The care and keeping of critique partners

Project: TFI

Looked at: Chapter 8-30

Starting word count: 80,886

Ending word count: 79,352

Gain/Loss: -1534

Biggest Problem: The most common mistakes were missing words. Little ones, like "of" and "she". (J.M. helped me find most of them, because my brain was fried at the time.)

Favorite line: He looked skeptical. "It sounds childish."
"Oh, it is," she grinned broadly.

Daily WTF: The entire letter from Aeronth to Jana, and the horrendous last chapter. Both have been fixed.

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This week was something. I haven't done an update on my editing progress in a while. J.M. has been a God send. Not only has she really helped to find the little things that my eyes skip over (but after looking at something for six years, it's bound to happen), she's also really put a fire under my ass to get this done.

I want to talk about the importance of having a partner.

First of all, it's important to have a writing partner that reminds you of a parent, in a good way. They need to be someone who is interested in what you're doing. If the other person is passionate about your work, not only will it help you, but it'll make the work fun for them. It will also give you much better feedback than someone who is so-so about your work. If they don't love it, they won't be able to help.

Second, your critique preferences should match. Make sure each of you know what the other is looking for. This isn't just about the depth of the crit, but also the timeframe for it. Some of us want to get feedback as soon as the same day, while others are happy with once a week, or even once every two weeks! Before committing to a partnership, make sure to discuss these things.

My third point goes back to the parent thing. A partner should be able to look at your work and say, "Okay, I really like this concept, but…" While we may think that all we want as writers is to hear how great everything is, it's immeasurably important that we get the negative things with it. Telling someone their work is perfect when it could use a serious overhaul is damaging to both of you. Not only does it give them a false sense, but it will eventually lead to mistrust. They will eventually see the flaws in their work, and doubt your ability to work on their novel.

Keep an open line of communication. Don't just talk about your novels. Talk about life, get to know each other if you don't already. Be friends with your writing partner. J.M. has been wonderful for this. I'm the type of writer that will see something that doesn't work and will have it revised in five minutes. She's been great about looking at something I sent out of the blue and giving her feedback on it.

You and your partner should complement each other. I'm not talking about back-patting and cigars here. I'm talking strengths and weaknesses in your writing. If you find your descriptions are bland but your dialog would make Elmore Leonard jealous, look for someone whose descriptions make you feel like you're watching a movie but whose dialog makes a first grader cringe. This is a little extreme, but you get the idea.

Honesty. If it sucks, your partner needs to be able to tell you. J.M. loved TFI. She loved it so much she couldn't sleep that night because she couldn't stop reading. She loved it so much she didn't want to stop reading it long enough to write the comment e-mails. She cancelled a doctor's appointment for it. Then she got to the end. And told me that when she got to the last chapter, it would have been thrown it across the room if it wasn't her desktop PC she'd be tossing. I love her for that.

Don't take it personally when someone trashes an aspect of your work, especially when they've enjoyed the rest of it. If all your partner does is point out that everything sucks, it may be time to sever ties and find someone more suited to you. Writing partners are like any agent or reader…they're people. Not everyone likes the same things. I have a friend who adored A Separate Peace. If I had the choice of reading that again and cleaning the animal cages of every zoo from New York to Miami, I'd be putting on some rubber boots.

This was a long entry, but it's also an important topic. It's important to find someone to confide it, cry over rejections with, someone to support you and enjoy your writing.

So thank you, Vic and J.M., for being so awesome.

Characters

Today on Nathan's blog he asked the question, "Do you own your characters or do your characters own you?"

I thought it was a great question, so I wanted to put my two cents in. Every writer handles their story a different way--we all have different ways of writing. Whether it's outlining or jumping right in, writing chronologically or skipping around, it's our way.

Anyone who knows a writer also knows that if you ask them about a character, they'll go on for hours if you don't shut them up. To us, the characters are alive. While this may make us borderline schizophrenic, it's also a good sign. I know that if I met someone and introduced myself as Jana Darren, they could ask me any question about myself, and I would have an answer for them without having to think about it. Jana is a three dimensional character, which is why I can do that.

Now, to answer Nathan's question.

I like to think of my characters as the Board of Directors for a company, and I'm the CEO. They can tell me what's needed and what direction we should take, but it is ultimately my decision. If I were to slack off and not do my job as CEO, I would get replaced and the company would collapse. That is, letting your characters take control the story and allowing them to take it in any direction they want is asking for a Chapter 11.

Every writer needs to find the delicate balance between the plot and the characters. You have to be there to make the decisions, keep a happy medium between the two.

If successful, you can say hello to Fortune 500 status.

Reasons why Heroes makes me angry

Tonight, I had a conversation with some fellow writers about Heroes. We got onto the topic because the Star Trek movie came up, and I mentioned that every time I saw younger Spock, I kept picturing him sawing the tops of people's heads off.

Let me say this now. Heroes had SO much potential. And now…fuck.

1. Claire goes through love interests like tissues, and every time they die or something terrible happens to them. What happened to West? Apparently they "still facebook". How about underwater breathing comic book kid? And then there's Gretchen…don't get me started.
   
2. Lauren. Shove off.
   
3. WTF happened to Molly?
   
4. Parkman takes all of TWO MINUTES to get over speedster girl, and then it's back to Janice like nothing happened.
   
5. Every season they try and reinvent the show, but it just doesn't work. Stop it.
   
6. Scaly, angry Mohinder. See also: Pissed off Gregor Samson Mohinder.
   
7. "I want to join the Company" Mohinder.
   
8. "I don't want to continue my father's work. Oh wait, J/K!" Mohinder.
   
9. Right about the time I started liking Nathan, he gets killed, which leads me to:
   
10. The Nathan-Sylar mindfuck.
    
11. Hiro's childhood regression.
    
12. EVERYONE CAN PAINT THE FUTURE! First it's Isaac, then Peter absorbed the power. Sylar gets it from killing Isaac, and Mr. Petrelli gets it from stealing Peter's powers. African man has it, and then he gives it to Hiro and Parkman. Seriously?
    
13. Nancy Drew and the case of the murdered co-ed.
    
14. Claire's obsession with helping, when in fact she's completely USELESS.
    
15. "OMG all I want is a normal life. Wait, strike that. I'm happy being special. But all I want is a normal life! I want to go to college! But then everyone gets abducted and I can't go to college with that happening! Wait, now I want to be special so I'm going to go join a freaking CARNIVAL, because creepy greasy carnival owner man says I'm great."
    
16. Jessica/Nikki/other personality that gets conveniently thrown in to kill DL.
    
17. Nikki/Barbara/Tracy. Uhm…what happened to Jessica being Nikki's dead sister?
    
18. The Carnival.
    
19. The amazing (sarcasm) idea that Parkman drinking causes Sylar to hurt, and eventually disappear. Uh..HELLO! Of course he's going to disappear! You've just given yourself alcohol poisoning.
    
20. Alice and her desert wonderland. Was there a point to that? I think not.
    
21. The Haitian wind chime thing. How the blazes does that work, anyway?
    
22. Peter in Ireland and the useless relationship with the pub girl.
23. Maya. You weakling, get over it! Man up and quit being a wet dishrag. Oh wait, they killed your character off because she was a crybaby moron who couldn't see that Sylar was a mass murdering lunatic. You decided to listen to him instead of your brother, even after you knew Gabriel was a murderer. Then you get involved with Mohinder, and he glues you to a wall because you're an idiot. How does that feel?
    

    There are so many more, but I think I'll limit it to these. In closing,
    

    If you were to watch Heroes backwards, it would get better over time.
    

Janet Reid, the Gordon Ramsay of Queries.

Project: TFI

Looked at: Chapter 7

Starting word count: 80,878

Ending word count: 80,886

Gain/Loss: +12

Biggest problem: Some of the sections didn't sound quite right.

Favorite line: "Can I ask you a question?"
"You just did."
Jana groaned. "Fine, have it your way. I have a question."
"I have an answer," Aeronth replied cheekily.-Page 69

Daily WTF: "The screen flashed green, and everyone breathed a sigh of relief." –Page 84

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What I'm listening to: New Math (Bo Burnham)

It's been a few days since I last posted. I've been in a bit of an editing slump lately. On the bright side, I did get a fabulous new idea for ELEVEN while I was on my way home from work the other night. I've written it down, but it'll be shelved until I actually start writing the novel for 2YN. I don't want to cheat the process. I spent the last few days reading over editor and agent blogs, catching up on the latest episode of Lost, and so on. I read back through Janet Reid's old blog posts. It made me realize something.

Janet Reid is the Gordon Ramsay of queries.

If anyone doesn't know who Gordon is, you're mad. (No, not the angry kind, you wanker.) Look him up if you don't know what I'm talking about. By the by, that is a compliment.

Also, I found this fabulous article about writing. Read it, learn it, live it.

Chapter Six: Surprisingly Uneventful Editing

Project: TFI

Looked at: Chapter 6

Starting word count: 80,915

Ending word count: 80,878

Gain/Loss: -37

Biggest problem: Surprisingly, there wasn't one. The action, I thought, was solid the first time around.

Favorite line: "She shook her head, trying to get her eyes to focus and to get herself to concentrate. Jana had her hand on the lock release. She pressed it as hard as she could, with barely enough energy to stand. It didn't release; she was too weak. Jana tried again, throwing her body weight into the movement. She slipped on something wet on the floor, hit her head, and blacked out." –Page 65

Daily WTF: "The force of hitting it threw Jana forward, creating an intense amount of pain as she gasped for air while her harness nearly strangled her." –Page 62

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Okay, so my favorite line still needs work. But the point is that I connect well with it.

The WTF was changed to: "The force of hitting it threw Jana forward. Her harness nearly strangled her, and she gasped for air through the pain." Which, I think, works better.

Overall, I was pleasantly surprised once more at how little I changed. Victoria will be looking over this stuff in a week or so, so we'll see what she thinks. I got some great comments from her on chapter one. It's just so hard to look at something you've written and see the places that might not be clear enough for someone else. So, thanks Vic!

Blast you, past self and your passive voice!

Project: TFI

Looked at: Chapter 4 and 5

Starting word count: 81,093

Ending word count: 80,915

Gain/Loss: -178

Biggest problem: The most common problem was passive voice. Then again, from here on out, it's all first draft stuff that I'm going over. I have a feeling it's going to get a lot worse.

Favorite line:

"You are to secure this case. If you encounter any wildlife during your stay, you are not to harm said wildlife under any circumstances whatsoever. Failure to do so will result in severe disciplinary action from the board for infringement of the Planetary Restoration Act."

Great. So if a herd of monkeys ambushed them, we're expected to just stand there and wave? After wondering this, Jana tried very hard to stay focused on the mission briefing, but her mind kept turning to thoughts about whether or not a group of monkeys was a herd.

Daily WTF: Today's WTF isn't a specific line. It's my past self's apparent lack of ability to write in active voice.

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Stupid, stupid passive voice! I was amazed at how wishy-washy it was. So there I was, going through my manuscript mercilessly hacking it to pieces, when I noticed a trend. I am now sufficiently depressed at going through the rest of this. I can already tell it's going to be one hell of a ride. Only, it won't be the good kind. It's gonna be one of those rickety, wooden coasters that I hate. I mean it! Every time I've ever gone on a wood roller coaster, I end up with black and blue marks. I can't help it that I bruise easily.

On another note, I've started to come up with things I need to fix in this (or the next) run through. This is including, but not limited to; Giving more information early on about the military and setup of the government, expanding the relationship between Jana and Aeronth, fleshing out the Earth mission more, and other things that I don't want to give away.

My plans for this edit are just to go through and tighten it up a bit. Change all the passive voice to active, get rid of any clichés, that sort of stuff. I've got someone looking at the first two chapters, and we'll see how that turns out. I've got some great new ideas that I'll play around with for inclusion in the next version. Wish me luck!

A brief history of TFI

Project: TFI

Looked At: Chapter 3

Starting word count: 80,421

Ending word count: 81,093

Gain/Loss: +672

Biggest problem: Like the last chapter, it needed a bit more fleshing out. I had skimmed over some parts that I had to go more in depth with.

Favorite Line: "This doesn't look so bad. I'll be out of here in no time, Jana thought to herself smugly as she filled in the first answer. Something she hadn't noticed before, in the corner of the screen was a tiny box that read "Page 1 of 572". Jana dropped the tablet and put her hands to her face. You have to be kidding me.
I'm going to be here until I die." –Page 47

Daily WTF: Surprisingly, I don't have one today.

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Today I found an older version of the Through Fire and Ice query that I had written on lined paper many, many moons ago. The date on it (because hey, I like dates) is from April of 07. So if anyone was wondering how long I've been working on TFI, the answer November of 2005. It started out as a NaNo project. A week and 23k words into it, I changed my mind. I liked the story too much, and was too afraid that pushing myself to finish in the month would ruin it. I finished it in August 2006, and shoved it in my sock drawer where no one would find it while I worked on the sequel, Truth in Coins.

TiC, by the way, still isn't done. Not even the first draft. It's close, don't get me wrong…but it's just not there yet. I have a beginning, middle, and end. It's just missing the beginning of the end, or is it the end of the middle?

To date, here are my current projects and their states of completion:

1. Through Fire and Ice (TFI) – Rewrites
   
2. Truth in Coins (TiC) – Rough draft 7/8 completed
   
3. Eleven – Some basic ideas. Also the novel I'm using for the 2YN
   
4. The River City – First chapter of rough draft, basic outline
   
5. The Chronicles of Reist – Four sections in, outline and worldbulding complete
   
6. Everliving/Unliving – Worldbuilding completed, first chapter, outline
   
7. Untitled – The steampunk novel I've got brewing. Basic premise, not much more
   
8. Once Upon A Dream – Premise, layout, and the ending
   

That's not counting any abandoned projects or stuff I have sitting in a drawer somewhere waiting for me to get back to it for revisions. Those are all things I'm (sort of) actively working on, in one form or another. Also included but not listed is the worldbuilding activity stuff. Yikes! I'd better get back to editing.

A query nark, and other things.

Project: TFI

Looked at: Chapter Two

Starting word count: 80,014

Ending word count: 80,421

Gain/Loss: +407

Biggest Problem: Needed to flesh out some of the sections a little more. Jana wasn't quite as snarky in this chapter.

Favorite line:
"He stood behind his desk looking down at Jana, beefy face and obscene mustache giving him a look resembling a walrus. If only he had a top hat." –Page 28

Daily WTF: "The SCORPION team. That is, the S-311M Central Organization for the Removal of Potential Infectious Outbreaks and Nosopoetic anomalies," he rattled off. –Page 24

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If you're wondering what's up with the favorite line for today, it's a reference to Alice in Wonderland. As for today's WTF line, the acronym system in this book is meant to be a bit cliché. I put that one in there because when writing this for the first time, I came up with all these words for the acronyms that made me say, "Yeah! That's awesome! That sounds so darn cool!"

I refused to change the words even when the fluidity was a challenge. I have a running joke with a friend about this. "And that's the PHOENIX team. Don't ask me what it is, because the author couldn't come up with a decent X word. Bit embarrassing, so we just don't talk about it."

But gosh darn it, I was determined! Eventually I ended up making it into a mech model, and it played a rather important part later on. Thankfully, it worked out this time.

What I'm reading now: The Hellgate trilogy by Mel Odom, based off of the game by Flagship Studios. (Which, by the way, could have been amazing, but just wasn't.) It was suggested to a friend of mine who currently has a full reading list. I suspect that I'm screening the book for him, but whatever. It started off great, until the character got killed off and I found out it's his son the book is actually about.

That aside, I'm not hating it. It's good enough that I continue to read it. It keeps me entertained, and I like where he went with the technology for the Templars. So far I've gotten about ¾ through the first book, just reading en route to work. (No, not while I'm driving. That would be irresponsible. But then again, it is Utah. What could possibly happen?)


Looked at Nathan Bransford's website more in-depth today. I've followed his blog for a while, but never delved into the forums. I really like what he's done with it. I signed up and took a look at the section in there for feedback. I was both surprised and happy to see that the forum community was so helpful (in the right ways). I did a critique on one of the queries posted on there, as well as a slightly older version of one of my own queries before I revised it. I'm curious to see what will be said about it.

I noticed while looking at this site and others like it that many people like to allude to the bad guys without giving any information about them, or who they are. They think it creates suspense, but I think it's just confusing. A little mystery is good, but you need to give the reader enough to sink their teeth into. If you have your whole query talking about Mary Gretchen looking for a birthday gift for the devilish pixie living in her sock drawer and then mention at the end, "and now they must run from the watchers to keep the Purple Scarf of Flamboyancy from falling into the wrong hands…" It's only going to lead to a resounding "WTF" from me. Who are the watchers? What's their aim? Why are they so dangerous? And most importantly, what on earth would they do with the PSoF?

Another Day of Editing

Project: TFI

Looked at: Chapter 1

Starting word count: 79,981

Ending word count: 80,014

Gain/Loss: +33

Biggest problem: None, really. Just a few wording changes here and there.

Favorite Line: "There was no time for petty injuries. After all, it was only a flesh wound. Even if there was a freak accident along the way that left her limbless, Jana would still find a way to get to this meeting." –Page 1

"Jana had always thought Lt.Colonel Buchannan had a voice like a broken whistle […] Her voice irritated Jana, high pitched and wheezing. As long as the Colonel was on Jana's side, however, she could wheeze the entirety of Beethoven's Fourth and Jana could care less." –Page 6

Daily WTF:
"The more she thought on it, the more obscure and mysterious it became, the way saying nearly any word repeatedly eventually makes you doubt yourself that it's a word at all." –Page 13

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With the stats for today out of the way, I'd just like to say that I have no idea where that WTF came from. I know what I wanted it to say, but don't ask me how it ended up like that. It's fixed (for now), but we'll just have to see how that turns out. On the bright side, there were two lines that I liked enough that I couldn't decide which was better. Not that they can't still be tweaked, but they're getting there. Which do you like? Why?

This year, I decided to give Lazette Gifford's Two Year Novel Course (2YN) on fmwriters a try. It's definitely got a thumbs-up from me so far. I was tossing two different ideas around for the course, and finally settled on ELEVEN. It's a project that's been shelved for two years, give or take. The other option was something completely new that doesn't have a title. It's currently called UNTITLED.

Original, I know. So sue me.

I stumbled across Query Shark last week. Two words: LOVE IT! Not only is it hilarious, it's incredibly insightful. For any writer who's wondered why their query gets rejection after form rejection, it's a great resource. I strongly recommend grabbing a hard copy of your query and a red pen, and going through the queries. Yes, every one of them. I guarantee that by the end of it, you'll have a very colorful query. But you know what? That's not a bad thing. Making mistakes helps you to learn all of the things NOT to do, and before you know it, you'll be doing the right things without even thinking about it.