Over at Cornell Deville, he’s running a type of workshop thing for showing versus telling that I decided to join. Why not, right? After I finished writing my little blurb, I looked at what I wrote and my jaw dropped. Have you ever had one of those moments when you’re writing (or after you’ve written something) where you’re truly, amazingly proud of what you’ve put on paper? And I’m not talking about just liking what you’ve written but a level of “OMFG I just wrote that! I rock!” That’s how I felt and still feel about this little blurb. It’s a definite ‘holy shit’ for me. Now if I could just maintain, I’d be golden.
But the deal for this little exercise was it had to be no more than 250 words and contain the following information: 1) Your main character is 12 years old. 2) She has long hair and we need to know the color. 3) She’s wearing white shorts, a tank top and flip flops. 4) It’s a late summer evening. 5) Her parents are out, and she thinks she’s alone in the house. 6) Something is making her believe otherwise.
Simple enough. We just couldn’t spell out the obvious. He gave a good example using other prompts of showing versus telling that you all should check out. I know I’ve practiced my own SvT on here. But here’s what I came up with for my bit to the action. Can you spot everything I needed to include in my less-than-250-words?
Slick foam rubber smacks against the soles of Maia’s feet to the tune of the aging grandfather clock in the living room. Tick flop. Flip tock.
She hurries past a black window where two luminescent eyes flicker unevenly at her from the other side. In the dead of August days, Maia’s hair burns just as brightly as those flickering bugs. Now it’s just knotted on top of her head to keep from smothering her neck. What was once flowing and smooth was now a nest of uncontrollable frizz.
Stark white shorts hidden behind smears of summer fwap against the wall as she grabs a pair of jeans. The dead duds on the floor came home in a bag from Mom’s hand, not hers. But the spaghetti straps are a must. She would have preferred a tube top but Mom didn’t allow those. Yet.
Just one more night until ‘teen’ officially enters Maia’s life. The kids at school won’t be able to call her a baby anymore.
The porch’s screen door slams and Maia jumps at the call. She frowns and walks to the window where an empty, velvet driveway waves back up at her. The screen slams again and she looks to the trees just out of reach. Their leaves hang heavy in the thick, humid air. A stair creaks and Maia’s heart starts racing the tocking of the grandfather clock.
First one to morning wins.
So I’ve finished typing in all of my edits for Earth Shatterer. It became pretty easy towards the end as I didn’t see much to really change. A few words here and there but nothing major. So when I looked at the ending word count I noticed that I’ve chopped a solid 9,000 words from the previous draft. Not a bad feat. That’s 9,000 unnecessary words gone. But now that leaves me with a word count that’s leaning more towards middle grade than young adult. Crap.
I want the count at at least 50,000 so puffing it up with another 4,000 words isn’t that big of a deal. I don’t want it to be too bare bones and I know a few places where I can go into fleshier detail about some things. But still. It’s a see-saw man, I swear.
Well, at least I don’t have to do another total rewrite. I’m pretty happy with what I have. The first chapter needs to be reworded a bit as the voice is a little off but overall, I’m satisfied. Now it’d be nice if I can be done with it already! I’m so close!
It literally just dawned on me as I was reading something in first person. Just now. Like I’m not reading a book in first as we speak but that’s besides the point. Sometimes things take a little while for me.
I don’t like using first person POV because, reading it, it sounds absolutely ridiculous. When I snap into writer mode, I’m looking at first person and going, is that how the character is really thinking? “Sun rays danced across the ground like faeries in a circle.” Really? If I think that way then I can’t help but think of the Family Guy episode where Peter narrates his own life. Equally as ridiculous.
If it’s not thought presently but maybe the MC relaying information after the fact, then they really talk like that? Really? Star-freckled skies? Really?
It just doesn’t make sense to me. First person is as intimate as you can get with a character. You’re literally inside their brains as they’re going through the story. When they’re going through the actions, do they really think all of that in such a verbose way? Really?
When I snap out of writer mode, it’s fine and some damn good writing. Of course I can read through it just fine. But writer mode keeps poking through the screen going WTF?!
Maybe I’m being way too technical here. First person is inside the character’s head. In the character’s voice. Sometimes I can’t help but think what pretentious asses characters are when they spout off internally like that. At the same time the same thing could be said for third person limited. Sort of. You’re not in the head there. More like on it. Same character voice but you’re not squishing the brain.
I mean, dialogue is one thing but when people shut their mouths, you have to wonder what’s running through their heads and if it’s anywhere near as loquacious as some of these first person narratives make them out to be. I have a hard time believing they all are but writers have to stretch their creative fingers somehow, right? I just have a hard time believing even fictional characters are running that high all the time.
I don’t remember where I read it but I do remember it was in the comments section of some blog. I think it had something to do with self publishing or something like that. It’s fuzzy in the brain right now. But what the commenter said was that the only reason published books were good was because of the editors on them, not the authors. Now, I’m not someone that gets offended easily but that felt like a punch below the belt.
Of course it shows the commenter’s total ignorance on the writing process and there’s really no use in explaining it but what the hell? Then why don’t we leave the writing to the editors, then? If they make the book, let them work it up from start to finish! What do we need authors for?
Just in case anyone reading this didn’t know (if you’re reading this and didn’t know, please come out from under that rock, the sun is nice and warm), editors fine tune an already heavily edited manuscript. It starts with the author who writes it, edits the shit out of it, rewrites it, edits more shit in and out of it, rewrites it again ad nauseum until they feel it’s finally ready for query. Agents will not take on manuscripts that need to be heavily edited. It’s too much work and, quite frankly, a waste of resources. If they feel there’s huge potential there, they’ll offer editing information and ask the author to resubmit AFTER the edits are made. With or without that step, an agent takes on a manuscript and may or may not make a few more tweaking edits prior to subbing it out to publishers. Once it’s taken up by the publisher, the editors give it one more once over, make whatever suggestions they deem necessary and hand it over to the author to correct. After all of that, a final, publishable copy is born.
Now, who did all the actual editing in that scenario? Most of it was self-edited by the author. Minor bits and pieces were RECOMMENDED by the agent and, eventually, editor. Editors do not make changes. They suggest them. The author then has to take his or her talent and transfer it to those recommendations. And they are minor suggestions. Changing a chapter is minor. Rewriting an ending is relatively minor. Doing a major overhaul on a manuscript at publisher level is unheard of.
So let’s get this straight, okay? Editors do not make the writers. They do not create the book you hold in your hand after purchasing it from the store. They sand the hard edges of a nearly finished product. They put that extra layer of laquer on it to make it shine that much more but they didn’t create the table. They didn’t bevel it. They didn’t inlay the wainscoting. They just put the cherry on the sundae.
Got that? Yes, editors make an author’s work look better (in theory, anyway) but an author has to create the work and build up the pyramid on their own before an editor can put that final pointed piece on top. So let’s not kid ourselves here and let’s never say that editors make the books. The book needs to exist first and that lies squarely with the author.
The third full edit of ES is officially done. I was right. The major hurdle of rewriting the beginning was done before I took the multi-month break, although my dumb ass broke in the middle of a chapter. Fun times trying to get back into that one. Of course, I make all edits by hand so now I have to actually type everything in to see where I stand with my word count. I’m really hoping it’s not under 50,000. I was able to whittle down the chapters from 26 to 23. Not that that means anything for word count but I did a lot of consolidating and eliminating of unnecessary wordage. The story as a whole is a little less snarky, serious when it needs to be serious. The tone is definitely more natural.
I don’t know if this makes me weird but I love noticing my own comfort phrases. I’m sure all writers have them. I tend to use “out of the corner of his eye,” “looked up,” “choked on his heart” (or a variation of it) and a few others quite a bit. Had to strike a lot of those. I love noticing those because it means I’m not failing as a self-editor. Noticing my own redundancies is a good thing, I think.
I started to lull around the late teens, having bouts of “OMG THIS SUX!!!” but once I got to the end, I realized how much I liked it. I don’t know if that’s something I should be worried about or grateful for. I should like my own book although right now I’m about 10 seconds from setting the thing on fire because I’ve edited it so much. I can’t edit it anymore. I think, as writers, we need to put our foot down on our own full edits. If we don’t, it’ll get to a point where we’ve changed and mutilated so much of the original story that it’s not even the same beast anymore. Plus, I don’t think any writer would stop editing one work. They’d always find something wrong, something to change, so it gets to a point where we need to utilize our self-control and tell ourselves to stop. This third run was it. I’m not making any more major changes unless absolutely necessary (meaning like the story’s totally FUBAR if I don’t). Small stuff, spelling, a few word choices, things like that. The foot’s going down.
I’m not going to make the January 25th start date for Amazon’s contest. But I am hoping to finish the manuscript up this week and I will make the final February 5th deadline. Who needs sleep? I just need to pray to the writing gods that they don’t hit their 5,000 manuscript maximum before I can get my entry in. I’ll have no one to blame but my procrastinating self if I don’t get it in but I won’t be any less upset about it. I really want to enter this contest and I really want to start querying. The thought alone makes me want to throw up but it’s time. My manuscripts about to graduate and I need to set it free in the real world.
*sigh* They grow up so quickly.
No, not the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Contest. I’m optimistic, not crazy. Thanks to the lovely Amanda Plavich for the heads up, I’ve entered a contest at Nathan Bransford’s blog. It’s for a book but I was more interested in the writing aspect of the contest. To enter you needed to write a diary entry or a letter from the point of view of a teenager (as the book being given away is written in that format). So I cooked something up and posted it for my entry. Apparently I channeled my inner emo. Here it is -
i
i
omg whatd i do
he just wouldnt stop yelling
i told him to stop yelling
372372372372372372372
i didnt need the combination
it was already open
his locker stunk
like him
he
he took her from me
he knew i liked her
she liked me
howd he get her
it was so easy
there was red everywhere
in my eyes
twerp was little enough
he fit right in
he cant have her
he has 372372372372372372372
did i wipe the corner
SHIT
maybe no onell notice
but she will
she notices everything
everything
wtf did i do
its all red
everythings red
she notices everything
SHIT
I never thought I’d hear myself say that.
I was at Barnes and Noble tonight spending the $50 gift card that was burning a hole in my pocket and, for the first time ever, I was actually recoiling from all the vampire stuff that was on the shelves.
Don’t get me wrong. I love me my vampires. My older school vampires. Interview with the Vampire. The Lost Boys. Near Dark. Anything manufactured prior to 2005. But this whole string of vampires in high school is just leaving a bad taste in my mouth. Oh yeah, I totally get the appeal for teenage girls. Absolutely no denying that. But at the end of the day, do vampires have nothing better to do with their immortality than go to high school and hit on jailbait? Really?
Not to mention the lot of them are just simpering pussies. While I highly doubt they’d be able to blend in with society if they went feral at the sound of the lunch bell, they’re just so mopey and blah and BORING that they’re kind of spitting on everything a vampire traditionally is.
One book I read fairly recently (more like 3 in one, actually) was Vampire Beach. I have never been so bored with vampires in my life. Of course the vamps are the hot, talented, unattainable high school crowd that everyone wants to be a part of but instead of being real vampires, they’re humanitarians and in order to feed, they throw parties. When they bite someone, it’s equivalent to dropping Ecstasy, apparently, and no pain ever comes to the victim. Where’s the fun in that? Not to mention their lives are just downright dull. They lay on the beach (yeah, they can go in the sun, according to them, they’ve adapted), surf and throw parties. Snore. I was hoping someone would go feral at lunch at that point. When one of them did (just not at lunch), it was over so quickly and painlessly it gave me the worst case of blue book balls since Breaking Dawn. Downer.
If I don’t read another vampire book for a while I’ll be quite content. I’ll probably wait until the shelves at the book store aren’t inundated with sappy high school vampires before I pick up another one. Although I do have one old school LJ Smith book in my TBR that I can see. And then 3 “vampire survival guide” type of books which I don’t fit into that category. Other than that, I’m branching out. I need a detox.
