About My Books (2017 November Update)

And so, here we are again, 4 months since the last update. Is that enough time in between? In terms of progress, I think it is :D

So what happened after 4 months? How have things changed, or how much have things not changed?

Well, I can start by saying some stuff is now available on Wattpad, just click here and you can see :)

Although some other stuff like "Liaffon" that I talked about first the last post (such a confoozing sentence :P ) you cannot see there and the link in the last post will not work after 12/31 because FIGMENT IS GOING TO SHUT DOWN! :0

I probably spent a good few hours screen-shotting (not a word) the heck out of that writing site that I've been on for the past 7 years. It's sad to see it go but hopefully "Underlined" the new site will be just as good. Fingers crossed!

Anyway, without further ado, here's my progress report :)

The Last Chapters

Let's do a Q&A with me.

How long have you been writing Liaffon, including the times when you were suffering from writer'sblockitis?

7 years.

How long have you been editing?

7 years.

Why is it the same?

Well, I did a rewrite once of the whole story but before I could finish that, I realized I had to change the entire story dynamic and have one MC instead of two. So I had to write the story with one MC.

Then I started to write that and I finished it when I realized the story wasn't interesting. Nothing made you cheer for the character. It was just too dull and dry.

All that together within 7 years.

How's that process going now?

Well, I can successfully say I'm on the editing phase of the last few chapters.

Wait...THE LAST FEW CHAPTERS?

YEAH I KNOW RIGHT???

*******************

The reason for this freak out is not because I'm almost done (satisfied with my work so far? Yes.) but because the last few chapters are as critical as the first few chapters. Just as the first few chapters make the reader read the rest of the novel, the last few chapters make them wondering for more as well.

So, let me just sprawl out my last few chapters ideas. I have two ways this can go.

1. Eventually, there's going to be a sequel and I can talk about some things that are going to be in the sequel in the last few chapters without revealing any plots.

2. Eventually, there's going to be a sequel so I don't want to reveal anything and keep it as close to the idea of book 1 as I possibly can but still add in the one marvel of the futuristic city that the characters of book 1 are all going to see at the end.

Both will have an end that obviously leads to another beginning.

I have option 1 in there right now and I'm not satisfied with it at all.

I might try option 2 even though there are some things in option 1 I really like and might want to keep for the future. When you're a writer, you have to be open to let go of your babies a.k.a the parts in the story that you really like and want to keep.

Actually, here's another option.

3. Yes they see the marvel, but just as they are about to see more, they are captured for some reason. MC is left wondering what will happen to them and whether or not he can fulfill his promise he made with his village leader.

Maybe that's more interesting...hmm...

Happy Writing, fellow writers :)

How to Edit (part 2): What to do with Details

I wrote an article about this before and I would like to, in a way, update the info there a bit. The reason is, I discovered more things during my own editing process (ongoing) and I would like to share my insights with you.

This is all about those details you put into your story in the beginning because you thought they were necessary. Most often I have found that these include the following:

In Defense of Made-Up Languages in Fiction: I'm Not a Linguist

Lord of the Rings. The author is a linguist. He's got experience making up a language. Elvish is awesome, I gotta say.

What about Star Trek? All those alien languages. Truly, some amazing imagination going on there.

But let's back up from all those big guys for a sec and think about people who are not linguists but who are tapping into making up a language.

Book Review: The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

This Book Review might be the only one or it may become a series depending on how fast I can get through the next one and whether or not I will have something to say about it. I have a lot of books to read so I might do another Book Review. If you are interested, keep on the look-out for them :)

WARNING: This might be a spoiler for some meaning that you might reconsider reading the book. Anyway, read at your own risk.

Would I recommend The Night Circus?

The answer would be,

About My Books (2017 July Update)

Never work on three projects at once...seems to be a common advice for writers.

Throw that garbage out the window! Not literally though.

No rule says you can't work on ten things at once if you think you can do it. But only if you think you can do it. Here's an update on the books I'm working on in order of importance.

The first one is...

How to...Keep Moving the Story Forward: a NaNoWriMo article

I talk about it a LOT in this blog. One way I say is to ask "who what when where why and how"? But there's another way to do it and I must confess, I just recently realized what it was I was doing.

The trick is

Types of Endings: The Last Lines

Congrats, you have successfully come to the end of your book.

Now all you need is a good ending.

But what kind of ending? All this time writing you may have never even considered what kind of ending to write. It was just all going to come to an end and everything was going to be all fine and peachy.

Endings aren't that simple though. Just as the beginning line, that first sentence, grips your reader and sends them off on an epic journey through the pages of your book and gives them many exciting, sleepless nights, the ending also has a function.

In fact, endings can have several functions. It all depends on how you want to send your reader off.

Through reading many, many books, here are some ending types I have found.

First, the typical,

Tips for CampNaNoWriMo

Welcome to this post, CampNaNoWriMoers.

I wouldn't call myself a veteran NaNoer but I have been through quite a few of them. And I know what you must be going through right now, trying to see into the future, one month later, when you have met your word count and feeling mighty proud of yourself...but then, there's that moment of doubt.

Can I do it? Me? Can I really commit to this? Am I serious enough to do it?

Getting those first few words down on the screen might be painful.

"Once upon a time... no that's not it. Jim was alone in the old cabin and...no that doesn't work. Where's my creative spark when I need it!"

And even if you get to 1,500 words, you still might wonder if you were in over your head when you signed up for this.

Someone of you may have even signed up with NO PLAN on how each chapter will go.

But don't fear! Here are some helpful tidbits (and an EXTREMELY IMPORTANT PLANNING TOOL at the end of this article).

These are little bits from other articles in this blog. If you would like to read the article the bits came from and learn a little more, I added the link :)


Just write even if it sounds stupid.

Google wallpaper in Google Images for visual inspiration.

Write the first part on paper. Apparently the act of writing by hand can keep you focused on your story and away from distractions. But don't feel obligated to write the whole story by hand :0
(From - How to: Start Writing Again)



If you have a plot line, write the climax scene first. The one where the MC is in such trouble. Make it your temporary "prologue" and go from there. Inspire yourself :)

Writers are often pressured not to write cliche. But for NaNo, you can write cliche. Use it to get you started.

Imagine you are watching your story. Imagine an opening scene in a movie. What do we see first? Describe that.
(From - How to: Begin Writing a New Story (5 Tips))



There are many different types of beginnings, as you may well know. Here are some for you to consider trying:

On main characters and focus characters.

Why should you even bother to have one main character? Can't you just write a story, stuff a bunch of point-of-views (POVs) in from a bunch of main characters and get on with it?

What is my story (really) about? The Struggle 2

At any stage when you write your story, you need to ask yourself "What is my story about?"

I have found, through my own experience writing one story for 7 years, that if you can't explain it in one sentence, you're still lost. And if you're lost, imagine what the reader must feel like... :0

No one wants to listen to you talk like a little kid explaining their dream they had last night, right?

Example:

Details in Conversation: A Discussion

So, I'm editing like crazy these days and one thing I started to do was to add more conversation and less "Interesting Tidbits".

Here are some Writerly Jargon and I'd like to add "Interesting Tidbits" as one.

Interesting Tidbits: Those details that the Author thinks is interesting and/or creative. Those details are only there because the Author wanted to show the reader some interesting detail about the story even though that detail does not make another appearance in the story. Those details are there because the Author is boasting how creative they are.

Admit it. I do that, you do that, we all do that, we are creative writers who love to show the world how creative we can be.

Now, to get back to the topic, I have started to replace details with conversation to MAKE THEM IMPORTANT.

To give an example,

How to Edit: What Details to Cut, What Details to Keep

In some stage in your editing process, you will find that you've got your story down and you know exactly how the beginning, middle, climax, and end are supposed to play out, you've got your world set up and your characters straight. The relationships between characters are so clear you can tell them to anyone.

Now you need to get rid of those details that hold the story back.

But how do you distinguish that from the details that you actually need?

Here's how.

Showing vs Telling: Examples and Exercise

This is to show you what showing and telling looks like side by side. Writing these up, for me, was certainly an exercise. I really needed to pay attention to show more for "Showing" and tell more for "Telling". I hope I did them both justice. Doing an exercise like this can really open your mind up to what showing or telling exactly feel like when you write them out.

The stories themselves, short and unfinished, are not from any story I have ever written. These were written on the spot but I hope you can get a gist of what showing and telling are.

To those of you who already are experts, let me know if I got them both right. Certainly there might be some mixing going on but the "Showing" to generally be only showing the story an the "Telling" should generally be only telling the story. To me, telling is like a kid telling a parent about a dream they had. "And then, I met a cat princess. And then the princess and I became sisters. And then we were flying in the sky. And then, we found a land of marshmallows. And then..."

So here are three stories each with a "Showing" version and a "Telling" version.

Story 1: A Winter Scene with Pigeons

Should I Edit My Story? Is it important?

The basic of basics of being a writer is that you need to edit.

Of course, if you have money, you can get a professional editor to help you out but still you should be able to at least do a basic edit yourself.

What is editing though? Well, here is a little introduction to editing for you newbies out there.

Is Editing...?

Is editing...

Can't Have it if it's (a) too expensive, (b) only for trade, (c) friends don't read

Writers, I am in that situation before publishing and I thought I'd let you into that world just so you know what you'll be up against if you decide to publish the traditional way.

The title to this post has three walls I'm facing.

(a) too expensive means that the editing services are too expensive. Even if it's only .75 to 2 or 3 cents per word, I have over 80,000 words. I mean...things add up and I haven't the money.

(b) only for trade means that I am on "Figment: Write Yourself In" a grand writing community site. But people will only edit your novel if you edit theirs, too. Right now aside from writing I'm also going to grad school and doing research for my thesis so a full edit of a whole novel is completely out of the question for me.

(c) friends don't read means that most of my friends don't read. And if you know about me from my other blog, "World Problems and Randomness", I live in Japan and most of my friends don't read English. Darn it.

So then why not my family? Well, my Mom said she'll read it when it's done but I don't think she'll edit it and asking your family to read is not such a good idea for two reasons: they will be soft on you and they haven't got the time.


The problem right now for me is to find some super bored person who will read my novel and edit it or at least tell me about any inconsistencies and stuff. Or, I'll just have to pay over a thousand bucks, which I ain't got and starve or somethin'.


Darn this whole thing.


But I'm gonna do it. I will, you'll see.


Happy Writing!


P.S.
If you're like me and your parents don't really approve of you writing a novel, it's hard to do anything that costs (editing services, online writing boot camp, going to literary conferences...) without them finding out because they still pay for your school.

NaNoWriMo CRUNCH: The last 5000 words

Hi there, fellow NaNoWriMo warriors! :D

How is your novel coming along? For those of you who have finished, lucky you, you can sit back and relax now. No, seriously, CONGRATS! :D

What about those of you still not there yet? Is the word count still too far away? Well, just do your absolute best. Even if you don't make it in the end, at least you tried :) And, there's always next year!

What about those of you, like me, who are down to writing the last 5000 or so words?

This is the NaNoWriMo CRUNCH. The second big one besides that time of Writer'sblockitis danger.

For me, anyway,

NaNoWriMo CRUNCH: 3 Ways to Keep Going

CRUNCH! Nope, not cereal or Captain Crunch. This is about Writer'sblockitis during, oh please no but it does happen, NaNoWriMo.

I'm doing NaNo now. Currently about 20,000 words and no, not suffering from Writer'sblockitis but I have experienced this during NaNo. But I still became a WINNER.

How did I do it???

Well, there is an important thing that I keep telling myself when I feel like I'm getting to that CRUNCH in NaNoWriMo. That is,

First Time NaNoWriMo: Prepping

With NaNoWriMo around the bend in four or five days, I thought I'd tell those of you who are doing it for the first time, how you should prep yourself for it.

I'm guessing you're at the end of your own personal prepping but here are a few things I do that have helped for many NaNoWriMo tries and this time as well.

1. Use the Story Outline Template

2. Look up images in Google Images that represent or loosely represent the many places you want to write about. It's good to get a visual on it.

3. Make folders and sort the pics in them.
Example: Village, Mystic Creatures, Main Character Sketch, the Main Square

4. Do a few doodles of your characters but don't push yourself to come up with the perfect look. You can always come up with the details later while you write.

5. Leave it alone but keep contemplating on it. Don't think too deeply about it until you actually need to write it.

6. Work on other projects to get a boost for your writing momentum. Writing for a whole month after having not written for weeks can be hard on you because you might end up suffering from Writer'sblockitis and get nowhere, ending up just wasting your time. To not waste your time, write little stories, even one-page short stories to keep that writing momentum. Another thing you can do is read books that inspire you or watch movies that inspire you.

IMPORTANT TIP:

Care for my MC! Care for him, I say!

What is going on with me and my novel? Well, first, I'd like to say that I finished reading the "Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children" series and realized one thing at the end of the books, I cared about what was going to happen to the MC. Will he be okay? What about him and Emma? What will happen with them?

And as it so often happens with me since I started seriously writing my novel, many of the books that I read teach me something.

For instance, Peculiar Children books taught me that in order for a book to be read worthy, there are many things it has to have and one of them is an MC that the reader will care about.

Now, I recently read another book called "Skinned" and if you want to know what cliche looks like in its most natural form, you should read it. It's about a popular girl who lost everything after an accident and is now just a mind in a body and then she runs away from home after losing yet everything else including her family's love. It's a series but you can kind of tell that sooner or later they will start opposing the government. If you read it, you'll know what I'm talking about.

This book showed me how not to write an MC. I couldn't connect to her. She lost her popularity; that was how the book starts. The reader is taken through what her life used to be because she keeps remembering it and having flashbacks and wishing again that she was the center of attention and how everyone looked up to her and all that jazz.

But I just couldn't really feel sorry for her.

Typically, the popular girl in books is mean so...that was stuck in my head and it didn't seem like she was any different. I didn't even feel sorry for her when her boyfriend left her (spoiler). I was more like, well, she kind of deserved it! And when she started to fall in love maybe with this geek guy who is all timid but fascinated in her (robot kind of thing) and then they kiss but because she's just mind and not body, she doesn't know what to do with her lips and stuff and has to think about it, I was like,

"Oh yeah here you just throw in the romance for the sake of it. She's just gonna end up joining that weird group that enjoys their immortal lives by having fun to the extreme and for some strange reason she refuses to join them in the beginning and she is pathetically trying to get her popular life back..."

Sorry, that book just really wasn't doing any amazing ish for me :/ I don't read many bad books but the blurb made it SOUND interesting...

Let's get back on track. I didn't care about her so I didn't care what she did or what happened to her or if she contributed to the story at all.

Jacob, the MC in Peculiar Children, I cared about. What was going to happen to him?

What of my own story? My MC, Belome, I thought about him. He was supposed to be like a cowardly failure who is self-conscious of his weight yet manages to joke about it sometimes. He has friends and is genuinely a friendly guy but he can't speak up for himself. He doesn't have much confidence either.

Yet from the first chapter I have him as this semi-confident guy who gets to dance with the girl he likes and even gets to show off his own dancing skills.

Throughout the story we are suppose to see him develop into a guy who can stand up for himself and say things and maybe even save the day. Well, MAYBE.

But it wasn't believable and it wasn't dramatic enough. I had to make him miserable.

I'm not saying EVERY SINGLE MC in the world of books should be miserable so we can like them more but it is true how people seem to be nicer or feel sympathy for someone who is humble or who doesn't have much confidence.

To sum up, I had to make my MC a failure, a coward, a timid guy, unable to really stand up for himself, and one that generally tries to avoid being the center of attention when there are a whole bunch of people around him. That way the reader can feel "Oh yay! :D " when he does things out of his comfort zone driven by his genuine care for others, love for his family, kindness to friends...and then little by little he is SUPPOSED to start standing up for himself.

Yes, this is the way it should be. We have to see the change in him. I need to make sure that his confidence toward the end of the story makes sense. This is where I am, guys. Wish me luck :/ I'm trying to finish it before NaNoWriMo because I have an epic story in mind.