Category: Writing

Progress Report on Hawk, or, Kids, Don’t Try This at Home

I’ve been doing exactly what you’re not supposed to do: going back and reworking things before getting to the end.  But it’s okay, I’m a trained professional.

Seriously.  Remember that scythe I was talking about before?  Well, I went and pulled it out and hacked the first two chapters to pieces and put them back together more powerful than I could imagine.  Since then, things have been falling into place nicely, though it’s sometimes taken a bit of teeth gnashing.  Now I have less than half the book done again, but I’m feeling worlds better about what I have. There’s a structure I like, and it’s tasting good.  I am cautiously optimistic.

“Boss, What’s going on?”
“Where are you?”
“Half a mile up on an updraft, almost over the Ocean-sea.  What’s–”
“Stay there for a bit.”
“Boss–”
“Just for a bit.”
I looked around the area again, carefully.  I moved around just enough to make sure the spindly trees and weeds weren’t concealing anyone.
“What’s going on, Boss?”
“A fluffy kitten tea party.”
“Boss–”
“Just wait.”

All Right, Yeah, I’m a Conservative

I really am.  Those who know me well already know that, but for the rest of you, let me explain.

There is what one believes, and then there are one’s natural inclinations.  And all of my inclinations are suspicious of change. Not against change; suspicious of it.  I scowl when new words are coined, and demand that they justify themselves.  In music, I grimace and tap my foot impatiently at drum machines and atonality.

In Texas Hold ’em, I still call the fourth community card “fourth street” and the fifth one “fifth street” instead of “the turn” and the “the river” respectively. Why? Because I do, that’s why.

In politics, yeah, I’m a Red, but I’m an old-school Red: an orthodox Trotskyist, a traditional Marxist. I believe that the proletariat is the revolutionary class, that the falling rate of profit causes market crashes, that history is best understood as the struggle to wrest human wants from nature, that the materialist dialectic is the best general explanation we have for matter in motion, and that explanations for social phenomena that don’t start with the class struggle are liable to be vacuous. I disliked the New Left when it was New; and I still dislike it now that it’s no longer Left.  Post-modernism and identity politics I find easy to hate, because both my inclination and my reasoned beliefs line up (as opposed to language and music, where, really, I wish I were more comfortable with change).

And in fiction, I am quite fine with both reading and telling stories. I feel like all fiction ought be stories. I do not believe that; I believe that there is room  for all sorts of experimenting and wild, weird stuff. But what I want are stories. I want to write them and then see them published in books.  You know, the kind people hold, and turn the pages, and read? And I want them sold in book stores where people browse; and I want them in libraries where people can pull them off the shelves and consider checking them out; and I want them in used book stores where people who can’t afford new books can try new authors without going broke.

I approve of the new stuff, of e-books, of certain alternate publishing strategies. I think, long-term, they will probably have a positive effect on the quality of stories; but I’m not comfortable with them.

Because, at heart, however much I wish I weren’t, I’m a conservative.

 

Update on Hawk

Had a good day yesterday, and I’m pretty sure the rough draft is past the halfway mark now. If my pattern remains true, things should pick up from here on.  On the other hand, this book is still being very weird–demanding I plan out certain levels of detail that I normally leave to revision–so we’ll see.

And speaking of revisions, oh my god this one is going to require them.  Like I said before, I’ll be using a scythe. That’s another odd thing: in the past, the degree of revision I needed has been inversely proportional to how much planning I did for the first draft; this time it seems they’re both going to be unusually long processes.

That said, with luck, I’m on my way.

 

An Open Letter To My Editor

Dear Editor:

It has now been over an hour since I sent my [email/query/story submission/250 thousand word novel] and I have heard nothing. Nothing. I now understand Lee’s frustration at Gettysburg when Stuart didn’t show up.  Has there been a fire? Has someone died? If so, I’d think you could at least drop me a note explaining the delay. It is almost as if there are things you do that don’t involve me. In fact, I could almost believe that I am not the most important person in the world to you. No, I don’t accuse you of that; but can you see how you might be giving that impression?

Have you considered what would happen if everyone behaved the way you are? I would have to learn deferred gratification. And, as you know, deferred gratification is a slippery slope that can lead to me not getting everything I want.

Now that I’ve explained, I trust the reply will be instantly forthcoming.

Sincerely Yours,

Joe “Center of the Universe” Writer