| A spasm gripped the reeve. She flailed and crashed to her knees, her shoulders trembling, her obsidian hair draping her like a funeral shroud. The Shepherd's vicious voice spilled forth."You cannot stop it. Nothing will stand before the might of the Great Crow. The gate of the Otherworld has yawned wide. Look inside, human, and you will see your death riding to greet you!" "Thank you," Ghastek said. "Would you join me for some tea and biscuits?" "Why, don't mind if I do!" said the Shepherd. "Let us have our tea and have us a lovely game of croquet!" I don't know about you, but things go wrong for me a lot. For example, this morning I put on my new (!) pants I bought at Target. So okay they are a size too big, but that's the only size they had and since I've lost a few pounds, I tend to overestimate the size of my butt. Also they are an inch too long, but that has no bearing on our current situation. Anyway, back to the pants. New (!) spiffy pants, one of my favorite tops - it's brown but it flatters me for some reason. I woke on the right side of the bed: no bags under my eyes, clear skin, good color. I brush my hair, spray it to cement it in place, and pose dramatically for Gordon. Nothing. Pose, pose. Nothing. That's okay. He's trying to get ready for work and not paying attention. "What do you think?" His lordship gazes upon me with his green eyes and says. "Muhhhm. Looks nice. Can you fix my tie?" Tie? What do you mean, tie? I have new pants, pretty top, I'm wearing a bra that lifts and separates and I have Pantene hair! Fix tie. No smooch. No comment on how lovely my butt looks in my new (!) pants. So okay, he might have been a smidgeon in a hurry to get to work and not feeling especially well, and I might be a tad anal and needy, as I have felt and looked dreadful for the last three days due to a cold. I wanted feedback that reassured me that I'm not the ugliest woman in existence. But the fact remains. Despite my spiffy pants, things have gone Terribly Wrong (tm). So what happens when things go wrong in writing? Honestly most of the time, it goes wrong because I am being a tad anal, just like above, and wanting the narrative to do something part of me knows is wrong. I'm basically fighting myself. A lot of times it's the plot. The creative part of me sometimes runs dry and produces a rather drab turn of events, and the critical part of me, which I painstakingly trained to recognize crap, identifies said drab plot element as being a big stinky glob of goo and grinds the whole thing to a halt. Sometimes you will see writing advice that instructs to turn off the critic while you write. I can't do that. As a result most often my first drafts are pretty much the only drafts I do, because I will not move on until my narrative is where I want it to be. I think it saves me a great deal of time, as I don't redraft the same thing 8-10 times. The side effect of this method is when I'm finished with something, just looking at it makes me want to vomit. The plot problems are not that hard to identify. After awhile, I recognize when I'm stuck and then I go to his lordship, who brilliantly resolves it. How he does it, I don't know. He just frowns in a manly way, drinks some coffee, and poof, we have plot resolution, accompanied by a celestial radiance and a chorus of Hallelujah. The character problems are a lot tougher. In the first draft of Magic Burns, which I will never ever show to anyone, Curran was a supreme asshole. It happens. It was a bad book all around. Then I scrapped the whole thing and wrote a new fresh novel, guided by my editor's feedback. From scratch. In four months. (Yes, it was that bad. Things indeed had gone Terribly Wrong (tm) with the first draft.) As a result of this new draft, Curran was a gentler kinder creature... until Reece, one of generous and kind (I love you all) people who have agreed to read my second novel prior to me stuffing it into the mailbox and running away, until Reece looked at and said, paraphrasing. "Why is he so wimpy compared to the first book?" Wimpy? Curran? No, no, Curran is Muscles! Wimmens! Honor! Rawr! So I went back and looked at it... and he was wimpy. (Oh crap I just recalled that I forgot to email a PDF to a friend. Crap. Crap crappity crap, crap. Things have gone Terribly Wrong (tm) and I will send it to you at lunch!) Anyhow back to my wimpy Curran. I brought the manuscript to his lordship and asked him, "Hey do you think he is wimpy?" "Yeah. Here. And right here." "Why didn't you tell me?" "You seemed very attached to these scenes." All together now... Things have gone Terribly Wrong(tm). So I went back and fixed it all to my best ability. And there were many other wrong things that had taken place within that tortured manuscript, which those kind and generous people corrected and pointed out and thought about. So the answer to the question in the title for me is simple: when things go wrong, I try to fix it myself, but if that does not work, I go to my husband, who is my best friend, and to my friends, and they help me drag things back onto the right path. Even if most of the time I am kicking and screaming and exacerbating the problem. Thank you! PS. I know you can't see it, but my butt does look nice in my new pants |
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If 'Things Going Terribly Wrong' in your life are usually on the level of your husband not noticing your butt in new pants on a busy morning... you'll be okay. :)
If I need to pay a licensing fee for each "terribly wrong" (tm) my writing alone will put your kids through college. Fun blog entry, though, so it's worth the cost.
Sometimes you will see writing advice that instructs to turn off the critic while you write. I can't do that. As a result most often my first drafts are pretty much the only drafts I do, because I will not move on until my narrative is where I want it to be.
I do the same thing, which is why I tend to work more slowly. Once I skipped a part and moved on, because I was stuck for almost three weeks and it was only one scene. It worked fine, and I went back and added the scene later and it slipped right in. But for the most part, I don't move on until it's right. I can't turn off my internal editor. It's not possible.
Oh, what I would give for the first draft to be the only draft! I don't write nearly clean enough.
I should post some of the junk from my first draft and we can have a good laugh.
OMG - next week's topic should totally be 'Post a snippet from your very early, unedited work'. Mark, are you listening? We want to be funny, right? THAT shit is funny.
bernardl - well, yes, there are bigger things too, like parents dying, jobs being lost, worry, etc. But I try to keep those behind friend filters :) I guess what I was trying to say is, sometimes it all seems so dire when you're writing, but really, if you break it down, it's probably equivalent to butts being overlooked.
tm - yes, yes, my diabolical plan is working...
D - you and me both. Maybe we are wired wrong?
your butt looks GREAT in those pants. i can see that from here! the niceness of the butt. not the butt itself. crap. :::insert trademarked terribly wrong::::
snookies. that's a great post :D
Jill - NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
I am entirely too embarassed to do that.
*compliments butt* If you say it looks good, it must since you never say anything nice about your tush... :) I know the feeling though. Went clothes shopping, got new outfit, I even twirled and he says 'how much did you spend?' Brat.
Anyway, love the post! I am an in-betweener. Some parts I can't leave til they are right, others I have to get down before I forget them. And I've been trying to the whole 'turn off the editor' and I am only semi-happy. I have never written this much before and I feel like I'm running out of words. Oi.
I loved the snippet and the revising points. Those made a lot of sense.
BTW, I am on mountain time and it is now 10:16am which means it will be my lunch time in precisely 1hour and 44mins. Counting down and waiting.
Hi Ilona,
I must come to your husbands defense... some mornings are just not 'new pants butt' worthy. It happens. Certainly there have been times when you thought your butt was just a mess, but your husband couldn't keep his hands off of it;-)
Now... about your writing... thanks for the fine post. Not that I want you to have to rewrite an entire novel, but it's nice to know that crap can happen to the finest of talents. (And I think, after reading Magic Bites, that you are one 'fine' talent.)
I used to think writing was a solitary art form. Wrong! A book needs lots of eyes to caress it into shape. Good, honest friends are crucial to the novel's final form.
melissa - oh, it was totally me this morning. I take needy to a new level. Gordon is actually very good at complimenting parts of my anatomy :)
Elizabeth - I need your email! I am thinking about how I am going to get it as I am at work
Brian - you are quite rigth, some mornings are definitely not for new pants/butt issues. I'm so glad my writing rmabling were of some use. There are times when I feel like a total fraud as far as writing goes. And thank you for the compliments
I hate those Terribly Wrong™ things almost as much as Bad Ideas™ and, my personal dread, the I Just Don't Get It™ that seems to haunt me. The hard part is keep on going, or finding a way of making it not Terribly Wrong™.
I have found that as I rework things, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, but eventually it always Works Out in the End™. :)
As for your butt, no comment.
Given the whole pants thing, perhaps this post should have been titled "What to do When Things Go Terribly Thong..."?
thank you thank you.. I'll be here all week. Try the veal.
I like your new (!) pants!
Pimped at http://tezmilleroz.livejournal.com http://blog.myspace.com/tezmilleroz http://tezmilleroz.blogspot.com
Have a lovely day! :-)
Waggles eyebrows, does the happy dance for spiffy new pants that make butt look good. Does the woot woot.