Updates! Updates! Read All About'm!

Project P is coming along well, although the past week (and the long holiday weekend) weren't as productive as I'd hoped. Between having some type of stomach bug and the complicated part of the Project P I find myself working on, my word count has been sluggish to progress. However, I am on schedule.

The "opening" part (Act 1?) is finished. It turned out a lot longer than I initially anticipated, but it was fun and easy to write so I don't care. It does, however, mean this book is probably going to be a lot longer than I'd originally planned. If my 60K by June 30th schedule does not see the end of the story, then I will add on another 30K more by July 31st "to end or bust."

I have been saying that I am entering "the good part" of the story, but in reality it is proving the most difficult. I'm only two chapters in, and my resolve has already been tested thrice by other stories trying to tempt me away. Almost the entire rest of the book takes place on Manhattan, and each step my MC takes must be carefully calculated down to the block. I have never been to New York, let alone Manhattan. What do I know of teeming metropolis islands, let alone the intimate details of one like Manhattan?!? O.O But with map and guidebooks in hand (and Wikipedia and Google Images & Maps on my Taskbar), I sojourn on. Thank God for technology, or this book wouldn't have a prayer.

At this exact moment, my MC is entering the King's Castle to receive her instructions - and learn that everything is as bad as she feared.

Mwahaha.

How is your current writing project progressing?

Practice Productive Procrastination

I'm still busy toiling away on Project P, and while I plan to give you an update on my progress this three-day weekend (don't hold your breath, though), for now I offer you another piece from Steal Like An Artist: 10 Things Nobody Told You About Being Creative by Austin Kleon (you can find him and his awesome book here). This book has been nothing but an inspiration and comfort to me, and I highly recommend it to everyone.

Today's excerpt falls under Rule 5: Side Projects and Hobbies are Important:

Practice Productive Procrastination.

Take time to be bored. One time I heard a coworker say, "When I get busy, I get stupid." Ain't that the truth. Creative people need time to just sit around and do nothing. I get some of my best ideas when I'm bored, which is why I never take my shirts to the cleaners. I love ironing my shirts - it's so boring, I almost always get good ideas. If you're out of ideas, wash the dishes. Take a really long walk. Stare at a spot on the wall for as long as you can. As the artist Maira Kalman says, "Avoiding work is the way to focus my mind."

Take time to mess around. Get lost. Wander. You never know where it's going to lead you.

My "boring creative time" is in the shower, the ride to/from work (I don't do the driving), and the hour it takes for me to fall asleep. What's yours?

Nothing Is Original

I am elbow-deep in Project P right now, but I hate to leave you, my wonderful readership, in silence! Therefore, I offer you this piece from Steal Like An Artist: 10 Things Nobody Told You About Being Creative by Austin Kleon. If you have never heard of him, or read this book, you have now and I highly recommend not only the amazing read but the author himself (check him out on his website here). His book has been inspirational to me, and I'm only on #2!

To inspire you today, I offer a comforting excerpt from the book, entitled Nothing Is Original:

The writer Jonathan Lethem has said that when people call something "original," nine out of ten times they just don't know the references or the original sources involved.

What a good artist understands is that nothing comes from nowhere. All creative work builds on what came before. Nothing is completely original.

It's right there in the Bible: "There is nothing new under the sun." (Ecclesiastes 1:9)

Some people find this idea depressing, but it fills me with hope. As the French writer André Gide put it, "Everything that needs to be said has already been said. But, since no one was listening, everything must be said again."

If we're free from the burden of trying to be completely original, we can stop trying to make something out of nothing, and we can embrace influence instead of running away from it.

"What is originality? Undetected plagiarism."
- William Ralph Inge

Library Haul Hiatus

Dear Readers,

So I can focus what little energy I have on writing Project P, I am taking a short hiatus from my weekly Library Haul installments. I will, however, try to blog as often as I can with updates on my writing progress, thoughts on writing in general, and perhaps the occasional book review (who knows).

Until then, yours in writing,
Skye

New Project Ahoy!

(Due to the fact that I was unable to attend my libraries this weekend, and therefore my haul was extremely malnourished, I have forgone the usual Library Haul this week. Do forgive.)

As you are aware, Project V has been giving me no end of trouble and refuses to be written, so I decided to work on another story, hoping it might get me back into the swing of the thing. I pondered a few options and started a few promising stories, but it wasn't until late last week that I found The Story.

And so, I am announcing the new and exciting Project P!

If you must know (because, of course, you must, right? ;), I am currently describing Project P as "The Hunger Games meets Legend (by Marie Lu) meets In Time." It is a stand-alone YA dystopian novel with a female protagonist in 1st Person Present Tense.

After much personal debate, I decided to devote the next two months to write it. To insure I don't aggravate my already bad health, the word count schedule is: 500 words on work days, 1,000 on off-work days, and 1,500 on weekend days. At this slow but daily pace I will have 56,500 words on June 30th. I do not consider this a novel length, though, and plan to write as many words as I can each day to be sure and make at least 60k in the end. But I need an attainable daily goal to strive for, lest I write nothing at all.

So why this story, you wonder? Well, there were two very important and very striking factors right from the start that indicated Project P was The Story:

(1) Before I could even wrap my head around it, my mind started writing a query blurb. I have yet to write a query letter, let alone a blurb for one, and yet there it was, pouring out of my pen onto the page. It was like another, more structured writer had taken over, which was both fascinating and freaky at the same time.

(2) And then, after several sentences of blurb, came The Outline. I am a hard-core discovery writer. I DO NOT outline. And yet I am now the proud owner of a currently 3-page and growing, honest-to-goodness outline. I don't normally outline because, once I get even the gist of the story written down, I lose interest. But so far, it has only increased my excitement to get this book written! Again, fascinating, yet totally freaky.

Needless to say I have no idea what happened, but I saw it as the writing on the wall - to write this novel, and NOW. Strike while the story iron is hot!

I begin tomorrow with a 1k day (although I'm hoping for 2k). I've had less than a week to get my main characters figured out, do some extensive research (of which I've only scratched the surface and will have to do as-needed from now on), draft an outline (currently only one-fourth done), and get some very important rules in order. But writing on the fly is what I do best, and I am all aquiver with excitement. I don't think I've been this excited to write a novel since perhaps my first Nanowrimo. Wish me luck!

Writing Block

I have writing block.

This is not to be confused with writer's block. Writer's block is when a writer is blocked in their story and they don't know what to write.

This is not my problem. I am not blocked in my story. My story overflows with ideas and material, my brain churning out new points and angles for Project V like nobody's business. If anything, I am too not blocked in my story - it refuses to stop evolving, constantly changing this bit and that bit until what I had before is nothing more than a second-rate idea.

My problem is that I'm blocked from writing, the physical act of putting words on paper. I know what I want to write, but when I go to physically write, I can't. And right now I am re-writing, which means I have 100 pages already written that only need to be physically typed and tweaked. You think this would make things even easier, but it hasn't.

I know the solution to this problem: sitting my butt in the chair and writing. I KNOW THIS. And yet, the physical act of writing repels me like magnets of the same polarity.

Luckily, I have found some solace in a new story. I am physically writing, and that counts for something with me. But sooner or later, I know I have to return to Project V. I have sworn to have the first draft finished by the end of this year. I keep telling myself this, scolding myself for every wasted writing moment. Yet every time I glance at my laptop, my mind simply goes blank of anything remotely resembling a cohesive sentence.

Here's hoping my polarity changes soon...

Library Haul: In Translation

It's time for a look at my Library Haul, the tower of goodies I picked up during my weekly trip to the libraries (TL, ML, and CL). Sideways are borrowed, upright are purchased used from library Friends.

Here is this week's haul:

Highlights:

• For 25 cents, wouldn't you pick up a nice copy of Torment? Even if you weren't reading the series. *blinks* Book hoarder? *looks around* Who?
• The Japanese manga (25 cents at TL Friends) is Alice 19th Volume 5, which I was then able to borrow from the same library to have some fun translating! Been waiting for something like this for a while.
• I've read Yurara before, but it's been long enough that I can enjoy it again. And I am.
• The last copy I got of Skinned was nasty - this one is almost like new! I'm a library gal, but sometimes even I'm afraid of where a book has been when it looks that dingy. And germs can live a long time on paper. Better safe than sorry.
• I didn't get Timeless back, but I got a book just as good: Glamour in Glass! I've been desperate for another Mary Robinette Kowal book since I finished Shades of Milk and Honey. I fear, though, that reading all these Jane Austen-period books one after the other is going to affect my writing voice. :\
• Nothing to speak of in the movie department... wait, two movies are missing from this photo! (I knew I was forgetting something!) Hehe, oops. :) They are second tries, though - In Time and Doctor Who Series 6, Part 2. Let's see if I get time to watch them this week.
• What I am finding an abundance of is CDs, especially awesome soundtracks at TL: Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows, Big Miracle, Downton Abbey. Oh, and I would like to announce at this time that I have put the first season of Downton Abbey on hold. It will take a while, but soon I shall be finding out what all the fuss is about!

What have you picked up from your local library as of late?


A Note to My Readership:
Do you enjoy reading Library Haul? I haven't gotten any comments in a while, so should I cease this odd little weekly segment? I would hate to continue boring you, if I am. Please let me know, even if it's a quick "I enjoy it. Keep it up!" or "It's pretty dull. I'd rather hear more about your cats." Thank you in advance for your comments!