michaeljasper.net
"Another Wrecked Web Site"
Jan 13, 2002
A little diversion into another land...
Now Playing:
"Back Porch Music," WUNC
Today's Quote:
When I first met her I was experimenting with the flavors of different ales, stouts, and porters. So far I liked what I'd tasted.
Well, I took a little break today from working on the novel so I could mess around with a fantasy story for a contest whose deadline is Tuesday. Yep, that's me, always a sucker for a deadline! So I've been cutting and tweaking and adding new stuff to the first section of the Ghetto Dwellers novel to see if I can somehow make it into a short story/novellette.
I'm getting closer. It's sort of fun, taking a couple novel chapters and trying to make them into a complete, short piece. I have about 2k more to write, I'm guessing, then this story will be complete. Maybe.
Not much else to report from this weekend. We had a nice breakfast with friends at Elmo's in Chapel Hill this morning, which was fun even though the drive over and back sucked. Lizzie got to drive our friend Tammy's new Xterra SUV, and she was totally digging it (though a madman in a van totally ran a red light the second she got behind the wheel and almost plowed right into us!). We saw a cool part of Chapel Hill to the north and west of the city that would be a nifty place to live... Someday. Good times -- I came home and took a nap, even though I'd had a bunch of coffee at breakfast. I think joking and talking with our friends wore me out -- we were all in rare form today!
For some reason, these weekends are too damn short! Have a good week. Later.
Jan 12, 2002
Words for a Saturday afternoon...
Now Playing:
Pearl Jam, non-stop
Now Reading:
Black Gate, vol. 2 (still!)
About 800 words today. Not as much as I'd hoped, but still pretty good stuff. I'm having to rethink a lot of stuff on the fly, especially the passing of time and the major events after the arrival of the Wannoshay, which is sort of fun. But tricky.
I've updated some of the links on my Links Page, so check that out if you're bored. I think I'm gonna spend the rest of the afternoon reading some short stories. I'm not feeling very verbose, so I'm gonna end this entry with a quote from what I wrote today. See ya later.
Today's Quote:
The command center was equipped with wall-to wall screens, keypads, and voicemikes that covered plain black tables ringing the inside of the tent. Everything revolved around the black ball of the central processing unit. Not a wire could be seen. Joshua, a closet gadget freak despite his vow of poverty, had never used anything better than an ancient, donated laptop and the interactive Netstreams that had replaced all of the televisions in houses across the world.
A setup like this must cost in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, he thought, grinning like a kid despite the fact that he was not here as a guest.
Jan 11, 2002
Words for a Friday afternoon...
Now Playing:
"20,000 Watt RSL," Midnight Oil; "Unplugged," Nirvana
Today's Quote:
I’m ready for this test to end, he thought. With a disconcerting sense of comfort, Joshua realized where he was letting the train take him.
He was going to the Wannoshay crash site.
Yeah buddy! While listening to some Nirvana after some Midnight Oil, I hit 20,000 words on the novel. Excellent! How fitting that the name of the Oils album was "20,000 Watt RSL"! Gotta love that synchronicity, eh?
While working today, I had some thoughts about how much the first few pages revealed, and took out all references to the arrival of the aliens. That way there'd be a little bit of suspense, and much less infodumping. Right now I have Father Joshua outside the government camp next to the crashed ship of the aliens, and Sami is getting ready to try and film the crash site outside Winnipeg. Yeah, I'm multi-tasking again, doing 2 chapters at once...
Some more nifty research revealed the metrarail train system in Chicago! Cool map -- did I mention I love maps? This one gives me exactly what I'm looking for -- an idea of what's north of the city, and what train Father Joshua might ride to get to the site of the crashed alien ship. I'm picturing it as close to Lake Michigan, out in some field, maybe. Maybe close to Waukegan?
A part of me is tempted to have it crash somewhere in a city, just for the effect it would have visually on the surrounding city -- how weird would it look to have an alien ship in a city park or next to a city bus? But I keep balking at any scene of destruction in a city which may even evoke the traces of past events. I'm not really censoring myself so much as running from the memory of 9/11. Is that bad? How can I overcome this? It's a weird, weird feeling. I think that sort of thing will pass -- I think I'm worried about exploiting all the emotions tied up with the World Trade Centers. It's a tricky subject.
Well, on to happier things -- it's the weekend! Wahoo! It's been a good first full week of the year, with work and working out and my own writing. My novel's on a roll, Elizabeth is adjusting to the return of grad school (we have our guest bedroom set up as her "studio" now, so she can spread out her books and work as well as have some space to do some painting when her work is done), and the snow is melting! It was fun while it lasted (the snow, I mean!), but I'm ready to see the grass again instead of slush and mud. Later.
Jan 9, 2002
One more thing...
Now Playing:
"All That You Can't Leave Behind," U2; "Yourself or Someone Like You," Matchbox 20
Now Reading:
Black Gate, vol. 2
Today's Quote:
Before starting the morning service, Father Joshua McDowell glanced out at the entrance to The Shrine of Our Lady of Pompeii and nodded at the National Guard officer standing in the shadowy alcove. The tall young woman was dressed in fatigues and carried an automatic rifle strapped to her narrow shoulders. When she nodded back at him, Joshua rang the entrance bells a little harder than necessary and walked out in front of his congregation. His entrance was accompanied by the sound of weak singing and the groan of old bodies pressed into motion.
From later:
At 8:30 p.m., with only half an hour left in my writing time, I was still working on that first sentence! Sheesh! Was this simply a stalling method? I wondered. Yep. I believe so.
The revised first sentence:
I think it's almost there. Cool. It's amazing how just one sentence can take so long -- I hate to imagine how long it'd take to write a novel if I did that with each sentence...
As for tonight, along with my revised first sentence, I also wrote another 700 words, getting the first scene of the book down, followed by a flashback. Not bad. I'm hoping to have 20k by the time the weekend's here, then hit 25k by the end of the weekend. But we'll see. One word at a time, y'know? Later!
From earlier:
It was getting late last night and didn't get a chance to follow up on a couple news items from some of my fellow writers. Seems like everyone's getting responses back from editors, including me -- two so far this year, one reject and one acceptance -- which always makes for exciting times.
Any day now I'm expecting to see a response from Cemetery Dance for "Mother of the Bride," which I sent on June 7 of 2000. Yeah, that'd be an almost 20-month response! Sheesh. But if other folks are getting a response, I want mine too!
So congratulations to Greg for his sale to the quirky and cool Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet (anyone know what that title means?). Very awesome news! I'm gonna have to check out that magazine. I've heard some good stuff about it. I printed out Ellen Klages' story "Flying Over Water," which appeared there, to get a taste of what it's like. I'll try and read it over lunch today.
Also, nifty news for Jon, whose story is gonna be in the next Black Gate, coming to a newsstand or mailbox VERY soon. Yeah, I need to hurry my slow ass up and read the previous one. There's a cool excerpt to the story on the magazine's website. Great illustrations! And a great story (so far...;).
And my bud Tim has sold even MORE poetry to like half a dozen places, including the prestigious Asimov's. Great news! Way to go, everyone. Y'all are da man. Da men? You know what I mean!
Oh yeah, and congrats to NAW ringleader Vera for her glowing review of her novel, by Charles de Lint, of all people! I know she's gotta feel awesome about that! Everyone's kicking ass and taking names these days!
More later.
Jan 8, 2002
First sentences.
Now Playing:
"Songs from an American Movie, Vol. One," Everclear
Also Listening To:
The Artist's Way, Julia Cameron (finished today on the ride home; I may listen to it again...)
Today's Quote:
Just before beginning the morning service, Father Joshua nodded at the National Guard officer dressed in fatigues and holding a rifle at the entrance to The Shrine of Our Lady of Pompeii.
I'm working on the first sentence of The Wannoshay Cycle tonight. That's about all I've gotten done. Some of you may find that odd -- all that time spent one just one measly sentence??? What is he, nutso? Well, yeah, but I like those first sentences. So much depends on those few words strung together.
If you don't knock the reader out with that first sentence, they're not gonna read any further. So I have to grab them. I think I read somewhere that the first sentence of a story or a novel should encapsulate the entire plot, in one sentence. I think that's a Damon Knight thing. It's fun to try that and see what happens.
Just for kicks, here are the first sentences to my other novels (the one from the Wannoshay novel is at the left, under "Today's Quote"):
I never realized how closely the Ghetto novel's first sentence resembled the opener to Last of the Hand. Interesting... By the way, that sentence from the All-Nations novel is the first time I've shared anything from that book. So I guess you should feel, like, lucky or something. ;)
So I'll probably change that first line a few more times as I work on the Wannoshay novel, but for now it has the important elements -- the main character, some sense of conflict, and a taste of the setting of the novel. Hopefully, in each of these quotes you can tell what sort of novel you'll be reading, and you'll want to read the next sentence, and the one after that, and so on!
And on that note, I'm outta here! Later.
Jan 7, 2002
First person present or third person past? ("I am crazy" or "He was crazy"???)
Now Playing:
"All That You Can't Leave Behind," U2
Also Listening To:
The Artist's Way, Julia Cameron (second tape, good stuff)
Today's Quote:
His mother's half brother was Native American, and while Skin wasn't a blood relative to anyone on the res, his nickname still stung, even if it was supposed to refer to his thinness, not his ancestry.
Man, I am FINALLY caught up with my fixes to the three short stories that I've incorporated into my Wannoshay novel. It took me three times as long to do this as I'd planned, and I just know I've missed some stuff, so there'll probably be some sentences that read like "She hurry over to my door and let her daughter ran in" or other annoying blips like that. Ah well. What can ya do?
It's all pretty much in order now, so starting tomorrow night I can start work on the brand new stuff. I'm pretty pumped up. So far I've added 2,300 new words, ratcheting up the word count to 17,300, and I've got all the chapters laid out and notes made and all the rest. The only thing I don't have is a really good idea for the prologue, but I'll worry about that later. Heck, this could be my first genre novel WITHOUT one! We're just breaking new ground left and right, aren't we???
Not much else new to talk about, really. I've just been working like mad trying to get the "old stuff" fixed up so I can start doing some new writing. It was a good review to go through the stories, and I now have a good outline and timeline in place, so I don't confuse myself with what year it is and when the aliens landed and all that fun stuff. I'm ready to dive in.
The snow is melting 'round here, by the way. There's still ice and crunchy snow, but lots of dripping water and slush and mud. Whit the dog has developed a strong fear of "black ice" -- the patches of ice that are sorta invisible on the roads. Anytime he sees some asphalt that's shiny, he's outta there. He'd prefer crunching through snow to risking a fall on black ice. Even if the ice is really just water and snow melt.
Have a good day. Later.