield of LOL.

And tonight, it's on to 2003. I'm looking forward to finding the one where I gave one of my main characters a drug addiction just for the sake of adding drama. (For those in the know: it was Rowyn, and I believe it was speed. Yeah, I don't know what the crap I was thinking, either.)

I hope my current notebook scribblings are this entertaining to the me of ten years in the future.