The Scientist and The Writing

I spent a lot of time in the last days examining my writing. Well, not the writing itself, but more my relationship to it -- why I do it, what I expect from it, what my goals are. You know the questions. You probably asked them for yourself before.

I've been writing for a little more than four years now, with something like 8 projects to back it up. I read blogs (and started my own), bought how-to books, participated on writer forums. I plotted, drafted, replotted, redrafted and edited, sometimes all on the same WIP.

Through it all I realised that the information I sought the most out of fellow writers was how they did it. Not necessarily how it should look in the final product, but how they got there (or are trying to).

Methods. Techniques.

I blame the scientist in me. Even knowing that every writer is different, and that someone else's technique might not work for me, I want to know. And with every new draft - every new attempt at this writing thing - he tries bits of other people's techniques.

Kind of the writerly version of the scientific method. Observe, Experiment, Note Results, Draw Conclusions. Try again?

I'm not done yet. My process is getting better and better, but I've yet to streamline it into a method that'll be flezible enough for most of my books, and fit my writing style.

As a side note, you should check Margo's mindblowing post (though perhaps not mindblowing in the way you expect it) at Wicked & Tricksy today. The content and title kinda prompted today's reflection.

And what about you? Do you steal bits of writing methods elsewhere? For what? Planning, writing, editing?

It's A Science Fiction!

You may remember when, towards the end of October, I freaked out about White Echoes' genre. In short, I had a hard time telling if it belonged in science fiction, fantasy or steampunk. I may have been in denial about the truth.

White Echoes is a science fiction novel.

It's a relief to know the technical, because I have a better idea of the conventions to keep an eye on and of what to pitch it as to agents.It's useful to know your genre.

In this case, though, it still freaks me out. I love this book. I love its story, its characters, its (now in-development) setting. But I'm a fantasy writer. It does not seem wise to try and publish a science fiction novel as my first book.

I guess what I am saying is that I'm glad I found what genre this book belongs to, though it comes with some side consequences. I'm willing to accept White Echoes is one of those stories you love, work on, show friends and family, even if it might not be meant for publication.

Or maybe it is. I try not to stress out about those things yet. Learning the craft comes first, and I have some distance to go still!

2010 - Setting Myself on the Path of Professionals

Whenever I look back at where I was a year ago, I have a strange shock. I knew I loved to write. I knew I could finish a first draft. In fact, I had just realised I could manage two stories in the same month when I set my mind to it. I knew I had a lot to learn, and that I needed to do so through careful editing of my novel.

I had no idea what was waiting for me. 

I wanted to clean up the novel in time to get my free copy. With two months, I should be fine, right? Haha-ha... ha. When I realised at the end of January how little I had accomplished yet, I finally caught a glimpse of how much work there is behind a novel.

At that point I must have tripled my efforts, and somehow I finished by the end of May. I had something that was slightly better than your typical first drafts, though I knew there were still mistakes all over the place. I also knew that although I had finished my line edits, I would not return to the novel.

At some point in March 2010, I decided to look up the publishing industry and promptly found myself on Nathan Bransford's blog. I must have read 80% of the archives, if not more, and I was finally confronted with the realities of the publishing industry.

The overwhelming odds only boosted my desire to be a part of this industry. I decided I was a writer. 

It's strange, to realise I made this a conscious decision less than a year ago, because it feels so obvious to me today. It's not a distant dream. It's right there, closer to my heart than any other potential job. 

In 2010 I decided I wanted to be a professional writer. I edited a novel, wrote a script, doubled the number of books I read, planned another novel, wrote it, realised it was all wrong, replanned it and a third, started this blog, wrote the two novels during NaNoWriMo,wrote and edited a handful of shorts, and began replanning WHITE ECHOES for the third time.

I feel I've come a long way, but it's a tiny bit of what is yet to come. Writing has become this second job, and I give 10 to 15 hours to it every week (in addition to the real job and the classes). This isn't going to change, unless it's to write more.

Hopefully, at the end of 2011 I will be able to repeat myself, and say I've come a long way.

Happy New Year to all of you, readers, and may we never falter!

The Colours of Language

I like to think words have personalities. They're more than a bunch of letters stuck together. They mean something, and behind that meaning there is a connotation. The same is true for sentences and paragraphs. The way we put them together has a certain vibe to it, a personality. It's that little thing we call voice.

But beyond that, on an even deeper level than words and sentences, I believe every language has a personality. When you speak it, you can see it from the expressions, from the vocabulary, from the sentence structures... but even if you can't understand a word of it, the language vehiculates a special vibe.

Compare italian and german for a moment. One is lyrical, full of vowels and intonations. The other is harder, straightforward, with a lot of sharp sounds.*

The language you write in brings a particular colour to the story you are telling. This is why translations can never best the original. You cannot capture one language's soul with another. You can try, and translators do an incredible job at it sometimes, but it will never have the original text's flow. It cannot.

I believe that is a beautiful thing. It does, however, raise a question: what language should I write my stories in?

I am fluent enough in English that I believe I can write a publishable novel in it. But is this wise? Would some of these stories be better served by French? Can I afford to play both markets? (probably not)

Most of the time I do not even ask myself such questions. The story came to me in English, right? That's enough to make the decision. Edingher, however... for some reason, Edingher was created alternating between French and English, and I wonder if French would not fit it better. I decided to focus on the other novel until I'd reached my decision, but there's something deeply disturbing to wondering if you're in the right language at all. It feels as though I did not know my story at all, and it does not sit well with me.

This is something I have been struggling with for three years now. I'm not sure it will ever go away.

*For the record, I love both german and italian.