Categories » ‘book: running on empty’
May 23rd, 2011 by bill
i’ve been bad at posting the last couple weeks, but i’ll blame end-of-semester grading and other work for that.
however, i have been writing and such:
- RoE’s latest draft is being left to cool for a month or two*
- i’ve just finished the third draft of a new short story that i can’t figure out a title for yet. the story is the result of a kick/challenge i was given in a conversation some weeks ago, for which i am deeply grateful, as it was a lot of fun. it’s currently out to beta readers**
- i’m finding myself thinking more and more about the YA novel I’d outlined some months ago (currently called Darkstar, for lack of anything more interesting), so that might be next
- or one of a couple other shorts that are kicking around
- rejections have almost stopped, which means its time to reshuffle the deck and get my recent stories out to a new batch of markets
i’ve also been hemming and hawing over the purchase of the new ASUS EP121, and not just as a toy. it boggles my mind that the idea of a slim, pen-based tablet capable of viewing a full page of text has taken so long to appear. it seems like a sure-fire win for the education sector. i’m expecting to use it for essay grading to drastically descrease my time and, hopefully, increase the value to my students. yes, it’s more expensive than an iPad, etc., but it seems quite worth it for the much greater functionality.
did i just convince myself?
* actually, it was my brain that needed cooling over all the changes i’d made and have still to make
**want to be one? let me know.
May 11th, 2011 by bill
i just finished the typing/dictation for Running on Empty, which means it’s all on the computer now, which is excellent.
The ‘almost’, however, refers to the fact that while Dragon well and truly saved my hands and wrists from my normal post-first draft carpal tunnel suffering, it isn’t perfect. it’s very, very good, but i rushed a bit on Monday and the recognition yielded up some really quite laughable results, as I’ve discovered on skimming back.
so, it’s all on the computer, but it’s not really finished. i’m going to take a short break (the biggest problem i’ve had so far with Dragon** is the earphones, which inevitably press the bows of my glasses between my ears and my skull**) and then see if I can focus on ONLY the sections that were dictated, and hold myself to just the language fixes, not any more revision.
i would not suggest holding your breath.
* and the revision that goes along with all that i do
** aside from the fact that it comes up with the most amazing alternatives to my phrasing of the exclamation point punctuation mark. i say “exclamation point” and Dragon types “escalation point” or “summation point” or “estimation point” or “this commision point” or “exhalation point” and so on. everything else is pretty amazingly accurate (?, *, -, em dashes, etc.), but not “!”. weird.
*** and without any hair to speak of, there’s no extra cushion.
May 9th, 2011 by bill
i didn’t make it to the end, but that’s sometimes the way of things. still, i am on page 238, so only 9 pages to go! i would consider pushing on, but good sleep has been evading me for several days, so i’m hoping to change that with an early night.
March 29th, 2011 by bill
throw out the hundred pages in the middle.
at least, that’s how i did it, as i’ve been typing up Running on Empty. i had forgotten just how much of a doorstop i’d started writing at the beginning of the book.
i think it’s all very cool stuff still, but i’m trying to Deppo my work sooner rather than later, and i spent the morning being ruthless about what was actually adding to the story.
sadly, that meant that i pulled out 102 pages.
on the other hand, it means i am free of that baggage.
i can always add pieces back in if necessary, but right now, this is the right thing for the story.
wasn’t easy, mind you, but i’m getting better at it.*
* says the guy who wrote 102 apparently unnecesary pages before he smartened up.
March 27th, 2011 by bill
the somewhat frustrating truth for me: i need to outline.
i spent a couple hours on Audrey, but it was very quickly apparent that i hadn’t thought it through well enough. the story is solid, even powerful if i may be so bold, and the initial tone feels right, but there are a number of things i have to have right in my head before i can get much further.
so, whilst i ruminate upon the possibilities for Audrey, i’ve turned to typing up Running on Empty, which will keep me busy for some time and probably not yield anything worthy of posting about.
not that that’s really stopped me before, though, eh?
March 26th, 2011 by bill
the more i run from something, the faster it catches me.
i tried to get some space from writing in general after finishing Running on Empty earlier this week. no dice. every spare moment (and plenty that were otherwise occupied) found me returning to it in my mind, whether it was getting Running on Empty typed up, or getting on with a new short story, or the steady and admittedly depressing filter of agent rejections, i couldn’t stop thinking about it.
unfortunately for my better half, these thoughts often spilled out of my mouth as well, leading to more than a few circular conversations (doubt > frustration > determination > excitement > uncertainty > doubt > etc.).
after much discussion, though, she suggested i try a more radical shift in gears. i was resistant at first, though i can’t honestly give you a good reason why. it was something i had been expecting to tackle at some point, so why not now?
another couple days of rumination and discussion brought me to the truth: i was avoiding this idea because i feared failure, and that’s simply a lousy reason not to try.
so this evening, after several days of no writing to speak of, i sent myself up over the garage for 45 minutes, to at least write something and see what came of it. i had mixed feelings, going into it: low expectations weighing down high hopes.
an hour and a half later, i had nearly 3 pages and i felt . . . moved. i don’t want to say it’s a better feeling than what i feel for the other pieces i’ve written, but i’ve decided to take on something more personal this time, though with some caveats from my normal process:
- it’s not really my story (this will make sense later)
- i haven’t outlined anything (and don’t really plan to)
- it’s contemporary fiction (a first, at book-length, for me)
what’s it about? well, i’m going to hold onto that for a bit. i’ve given it the placeholder title of Audrey, for now, and i probably won’t keep posting about it as i go, until i’m ready to divulge more. this feels like something not to be piece-mealed, but presented fully-formed.
this feels a bit like jumping off a cliff.
March 22nd, 2011 by bill
it is said a picture is worth a thousand words. well, allow me to stretch that a bit here, with a picture that is worth, to me at least, between 90,000 and 110,000 words*:
 Running on Empty - The End! yep, finished. done. complete.
well, okay, perhaps ‘complete’ is going a bit too far. it’s only draft 1 and i know there is plenty to work on and more than a little to cut out, but that’s all for draft 2**.
right now, though, i’m thrilled by the outcome and having trouble concentrating on anything.
besides the clamoring of my stomach. i knew i forgot something.
* based on 247 handwritten pages at roughly 350-425 words per page, which is what my previous work has averaged out to.
** and 3. and probably 4 and 5, if i’m honest.
March 21st, 2011 by bill
okay, so it’s actually been a bit more than a few days since i last posted progress on “Running on Empty”.* i have not been idle, however. while it’s true that the aforementioned query work essentially consumed the last few days, i was actually quite productive prior to that, though i had let the blogging slide.
today, with the queries out and the college on spring break, i was able to get back to RoE, starting with a couple strong pages after my morning run, followed by a few more pages later on.
unfortunately, the last couple pages are filled with more cross-outs and scribbles than actual writing.** i was against a wall. the end is mere pages away and yet i couldn’t seem to get the words out. over and over i tried to approach the scene, but over and over i ground to a halt because i was forcing the characters or getting lost on tangents or some such other problem.
why? because i didn’t plan the ending. my outline reached all the way up to, but did not include, the final scene. i knew essentially what had to happen and who would be involved, but i hadn’t been able to identify the particulars despite all my outlining. finally, i just started writing and decided to take the risk.
well, here i was, 241 pages and 77 writing days later, and i still hadn’t figured it out.
i’d managed to pick up a number of pieces along the way, most of which i could not have planned if i wanted to. still, the whole was incomplete. after wrestling with it for probably too long, i realized that it came down to the fact that i was stuck between two possibilities:
- ending the story where it was, where i had initially thought it was going to end, though i was still unsatisfied with the anti-climactic-feeling scene that currently existed, in hopes that i would discover what was not quite right about it during revision, or
- letting the story run along one of the unexpected tangents i’d started, which opened the door on a further series of events that held the promise of a more exciting ending
try as i might, i truly couldn’t figure out which was the better course.
when my wife came home, i was still no better off and i harangued her, as usual, with my plight. she listened patiently until i had spun myself out, then proposed a distraction.
i tell it to my students all the time: when you’re stuck, walk away, get some exercise, work in the garden***, whatever, just do something else entirely and let your subconscious do the heavy lifting for a while.
it is quite humbling to be reminded to take one’s own advice, and the more valuable for it.
because after i finally stopped looking or the answer, i found it. what’s more, my instincts had been right; i had reached the end and the tangent was a mirage, nothing more. there are a couple of key changes to make, of course, but i had been looking so hard for what was wrong, that i wasn’t seeing what was right.
* 10, to be exact
** okay, yes, my so-called ‘actual writing’ is not terribly distinguishable from scribbling, but that’s not the point.
*** i love winter, but it’s spring, right? somewhere?
March 20th, 2011 by bill
i haven’t blogged in a few days, and i’m about 5 pages behind in Running on Empty, which is rather hard to take because i’m right at the end, now, but i made a decision to take care of something that was cluttering my mind to a distracting degree.
specifically: query letters.
*gasp* horror!
and yet, i’m getting better at them. at least from a subjective point of view. i haven’t actually had any responses from agents or publishers that would validate this*, but i’m feeling like the stress is less in the writing of the query letter itself than in the dogged search for the proper audience.**
ah, well. complaining won’t solve anything.
doing will, though.
back to RoE!
* and their absence seems to actively invalidate this, but i’m not going to dwell on that.
** that said, i cannot but thank my wife yet again for her tireless assistance in this endeavor, as in all other things.
March 9th, 2011 by bill
i had rather high hopes for today. serves me right.
i’ve only just been able to crack the 3rd page of today’s writing, and i’ve been at it for more hours than i care to mention.
still, i did it. it’s not awesome, but that’s what revision is for.
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