Journal

The meaning in things

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This week my great Aunt died. While I hadn’t spent a lot of time with her in recent years, she was a big part of my childhood family-gathering memories. She is also the last of that generation to go, which opens up a whole plethora of feelings which I won’t be exploring here.

Next week my parents and I will likely go down and start clearing out her house, disposing of possessions that would have meant so much to my great Aunt, but to us are just things. It’s led to the inevitable review of my own life and all the collections in my house. How would my stuff look through the eyes of someone else?

I look at the biology text book that I’ve lugged from Adelaide, to Brisbane, to Melbourne and back to Adelaide as I’ve moved around the country. It’s well out of date, and I haven’t opened it in years, but every time I look at it, I have fond memories of all the hours I spent pouring over it for Uni when I still believed that I could work as a zoologist. No-one else will see that book that way.

There is the stuffed toy that was my favourite as a child, the framed drawing done for me by a friend at a time when I needed it, the glasses I bought myself as a gift to when I had my first paid publication, and of course the beautiful Archaeopteryx that I’d wanted for as long as I could remember and a special boyfriend managed to track down for me as a wonderful surprise.

All these things are just things, but they are the things that make up my past and colour my future. I just hope that I can give my Aunt’s things the respect and attention that they deserve.

 

Writing

Change in Genre?

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There is a short story competition coming up that I want to enter. I work best with deadlines, so competitions are great for that. But here’s the thing, it’s not my usual genre. Even though I read really widely, I tend to write 80% science fiction or horror, and the remaining 20% would be classed as fantasy. Which equals 100% speculative fiction.

Spec fic is not terribly in demand, and while it could easily be my style to blame, publishers don’t seem very interested in my speculative novels. So I’ve decided it is time to try something new. Of course the first story idea I got was also set in the future, keeping me in my comfort zone, but it also met the criteria for the competition. The next idea I got had no speculative elements in it at all, and this is the one I’m going to focus on.

Neither story is actually written yet. And they may both turn out to be duds. But it is nice to venture somewhere else for a while. Who knows, maybe it will become my new thing?

In my heart I’ll still be a spec fic writer, and I’ll always be writing spec on the side.

Writing

Special Sundays

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A few weeks ago I decided to give up on always trying to ‘grab’ moments of writing whenever I could. Mainly because it just wasn’t happening, which left me feeling  a bit of a failure. Instead, I nominated Sunday as my writing day, which meant I blocked out at least a half-day (but usually the whole day) in which I could write.

This lifted a huge weight off because I stopped feeling guilty about not writing on the few days after work when I didn’t have something else on. It also took off the pressure of trying to get words done between housework/friends/family on Saturday.

The other great thing it did was give me back some anticipation. I’ve found myself thinking about what I’m going to do on Sunday throughout the week, and even better, looking forward to it.

Yes, it’s true that I’m not getting out anywhere near as many words as when I wrote every day, but I am keeping the house clean, recording loads of quality family time in the memory banks and keeping in touch with friends. These things are all important too, and giving them some priority as well doesn’t make me any less of a writer.

 

Writing

Past half way

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I’m sure I’m not the only one who still thinks of the year as being fairly new. Now we are about to hit August and I’ve finally realised the end of the year is quickly closing in. I have also realised that I don’t have any short story submissions out for review, so my hopes of another publication this year are fading fast.

It’s pretty unlikely I’d get something published before the end of December anyway, given that the turn-around from submission to publication is usually about a year these days, but waiting until the end of July is really leaving it a bit too late. I need to pull my finger out.

Every week I look at my Duotrope email about the upcoming anthology deadlines, and every week I find at least two that grab my interest, but that’s as far as it goes. This week I need to change that, this week I want to pick something, write a story and send it out.

Sure, I may have left it too late for 2019, but it would be great to start 2020 with a publication. It really is time to get back into the swing of things, and I have so many short stories pestering me to be written.

 

 

Writing

Back-up Plan

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I’ve seen a few TV shows about chasing dreams, but like any good story, we’re always following the person who makes it. The thing that has always struck me with this sort of movie/documentary/reality TV show is that there is always something said along the lines of ‘do what you love and you will succeed’.

The past few years has taught me that this is not always true. Implicit in the statement (or those like it) is that if you don’t succeed it’s because you haven’t been trying hard enough. And the fact is you can always try harder. What is never addressed is how many people do succeed despite having done very little. The luck factor is ignored.

Then I watched a different documentary, one that followed the lives of a group of individuals just to see where they ended up. It started with no real idea of where (or when) it would finish. One of the people it followed wanted to be a writer, and despite years of dedication, he has still not made it. Now I’m not saying he will never make it, but his effort has made my piddly 15 years seem very short.

I know it is a very negative thing to say; to suggest that despite the belief and effort it is still possible to fail, but I think we do need to sing the praises of the back-up plan. I once heard a successful singer (who found success at the ripe old age of 16) say that you should never have a back-up plan. It puts the message out to the universe that you don’t want to succeed.

What total rubbish. I have friends who have lived by this, but because they have to make money while waiting to be discovered they have taken jobs in service stations, bottle shops and cafes. No slight to them, but let’s face it, if you are in a café you can’t do any more writing than when you are in an office.

Also, too many people have succeeded who also have successful careers in other things. I think what is more likely is that because you get worn out or tied from the day job, you might be less likely to make the most of the opportunities to chase your dream. It gets to be easier to come home and watch TV with a glass of wine than to come home and enter that competition.

So yes, have a back-up plan, but just remember to keep your eye on the real prize. And if you choose the right back-up plan it may even give you the financial backing to take the time off and really chase that dream when a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity comes along. At least that’s the thought that’s keeping me going now.

Writing

Trilogy Trap

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Over the past month I’ve been reading the 9th book in a trilogy of trilogies. The last three in the series were all over 800 pages long. This was quite a commitment. Perhaps that was why I abandoned my 100-page rule, where if I’m not enjoying a book by page 100, I put it down.

I loved the first series, liked the second series, and then loved the first book of the final series. But then I hit what can only be described as filler books. In all honesty there was only a book’s worth of stuff to happen, and a 400-page book at that. But this author was wed to the trilogy mentality, and there were two more books to go to meet that, so two more were written. As a result there were several verrrrrryyyyy long ship voyages, long hikes, lots of reflection, and lots of meaningless arguments that didn’t contribute much at all.

It made me quite sad that I found myself getting sick of characters I had loved for over 10 years (yes, that’s how long it took me to read the series). The end left me a bit flat because it was tied up a bit too neatly, and showed me too much of the happily-ever-after without any reflection on the sacrifices the main character had made to get the happily-ever-after. I was still hurting over those sacrifices, but the character was so busy getting on with being happy that he didn’t seem to lament them.

It has taught me such a valuable lesson; never fall into the trilogy trap. Yes, trilogies are nice, but if the books can’t stand alone – at least in so much as having a beginning, middle and end – then they shouldn’t be written. And if the middle book is just about reflecting on the first book and anticipating the last book, then it has no purpose.

I have written/planned a trilogy, but I believe the books tell three different stories. If I find that this isn’t the case once they are all finished, then I promise I won’t force them onto the world. They can come out as a duology, or even two stand-alone novels set in the same world. There is nothing wrong with that.

 

 

Journal

Back!

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I will confess, it was a lovely month off. I got to do a lot of socialising, family stuff, weekend getaways and lazing around. But that’s all I seemed to do. And if I’m honest, I could easily have fit the blog in around all those things.

What I noticed was that I felt no compunction at all to get to the computer. So, I didn’t just have a month off my blog, I had a month off writing. While I know I’ve said many times that I’d done no writing in the week, I did put out some flash fiction and edited stuff which I just didn’t count. This month I literally didn’t write any words of fiction.

And what was also strange is that I posted on social media less, not more. I took photos that I thought I should put up, but didn’t. I mentally composed ‘funny’ (IMO) tweets, and then never wrote them down.

It’s made me realise that this blog isn’t about getting followers or connecting with the big wide world; twitter, Instagram etc. do that now. This blog is about accountability, and clearly I need that in spades. Let’s see if anything else gets written this week.

Writing

Blog Break

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Yes, I know I’ve taken a few of these recently, but this time I’m going to have a think about what I want to get out of this blog. When I started it (nearly 10 years ago) there was no such thing as Twitter or Instagram. I’m not even sure if Facebook was out yet, and if it was, it was still something you only shared with friends.

In 2010 when I was blogging I was also regularly reading other people’s blogs. Not so much now. With all the different feeds of information these days, I struggle to keep up with the blogs I used to follow. There is only so much time in the day.

Likewise, I used to enjoy a bit of discourse with strangers; commenting on each other’s blogs and referencing the posts we had enjoyed. I now do all that with Twitter and the only regular contact I have on the blog is with spammers. I must confess some of their comments are amusing and I would love to turn them into a story, but that’s not enough to keep me going.

So I’m going to take June off and consider if I want to attempt a JulNoWriMo to kick-start me back into the world of fiction.

I will be back, but it may only be briefly to say my goodbyes, or it might be haphazard, only when I have something to say. In the meantime you can find me on:

Twitter @nataliejepotts
Instagram @nataliejepotts

Please say hello if you do find me there.

Writing

Self-Assessment

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One of the big reasons why it is good to be a part of a don’t-pull-any-punches writers group is that they can tell you when you are off the mark. I find it very hard to assess my writing in terms of what is good and bad. In the past, the members of my writers group have had no trouble making that distinction.

Sure, they may sometimes get it wrong, ideas of good and bad are very subjective after all, but they can save you a lot of time identifying what’s not working, and can usually give you some hints about how to fix it. I think I need that help at the moment.

I have a piece of flash fiction that keeps coming back to me in record time. It’s short, punchy and complete – so is the sort of thing that normally gets accepted the first or second time I send it out. This one just came back to me in two days. So clearly there is something very wrong with it.

I’m not part of a group at the moment, and I feel that loss most months. I think it might be time to try and track a new group down. Wish me luck!

The journey of a spec fic writer.