What I learned about my writing
Dec. 1st, 2018 02:43 pmProducing wordcount
Last month I did another NaNoWriMo month. I wasn't sure if I would, as I've been more wanting to work on techniques that work in shorter works, than in planning a whole novel, but idea that grabbed me was for a superhero novel I'd been doing bits on before that, so that's what I went with.
Details about the novel to follow, I won't try to force myself to cram all that into this post.
I set myself a more restrained goal, the same as last year, of about 30k, or whatever felt right. That was a good choice -- I can do a whole 50k nanowrimo when I push myself and did the first year, but it required using some time I was off work, and took my attention away from everything else a lot. And, it works when I have a good idea what I'm writing, but it was a real struggle to invent enough of the world and characters to keep up with what I could write.
In fact, this year, I came in slightly short of my original goal, but I'm fairly pleased with that. I feel like between the three years I got a good spread of what I could achieve pushing myself different amounts, and all of them have a place, and it's good to know that -- unlike how I used to be -- the alternative to "obsessive dedication" isn't "absolutely nothing got done" :)
That said, I think I would have benefited from being firmer about sticking to a daily word count target. I don't think I should have aimed for an average, as if I get behind I lose all my motivation, so trying to "catch up" to lost days when I wanted to pay attention to something else just wouldn't have worked, which is why I gave myself more latitude in the first place. But, despite (amazingly!) having cured myself of not starting *at all*, not having a specific target can translate to not getting very much done on a particular day. A specific goal would help with that, and I may try to do that more specifically in future: not every day necessarily, but decide something like a 1000 words "three weekday evenings and double at the weekends."
The other difficulty is that often I need to specifically come up with more plot to happen, and no amount of trying to write words helps, I need thinking time. But it's easy for that to turn into procrastination time. I think I need to find a level of outlining that works for me, and have a split target of "outline N lines, or write N words" or something like that.
Or maybe, deliberately feel out characterisation and worldbuilding choices by writing short vignettes which are NOT the novel, and then once it's more clear, try to do the actual writing at stronger pace. Lots of famous novels are mulled for years before they're written, and often "two novels a year" authors, while often really good, produce novels without the same depth as other novels of the same length.
Like, this blog post. I'm writing it about as fast as I can physically type it. But I don't usually write fiction like that, except for some scenes where I'm familiar with all the characters and what might happen and am just really excited to get to it actually happening.
Writing characters
Another big realisation was, if I have cool characters, ones I'm invested in, I'm excited to write. If I don't, then I'm not.
I never expected to do much creative stuff because as a child I found intellectual stuff easy and people hard, so I just always assumed I'd be an abstract-thought type person. I was pleasantly pleased to find that writing was a habit that DOES work for me.
But even so, I often had ideas for premises I found really interesting -- magic systems, virtual worlds, etc, and I just assumed I'd be like an old-school hard-sf writer who mostly wrote about physical sciences and didn't write about characters. But it doesn't turn out like that. I can write lots of worldbuilding, but actual prose tends to flow when I have characters, and even the worldbuilding is a lot better for looking from a point of view of "what's this like for people actually living in it?"
What parts of writing am I good at
Well, I don't want to over-egg the pudding here, I'm probably not as good at *any* parts of writing as people who are *good* at writing, but which tend to work out well for me?
As mentioned, premises -- people over-value premises as a good premise without a good execution doesn't bring much, whereas a good execution can shine without a good premise. But still, I think books with excellent premises benefit from it, and all my stories have a core idea which is really interesting when I describe what it's about, even without knowing about the content (at least to me, I often stumble describing it aloud).
And characters, I'm often giggling at the characters bouncing off each other, and I never expected that to be one of my strengths.
What about everything else. Poetic prose? Good plotting? I think those are things I can *do*, but aren't usually what drives readers to love them.
"Fun" ideas
I don't quite know how to describe this, but often I have an idea and think "that moment would be really cool" or "that cultural reference would be really funny there", but then can't tell if it looks sort of contrived.
Reading other people's writing, some moments stick out to me like that's what happened. It isn't always. I've heard people describing their process, and sometimes they built a scene around a payoff, adding all the necessary initial conditions to the scene that when I read it feels like it grew naturally out of what came before. And sometimes I hear an author talking about why they wrote "that line" and it was for some completely other reason than I guessed. But I think it is a common flaw, dropping in something that seems funny, trying to do slapstick in prose, or putting in a cultural reference that sticks out uncomfortably, or trying to do an emotional pay-off of character X telling character Y where to stick it that feels fake, because you liked it, and didn't realise or didn't let yourself realise it didn't stick.
Obviously this depends on taste. Sometimes it works for some people and doesn't work for others. Some things don't work but aren't cringe-worthy when they don't work, and some things really, really, are.
My philosophy has been, put it in (or at least put it in in square brackets), and then decide, LATER, whether it works or not, and if not, don't get hung up on taking it out. Rely on the scene to be good, don't stretch for that particular line.
At the time I'm writing it, I'm literally incapable of telling if it works or not.
Writing with people
I really like writing with people. But it's not actually an especially efficient way for me to write. Writing in a quiet room with mandated silence does help, but it mainly forces me to start and I've got a lot better at doing that anyway. And I find a lot of things, even just hearing people start and stop typing, quite distracting.
Meeting up with people with mandated quiet periods for working and short breaks for chatting would probably work well, but I'm quite content going along for a bit, filling up my encouragement and social meter, and heading home after a bit. And writing at home with people there is usually fine too.
And posting cryptic comments on twitter helps me a lot, for whatever reason! :) Although there hasn't been that much this month :)
Last month I did another NaNoWriMo month. I wasn't sure if I would, as I've been more wanting to work on techniques that work in shorter works, than in planning a whole novel, but idea that grabbed me was for a superhero novel I'd been doing bits on before that, so that's what I went with.
Details about the novel to follow, I won't try to force myself to cram all that into this post.
I set myself a more restrained goal, the same as last year, of about 30k, or whatever felt right. That was a good choice -- I can do a whole 50k nanowrimo when I push myself and did the first year, but it required using some time I was off work, and took my attention away from everything else a lot. And, it works when I have a good idea what I'm writing, but it was a real struggle to invent enough of the world and characters to keep up with what I could write.
In fact, this year, I came in slightly short of my original goal, but I'm fairly pleased with that. I feel like between the three years I got a good spread of what I could achieve pushing myself different amounts, and all of them have a place, and it's good to know that -- unlike how I used to be -- the alternative to "obsessive dedication" isn't "absolutely nothing got done" :)
That said, I think I would have benefited from being firmer about sticking to a daily word count target. I don't think I should have aimed for an average, as if I get behind I lose all my motivation, so trying to "catch up" to lost days when I wanted to pay attention to something else just wouldn't have worked, which is why I gave myself more latitude in the first place. But, despite (amazingly!) having cured myself of not starting *at all*, not having a specific target can translate to not getting very much done on a particular day. A specific goal would help with that, and I may try to do that more specifically in future: not every day necessarily, but decide something like a 1000 words "three weekday evenings and double at the weekends."
The other difficulty is that often I need to specifically come up with more plot to happen, and no amount of trying to write words helps, I need thinking time. But it's easy for that to turn into procrastination time. I think I need to find a level of outlining that works for me, and have a split target of "outline N lines, or write N words" or something like that.
Or maybe, deliberately feel out characterisation and worldbuilding choices by writing short vignettes which are NOT the novel, and then once it's more clear, try to do the actual writing at stronger pace. Lots of famous novels are mulled for years before they're written, and often "two novels a year" authors, while often really good, produce novels without the same depth as other novels of the same length.
Like, this blog post. I'm writing it about as fast as I can physically type it. But I don't usually write fiction like that, except for some scenes where I'm familiar with all the characters and what might happen and am just really excited to get to it actually happening.
Writing characters
Another big realisation was, if I have cool characters, ones I'm invested in, I'm excited to write. If I don't, then I'm not.
I never expected to do much creative stuff because as a child I found intellectual stuff easy and people hard, so I just always assumed I'd be an abstract-thought type person. I was pleasantly pleased to find that writing was a habit that DOES work for me.
But even so, I often had ideas for premises I found really interesting -- magic systems, virtual worlds, etc, and I just assumed I'd be like an old-school hard-sf writer who mostly wrote about physical sciences and didn't write about characters. But it doesn't turn out like that. I can write lots of worldbuilding, but actual prose tends to flow when I have characters, and even the worldbuilding is a lot better for looking from a point of view of "what's this like for people actually living in it?"
What parts of writing am I good at
Well, I don't want to over-egg the pudding here, I'm probably not as good at *any* parts of writing as people who are *good* at writing, but which tend to work out well for me?
As mentioned, premises -- people over-value premises as a good premise without a good execution doesn't bring much, whereas a good execution can shine without a good premise. But still, I think books with excellent premises benefit from it, and all my stories have a core idea which is really interesting when I describe what it's about, even without knowing about the content (at least to me, I often stumble describing it aloud).
And characters, I'm often giggling at the characters bouncing off each other, and I never expected that to be one of my strengths.
What about everything else. Poetic prose? Good plotting? I think those are things I can *do*, but aren't usually what drives readers to love them.
"Fun" ideas
I don't quite know how to describe this, but often I have an idea and think "that moment would be really cool" or "that cultural reference would be really funny there", but then can't tell if it looks sort of contrived.
Reading other people's writing, some moments stick out to me like that's what happened. It isn't always. I've heard people describing their process, and sometimes they built a scene around a payoff, adding all the necessary initial conditions to the scene that when I read it feels like it grew naturally out of what came before. And sometimes I hear an author talking about why they wrote "that line" and it was for some completely other reason than I guessed. But I think it is a common flaw, dropping in something that seems funny, trying to do slapstick in prose, or putting in a cultural reference that sticks out uncomfortably, or trying to do an emotional pay-off of character X telling character Y where to stick it that feels fake, because you liked it, and didn't realise or didn't let yourself realise it didn't stick.
Obviously this depends on taste. Sometimes it works for some people and doesn't work for others. Some things don't work but aren't cringe-worthy when they don't work, and some things really, really, are.
My philosophy has been, put it in (or at least put it in in square brackets), and then decide, LATER, whether it works or not, and if not, don't get hung up on taking it out. Rely on the scene to be good, don't stretch for that particular line.
At the time I'm writing it, I'm literally incapable of telling if it works or not.
Writing with people
I really like writing with people. But it's not actually an especially efficient way for me to write. Writing in a quiet room with mandated silence does help, but it mainly forces me to start and I've got a lot better at doing that anyway. And I find a lot of things, even just hearing people start and stop typing, quite distracting.
Meeting up with people with mandated quiet periods for working and short breaks for chatting would probably work well, but I'm quite content going along for a bit, filling up my encouragement and social meter, and heading home after a bit. And writing at home with people there is usually fine too.
And posting cryptic comments on twitter helps me a lot, for whatever reason! :) Although there hasn't been that much this month :)