3 posts tagged “accomplishments”
Feeling some better. Didn't break out in hives at Littlest Brother's swimming lesson today, so that weird skin-sensitivity thing seems to have gone away. Pretty much just dealing with stuffed-up head and a cough, which seem to be minutely better from one day to the next, so not really impacting my life any.
L.B. got the stomach-fever-gas thing, but he's better now too, and nobody else got that. Yay.
Eldest Son's Recent Accomplishments:
(Just to show you it's not all challenge and no reward...)
- Piano Recital a week and a day ago (the day of the night I got sick, so didn't blog about it)
- Had a piece of artwork chosen for the all-school-district art show that was held this past weekend over at the High School. (He had a piece chosen last year during kindergarten, too. There are things chosen from maybe 5 or so kids in each classroom at the elementary grades.) We all piled into the car and went to see that on Friday night, which was a big hit. Big Daddy got a cute Portrait Of The Artist As A Young Man in front of his work, which I will post one of these days once I get the camera downloaded. The kids all really dug the quite-impressive works of the high-school art students, too.
- Is doing well at swimming lessons. Learning to dive into the deep end! "12 feet 3 inches deep," as he explained with precision later.
- Provided this completely adorable Mother's Day book which had me yelping in laughter as I read it. This book was where the children were provided with fill-in-the-blank sentences which they could complete as appropriate for their own mother, plus space where they could illustrate said fact.
My personal favorite was the page where Eldest Son had written,
My mother is very good at staying calm."
The little stick-figure-me above was smiling, and a speak-bubble impaling her head contained these enigmatic glyphs: "Huuuu. Huuuu."
"What am I saying here, honey?"
"Oh, that. You're taking deep breaths."
*giggle*
Well, I guess I OUGHTA be; goodness knows I get enough opportunities to practice!!!
;-)
Happy Belated Mother's Day to everyone to whom that applies!
#1: Just Do It.
Quit yappin' about it, dreaming about it, wondering if you'll ever be good enough to actually do it... and DO it!
('S the only way to get better.)
#2: But do SOME prep work first.
Next year, when I do it again, I'm going to spend September and October whipping my outline into shape: What I want to achieve in each chapter, in terms of introducing characters, the dilemma they face, what they learn, how they develop... and oh yeah, how the plot moves forward.
#3: Make Conscious Choices on Point-Of-View: It's Crucial.
Probably the technical aspect of the writer's craft where I most need to develop my judgment is POV. Next time I do this, I'm going to spend a LOT more effort ahead of time, during the outlining process, planning out my POV.
From whose perspective should most of the story be written? Should I EVER show a scene which that character doesn't witness? To what purpose? And, if so, what alternate perspectives should I use? And why?
C.J. Cherryh, for one, in her "Foreigner" series, uses a 3rd person that is so deeply linked to her protagonist (Bren) that it FEELS like 1st person. She never shows a scene which Bren doesn't personally witness. You, the reader, NEVER know anything Bren doesn't know. Even what he witnesses, he interprets in the light of his own preconceptions -- sometimes wildly inaccurately. When other characters go off on mysterious errands, you, the reader, NEVER find out where they've been or what they've been up to until Bren does.
This gives the story a kind of breathless off-balance feel where you constantly feel like you don't understand what the heck is going on -- because Bren doesn't -- and you HAVE to keep reading so you can figure it all out at the end. It gives it momentum, like a runner leaning forward for the finish line.
Lois McMaster Bujold, however, does switch POV characters during a story. She does show things happening "off-stage" from her protag's action. This is usually when she's got more than one main character. For example: "Mirror Dance," in which Mark truly begins to develop a persona separate from wanna-be-Miles. Couldn't really show this unless half the book was written from Mark's perspective, not Miles's. (Also b/c Miles was technically dead during much of the book -- and the Vorkosigan universe is not a ghost-inhabited one -- making it rather difficult to show things from his perspective. Awfully boring, the inside of a cryopreservation tank, even if he had been conscious within it, which he wasn't.)
Or in "Komarr," where she wants to teach us something about Miles that he can't see for himself -- precisely BECAUSE it's a point of faulty self-perception -- she shows it through Ekaterin's eyes, watching Miles and speculating about him.
But the point is she makes these switches in a disciplined way, not just bouncing from person to person for no good reason.
#4: Slow Down.
A little. Only a little. Maybe 40,000 words in a month instead of 50,000. Give yourself a LITTLE time to add in some of those artistic details and fix a few of the more awfully awkward sentences. Bring down the wordcount average from 900 per hour to, say, 700 per hour -- editing time included.
#5: But Don't Slow Down Too Much.
Don't get so hung up on perfecting what you've already written that you fail to make forward progress in word count.
It will never be perfect at the end of the first draft! So stop trying to make it perfect.
It will never be perfect until someone else has read it and given you honest feedback about what is unclear, what is slow-moving, what characters feel wooden, what holes there are in the plot. Several somebodies, if you can drag them into it.
So your goal with the first draft is NOT to make it perfect, but just to make it to the point where you aren't ashamed for someone else to read it and give you that feedback, which is what WILL make it perfect.
#6: I Need Deadlines.
Even self-imposed ones. Which is all NaNoWriMo really is. Self-imposed deadline, and a nice friendly cheerleading squad to help keep you motivated to achieve it.
As I told various people about this over the past few weeks, many of them would look at me quizzically and say, "But what do you GET for it?" And I would have to say, "I just get to know that I did it." And they'd be like, "Oka-a-ay..."
Don't know why, the deadline spurred me on.
I've always done my best work under pressure, actually.
So I need to think of a new way to impose deadlines on myself.
*****
So that's it.
I've been thinking of adding to my self-descriptors, "Unpublished Novelist." ;-)
But, I think I'll wait until I've gotten this novel at least to first-draft stage.
50,000 words or not, it's still at a very rough-draft stage. Not even what I would consider a good first draft.
I don't think I can call myself a "Novelist," Unpublished or otherwise, until I have a novel that I'm not ashamed to wave under the nose of anyone who challenges me on the title!
*****
Thanks, everybody, for your unwavering support and enthusiasm!
It really means a lot to me!
- C (Author-In-Training)
In honor of which, I get to display THIS lovely sticker:
Final word count as of 10:00 PM on Tuesday, November 27, 2007:
50,157
And I even got my protag where she needed to go!
I'm so proud!
But you wanna know the funny thing?
Now that I've actually "done it" -- I don't want to BE done with it!
I'm on fire to go back and FIX it all!
Go back and outline what I've already got, then work out the character arcs and subplots and so on that I WISH it had, and then write a new outline to get me there, and then keep cranking it out!
AAAaaahhh!
I'm addicted!!!
