Days of Spontaneity

From the Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition:

spontaneity /ˌspɒntəˈniːɪtɪ; -ˈneɪ-/ noun (pl) -ties

1. the state or quality of being spontaneous

2. (often pl) the exhibiting of actions, impulses, or behaviour that are stimulated by internal processes

I am not spontaneous by nature; my usual creative method is to think/research/plan/test/check/recheck and only then do. I don't think it's a bad thing; I tend to get lots accomplished and nearly always finish what I start. For example, I generally plan, write and schedule for publication all the posts for PBW two weeks in advance. That gives me a forever floating fourteen days to add/change/delete things, and it keeps the blog automatically updating every day if/when I'm offline working.

It's not always a positive, however, The past few months I've been so busy with building my client list that I've been neglecting to adhere to my two week advanced posting method, which is why there were no posts when I went off to write last week. I suddenly ran out of pre-written posts, didn't have time to restock my post inventory and couldn't think of anything in the short time I had to work on the blog. My lack of spontaneity suddenly became more of a hindrance than a help.

Since I want to change that (and I still don't have time to restock) this week I'm going to write my non-feature posts the day before I post them, with no advance planning, and see if I can be a bit more spontaneous with my content.

Here's what a planner I am: as I was writing this post I opened another window so I could search for articles to read on how to be more spontaneous. About two-thirds of what I found before I realized what I was doing related to sex, and while I love you all that's simply not helpful in a blogging situation. Being addicted to research is an occupational hazard as well, but I think I've programmed myself to research anything I'm not sure of because I'm self-educated. I've read enough about artistic writers to know that to be more spontaneous you have to set aside your fears, forget about planning and organizing, and try new things. So for the next few days PBW will be my hub of spontaneity, and we'll see how I do.

To kick things off, let's talk about books. I just finished Consumed by Fire by Anne Stuart, which was an interesting American spin-off of her popular Ice series. I'll have to go back and try to read the last Ice book that was released as a Kindle-only e-book, as I never finished that one due to the pre-surgery eye problems. My next book is a re-read of Derelict by L.J. Cohen, as the sequel, Ithaka Rising, is coming out next week, and I am planning to write a revisited reads post about it because I can't not plan everything.

I've been very restless with my reading this summer, and currently bouncing all over the place with what I'm buying. The owner of the indy bookstore I frequent recommended one of her book club titles, The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared by Swedish author Jonas Jonasson, so I grabbed a copy of that. I have one more Jack Reacher to read and then as it's never going anywhere but in cookie cutter circles I think I'm done with that series. Because I'm missing Europe I invested in Bella Tuscany by Frances Mayes and new copies of all the Peter Mayle books someone borrowed from me and never returned, may a million silverfish infest their library. And finally, I bought a remaindered novel titled Happily Ever After about a housewife/single parent who secretly writes erotica and meets a hunky stranger in Target because of how it absolutely shrieks realism. Kidding. I bought it because I'm apparently a masochist.

So what are you reading, and why? Let us know in comments.

Story Prompt Cards

I never run short of story ideas, but for writing prompts I usually depend on music, poetry, art or anything random to strike me and start the gears turning. My habit is to wait for it to come to me, and I've always viewed this as a necessary evil, as my interest needs to be seriously engaged by concept before I dive in to investing my writing in it.

To change my habits and step outside my comfort zone, I decide to challenge myself to write some short stories based on a preset collection of prompts. I still wanted a random element involved (mainly to prevent myself from deliberately or subconsciously picking out easy or story-sympathetic prompts), so for that I went to my jar of fortune cookie fortunes -- yes, I save every one I get -- and pulled out twenty slips at random.

To prevent misplacing or losing my 2011 theme fortune, I made it into an artist trading card, something I'm using as my annual art project for this year (more on that at the photoblog here.) I decided to do the same thing with these fortunes and make them into an ATC series. I've named the cards my story prompt deck, and my goal is to pick at least one card at random every month and use it to inspire a short piece of fiction.

It's good writing practice; it's definitely different for me and I'm hoping to get at least one novel idea out of the exercise. The real creative room is in the interpretation of the prompt while (hopefully) remaining faithful to it. I'm not giving myself any limits on length, genre or time period -- during my busy months, I may only be able to write a couple hundred words -- but I do want to tell a complete story for each prompt.

Some of the fortunes are a bit odd, and I don't agree with a couple of them, so I've also given myself permission to flip, twist, and otherwise put my own spin on them. Such as the Fearless courage is the foundation of victory card; I don't buy that at all. The truly fearless don't need courage; they operate on self-assurance, certainty, narcissism or whatever drives their confidence. In my experience the courageous are generally terrified souls, but somehow endure it, plow through it and persist in spite of it. Courage doesn't even exist until you acknowledge that the odds are against you and no matter what you do you're probably going to fail. Fearless people are by their nature incapable of feeling anything like that. When I pull this card I have no doubt I'll write a story that turns it on its head.

If you'd like to create a deck of your own story prompt cards, you don't have to eat Chinese take-out from now until March. Try clipping interesting words and phrases from magazines, newspapers or other printed materials, or gathering some interesting images (faces, objects, landscapes or any other story element would work well.) Write or print out some lyrics to your favorite poems or songs and snip some lines from them, or feed them to Wordle and see what pops up in the cloud. If you'd like less obvious prompting, collect some paint chip cards from your local home improvement store, pick a color at random and use the color name or the color itself in some way in your story.




Related links:

Big Huge Lab's photo trading card generator can help you design and print out some very cool-looking cards.

Creative Writing Prompts.com has 346 story prompts here to help spark ideas; hover your cursor over each number to read them.

Seventh Sanctum has an entire page of writing generators here that range from silly to seriously neat.

Symbols & Words

One way to exercise your imagination and come up with some new story ideas is to use online generators that provide you with random prompts. The latest I've found, The Creative Idea Generator, is very simple and quite fun to use. You click on a word, image or surprise button to produce words and symbols, then move and rearrange them to create different pairings, idea clouds, plot circles, etc. It's almost like making your own story road signs, which is great for sparking ideas.

Here's a screenshot of my first test drive:



I paired the symbols with the words at random and then rearranged a few as ideas started forming. The downstairs symbol + "contract" made me at once think of someone who sells their soul to Satan (this is probably because I just reread The Grimrose Path by Rob Thurman) but I also got a very strong image of a nice cleaning lady character who doesn't just clean up corporate offices.

Other random story ideas I had: Where do you keep an important hostage? On a boat. A plague that turns 99% of the population into sleepwalkers who act out their dreams. When the ski lift fails, all that saves you is your scarf. A bug that either contaminates the world's petroleum supply, or renders it obsolete. An alien blade so beautiful that to look at it blinds you (the blade made of light has already been done.) A murder mystery where a writer kills everyone who violates his copyright -- or maybe an editor or someone tries to kill him over an inconvenient copyright. Fish and chips, I need to eat dinner (and I did have fish and chips last night, so it even inspired a meal.)

This generator is especially useful because we all interpret images and words differently, thus no two people are going to get the exact same ideas from it. I like the simplicity, too; it prods your imagination without overwhelming you with a lot of data.

Link nicked from Gerard at The Generator Blog.

Might Haves

I saw this graffiti today while walking the streets of an old city:



Since it's a quotation from a writer this made me very happy. I also let it percolate in my head all afternoon, and eventually distilled it to this: It's never too late to write what you might have been writing.

It's easy to get discouraged and give up on a story that you think you can't write, or you're convinced you can't sell, or for whatever reason just scares the bejesus out of you. The vision is there, the story is waiting, and suddenly your spine turns into pudding.

I think most of the stories we don't write turn into vague regrets, but a few become ghosts that follow us and haunt us. I try to write mine into short stories whenever I can, just to exorcise the little demons, but there are a couple that won't work as anything but novel-length works. With my schedule I already have to be very selective about what I write; I can't afford to waste my energy on a project that worries me more than it excites me (and even as I write that, I feel like I'm making excuses. If I really wanted to, I could make the time.)

I'd say of all the might-have-written novels in my head, there are four that someday I would like to get over my fear and get them down on the page. Even if the only person who ever reads them is me. I don't know if I'm ready to say I'm planning to write them; maybe they need to haunt me a bit more.

How do you handle your might-have-written stories? Let us know in comments.

Hunting Metaphors

I went with my guy and the kid to a flea market this past weekend, but the allure of cheap plastic clogs, temporary tattoos and cardboard bins of slightly dusty, almost-designer handbags couldn't compete with all the stuff waiting beyond in the fields behind the warehouses. I left my loved ones nibbling on boiled peanuts and headed for the really gritty outdoor section.

There's about an acre of everything you've ever seen set out at a garage sale, donated to a thrift store or abandoned to quietly rust in a field, multiplied by dozens, even hundreds. While I always love getting the perfect beautiful shot, I'm also drawn to things that are not so perfect; things left behind, things that were forgotten, and other debris piles from the past.

This is the kind of place where my camera and I mine for descriptions, by taking shots of interesting/ugly objects to study later, but this time I hit a metaphoric goldmine. Everywhere I looked I saw something that defined something else for me, so much so that I took out the notepad in my purse and started taking notes.

Here are a few of the snapshots, and what they made me think (to find out what that was, place your cursor over the image. To see a larger version, click on the image):



I spent a lot of time photographing the glassware tables. On this one everything felt brittle, crowded, transparent, uncomfortable, as if one wrong move would sending everything crashing. Everything here wants to see and be seen. Glassy expressions, gaping mouths, dangerous proximities, but nothing real or especially attractive.



Also lots of rusty things to be admired. This conglomeration of old bikes probably hasn't been moved in years. They've been left all jammed together, but when you look at each one it's as if they are wheedling you to give them another chance: "Come on, I still work. Buy me. Rescue me. Take me for a ride again."



I don't know their name, but these are such shy flowers, too bashful to even raise their blooms. I remember all the years I felt like this -- like if I kept my head down and said nothing, I wouldn't get stomped. And yeah, that actually doesn't work. If you listen you can almost hear them whisper, "Nothing to see here, lady, just move along." Still lovely, though, and wistful.



This is back inside, but when I looked up and saw the sunlight sparkling through this curtain of crystal I had to get the shot. Each gem threw its own rainbows and glitter at my head. All the shapes and colors -- how could you choose to take just one? Their dazzle makes you into a greedy kid. You want them all.

The lovely thing about hunting and collecting visual metaphors are the many ways you can use them; they don't have to be assigned a single meaning. The hanging crystals are definitely going in the story I'm working on now; they'll serve very well as part of a characterization. I like the rusty bikes, too, and I think I know just how to use them to illustrate a chunk of backstory.

Keeping a photographic metaphor journal can be a fun way to collect your visual trophies. If you're not into taking your own photographs, look for images online you can print out or cut out from magazines. If you don't want to keep a paper journal, put together a video or slideshow (everyone does music playlists for their stories, why not a video playlist?)

If you'd like to see more examples, I uploaded the best of my shots from this day and made a Visual Metaphors online photo album here.

Reinventing the Bookmark Idea #1

As you may recall, back in May I set a challenge for myself to come up with a new design for the standard bookmark. My objectives were to cook up an eye-catching design that would be easy to use and fun as well as functional. I also wanted a bookmark that wouldn't slip or fall out of place when the book was moved.

My first idea came along as I was sitting on the porch one morning watching Cole chase his tail. He likes to bite onto it and turn in a circle while holding his tail in his mouth; at the time I was thinking I really should have named him Ouroboros. That's when inspiration hit: what if I could design a bookmark that held its place by biting some part of the book -- or itself?

I sketched a bit, and initially came up with this design(click on any of the following images to see larger versions.) As for naming it, I thought of the Tale Holder or the TaleMark, but decided to go with The BiteMark as it was funnier.



The body of the BiteMark (here shown in the same dimensions as any standard bookmark) goes in the book. The head of the BiteMark sits above the top edge of the book, taking the place of the traditional tassel, which I moved to the bottom to serve as a "tail." By using a simple clip mechanism on which the head is mounted, the reader can secure the BiteMark in place by having the head bite the tail. Since the tail is long this makes it easily adjustable.

This is a paper mockup of what one would look like:



Here's what it looks like marking my place in Marjorie M. Liu's The Fire King:



Once I had put it all together I didn't much care for the clipboard look it has, so I think the body of the bookmark needs to be shaped differently. Also, one technical difficulty: the yarn I used for the tail was actually hard to put into the clip mechanism; there needs to be something more you can hold onto at the base of the tail to easily tuck it into the clip. I don't think beads are the answer, but a small trinket or shaped tab attached to the tail would work. I'm going to work on a couple versions of the design and fabricate them in cloth, pics of which I'll post here when I've got them finished.

This idea has instant novelty appeal for the children's market, but I think it also can be customized for books with a particular theme or icon. A book about pirates could feature a pirate's head and a tail with a little sword or blade tab he could hold between his teeth. The BiteMark doesn't even have to go with a head as the top component; you could use anything that holds whatever is attached to the bottom tassel (for example, if you wanted a Harry Potter-themed bookmark, you could do his owl and a message; for Star Wars you could do Darth Vader's gauntlet and his light saber.)

So what do you guys think of my first attempt to reinvent the bookmark?

28th of Snowfall, Year of the Vulture

The Fantasy World News Network is an automated generator that uses word replacements to transform our planet's news into headlines from a mirror-universe world, where things like the month of January are called Snowfall and personal computers become valesylvers. The host site also has another headline generator that does the same thing with a SF spin here.

Making up newspaper headlines is fun, and good practice for learning how to condense ideas and make them attractive (like a story premise you might mention in a query letter, or a tagline for your upcoming release.) The trick of writing a great headline is to offer just enough information and provocation to make the reader want to keep reading:

Improve Your Love Life and Lose Weight (Have That Secret Baby!)

The Scroll That Makes You Immortal -- Or Dead -- in 3 Days

Mayan Miscalculation Means New Date for Apocalypse: Tomorrow

If you want to use headlines as a way to create a non-traditional outline of your story, write up one for each scene or chapter that provides a quick overview or general idea of what happens in them, i.e.:

Faceless Vampire First Kidnaps Then Infects World's Fastest Surgeon

Socialite Slashed by Ghost While Sleeping, Spell Breaker to Investigate

First Day of School, Worst Day of Life

Headline-writing is also a great way to explore the unfamiliar territory of copy-writing, which sometimes authors are called upon to proof for their back covers. When you've got space for only a couple of paragraphs, being able to relate your story in a brief but alluring way is a handy skill, especially when the copy you get is less than stellar.

The other great thing about headlines is that they're kind of like writing haiku -- the more often you write them, the better you get. While I was putting together this post and making up headline examples, a tagline I've been trying to think up in more conventional ways finally popped in my head:

It's After Midnight -- Are You Ready to Ride?

Now it's your turn: what would be a fun headline for what you're working on right now? Let us know in comments.

Related links:

Copyblogger has a post here that defines the different types of headlines and why they hook a reader's attention.

Melissa Donovan's Writing Exercises for Titles and Headlines explains how to write them and gives you some exercises for practice.

Failed at Installation

My guy has a little control board sitting in a box on his work bench. Not an unusual thing; on the equipment he works on these boards are pretty common now. When one burns up or fails, he has to swap them out. It must be under warranty, too, because the board's box has a big yellow Return Information label on the top.

It's the label, not the board, that keeps distracting me. It has a check-off list of seven reasons for the return:

Failed at installation
Failed after storm
Changed board during troubleshooting
No defrost
Too many defrosts
Incomplete defrosts
High utility bills

I wish we writers could return ideas to the muse that way. The checklist wouldn't even have to change that much:

Failed at installation: I never got past page one. Oh, look, cookies.

Failed after temper tantrum: Oops, I just accidentally on purpose killed off all the characters. Next story!

Changed during troubleshooting: While I was editing this I got this idea. It's way better than this one. So I'm going to write that.

No writing: Love the idea, have no clue how to write it. And I'll probably talk about it forever but not one word is actually going to hit the page.

Too much writing: The manuscript is two thousand pages long and that's just chapter one. Do you think I should get trim down the thousand-year war of the orcs and the dragons? Maybe cut it to five hundred?

Incomplete writing: I got to the third chapter and then gave up. Which publisher accepts partials again?

High utility bills: I can't write this, I have to do stuff for my day job before I get fired and they turn off my power again.

Although I hate beginnings, I have no problem starting novels, and I'm also fairly adept at getting through the middles and wrapping up the endings. My biggest problem in the past was never finishing anything. I'd start approaching the end of the story, my energy and enthusiasm would begin to lag and I'd get bored with it.

Boredom sets up a writer to be easily distracted, and more tempted to set aside the WIP to do something else. I used to start sneaking away from the manuscript to work on other stories, and then found myself growing more resentful every time I went back to the old story, until I gave up on it. It's the classic oooh bright and shiny new idea syndrome combined with poor time management. I always put keeping my energy levels high as a priority over finishing my stories -- which is why there are about ten boxes of unfinished manuscripts in my storage closet.

You can't sell 2/3rds of a novel, and that was what motivated me to deal with my problem. I knew I was fighting myself, not the work, so my habits had to change. I made a new rule: never start anything unless I was going to finish it. That spurred me to be a lot more selective about ideas. I also started quickly outlining the new ideas that came along to distract me and then set them aside versus working on them.

I still felt the same dip in energy at the 2/3rd done mark, and a deep sense of resentment over never having enough time to write everything I wanted, so to address that I focused on training myself to write faster. I also forced myself to write through the tiresome, boring draggy final third of the story. As the finished manuscripts began piling up, I saw a gradual change in my attitude. The rush from a new idea began to pale beside the weary satisfaction of having nailed a story from start to finish. I also felt more like a writer, too -- I wasn't just having fun anymore; I was making a real effort. I wasn't playing or dabbling, I was working.

I don't consider any writing to be a failure; you can learn from your mistakes as well as your successes. Occasionally taking a hard look at all your unfinished or unsuccessful ideas and stories to evaluate them for their flaws will arm you with knowledge. You'll identify your weaknesses, and may even bring to light a pattern in your writing process or story habits that is proving counterproductive.

So if you could add something to the muse return information list for a story that didn't work for you, what would be the reason?

Runaway Trains Part II

Yesterday I talked about the three types of new story ideas that regularly bedevil me; today I'd like to tell you how I calmly and intelligently sort through new ideas, neatly categorize them and only use those that result in bestselling novels. And as soon as I figure out how to do all that, I'm sure I will.

New story ideas are the Viagra of writing; they make you feel like you can nail anything. Inevitably the feeling wears off and you're stuck with a lot of work you don't think you can do. Back when I was a youngster I had a million ideas, and whenever a new one hit me I'd drop everything and work on it. Until I had to stop and do a story for another, better new idea. And just as that one grew tiresome, yet another would whisk me away.

After building a depressing collection of a hundred or so story fragments and partial novels, I knew I had to stop idea-hopping or I'd never finish anything. So I made the vow: I will finish everything I write, and not start anything new until the story is complete. Only my new story ideas didn't go away; they began gathering and organizing and ambushing me. Soon every time I started writing I'd get hit by a barrage of new/better ideas.

Eventually I crumbled, stopped writing the story I was working on, and opened a new file. But by that time my vow had forced me into the habit of plotting and outlining my ideas before I started writing them. I decided to do the same thing with the new idea, only I didn't plot out an entire story. Instead I wrote a brief outline of just the idea itself.

I still felt torn; it's hard to resist something that bright/shiny/new. But: outlining the new idea preserved it, and dispelled my anxiety over losing it to the abyss of Stories Forgotten. That allowed me to return my focus to my current project. There was another side effect, one that didn't become apparent right away: over time the idea I put aside got better.

To illustrate, here is one of my more recent new story ideas: to inherit millions, you have to spend a week in a haunted house. It was such a dinky, run-of-the-mill idea that I ignored it, until two young female voices popped into my head. They wanted to chat about it. And they wanted me to listen. While I was trying to update my business ledger.

Their names were Lucy-Something and Something-Taylor. They were also bestest friends, the sort who honestly believe they are, which made me think if I wrote them I'd have to kill off one of them like immediately. This evil thought did not discourage them or the images that began flashing around them: a reading of a will, a decaying, haunted chateau, and a rather delicious-looking veggie pita.

I think it was the chateau that did me in. Or maybe the pita. Anyway, I put aside the ledger, pulled out a plotting template and addressed my twin mosquitoes: All right, you two. You've got ten minutes. What?

It's like being a reporter live on scene, only you don't have to wear makeup, pantyhose or helmet hair. They started over while I listened and jotted down everything on the page (see my lousy handwriting on the left here.) And sure enough, when the ten minutes were up I had a decent one-page outline, a list of ideas and questions to jog my memory when I read it again, and a couple of potential directions in which to take it. I gave it a temp title (The Inheritance) and filed it away in my idea folder, and then I caved in a bit more and wrote out a couple pages of dialogue (the unaltered rough draft of which you can read here.) Lucy and her pal finally shut up, and I went back to crunching my numbers.

Flash forward a couple months to this week. I was talking with a friend about NaNoWriMo and and how I wanted to do something new and completely different this year. The friend (who is used to these conversations) asked what I haven't done yet, and with Halloween already on my mind I said a haunted house story. I love really good haunted house books, the twistier the better. Since I don't personally believe in most of that stuff, writing my own so that it was plausible enough for me while giving it a completely new spin would also be extremely tough, aka a true writing challenge.

I rambled on with some bits and pieces of haunted house/ghost story ideas I've had floating around in my head forever, and she (patiently) listened and gave me feedback. By the time the conversation ended I had worked out what I wanted, just not the who or the why. Also among those bits and pieces were Lucy-Something and Something-Taylor, who I'd thought of occasionally since outlining their idea. They'd had a few months to percolate a bit, so they had more to say to me this time around. A lot more.

All the free-floating stuff in my head began to fall into place to build a haunted chateau. While I made the salad for dinner (and made a note to buy more pitas) I was also building a story outline of my dinky mosquito idea, which now seemed much bigger and faster and scarier. Later I pulled my old outline and the dialogue pages from the idea file, shuffled the story concept around a bit until I began to see the who and the why of it. A train whistle went off, and then it arrived: a big, wonderful who; a dazzler of a why.

If I had started writing the idea back when it first hit me, I probably would have turned out a nice little short story. Dinky, run-of-the-mill, nothing special. Time, thought and serendipity had turned my buzzing little annoyance into a huge steaming iron horse of a story, one I think is going to make a terrific novel.

Related Links (freeware caution: always scan free downloads of anything for bugs and other threats before dumping the programs into your hard drive):

Holly Lisle's Notecarding: Plotting Under Pressure

PBW's Ten Point Plotting Template and Single Novel Plotting Template (link corrected)

Alicia Rasley's Outline Your Novel in Thirty Minutes

Text Block Writer is "a virtual index card program for writers. It can be used to organize research papers, articles, fiction, non-fiction, books and whatever related to writing. It is intended for people like me who use paper index cards to write all the notes and pieces of an essay, and then arrange the pieces and then use that to type them into the computer. With this program, you can type in the notes and arrange them on the computer, and then export them to an rtf document (that can be opened in word, open office, or just about any other word processor)" (OS: Windows; designer notes "This program requires version 2.0 of the .NET framework.")

Image credit: © Christian Lagereek. Fahraeus | Dreamstime.com

Runaway Trains Part I

I've always thought new story ideas belong in three categories: ravenous mosquito, rose bouquet and runaway train.

Unfortunately the ideas I get most frequently are of the ravenous mosquito variety. Like the insect, this sort of idea is annoying, and there's not much to it, but it's hungry and persistent. This is why it circles your head and distracts you until you feel like swatting yourself with a baseball bat. Mine are forever whining What if...? The only good thing about them is that if you don't feed them anything eventually they do buzz off.

Rose bouquet ideas are much more substantial, and they show up on your mental doorstep like a polite gift from the muse. They're lovely and lyrical, and not pushy at all. Whether you accept them or not, they make you feel appreciated and loved. If you have to set them aside, they're also quite willing to bloom in silence until you're ready to admire and arrange them. Many of my old romances were rose bouquet ideas, and if you plant them regularly they eventually become a garden that is always sprouting new varieties (frankly I never get enough of these.)

Then there are the runaway train ideas. Nothing else is as huge and powerful as these monsters. When they show up, everything else stops. They are often packed with tons of story elements and info, and they are driven by an engine that sounds like it will go forever. When they hit you, they can wreck you for any other story, but if you decide to jump on and go along for the ride, the rush can be incredible.

No matter what sort of new story ideas you have, finding a method of dealing with them is important. Ideas are great, but they can also become such a frequent nuisance that you're never able to finish writing any stories. When you have to commit to a writing schedule (pros are forever under a deadline) it's especially imperative, because new ideas can actually interfere with and even derail your contracted work.

This is where I ran into some problems, because the weird thing about any type of story idea is that I never know how important it is or where it will take me. I've had runaway train ideas that dragged me off to go nowhere fast, and ravenous mosquito ideas that grew into big beautiful stories that seemed quite willing to write themselves. I always thought that after I wrote enough books I'd be able to predict in advance which ideas will work and avoid the ones that won't, but that hasn't happened yet. This also is why I'm also reluctant to banish anything to the void.

Up tomorrow: How I manage story ideas that allow them to develop and grow while I stay sane and on schedule, and what happens when a mosquito idea grows to be the size of a train.

Image credit: © Christian Lagereek. Fahraeus | Dreamstime.com

Hands-On Writer Tools

I often see inspirational and how-to writers' kits at the book store, and occasionally I'll pick up one to play with and see if it does anything for me. Most are good for sparking an idea here and there but rarely go the distance.

My latest acquisition is The Writer's Toolbox by Jamie Cat Callan, published by Chronicle Books. At $24.95 list price it's a bit expensive, but B&N.com has it new for $19.98 and used for less than ten bucks. One thing I did like was seeing a photo of the box's contents on the back, which I find reassuring (I don't like buying a kit that I can't open to see what's inside, and like most kits this one is shrink-wrapped to protect the contents.)

Roughly about the same size as a cigar box, The Writer's Toolbox was nicely packed with a variety of interesting stuff. There's a slim book that explains how to use all the components with various writing games and exercises, a deck of Sixth Sense Cards, four different story element wheels, three sets of Popsicle sticks with different phrases printed on them, and a mini hourglass (just like those old-fashioned three-minute egg timers our Moms used to use before digital everything.)

I skimmed through the book, which had a lot of narrative about writing, some very brief instructions on how to use the kit via various games and exercises, and example stories that had been written using the kit. Being more of a card person, I personally tried out the game for the Sixth-Sense cards (and a quick user tip -- don't discard the strip of paper bound around the cards because when you put them back loose and then try again to get them out of the box's niche they all don't want to come out.)

The game is to shuffle the cards, select three and place them face-down, then turn over the first card and write for three minutes. My first card read: your mother's pearls and here's what I wrote in three minutes (all of my examples are the first drafts, so don't expect perfection):

I kept a polite face on as my father introduced me to Darla, his personal assistant. She had seven feet of legs and one inch of forehead, the latter probably being slowly crushed by the lacquered weight of her Dolly Parton hair.

I listened to her breathy small talk for as long as it took me to study her pinched-waisted fuchsia jacket, the breast augmentations testing the elasticity of the white polyester shell beneath, and the matched pink perfection of her necklace. Then I excused me and my father, steered the old man into his office and shut the door on Darla's .

"Dad," I said, mostly through my teeth, "Why is your bimbo wearing my mother's pearls?"

The game continued with turning over the second card, which read orange spray paint, which reminded me of some real life experiences. Here's the bit of nonfic I wrote in three minutes:

The last time I saw orange spray paint was in L.A., along with blue spray paint, black, white, green, and every other color of the rainbow. In some neighborhoods you couldn't see a building that hadn't been tagged by some kid with a can and too much time on his hands at three a.m. on a school night.

Every so often we'd get a call to a scene of an apparent jumper, only to hear later from the police that the victim was a tagger who had slipped off whatever bridge, building or billboard he was adorning with his handle. Falling to your death, now, that's suffering for your art.

And finally, the third card to be turned over read: the sound of the dishwasher, and the final three-minute round. This time I tried writing a quick poem:

The dishwasher is much faster
he tells me again
what he means is it's safer
and won't cause me pain.
I've handwashed our dishes since '92
since the day we got married
it's one small thing I could do
not a burden I carried.

You load it like this
he says as he shows
how much room that it has
and where everything goes.
What he means is it's faster
it won't drop things or bleed
nothing for it to master
it just does what we need.

I stand back and watch him
as he turns the dial
and wait for the hum
with a plastered-on smile.
There's the sound of a wheeze
and then nothing comes from it.
He finds the motor has seized
because I've never used it.

The game was a lot of fun, especially using the timer and trying different forms for each card. As a writer I don't need a lot of explanation or examples; I'd rather get right to the games and exercises. But for a beginning writer, or someone who is dealing with major writer's block, this kit might just be a perfect fit.

Must Love Books

Most of my real life friends are not huge readers. Those who did not read books at all before meeting me have been gently prodded by Yours Truly into reading at least one book a month (I make no apologies for dropping unsubtle hints and shoving books at them until they caved in; I consider it a sacred duty.)

I think the main problem is that I live in a rural area where there are no bookstores and only a couple of tiny libraries. Limited access to books = few readers. I keep a stock of extra copies of my favorite books so I can lend them out, but there are only so many unsuspecting visitors I can corner at any given time. This naturally drives me crazy.

I know I'm a pain in the ass about getting people to read, but my motives are not self-serving. I love books, and all I've ever wanted to do is share that love. From my perspective people who refuse to read are depriving themselves of one of the finest pleasures in life. I don't expect everyone to knock out five or ten books a week, or spend half their income at the bookstore, but surely there's time in any schedule to read one book a month.

Anyway, since I gave up LB&LI last year I've been giving some thought to starting a new weekly feature here at PBW this summer. I thought it would be fun to touch base once a week and talk about what we're reading, what books we're handing out to friends, upcoming titles we're impatient for, who has a new book being released and so forth -- your basic reader/writer/book fest. As an incentive I could do a weekly giveaway of some sort (a BookWish, signed copies of my stuff, the occasional big honking bag of new titles, etc.), but the main purpose is to shamelessly take advantage of my blog's popularity to get more people reading and talking about the books they love.

What do you guys think? Good idea, bad idea, other? Let me know in comments.

Strange Houses

My guy and I love to drive around different towns and look at houses. I'm always checking out the architecture, while he evaluates the property and the landscaping. Since both of us have worked in the past as house painters (there, another bit of professional trivia you didn't know about me) we always talk about the color choices and condition of the exterior paint. This is yet another way in which we're totally boring, but it's one of the few hobbies we share and we think it's fun, which is all that matters.

Since getting more into photography, I've been taking the camera along with me on these drives to snap shots of unusual houses. I especially like small houses versus the big ostentacious McMansions; people who live in little places tend to be less uptight and more creative in their choices. For example, I was fascinated by the long, narrow windows and green roof tiles on this little house (click on any image to see a larger version):



I have to do a little research and find out why those windows are so narrow (probably antiques, and had something to do with weather conditions and/or cost.) I liked seeing the two chairs set out by the flowering shrub, too -- they're facing west, so I'll guess whoever lives in this small charmer likes to come out and watch the sunset.

Here's another home in the same neighborhood:



I can't say the pea-green exterior color, blue roof tiles and the red brick chimney do anything for me, but there was a definitely a castle-type feel to this one. Very stately for a single-family home. I wonder if the owner feels a bit like the ruler of a small kingdom.

Occasionally we'll spot odd things people have on their doors, in their yards or do to things around their home that I also photograph. One of the weirdest I've seen was the very strange fruit of this front-yard tree:



I know in Alsace the makers of brandy put empty bottles on the buds of pear trees so the fruit grows into the bottle (then they pick the bottle and fill it with brandy, and the effect of seeing a whole pear in the bottle is pretty neat) but I'm mystified as to why you would stick wine bottles into the trunk of tree.

When you're creating living spaces for your characters, you're generally concerned about the interior, where most of the action probably happens. But don't forget about the outside of the home -- if someone were to drive by your protagonist's house, what would they see? Adding some personal details and quirks like color choices, architectural features and even something as strange as wine bottles stuck in a tree can give the reader another glimpse into the personality of your character.

Small details can be just as fun to play with as the larger features, too. I thought one of the creepier house shots I took for the photoblog last year had excellent story potential. While standing outside a tea room to read the posted menu, I noticed a trio of suspicious-looking characters hanging out in the corner of one front window:



These cheesy vandals have since relocated from the tea room into one of my novels, because the moment I saw them I knew they were something that my protagonist would paint on one of her window frames. I just didn't know until I saw the real thing.

The Three I's

I'm going to steal three keywords off the cover of one of my favorite magazines to illustrate today's post.

Inspiration



This is the cover of a blank journal (ISBN#9781593594930, published by Peter Pauper Press) with a detail from of one of Josephine Wall's paintings, The Spirit of Flight. It contains 192 ruled blank pages of acid-free/archival paper, and the binding lies flat when you open it. One of the prettiest blank books I've seen at the store.

I make most of my own journals, but every so often I'll pick up a ready-made that catches my eye. Beautiful cover art on a blank book may seem like a waste, but each time I see an image that inspires me, I usually need to write as soon as possible.

Ideas



One of my favorite magazines, Art Scene International, has wall-to-wall ideas for characters, settings, scenes, etc. in every issue, with art from some of the hottest young artists from around the globe. Finding this magazine for me was like discovering Frank Frazetta all over again.

Reading fiction these days I recognize a lot of characters and ideas modeled on celebrities and television. There's nothing wrong with this, but I'd like to see more writers stretch their imaginations in other directions. Magazines like Art Scene are great alternative idea wells.

Instruction



When I wanted to learn how to properly paint watercolors, I picked up an issue of Watercolor Artist to have a look-through and see if I could find any useful tips. While I will never get anywhere in the same solar system of ability that the contributors possess, I have learned a lot about technique as well as expression, meaning, reasons to paint and why people even bother with a medium that is so demanding, unpredictable and frustrating. I think the cover art of this issue pretty much answers that question (and also gives away where I stole the three keywords, too.)

Almost every writer I know does something creative that has no writing involved in it, such as painting, sewing, knitting, crafting, gardening, dancing, playing a musical instrument and so on. It's not a requirement that a writer have another creative hobby or sideline, but I think it helps. Maybe because writing is the only art that takes place inside the head where no one else can see it.

Inspiration, ideas and instruction should also be shared. In comments to this post name a source where you find one or more of the three i's (or if you're running low on all three, just toss your name in the hat) by midnight EST on Thursday, April 23, 2009. I'll draw one name at random from everyone who participates and send the winner the brand-new unused blank journal, both magazines, and a surprise. This giveaway is open to everyone on the planet, even if you've won something here at PBW in the past.

Spinning Away

Writers are like spiders, in that we are constantly producing and spinning and weaving our words into stories, something we hope will catch a reader or two and give us a reason to keep spinning.



The last couple of days I've been alternately nursing my daughter through the flu, trying to make this new proposal shine, and working on a quilt guild challenge. Add to that taking care of the puppy, the housework, and dealing with NY. If I'm not doing ten things at once I'm not happy, but this was not the time I needed a couple of characters with unfinished business to come and bug me.

So of course they did.



If you don't recognize them, they're Kyan and Melanie from Twilight Fall. They decided to pop into my head at three a.m. while I was giving the daughter her meds. They had this wonderful idea for me to go in and get on the computer and write about them until I toppled over from exhaustion. They do this because they're characters, they don't live in the real world, and they never have to get up at 6 a.m. to walk the pup, make breakfast, pack lunches and get everyone healthy up and off to work and school.

I might be able to get around to exploring more about these two later this year, but I've already committed myself to the Chrysalis project, and I have another print book to finish before I can even start that. Simply put, I would love to write more about Kyan and Mel, but I don't have time for them right now. It's not their turn and they have to wait.

I didn't force them out of my thoughts; that never works. Instead I outlined a few new notes, added that to their existing file, and mentally promised them they'd get their turn eventually. They followed me to bed but by then I was able to shove them back into my subconscious or whatever place characters go when we're not writing them and got a couple hours of sleep.

I like to finish what I start, and I think the characters who try to railroad me into writing in the middle of the night know this. What I know is if I jot down the important points of whatever new idea they bring to me, I purge that creative urgency that can be so disruptive (and, at times, actually harmful) to a writer's real life.



Like the spider's web, what we spin is beautiful to us, and those gleaming bright threads of new ideas can be very distracting. If we go running off in all directions to chase this thread or that, we don't really build anything, or we end up hopeless entangled in our own creativity. That's why it's important to me to finish what I start, so at the end of the day I have something to show for all this spinning I do.

How do you handle those characters with their bright, shiny, distracting ideas when they come for you in the middle of the night? Let us know in comments.

Falling cover art photo credit: Geo Martinez