My Writing Process (blog tour entry!)
So a couple of weeks ago a fellow writer named Eric M. Ralph (who has the death sentence in twelve systems for aggravated punnery) asked me to talk about my writing process as part of a greater blog tour that’s spreading across the Internet: The Writing Process Blog Tour! (Cue fanfare, streamers, balloons…maybe a unicycling monkey in a Lara Croft cosplay for some reason…) His invitation to action ended with “Don’t make me destroy you,” so of course I said yes!
Eric M. Ralph
(bow tie sold separately)
But first, a little about Eric: He does lots of stuff™! He also likes to write: books, short stories, poetry, speeches, and really disturbing puns. He has a self-described odd sense of humor, a blue and orange bow tie, and a novel: And God Said…An Absurd Tale of Love, Power, and Paperwork. (Hey, I should check that out…) You can find his own part of the tour here, but ignore any libelous codswallop about me that you find there.
And now, on with the content!
What am I working on?
I’m working on two things at the moment. (Well, three, if you count this blog entry. Though maybe that only counts if it’s RIGHT this moment—in which case I’m only working on this entry and nothing else but—okay, I’m over-parsing the question, aren’t I?) So, yes, two things: Working with my publisher (Booktrope) on the final part of the publishing process for Zeus is Dead: A Monstrously Inconvenient Adventure (my comedic fantasy about the Greek gods returning to public life in the modern day), and writing the third and final book in my cyberpunk series The New Aeneid Cycle.
How does my work differ from others of its genre?
Humor nozzle for writing Zeus Is Dead…
It’s written by ME! (Boy, what a silly question!) Okay, so honestly I always think this is a bit of a loaded question. Every author brings their own unique perspective, voice, and nuance to any story they tell. A good deal of what comes from me is likely my sense of humor, which ranges from deconstructive to just plain goofy. There’s less of it in The New Aeneid Cycle, as those are serious novels (though certain characters within them have a sense of humor that’s informed by my own), but the humor nozzle is on full blast for Zeus is Dead. I had so much fun writing it.
I’ve also found that I have a thing for the concept of memory and of Greek mythology…
Why do I write what I do?
Some writers write to give voice to their deepest yearnings, strongest opinions, or universal truths they feel cannot be expressed in any other form. While such things do find their way into my writing, my primary motivation is simply to tell a good story. I write to entertain, both myself and my readers. I love to grab a reader’s emotions, pull them to the edge of their seat with excitement, laughter, or intrigue, and keep them there for as long as I can.
I confess I also take a special delight in making a reader curse me at the end of a chapter because they just can’t help but turn the page. (If a beta-reader wants to beat me over the head because they just finished a chapter and I haven’t yet written the next one, I consider it a success.)
How does my writing process work?
Dramatization. May not have happened.
Heh. “Writing process.” Like it’s so organized. …Well, okay, so it kind of is. I tend to front-load the work in the sense that I prefer to plan things out ahead of time:
- I get my premise, which can often take a long while as I search for an idea that excites me enough to keep me interested the entire time it will take me to write a novel.
- Sketch the main characters, create a “step sheet”/outline that shows the flow of both character arcs and plot progression, and a general bunch of notes about the setting itself to help inform the writing.
- Actually write, using the step sheet and character sketches as a guide. This does NOT mean such things are inviolate. On multiple occasions I might come up with new ideas as I go (and certain parts of my outline might simply say “whatever seems to make sense for the characters at this point”), change directions, or even discover that the characters themselves have tapped me on the shoulder (or punched me in the face) to say they’d do things differently.
- Edit, revise, agonize, improvise, and probably eat some pizza.
Next on the tour…
Rachel Frost: An author, artist AND musician, Rachel is in the midst of writing a sequel to her first NA novel (Tsirash), in between a multitude of art and music projects. Nevertheless, she still has the good taste to play lots of video games.
Mary Lynne Gibbs: A former city-dweller now ensconced in Kentucky farmland, Mary is both an author and an actress. Her interests lie in fantasy, scifi, paranormal, and adventure fiction (so hey, she’s got excellent taste), and in creating worlds with strong female characters.
J. Edward Neill: J. Edward is a dark fantasy writer living in the southeastern United States. Among his inspirations are Dan Simmons’ characters, Shakespeare’s truths, and Tolkien’s wordiness. You’ll find no elves or dwarves in his writing, but epic tales written for adults with sharp (and slightly twisted) minds.
Gareth S. Young: Gareth is a lover of all the stuff and most of the things (that’s a direct quote), as well as a watcher, listener, thinker, and dreamer (that’s another direct quote). His psychological thriller Monsters, with a 4.4 rating on Amazon, is set in my own backyard in the shadow of Mt. Rainier (that’s a sentence I mostly wrote myself).
Look for their contributions on May 19th!
Starting to feel like Apollo
Whew, it’s been a busy few weeks here. I’ve been a bit slow in updating the blog, but I assure you it’s all for a good cause. There’s a lot happening on the Zeus is Dead front, which is what’s filling up most of my time, and most of that is due to the final edit on the manuscript itself. My Booktrope editor is giving me a lot of great comments and notes. It’s making the novel even better than it was, but it does mean that much of my time is taken up in reviewing and incorporating those notes into revisions. It’s fun (and it’s fantastic to work with someone as excited about the book as I am), but time consuming. Our deadline is April 15th, so I’m working hard to meet that. [Read more…]
Writing Zeus is Dead
In part two of my reblogging some entries written a few years ago when I finished writing the original manuscript of what’s now titled Zeus is Dead: A Monstrously Inconvenient Adventure (a comedic contemporary fantasy coming soon from Seattle publisher Booktrope!), I talk a little about the process of writing the novel itself. (See part one for the origin of the idea.) Writing it was a blast, though not without difficulties…
(Note that the working title of the novel was Murdering Zeus for Fun and Prophet.)
In my last entry I wrote about how I originally embarked on writing the (completed) manuscript I’m now calling Murdering Zeus for Fun and Prophet. At the time I began, I only made a few veiled comments about what I was working on. “Somewhat less serious” was the phrase I used when comparing it to my previous work, but I didn’t mention anything at the time about Greek gods.
The origins of Zeus is Dead
So you’ve probably heard my news that Zeus is Dead: A Monstrously Inconvenient Adventure will soon be published by Seattle publisher Booktrope. Today I’m reblogging something I wrote a few years ago after I’d completed the manuscript and was getting ready to shop it around to agents: the “origin story” of how I came to write my favorite work…
(Note that the working title of the novel was Murdering Zeus for Fun and Prophet.)
Way back when I started writing–at least in any serious fashion–I had an idea about writing an original Greek myth. Not to retell The Odyssey or some such thing, but rather writing an epic of my own plotting using the already existing (and public domain, obviously) characters of Greek and Roman mythology.
Excerpt: A Dragon at the Gate
Happy New Year! New Year’s Day finds me working on A Dragon at the Gate (Book Three of the New Aeneid Cycle, if you’re new around here). Unfortunately, it finds me just a little sluggish with the whole stringing words together part, so while I wait to regain my writer’s perspicacity, I’ve decided to give a little glimpse into some of what’s written so far.
Obviously this is still a rough draft, but I figure it’s a good teaser. Obviously again, this has some spoilers. There’s nothing major, but it does at least tell you some of whom has survived the first two books, and a hint of something that’s going on in the early parts of book three. Continue at your own discretion… [Read more…]
December 20th Writing Update + Tip
So I haven’t done any sort of post on writing lately. The good news is that this is mainly due to the fact that I’ve been too busy with actual writing. I’m seven chapters in to the rough draft of A Dragon at the Gate (possibly eight, depending on how I break it up). Things were moving along pretty well there for a while, but then I hit a snag. [Read more…]
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