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 Posted: Sat Jun 21, 2008 9:36 pm
It is the year 2008, in the sixth month. Five years ago did this project embark, weathering the First Hiatus of 2003-2004, the Great Hiatus of 2004-2006, and the Writer's Block Uprising of 2006-2007. Its Golden Age of Rewriting and Revision has thus begun, and ever shall endure, unto the end of the world, or until its world is complete.
Lawlz.
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Posted: Sat Jun 21, 2008 9:38 pm
Post 1: Declaration of War
Going to kill something. GAH. *headdesk*
My writing process is apparently determined to be masochistic and generally unpleasant with me.
I've declared, decreed, and otherwise decided that every chapter will have a preceding flashback, as sort of a character explication by proxy. It's good for bringing everything full circle and so far it's also been an unexpected and thoroughly wonderful boon in terms of keeping my pacing from getting out of hand (previously my chapters kept running away and being 15,000 words each).
Now, though, I've been staring at my current chapter, and realizing that the wonderfully relevant flashback I've concocted for the beginning is going to overshadow the rest of the entire chapter. It sneaked up on me. It's too long (and consequently looks too much like padding for length), it's too stylistically skewed, it's too light-hearted, and it's frankly going to make the rest of the chapter look emo by comparison. I'm not sure if the solution is to move it to a later chapter because I do still want it in there, or get rid of it altogether and try again.
But -- if I do either of those, I'll be back to writing another one to go with this chapter, and I have no ideas. The concept for this one is perfect. I suppose I could try to re-articulate it, but I worked on it for weeks, and there's nothing actually wrong with it as a scene or as far as my intentions go in using the flashbacks for background explication.
Which brings me back to staring at it. Dammit.
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Posted: Sat Jun 21, 2008 10:52 pm
borderline_mary It is the year 2008, in the sixth month. Five years ago did this project embark, weathering the First Hiatus of 2003-2004, the Great Hiatus of 2004-2006, and the Writer's Block Uprising of 2006-2007. Its Golden Age of Rewriting and Revision has thus begun, and ever shall endure, unto the end of the world, or until its world is complete.
Lawlz.
*Giggles.* I like this introduction of yours. Very creative.
As for your problem with the flashback, I say keep it, write on, and go back and figure it out later. The first step is getting everything out. The second is the editing and reordering of things.
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Posted: Sun Jun 22, 2008 3:39 pm
You make writing sound like a war or at least a battle. I mean that in a good way.
I really like your idea of spacing the flashbacks out at the start of chapters. Sounds like a really good way to keep the readers on their toes and paying attention. And anything that keeps chapter length under control ^_^V.
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Posted: Tue Jun 24, 2008 3:19 pm
Post 2: Cessation of Hostilities
Er, apparently all I have to do in order to make my story cooperate is b***h about it a little bit. Quietly fuming appears to escalate things, but as soon as I have a good, solid pity-party, it rolls over and presents me with its throat.
I've elected to move that flashback, which I'm sure I can use later to some good effect, and in its place is a beautiful little scene that hemorrhaged from my brain last night without warning and is absolutely and utterly perfect as a replacement. Shorter, although not by much, but by just enough; much more in keeping with the chapter's overall mood; bloody philosophically gorgeous says my entirely narcissistic muse, and a flashback angle I hadn't really worked with before. Granted, this violates my pseudo-plan to have every flashback be in the same character's perspective, but that works for me right now. The first two have been one particular character, so since I'm switching, I'll use this character for the next one again, and then another character for the subsequent two. I've got four main characters and might as well split the scenes between them.
This does require a massive restructuring of several subsequent chapters, but that's also something with which I can deal. It's just copy-paste anyway since they're entire scenes. This also keeps them from getting too repetitive anyway, and I can therefore afford to push my own boundaries somewhat.
The only reason I refrain from thumbing my nose at my story and blowing it a triumphant raspberry, now that I've gotten it to marginally surrender, is that it still has seige towers and a few POWs on me, and it's already proven it can wait out my food supply. It's best not to antagonize it. I'll take my victories where I can.
(Thanks to both of you who posted here! It's really helpful to have the encouragement!)
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Posted: Tue Jun 24, 2008 11:34 pm
Hemorrhaged is exactly how it feels sometimes XD. You'll be writing along and all of a sudden *SQUISH*.
If talking to people about your story make it go more smoothly, by all means, DO THAT. Used to be writers could go hang out in pubs together and carry on. Now, I think they kick you out because they want the table back. But that's why we have the internet.
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DesertRoseFallen Vice Captain
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Posted: Wed Jun 25, 2008 5:17 am
Haha if I spoke to people about my stories I wouldn't know what to say. It's why I never describe mine...they are too complex.
But you have to be victorious over stories borderline_mary, don't let them beat you!! biggrin
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Posted: Wed Jul 09, 2008 8:12 pm
eek
Frankly, I am just loving how you world things, like a log book during a battle or war. Makes it nicer to read, a breath of fresh air.
I wish I could get my story(stories) to surrender, even marginally. At this moment in time, all of them seem to have the upper hand.
Congrats on the sudden writing-fest. Hemorrhaging ideas can be fun.
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Posted: Wed Jul 30, 2008 1:35 pm
Post 3: Bogged Down in Negotiations
It's helpful for me to know that this story is about halfway done already. At least seven chapters only need preliminary flashbacks to complete them, and another six only need a scene or two. Granted, the way I had to split the previous version up means that there are a couple that need massive expansion for which I currently have no ideas; but overall, I'm happy enough with the way it's going to let it present its side without too much argument as I work my slow, painstaking way to the end of Chapter 4. Part of this is because it's hard to work on Chapter 5, or any of the later chapters, without knowing what I'm going to do with Chapter 4, given the delicate balance of the plot early on. Hey, I thought, why not be nice and try not to push it?
It, on the other hand, has rewarded my lenience with unreasonable demands, stalling tactics, and semantic harping, all designed to make absolutely sure I get nothing done. This is because for Chapter 4 I have to rewrite a bunch of established scenes from the previous version, all of which one half of my brain stubbornly insists are fine, while the other half of my brain b***h-slaps the first half and wonders what crack it's smoking because they suck. However, the first half is entirely too good at talking in circles, so I keep opening the file, fiddling with a paragraph or two, staring at the screen, and defaulting to playing several hours of Minesweeper rather than working on it. What really annoys me is that the chapter doesn't need all that much else to be complete -- just a good reworking of those scenes to account for continuity alterations and overall flow. I didn't have any problems doing this to the first chapter, either.
I frankly don't understand why the story feels the need to be this difficult. The end is in sight, and all we're really arguing are technicalities and mutual aid clauses. I can't seem to get it to understand that the longer this takes, the more likely one of us is to get overenthusiastic and attack the other side, and then our peace summit is going to implode and we'll be back to staring at each other over our respective parapets and yelling trash talk. How many more fields must be pillaged, dammit?
(Thanks, IrinChendale. I'm having entirely too much fun with the entirely too relevent metaphor. ^^ Also thanks to DesertRoseFallen and saint_savin for the encouragment!)
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Posted: Mon Aug 04, 2008 10:32 am
Yar!~ Battle that word processor! Yar.
Minesweeper is addictive, but Mah-jong is my distraction.
Technical difficulties should wait until your first draft is done. I use track changes in Word to leave little notes of details I've missed writing in and so forth. It helps because I have them written down and can go back and remember what I was going to put where, and it doesn't slow down the progression of the story.
Sounds like you're doing great, though!
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DesertRoseFallen Vice Captain
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Posted: Mon Aug 04, 2008 11:58 am
I love Mah-jong!!
I always kick myself when I spend too much time on games, and not much time on writing.
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Posted: Mon Aug 18, 2008 8:20 pm
Post 4: Unexpected Alliance
While I'm still thumping my head on the negotiations table across from the snippy and long-winded filibuster that is Chapter 4, Chapters 7, 15, and 21 unexpectedly tossed in with me by being insanely easy to complete. All they'd needed was that preliminary flashback, and suddenly I was inspired. The flashbacks are actually beginning to go somewhere, to have a mini-continuity of their own, and it's an entirely nifty thing.
I might focus on the other unfinished chapters for a bit, starting with Chapter 10, since there are at least five more than only need flashbacks. While this is all going to make keeping my continuity in line kind of a b***h as I go back and write chapters that go before these, it also means I'm getting solid, concrete work done, and it's work I would have had to do later anyway. And who knows? With fresh troops in the field, it's entirely possible the enemy will begin to rethink stalling the peace talks.
(SugarRos: Unfortunately I'm not using Word, but I've got a separate document to keep track of things I don't want to forget to include, so I think I'm set. And Mah-jong is also an addiction of mine, just not as prevalent as Minesweeper. >.>)
(DesertRoseFallen: Likewise. It eats my brain sometimes.)
(Thanks to you both!!! heart )
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Posted: Mon Aug 25, 2008 9:23 pm
My goodness! Problems aside, it sounds like you're getting a lot done. Oh, filibuster chapters. Tell me about them *DED*. I have a few. I am so looking forward to cutting them down when I revise. I bet you are too!
Keep going! The more you write, the less you will have TO write!
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Posted: Tue Aug 26, 2008 7:25 am
Gah, I have my fair share of huge chapters that I need to somehow cut down.
I wish you my very best of luck in getting things sorted. biggrin
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DesertRoseFallen Vice Captain
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Posted: Sat Sep 13, 2008 8:34 pm
Post 5: Breach of Cease-Fire
Chapter 4 has officially thrown out my terms and stormed back to its side of the field to arm the catapults. It still thinks those scenes are fine, thank me very much, and has resisted all attempts to have them rewritten even a little, even though they bloody need it or I can't continue. I've tried a different angle on one of them, but that forced me to shuffle the others around in a way that just plain can't work, and nothing is getting done because I can no longer find a functional configuration for the chapter.
I've been so badly irritated by my lack of progress that I've been reduced to fiddling with my list of prospective chapter theme songs. This is mostly so I can pretend I'm accomplishing something even as I continually headdesk. I'm more than a month past when I wanted to have Chapter 4 done, which is irking me vastly, as I've been known to be stuck on things for months (or years) at a time if I let it go too long.
Maybe I should just go back to my Marvel RPG for a while. It still loves me.
(DesertRoseFallen: Yeah, cutting down long chapters is a b***h, especially when you, say, hypothetically might be prone to degeneration into long-winded, plot-important philosophy at any given moment. >.> Do you have any particular method for deciding what stays and what gets cut?)
(saint_savin: Yeah, stuff was getting done, and I'm totally happy about that. I'm thinking of just working on future chapters exclusively for a while to see if that somehow jumpstarts my current one.)
( heart )
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