Becoming A Fiction Writer
One girl, one dream … and a whole lot of procrastination
April 29, 2008 by amanda

Starting a novel can be tricky; my problem is continuing it

I’ve been enthusiastically re-watching the Australian series Seachange since I unpacked a box containing my old videos – if you don’t know it, it ran in Australia from 1998-2000 on the ABC, starring Sigrid Thornton as big-city-lawyer turned small-town-magistrate Laura Gibson.

In any case, towards the end of Series 2 there’s an episode called Not Such Great Expectations where leading man Max Connors is trying to write a novel. I sympathise. But I’m grateful to have fewer problems than he seems to in getting started. Throughout an entire episode, he chases poor Laura around with new versions of his opening line. At one stage, he changes just one word – Colombia instead of Argentina, or something similar – and expects her to have a positive reaction. As a lawyer, her mind refuses to make a judgement until she hears a lot more than just one line, so they both get utterly frustrated by the process.

What’s the lesson here? First of all, the age-old truth that you probably shouldn’t be asking your friends and family for feedback on your fiction writing. I’ve got that one pretty much under control, although perhaps to the extreme that I don’t really share my fiction with anyone until it gets sent off somewhere – I do keep meaning to explore an online writers forum of some kind. Secondly, poor Max should really just give up on getting an opening line and plunge into the story anywhere that he has the inspiration to do so. Hmm, is that a lesson for me too? Now that I’m trying to rewrite and simultaneously restructure my novel draft, I seem to be stuck doing it in a linear order. I might have to explore that further.

Permalink | Posted in Writing Novels | No Comments »

  •   •   •   •   •
April 27, 2008 by amanda

Short story progress and the Writers Weekly contest

Incredibly, three months has come and gone since I entered my first Writers Weekly 24-Hour Short Story Contest, which makes it time for another one. Today, I wrote a short story for the Spring 2008 contest, and I’m happier with it than the story I produced the last time round.

I love the idea of this forced creativity, having to use a prompt to develop a short story all within a short time – about 12 hours for me, due to time zone differences (unless I could get up in the middle of the night to see the contest details and prompt arrive). I work better under pressure and almost wish they’d put on a 24-hour contest every week – my productivity would definitely improve!

In any case, I wanted to make some notes about how my approach was different next time. I’m already looking forward to the Summer contest in another three months, but I want to make sure I’m improving. So what I think I did better this time is:

  • I read the topic, then went about the beginning of my day – eating breakfast, having a shower – with the topic at the back of my mind. I often have good ideas in the shower so I kept moving my thinking back to the writing prompt when it strayed to other thoughts.
  • I brainstormed a little on paper. I extracted the main elements of the topic (the contest doesn’t insist that you use every element as they have it – just that it’s obvious your story was written in response to that prompt). Looking back on my brainstorming scribbles now, I can see I did use a few of the ideas I generated here.
  • I told my husband what the topic was and he gave me a few of his immediate ideas. He’s very creative and imaginative, and the ideas he gave me weren’t really anywhere down my alley, but something he said stuck and gave me a slightly sinister tone for the story.
  • Then I wrote the first draft all in one hit. This was relatively easy, as there was a 1000 word limit, plus my husband was threatening to turn the power off so he could do some electrical work, so I knew I had a physical time limit. I printed out the draft just before he got to the switchboard.
  • For the very first time, I used a suggestion I read in one of Hope Clark’s Funds for Writers newsletters a long time ago – to the mechanical voice of ReadPlease to read my story aloud to me. This free software is pretty neat. It’s developed enough to include pauses for commas and something like normal sentence intonation, so you can really pick up when the rhythm of a sentence is wrong or words don’t fit together smoothly.
  • And finally, because I’d come up just over the 1000 word limit, I edited carefully to eliminate a few unnecessary adjectives, adverbs and other redundancies.

The interesting thing will be to see if I still like this story tomorrow. I didn’t last time round – that’s the Australian time zone disadvantage of not being able to sleep on your story like the American contest entrants can. In any case, I’ve had an interesting day with it and I look forward to reading some of the winning results.

Permalink | Posted in Short Stories, Writing Contests | 2 Comments »

  •   •   •   •   •
April 22, 2008 by amanda

Saving money buying books online, or splurging at a favourite book store?

It’s a common trait down here that if a New Zealander moves to Australia to become famous, we Australians take them over and tend to forget their Kiwi origins. Russell Crowe, for example, or the Finn brothers and their band Crowded House; we Aussies like to claim all the popular exports as our own. And it looks like I’ve done the same again with my discussions of Fishpond, the online bookstore down here.

The reason I noticed is that the second book from my original order arrived today, and my curiosity was aroused by a New Zealand postmark. I surfed around and quickly discovered that the original company was actually Fishpond.co.nz, and they later expanded to the Aussie version. Who would’ve thought … not me, obviously. So I stand corrected.

On the same issue, I had a comment suggesting that The Book Depository in the UK was a great place to order books online, because they have free delivery worldwide. It looks like it’s true, and using the same book as an example – What Was Lost – I could get that sent to me from The Book Depository for just A$12.64 – nearly half of what Amazon would charge me.

But it’s not just about the dollars, is it? I was listening to an ABC Radio National Book Show podcast today which discussed the vital role of small, independent bookstores in Australia. I agree, and I’m feeling fiercely loyal again to my two favourite book stores, Planet in Mt Lawley and Oxford Street Books in Leederville, and will plan a trip there soon. According to Planet’s online catalogue I’d have to pay $24.95 for What Was Lost there – and they’re out of stock, anyway – but there is definitely something special about strolling through such a book store and discovering all kinds of new books I haven’t heard about.

Permalink | Posted in Reading Fiction | 2 Comments »

  •   •   •   •   •
April 21, 2008 by amanda

Fiction writer’s over-inspiration … a good problem to have

A recent post about why writers should read on FWJ wasn’t news to me – I’ve always presumed that all good writers must also be good readers. But I had an unusual experience last week, which put me off my regular evening reading session for a couple of days.

I’m an avid reader. I read on the train and the bus, in my lunch break if no colleagues are around to chat to, at night before I go to sleep, and anywhere I have time to kill – there’s always a book in every bag I take out of the house.

But last week, I got to bed, picked up my book, and I just couldn’t. It wasn’t the book’s fault: Francis Mayes’ A Year in the World- a pleasant enough travel narrative that I happily read, even if it didn’t absolutely thrill me. Well, in a way, it was the book’s fault. Almost every word, every noun and adjective and verb, was leading my brain down all kinds of inspired paths of ideas. I was over-inspired.

I’d spent much of that day either talking about fiction writing or actually doing some fiction writing. The creative part of my brain was on high alert. I had ideas for short stories, novels, blogs, travel articles; I was just waiting for the meaning of life to pop in there too. I just couldn’t switch off. But I wanted to. I needed a break, and a good night’s sleep.

So there I was, lying in bed reading and trying to dampen down the fireworks in my brain, whenI glanced to my left: my husband was engrossed in his nightly sudoku exploits. Suddenly I understood why. I borrowed a puzzle off him and got deeply involved with putting those pesky numbers in the right squares. My inspiration stream slowed down and a bit later on, I got to sleep without too many urges to jump up and make notes.

Of course, I was a little worried that I’d wake up the next day with nothing to write about. An empty brain, full of 4-2-8-1-9-3-6-5-7 sequences. But I survived and so did my writing. It took a couple of nights of sudoku therapy before I could go back to reading.

Permalink | Posted in Inspiration for Writers | 2 Comments »

  •   •   •   •   •
April 18, 2008 by amanda

7 reasons why I have to finish writing my novel

Ah, life. So many distractions, so many reasons not to finish writing my novel. From the lows of that quiz which told me it would take years for me to finish a novel to the highs of November when I actually completed a (really very terrible) draft of it for NaNoWriMo, there are some days I can practically see my novel on a bookshop shelf, and others when even finishing one more chapter seems like a Mount Everest level challenge.

But I just have to finish it. Why? That’s a good question, and one that’s definitely open to late-Friday-evening-philosophising:

  1. I have told the world I’m writing a novel. Can’t let “the world” down now, can I?
  2. I’ve promised myself I will write a novel. Letting myself down is even worse than letting the world down.
  3. Because I’ve started it. Shouldn’t you finish everything you’ve started? (Does that mean I should go and finish that bar of chocolate I started eating earlier this evening?)
  4. Writing a novel is something I think I’m capable of. Alone, that’s not a reason (I’m probably capable of learning how to code horridly complicated HTML too, but I’m not going to do it), but I feel a need to prove myself right.
  5. Mr Stockdale. He was my Grade 7 teacher and he believed I could do it. On the last day of school he came up to me and quite seriously told me he knew I’d write books, and he wanted a copy of the first one. Unfortunately, he passed away before I even graduated from high school, but I still think of that day.
  6. I will figure out exactly what my characters are doing and I’ll learn something from them. I’ve already learned curious things about human nature just by getting the first draft out and looking more closely at the first chapter. Really curious. Exactly what is still a secret.
  7. I might become slightly wealthy and slightly famous. More realistically, perhaps, I might be able to trade some of my not-so-favourite blogging jobs for equally paid novel writing.

That’s it. Enough blogging, I’ve got to get writing. I promise.

———————-

I’ve been getting tonnes of good advice at the Network Blogging Tips blog recently and this post is actually an entry for their Make A List challenge.

Permalink | Posted in Goals and Motivation, Writing Novels | No Comments »

  •   •   •   •   •
April 18, 2008 by amanda

Australia-Asia Literary Award sounds like a step in the right direction

What’s happening to my country? Are we actually supporting literature? This week in my state, a new award was announced: the Western Australian Premier’s Australia-Asia Literary Award. It’s for books published by Australian or Asian writers, or largely set in these regions, published in the preceding year, and the especially nice part is it’s worth A$110,000. This makes it one of the richest prizes of its kind – even the Man Booker Prize is only worth a little bit more.

It was only a few months back I mentioned the new Prime Minister’s Literary Prize of $100,000, so I’m getting quite a few warm fuzzies from politicians at the moment. Of course, they do dumb things too – like not funding long-running and vital organisations like FAWWA or stopping funding for important magazines like Westerly … but I’m at least grateful that they’re getting some things right. I’m not naive enough to hope for a perfect world. And on a personal note, I’ve just got to keep writing and daydreaming of one day winning one of these prizes myself. This weekend should see a return to that pesky novel …

Permalink | Posted in Awards for Writers | No Comments »

  •   •   •   •   •
April 15, 2008 by amanda

Fishpond sends me books, but can’t beat American prices

Remember how Australia’s attempt to compete with Amazon, Fishpond, cleverly convinced me to order my first books from them? The first book just arrived, in under a week, which is obviously not as fast as Amazon.de used to deliver to me in Germany, but I can accept that the distance across Australia to my isolated suburb on the west coast is a whole lot further than anywhere within Germany. So for speed, they get a check mark.

Packaging is fine too. They don’t use the heavy cardboard that Amazon.de sent me, but they do use nicely solid envelopes and, on top of that, my copy of What Was Lost was lovingly protected by a plastic bag (hmm … environment?). In any case, the book came to me unblemished, so I’m happy.

But since I placed the order I’ve been wondering about why, after all these years, there isn’t an Australian Amazon-equivalent that is actually doing well enough for everybody to know about it. I’m wondering if it’s just because books are so crazily expensive here in Australia. Here’s an experiment using the very book I’ve just bought:

- Australian online price at Fishpond is A$22.77, discounted from A$24.99. Using today’s exchange rates, that’s a cost of just over US$21.00. This time, shipping was free.

- on Amazon.com in the US, the same book retails for US$11.20 (discounted from US$14.00); a little under half the price of the same book in Australia. On top of that, I’d have to pay shipping to Australia of US$9.98, but I get a discount of $0.56 because I’m making a pre-order – making a grand total of US$20.62. If I buy more books or participate in other Amazon deals, my shipping costs would be reduced.

But even with the full shipping price and the uneconomical method of buying just one book … it’s still cheaper to order this (British) book from Amazon in the US than from “Australia’s biggest online bookstore”. This time I’ve used Fishpond’s enticing first-sale discount to come out on top, but in the future, I’d be financially better off ordering my books all the way from the US. Something’s really wrong there.

Permalink | Posted in Reading Fiction | 3 Comments »

  •   •   •   •   •
April 13, 2008 by amanda

Organising my writing week (and not just my fiction)

One of the biggest problems I face with making progress on my fiction writing career (I say confidently, because I hope it one day becomes a career too) is organising all the writing I need to do each week – the stuff that pays the bills – as well as squeezing in time to work on novels or short stories. A few months ago I started printing out a weekly “Writing Tasks” table that gets pinned on the board above my desk, showing all the blog posts and articles I need to write, their due dates, and a list of fiction writing tasks I hope to achieve as well.

It gets me on the right track, mostly. I’m a list lover, and crossing off posts and articles as I do them during the week is a great motivator (and between posts, a great reason to stand up so I can reach the pin-up board). I also felt my table must be on the right track when I saw a video at the Freelance Writing Jobs site showing how Deb Ng organises her weekly writing schedule, and we’re doing something very similar.

And all that works great for the paid blogging jobs I have. But it tends to fall down at the fiction writing tasks. Clearly, a big reason is that nobody’s paying me for that (yet?!), so the motivation is lower – I’m trying to get the bills paid first. But it’s not just the money either – I don’t want to have to explain to any of my editors why I’m missing a deadline. This is clearly wrong, but … it’s human nature.

I’ve come up with various solutions so far, and the best seems to be that I should do my fiction writing before I do anything else. Before I even open a web browser, especially, because then there’ll be all those feeds to read and emails to reply to. Open up a Word document, write for at least half an hour, then start the working part of my day.

Any other ideas? I need all the help I can get.

Permalink | Posted in Organisation | No Comments »

  •   •   •   •   •
April 12, 2008 by amanda

First chapters and the Writing Show

Remember the Writing Show’s first chapter makeover contest I wanted to enter? The contest is a great idea: the winners will get “professional help” to improve their first chapter, all done through podcasts and stuff online so that listeners and readers can follow and learn something out of it themselves.

You might recall I got my first chapter rewritten despite all the other parts of life happening around me, and sent it off just ahead of the final date. Yesterday I heard back from the Writing Show: my chapter’s not bad enough to need a makeover! In fact, I got some positive feedback. That was pretty exciting, as you’ll recall the only other person who’s read this chapter is my non-literary-minded husband.

So the good news is, maybe I’m not a terrible fiction writer after all. The Writing Show has a really big First Chapter contest coming up – not for makeovers, but for the best that’s out there – the first prize is $1,000. I’ve decided this is good motivation for me to start the second novel idea I have, the one I hope to write during this year’s NaNoWriMo, so I’ve got between now and 20 May to get it done. I wonder if it’ll be easier or harder than the first one?

Permalink | Posted in Writing Contests, Writing Novels | 4 Comments »

  •   •   •   •   •
April 10, 2008 by amanda

Contest entry goals: Need … public … pressure …

Everyone knows (or if they don’t, they should) that one of the best ways to achieve goals is to tell the whole world what you’re trying to achieve. Shame is a great motivator. It got me through NaNoWriMo and I’m going to try to use it again.

I’ve already mentioned that my goal for the year is to submit short stories to 20 contests. I’m not exactly on track to do this … I’ve managed two. If you’ll allow me to amend this goal a little, I hope to enter 20 contests that encourage me to write something new and creative, but not necessarily a full short story each time. And to help me on my way, I’m going to make a list of several contests I’ve got listed in my “to enter” database for the next couple of months:

So if you bump into me walking down the street shortly before one of these dates – and yes, I’m aware that April 15 is very, very close – hassle me. You have my permission.

Permalink | Posted in Goals and Motivation, Writing Contests | No Comments »

  •   •   •   •   •
« Older Entries
Sixhours Theme by Caroline Moore | Copyright 2012 Becoming A Fiction Writer | amanda@becomingafictionwriter.com | Powered by WordPress