Category Archives: Writing

Poetry: Unending

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Mobius-Strip

INFINITY
Circles, they say, exist with no beginning or end.
They swing around and again, tracing their own pasts.

As does every shape, I think,
Only some hang hard-lefts, or hard-rights, at sharp angles.

Triangles endure whiplash pain.
Squares rush to full-stops, to change direction.

Growing more sides, more corners, with each pass.
With a less-jarring now.

History overwritten by every orbit.
New points, fresh curves, smoothing old hairpins.

Triangles become squares, which swell into circles
Past, present, future, looping in rhythm of elegant curves.

Some say.

 

ETERNITY
(Wrap your arms, parenthetically, around me,
our breathing, for a moment, an aside,
enclosed, a separate thought,
within the pause of us thrumming against the silence,
and your lashes,
oh, the life and death of me, perfect commas of lashes,
splicing,
closing, opening,
extending, delaying,
the end of our sentence, so it runs on, and on, and on.)

 

IMMORTALITY
I’ve spent a lifetime loving poets
who
pine and rejoice
love and wonder
savor and yearn.

One in particular knows
me
through and through.
The poet’s name is Long Forgotten
unlike the words.

Goldilocks On Editing: Eat From All 3 Bowls

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goldilocks1

Not-Goldilocks says: AFTER DRAFTING, WAIT BEFORE YOU EDIT OR THE UNIVERSE WILL RIP APART AND YOU’LL RUIN EVERYTHING IN ALL OF EXISTENCE EVER AND YOUR EDITS WILL SUCK AND THAT WILL BE TRAGIC [ALSO UNIVERSALLY DESTRUCTIVE WHICH ISN’T EVEN FAIR TO ALL OF EVERYTHING] AND JUST WAIT DAMN IT WAIT.

^You’ve heard that, yes? [Maybe in a less hyperbolic manner…] We writers should not edit our first drafts right away. We’re too close to them. The words and ideas are too fresh. We need to let them rest / chill / simmer / mellow / fester / [insert similar passive verb here].

This, like all advice, is subjective. And, well, it is advice, but it is not law.

In a similarly subjective manner, I’d like to toss my Goldilocks-esque thoughts in the opinion pool. [Because, honestly, all “advice” is opinion. My opinion can sink or swim. I don’t mind either way. Because the Universe will continue to do its thang, regardless.]

Check this: You can edit as soon as you type/write the very last period of your first draft.

I call this “Hot” editing. I’m a believer in hot edits: hitting the words right away, while the draft is still searing hot. [My reasoning is down in the convo which follows.] I’m also a believer in “Cold” edits: at some point, once my brain and heart and soul feel it’s time to back away, I back.the.hell.away, and let my manuscript do one of those resting-verb thingies.

Some folks might need a few weeks or 6 months or eons before touching that first draft ever again. Cool. Awesome. Do only that cold thing, then.

Some folks are itching under their skin and will basically die and/or implode if they don’t dive into edits right away. Cool. Awesome. Do that hot thing, then.

This post was triggered by a convo in an online writer’s group, the #4evnos. In this little corner of the
e x p a n s i v e  Writing Universe, this is what we discovered:

Crystal Ord: Curious…how long do you guys wait before jumping into edits/revisions of a first draft? I have vowed to give it a couple weeks but I already have the itchy keyboard fingers.

AJ Pine: Welp, because I’m on deadline, I finished drafting Sunday and started editing Tuesday. 😉

Lex Martin: Yeah, it depends on other deadlines for sure. But if you have the motivation to do it now, that’s a definite bonus.

Katie Bailey: For me, it depends on the project. Often enough, I’ll do it right away, but I do have one that I’ve pushed off editing simply because I’m working my way through other manuscripts and I don’t know what it means to take a break. I mean, what?

Brighton Walsh: I’ve always done them immediately, with just a day or two off in between.

Lucas Hargis: I know some folks give the advice of: “Let it sit.” I jump in right away. Here’s my reasoning: The voice and events at the end are still fresh in my mind. Wrapping around back to the beginning with those still burning bright-white helps create a beautiful continuity. So the voice and echo of the ending can be successfully edited in the beginning. In my opinion. Sure, I step away & let it sit/breathe/mellow later. But not until a full pass or two. Or three…

Crystal Ord: Well, this all makes me feel better then. I might just jump right back into it. I’ve always heard about writers letting a manuscript rest so they can come back to it with fresh eyes…I never normally do this but thought I’d give it a try…it’s torture, haha!

Lucas Hargis: I believe some precious value is lost with a waiting period.

Allison Varnes: Last summer, I made a full pass edit after finishing the draft, sat on it for two weeks, and then made myself do it again. And again. 🙂

Crystal Ord: I just hear SO much about coming back to it later that I was starting to think I’ve been doing things all wrong!

Lucas Hargis: Maybe those folks mean “at some point” step away and let it air out?

BA Wilson Writes: I jump back in almost immediately for a full pass, because by the end, I haven’t seen the beginning in awhile. Then, like Lucas said, everything is still fresh. . . . However, I’m that compulsive type of editor/rewriter, so it will go through a few rounds before I even let anyone else look at it. When I start feeling too on top of it and second-guessing everything I’m doing, then I step away from editing for awhile and take a break.

Lucas Hargis: We share the same process, BA.

Crystal Ord: Yep, that sounds about right, BA. 🙂 That is exactly what I like to do!

AJ Pine: That’s the thing. There is no right or wrong when it comes to the process. Correct answer is always what works best for you. #peptalksbyamy

KK Hendin: I go right from drafting to editing. I don’t reread while I’m drafting so edits are kind of a blank slate, in that I don’t remember everything. Then I edit until I hate it and then send it to CPs and repeat until it’s done.

Katie Bailey: Normally, I edit as I go. It makes for a longer writing process, but the technical editing stage isn’t as intense. On the whole, I’ll often edit a manuscript right away once I’ve finished. I can distance myself enough to see if everything makes sense, but I’m still in the zone. There’s only once I really waited on going back to edit, but that was because I had another manuscript that I needed to work on and I was pressed for time.

Olivia Hinebaugh: Umm. A few days? As long as it takes to binge watch something on Netflix and read a good book.

Lucas Hargis: So you DO put a little space/time between yourself & the new words, Olivia Hinebaugh?

Olivia Hinebaugh: I mean, a bit. I like to go in and slash pretty early. 😉 Because slashing is always the first since I don’t know where the plot is going to go when I start writing. haha. #pantser

Olivia Hinebaugh: One more thing to add: normally when I’m finishing a draft and I’m in beast mode, I am denying myself reading and watching anything, so when I finish drafting, all I want to do is pick back up with the old TBR pile.

BA Wilson Writes: The only reason I pause at all at the end of a novel is to drown in all the epic feels for a moment (usually the rest of the night). Then I buckle down and start the first edit the next day.

Brighton Walsh: Okay, so I write and edit almost immediately. Those are grammar and content edits, polish it as good as I can, send off to CPs/betas and do it all over again before I finally let it sit for maybe a week or two and then read it from start to finish one last time.

Natasha Neagle: Haha. I waited 6 LONG, painful days.

 

So those are thoughts from 11 #4evno writers [in the almost infinite population of the Writing Universe]. None of it is law.

We hear and read stuff like “advice”, and, wanting to do the very best we possibly can, we sometimes trick ourselves into believing somebody else’s process is Universal Law. [See opening statement.] Eff that. Do you.

Edit hot. Or edit cold. Or do both. Or make up your own temperature that’s basically anti-matter that would negate everybody else’s. You can do that.

The key, I believe, is to test out a few methods. Read about others’ processes, but don’t let those opinions stifle your very own unique way of doing things.

Find your Goldilocks method—the one that’s jussssst riiiiight for you.

I promise, the Universe won’t explode. Probably.

—

Much love to the #4evnos for ongoing encouragement, discussion, laughter, STICKERS, and agreeing to let me share their words here. You can find every last one of them on ol’ Twitter. Say hi.

And a simple Google search turned up a dozen other convos very similar to this one. Some folks preach cold-edits-only as LAW. Meh. What about you? What’s YOUR specific & unique editing preference? Which bowl(s) do you go for?

My 10 Year Old Downloaded Grindr

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I love everything about this.

raisingmyrainbow's avatarRaising My Rainbow

“This app is taking forever to load,” my 10-year-old son Chase said as I was driving. It was just the two of us in the car and he was fiddling with his iPhone*.

“What app is it?” I asked. He isn’t supposed to download anything unless he has our permission.

“It’s called Grindr,” he said. I nearly crashed the car.

iPhone5_Splash“You can’t download that,” I said quickly, full of panic and resisting the urge to reach over and snatch the phone out of his hands. I was certain the app would load faster than any app has loaded in the history of all apps and his profile would be automatically complete and naked selfies of men would flood his phone and his brain.

“I can download it; it’s just taking forever,” he said.

“No. I mean you aren’t allowed to download it. I’m saying no. You’re not old enough…

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Astrotalisman

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Astro Bracelet 1 (2) (800x600)

Weird writer ritual confession time…
While drafting each novel, I have a talisman or totem of sorts specific to that novel.

While drafting Phreak Show, I wore this one particular sterling ring every day because it’s oval like the eye rings Phineas slips onto each phreak.

While drafting Epistle of Doff: The Most Blasphemous Monker, I changed all my shoelaces to red, because red thread is kind of important to the story.

Now, while drafting If Found, Return to Astropop, I’m wearing a ribbon around my wrist.

In the novel, a two-star ribbon binds a pair of journals together when Astro finds them.
The red star represents Astro’s red journal.
The black star represents Pip’s black journal.

Do these things actually DO anything when it comes to my drafting?
Who knows? But they mean something to me—keep the world and characters ever present in my mind—which certainly can’t hurt.

Astroplotting

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A portion of the Astroplotting ridiculousness. My copper-clad desk totally helps things go smoother. Somehow?

A portion of the Astroplotting ridiculousness. My copper-clad desk totally helps things go smoother. Somehow?

With Pitch Slam behind me and CP duties complete, it’s almost time to draft my next novel:
If Found, Return to Astropop.

Let me give you the [rough] pitch before I prattle on about the plotting for this many-tentacled monster.

 

SHORT PITCH

Unaware of one another’s gender or appearance, two teens find themselves mutually smitten by reading each other’s journals.

 

FULL (Rough) PITCH

When sixteen-year-old Astropop finds his/her previously lost journal, Astro discovers the mystery person who returned it (known only as Pippopotamus)  read his/her innermost thoughts and traced Astro’s movements like a teenage P.I. This stranger believes s/he is smitten with Astropop—sight unseen. Astro knows this, because teenage Pip wrote a journal in response.

As Astro re-reads his/her own forgotten words, and those of Pip, Astro is amazed at how simple letters on paper can bond complete strangers. In fact, Astro is completely smitten with Pip, too. Using unintentional clues in Pip’s journal, Astro engages in a little P.I. work of his/her own to search for the anonymous Pippopotamus.

With the confessions and intimate stories in the pair of books tangling with Astro’s real life in uncanny ways, Astro reaches the end of both journals. On the last precious page, Pip left one final clue. Perhaps accidental, perhaps intentional. Astropop can finally meet this intriguing stranger face-to-face, but fears, if s/he does, their inexplicable connection will be broken.

 

If Found, Return to Astropop has been percolating for a while. I’m in the final stages of [ridiculous!] outlining. Not because the process is ridiculous. I love it; it’s essential for me. But because this story requires…more than any story I’ve attempted before it.

With 3 separate timelines overlapping: the present, Astro’s journal written 6 months earlier, and Pip’s response journal written 3 months earlier, it’s a beast to manage. Along with those interwoven timelines, I’m also juggling a calendar (noting meteor showers & moon phases important to Astro), a grid of the 3 interwoven arcs, and a complete outline packet for each of the 2 MCs. Plus a OneNote file with random scenes, dialogue lines, imagery. Oh, and extensive research on both arborsculpture and architecture (specifically Art Nouveau).

Confused? Yeah. I would be, too.

Thankfully all these tools help give order to the chaos I’m attempting to wrangle.

This story is rich, layered, insanely interwoven. The timelines wrap back on themselves (in a sense). Events in the present mirror the completely different stories in the 2 sets of journal entries. Yet, the happenings have a completely separate arc all their own. But align. But stand alone. (SEE WHAT I MEAN!?)

To add to the challenge (because this is apparently not enough…) I’m keeping Pip’s gender ambiguous. For reasons.

And, for just a little more personal push, this will be my first Contemporary YA. At least, it’s 97% Contemporary, with about 3% Magical Realism thrown in? I mean, I’m guessing here. It may be considered MR all around. I just don’t know which bucket it fits in. The setting is our world, 100%. Everything works as we know it. But the way the three layers align in uncanny ways, there is a hint that something more than mere chance is at work.

So is that actually 100% Magical Realism?

Hell if I know. But it’s a story I must absolutely tell.

Even if my brain Astropops in the process.

How To Create A Tweet That Won’t Die

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The Tweet That Won't Die

The Tweet That Won’t Die

Sometimes [okay, often] random things happen.

Like, a streetlight blinks out right as you pass under it. Or a portal opens in the overcast sky so a single, slanted ray of sunlight sneaks through in glorious perfection. These are things we cringe or smile over.

A random occurrence on Twitter had me both cringing & smiling this week. Also, head-scratching.

See that Tweet up ^there^? I posted it on Monday 3/10/14 at 10:38 pm EST. It received a few RTs that night, which ballooned the next day. And the next. It got up into the hundreds—I’m thinking around 300 or so RTs. And that was a complete aberration for me. My highest number of RTs before that was around 75 for a coffee-related Tweet shared in the morning. [Because coffee!] My How I Got My Agent link also received a massive amount of play. [Because writers!]

Everything quieted down with the Undying Tweet. I [mostly] forgot about the aberration and moved on. As one does. But it sparked some lingering questions in my mind:
– What made that one so popular?
– How can I repeat that?
– Is there a formula here, or at least attributes I can glean, to help craft RT-able Tweets in the future?

I’d already been reading quite a few articles on social media marketing. Stuff like the best days & times of the day to Tweet/blog/FB/Tumbl, the types of information that get the most interaction, etc. There’s an abundance of data and research findings. Here’s one such example: Best Time to Tweet

Before the Undying Tweet was born, I’d been intentionally playing with timing and content, tossing out test subjects—funny, serious, links, images—at different times of the day. I wasn’t super-scientific about it, but just intentionally varied the types of content and posting times. During this process, I stayed decidedly me, Lucas, but chose to tailor my content a bit for the test subject Tweets.

My non-scientific findings:
– Folks seem to like short, funny things in the morning.
– Image Tweets in the morning do especially well, but are golden anytime.
– Helpful links get good play in the daytime.
– In the evenings…beats me! I revert back to sharing whatever randomness pops in my mind or I stumble across. #QUASI-SCIENCE!

Back to the Undying Tweet.

I found that image on Tumblr. I switched venues and added my own insight. The author of that book, Jack Douglas, obviously titled it like a boss back in 1972. That made the image intriguing. Maybe my commentary had nothing to do with the success of the Tweet, but I’m going to pretend like maybe it did.

And, apparently, magickal streams of energy aligned and {{poof}} it grew wings, flapped around for a while, and eventually nested. Then, 3 weeks later, for some unknowable reason, someone, somewhere resurrected it. It bounced over to some guy with 50k followers who ended up RTing. Then others with 5-digits of followers. And it hit 500 Favs, so Favstar RTed it. The chain reaction just kept spiraling outward and it went quasi-viral.

The Undying Tweet hit 1ooo RTs yesterday afternoon, then nested again. I woke up to an influx of 100 more RTs this morning as folks on the other side of world picked it up and continued the signal boost. Again.

You better believe I’ve deciphered the hell out of the wording, the structure, the timing…

Based on some Twitter comments and questions, I get the feeling many of you have been doing the same. Because we all know that an occasional viral Tweet, when it could really help promote a book, for instance, would not be a bad thing at all.

In my ridiculously limited wisdom, here’s How To Create A Tweet That Won’t Die:
– Be intentional about varying your content & timing.
– Share stuff that interests you. Chances are, it will interest others.
– Keep the topics broad at times: food, books, movies, kitties (blergggh) for the most RTability.
– Add your own flare. What good is a signal boost if your brand isn’t lightly stamped on it?
– Use images.
– Believe in luck, magick, serendipity.
– Don’t stress over it, but like any other goal, continually experiment & hone that skill.

This has become an experiment at this point. The Undying tweet is currently at 1128 1133 1136 RTs and 811 813 816 Favs.

If you’d like to add to the magick, RT or Fav the infamous Undying Tweet by clicking here.

And I’m curious…
What patterns have you noticed?
What are the characteristics of your most Retweeted or Faved Tweet?
Do you believe Tweeting is a craft worthy of honing?

I’d love for you to share in the comments so we can keep deciphering the magick [as much as magick wants to reveal of itself anyway] together.

Loud and Quiet Days

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star_life_cycle

I’m feeling a bit ~quiet~ today, which is a thing that comes and goes in waves. You know those days where you turn a bit inward and think a little deeper on things than on most days.

Today my thoughts are hovering over reality, expectations, promises [kept and broken], goals, forward motion, commitment, longevity, why some supernova collapse into blackholes while others morph into neutron stars. You know, light stuff like that.

When I drift into these moods, it’s nice to find other’s words to help express what I’m feeling. It’s part of the processing, I guess. A way to sort things out—simplify them—and ease back to a more outward existence.

“We do not grow absolutely, chronologically. We grow sometimes in one dimension, and not in another; unevenly. We grow partially. We are relative. We are mature in one realm, childish in another. The past, present, and future mingle and pull us backward, forward, or fix us in the present. We are made up of layers, cells, constellations.” ~Anais Nin

And a lot of times one set of words will lead me to another set, which may or may not be directly related but possesses this ethereal connection somehow.

A lot of you will readily know this reference

A lot of you will readily know this reference

And I seem to stumble upon the most random & interesting tidbits when in this mindset.

Described by one scientist as “the ultimate alchemists,” stars are pretty incredible in that they are these miraculous self-contained and proactive systems that, with the pure power of their own mass, produce the principle elements of life.  Then, because all life is about connection, they clump together into star forming regions (or nebula), evolving, and turning themselves into new stars. ~ Lynn Johnson

So, yeah: growth and transformation and thoughts and stars.

The great thing about these ~quiet~ days is how they usually spark new ideas. They serve as those star-birthing nebulae. And they also help existing ideas, thoughts & emotions kinda coalesce. They’re as welcome as the ~loud~ days, and perhaps cherished because of their rarity.

Here’s to hoping you find that perfect balance of ~loud~ and ~quiet~ days.

nebula A lot of times, my ~quiet~ days are triggered by hurt. Someone I trust, I’m close to, lets me down in some way. The processing is how I stretch beyond the hurt to forgiveness. Because nobody wants to be a blackhole.