Regrouping

This is just a quick and personal blog from me…

Finding your space

I finally feel as though I have started regrouping… even if it’s only a little bit.

We have just been away down in the Marlborough sounds as there was work that needed to be done. Michael worked his backside off chopping down some incredibly big pines, while I tried to provide support to my cousin, who is feeling incredibly strung out. (She was in Christchurch.)

While thinking about Tales for Canterbury, I sifted through some of my older short story work, and I came to the realisation that I really don’t need to regurgitate it into something else, so I’ve figured that I will dream up new little pearls to send through.

But aside from all that, I feel as though I have actually stopped and caught my breath. And after that – I feel a lot better. Renewed energy so to speak. You see, I was feeling a little drained, and drowning in floods of work. Not only writing work, but real work, as well as reviewing work…. And then anything else I decide to tackle on top of that as well.  I think that I would cope a lot better if I was a full-time writer working from home. But until I win Lotto, I doubt that’s going to happen in the near future…

So as writers… how to we regroup?

Throwing ideas around...

Well, I know that with me, I just really need to take time out from the rest of the world. This means ceasing all email, texting, internet, and even the TV. For those of you who know me well, you’ll know that I watch hardly any TV, unless Mike has it on in the room. I do, however, love watching movies. But during the weekend, I didn’t watch any movies. The only TV that I watched was the press releases from Canterbury… and that was about it. I did get a lot of reading done, a bit of character development stuff, and thought about life – a lot.

I think that it’s only natural to think about life when some sort of disaster occurs. Today, I am thinking that I really have to send my manuscript through to someone who has been requesting it since December! *blushes* I know. I am a slacker. Sometimes I just don’t know what I’m afraid of.

But anyway – I’d better get on with it. I have work to start for the week… and the piles are looming.

 

Tales for Canterbury

Publishing an Anthology: Tales for Canterbury – All proceeds to Red Cross Canterbury Earthquake Appeal. Seeking Stories.

This is an idea that a NZ writer came up with last night, and since then – it’s escalated. So – I’m going to throw this out there. If you have any further queries about it, feel free to email Cassie and she will be happy to answer:

Christchurch, New Zealand, and the wider Canterbury region, was rocked yesterday (22.2.11) by another round of serious earthquakes. This time they struck during the middle of the day causing more devastation, and loss of life, to a city still trying to pick up the pieces from last September’s quakes.

In an attempt to do something, anything, to make a difference, we are putting together an anthology of short stories loosely themed around survival, hope and the future. All profits of this anthology will be donated to the Red Cross Earthquake Appeal, or another registered charity aimed at aiding those in need in Canterbury.

The purpose of this Anthology is two-fold—to help financially, but also, we hope, to provide entertainment and alleviation in a time of crisis. We hope that our words will help make a difference.

We have already begun to approach authors, and the response is encouraging. Mainly due to time pressures, this anthology will be by invitation. However, if you are an established writer, and keen to contribute, please feel free to get in touch with us at just.cassie.hart@gmail.com. We are looking for stories between 1,500 and 5,000 words, of fairly upbeat nature in the general, literary, science fiction or fantasy genres.

 

Stories of Disaster

Out of disasters, whether they are natural or not, come stories.

As many of you know, I am a New Zealand resident. Yesterday – five and a half months after our last big quake… we had another one. The impact of this quake is so much worse, even though it was less on the Richter scale. The key difference in this one was that everyone was out and about. People were at work, visitors and tourists were around, your usual run-about-town people, families and parents with their children, and half the office blocks were on their lunch-breaks. You see… this quake happened at 12.51pm in the afternoon. The last quake happened at 4.35am while everyone was at home and in bed.

Christchurch Cathedral

Quite naturally, my fellow New Zealanders and I are in shock about what’s happened. There are many people missing, others trapped in buildings, and of course, people’s homes have been destroyed. Roads are incredibly unsafe to travel on, flooding is occurring from the rivers and from broken infrastructure pipes, and we also have the added risk of liquefaction occurring.

But all that being said, there is a whole nation standing behind the city of Christchurch trying to help. Calls are out there for people to donate not just money, but also other more personal assets that they have such as blood, time, sweat, and tears. Our wonderful neighbouring nations are offering and sending help in these times. As they have in the past, and as we hope they will in the future – as we will with them.

Stories are reaching our ears of their experiences are all shocking, devastating, and by some fate of silver lining – they are also inspiring. Stories of survival, stories of loss. Everyone in New Zealand have their stories to tell today that are in direct relation to the earthquake. I even have mine.

The cathedral in ruins - 22 Feb 2011

Members of my family live in Christchurch, as well as friends. I thank the gods that my family are safe. I received a text message from my cousin within thirty minutes of the quake to get me to pass the message on to the rest of my family on their behalf. Considering the telecommunications were pretty much knocked out, this was incredible, and relieving. I got the last messages from the rest of my family members last night to say they were safe.

In the car this morning, I passed a huge convoy of emergency response and military vehicles on their way to assist. It warms my heart that they are going down there to help. As I was listening to the radio in the car, I heard a recording of a woman on there. The message was recorded yesterday afternoon after the quake, and her 9 month old grandson had just died, and no help could get to them. It was so heart breaking; I ended up having a good cry in the car with my friend who carpools into work with us.

Then when I was standing in the local 24-hour store buying the paper, a woman looked at me and burst into tears. She has a daughter living in Christchurch, and cannot get hold of her. She has worried herself sick all night, hardly slept, and is emotionally overwrought. Needless to say, I found myself embracing this stranger in desperate need of comfort.

When disaster strikes, we tend to find comfort with strangers. These are the bonds that tie us together to stand up and be strong. There is a Maori saying in New Zealand, which is ‘Kia Kaha.’ The translation of this is, ‘Stand Strong’. All over New Zealand, our Kiwi nation is giving this exact message to the Christchurch people.  Shouts of it are all over the social networks, via text messaging, media, and through word of mouth.

And like a phoenix rising from the ashes, so will this fair city, together with the bonds of an entire nation standing right behind them.

Kia Kaha Christchurch, your stories will live on within our memories.

 

Writing like Cassandra Clare

The first three books of The Mortal Instruments

I have just finished re-reading the first three books of The Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare. I first read these books in 2009, and completely devoured them within about two days. This time, I took my time, and spent the energy that the series deserved to read it. I can honestly say that I will never ever stop buying Cassandra’s work… well, that’s as long as she keeps writing and publishing!

I love Cassandra’s work. She spends time developing the characters, just to show you that they are not perfect, but that you can relate to each one of their flaws on the character level.

Her genre style is Urban-Fantasy, which is the same genre that I am trying to write a series in. In Book Three of the series though, she does flip into the more Fantasy side.

But regardless of all this, I want to write like her! I first started writing the Talent series in June 2009. When I read her series at the end of 2009, I thought ‘Wow, I want to be just like her – but with my own stories and characters.’ Her writing is inspiring. I didn’t feel this way when I read the Twilight series, or even the Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy. Not like this. Of course there are similarities throughout all these books, in that they deal with love, adventure, good people, bad people, the unwavering bonds of friendship, and the supernatural – in a sense. But this… is different.

But what makes her different as a writer? I really and truly believe that it’s Cassandra Clare’s ‘voice’. No character sounds the same, yet her narrative style flows throughout the books, linking them together in a lovely familiar way. And that’s what I want to achieve within my own work.

I want to have a lovely, familiar voice for my characters to dance around. And I’m hoping this will be the same voice that will wrap itself around my readers to guide them on their journey through my worlds.

 

Climbing the mountain

Last week my grandmother phoned me and asked if I would like to go and climb the highest peak on the Island just off our coast. Since we have been trying to go there for the past two years, I jumped at the opportunity. I was delighted to find out that my cousins would be joining us for the journey.

So early on Sunday morning we set off for our family adventure. Kapiti Island, off the coast of where I live, is a wildlife sanctuary for native birds and bush. It has a lot of history linked to it – much to do with settler trading, whaling, and Maori leaders, and it also has a great spiritual association for many New Zealanders. 

Looking south towards Kapiti Island

It stands majestically, rising out of the sea, often with misty cloud surrounding it. There is nothing quite like standing on our beach, looking out at it. In fact, there have been times when I have driven the car down to the beach, parked up, and opened my laptop to write.

But despite the fact that I can write on the beach while overlooking the island… while I was there, I did not feel the inspiration to write. I’m sure that it would probably inspire other people to write there. I can imagine that there are oodles of poetry out there about the island.

My focus wasn’t on writing (like it usually is), but entirely on getting my backside up the mountain. It was the challenge that I was mentally prepared to take on. Not only that, but my 82-year-old and legally blind grandmother wanted to get up there as well. It was the drive and passion of my grandmother that got me thinking about writing. Here is a woman who raised a her siblings in the guts of war and the depression, married, took on the raising of her husband’s split family, had more of her own children, and now has a lot to do with all of her grandchildren’s raising and education. A busy woman all of her life, yet she still makes the time to walk and hike some of the hardest trails in New Zealand. In the past when I have asked her about how she has managed to do it, she has turned to me and said, “Oh, you know, one walk at a time.”

Rex - the Kaka parrot on Kapiti Island

This is the same for a writer’s journey. One word at a time. One story at a time. One book at a time. It’s a bit like climbing a mountain with each novel written. At the start, it’s all uphill and hard work. I would say that the ascent would take approximately two thirds of the book to write, and on the way you have met many different characters. Then you are at the peak, and your writer’s spirit is peaking. You know that as you look down, you know how far you have come. And there is only one way back, and that’s downhill. This is your home straight – even if the pathway isn’t actually that straight.

You have done all of the hard work getting up there, and now you deserve to reward yourself with the satisfying walk back down. Looking at those points and pathways that you have already covered… tying everything together, and trying not to trip over any rocks and tree-roots that are constant obstacles to navigate. And then once you get back down to ground level, you look back at that great achievement.

You know how hard the journey was, but you have accomplished it. Yes, you are a bit battered and bruised. Muscles that you never knew you had, are kindly letting you know that you have worked your backside off. Climbing a mountain is like writing a novel.

It has its peaks, troughs, and challenges. But one step at a time is equal to one word. And you can only move onwards and upwards. Keep climbing, keep writing, keep dreaming.

 

Writer’s Block and Foundation Stones

A lot of writers suffer from something commonly known as ‘Writer’s Block’. I have in fact used the term myself. But that was back when I couldn’t identify why it was happening.

Then I discovered that it wasn’t writer’s block at all. I suffered from something a little different… something I like to call ‘Middle Book Blues’. I’m pretty sure that I didn’t coin that phrase… but that’s what it’s called to me.

Middle Book Blues is when I get to the middle stages of the book that I am writing, and I start to hit snags. This is when each word that I write seems crap, and I don’t think that it advances the plot, the characters, and I feel as though I am running to nowhere. But I know that I have to continue writing, or else I’ll never write my way out of it. But throughout that whole time, I feel like rubbish.

Times are dark and dreary in the Middle Book Blues. I’m usually rather grumpy around the house, and in my real life. The Evil Day Job suddenly doesn’t seem so evil at all. My Husband is more than aware of my tortured artist mood-swings, and he kindly distracts me with all sorts of distracting paraphernalia like movies, buying me new books to read, house DIY things… and then slowly but surely, I work my way out of it. Sometimes it’s a massive blast of inspiration, where I just need to get home, close the door, and write. Other times the ideas start slowly, as I re-piece together my plotlines and characters. But however it happens… it always works out for the best.

There have been times in the early life of my writing career that I actually used to stop writing, file the book away, and start a new one. Then I would find that the new one was all shiny, new, and interesting… until I would develop Middle Book Blues again, and start another new novel. Needless to say, there are a number of novels sitting on my computer systems that are half finished.

I know. You’re saying, “What a waste!”

But if the truth be told, I wouldn’t be the writer I am today without having written these half-finished manuscripts.

Many of these manuscripts have been building blocks and obstacles that I have had to climb through and over in order to write the way that I do today. They are the foundation stones of my ideas, and writerly processes. I have often thought that perhaps I should bring them out into the light, dust them off, and have a decent look at them… but we all know that you shouldn’t shake or rattle the foundations. But one day, I will step outside of my carefully built comfort zone, shake my own foundations, and see what falls out. Because who knows what worlds I might stumble upon. They may be glorious… or they may be dark, dreary, and awful. But regardless of what happens, the memories of those foundations will always be there to support me.

 

Climbing out of the world… the tortured artist

As a writer, you have to move your mind-set between different worlds – constantly. This is all part of the creative process. One of the biggest things that I have difficulty with is when I’m interrupted in the middle of a thought by someone or something. This could be the telephone ringing, someone walking into the room, or a text message coming in.

When I am writing, as you probably know from a previous post, I control the noise around me by listening to music. If I am deep in another world, thinking about how to advance storylines, or scenes, I find these interruptions extremely difficult to deal with. Suddenly I am not in the creative world where I need to be, but I am kicking and screaming my way to the surface of reality because someone feels the need to engage with me.

Today, I look worse than this...

The fact that someone would have the audacity to step into a writer’s own personal mind-set and creative space, while they are trying to channel different ideas enrages me. Yes, right now, they probably don’t understand… but right now I am a little enraged and frustrated. You see, just this instant, my flatmate came home from work. I couldn’t hear her through the house because my music was up… she gave me the shock of a lifetime because she yelled across my library at me from the doorway, and then once my heart had started to settle, her friend walked into my personal space as well. They then had the cheek to ask me if I was busy.

Could they not see me bent over scattered pieces of paper trying to sort out my plotlines. Could they not see the pen behind my ear, with another in my hand? Could they not see my laptop blazing with literary life in front of me? But more importantly, did it look like I having a party in my library by myself with nothing else to do? No, I very much doubt that. What it looks like is a writer, with very messy unwashed hair, glasses perched crookedly on her nose, dressed in a ratty singlet and the comfiest pants she’s got, trying to get some work done. Now you know it’s not all glamorous.

So now that I have got this all off my chest, I am going to once again climb back down into my worlds, and pray that they don’t interrupt me again today. There is a lot of work to get through… that if I don’t get it done this afternoon and tonight, I’m not going to be able to look at it for another two days.

Thanks for hearing me out… Ciao xx

 

Many ideas… so little time

I am in constant awe of those writers who can pump out blog after blog, and still have time to write novel upon novel.

Epiphany anyone?

There are some blogging challenges out there that are a ‘blog-a-day’ or ‘blog-a-week’ challenges. These are the challenges that some of my friends are actively participating in during 2011. Like many writers, they pluck their ideas out of the ether of their surrounds, and blog it out there for the whole world to read.

I am jealous. I find that when I have a blog idea, I think that I could never forget it. But once again… Much to my disappointment, I have. The inspiring blogging moment that had my creative brain in a whirlwind of activity has come and gone. Bugger. (ß Very common NZ slang…. I know that I probably shouldn’t use profanity on here…)

So I now know that blogging a lot of the time are fleeting moments of inspiration that I’ll just have to jot down in the future in order not to forget them. I’m going to have to start up a new system somewhere in my notebooks for it. There are so many ideas out there, it’s up to me to capture them, and store them somewhere until I have the time to write them out. If you ever want to read some incredible blogs – just take a look at my blog roll to the right hand side of this screen. Each of those people have extremely targeted and focussed blogs. And they publish new blogs, if not every day, then every other day. Each of those bloggers are incredibly talented, some even award winning.

Always on the go...

I read copious amounts of material. This is another activity that takes up huge amounts of time. During the day at my Evil Day Job (EDJ) I send home many links to information on the web of articles that I need to read to stay on top of my chosen craft. Do I get through it all? Not always. Each night when I get home from work, I open up my email accounts, and start reading my way through it all. Then I either file it away if I think it’s useful, or I dump it. When I’m not catching up on the reading, I’m normally chatting away to my writers groups, developing characters, doing research, or even just chilling out reading a good book. I consistently read novels at night before I drift off to sleep. And if I don’t get all my reading done, then I take it with me where ever I go, just in case there is a chance that I can harness a small snippet of time to inhale more knowledge and information.

And then… after all this, I have my own work to write as well. I have books to produce, readers to please, but most of all – the self-satisfaction and balance that it provides me. So not only to I work in the corporate EDJ world for forty hours a week… I like to be able to put in at least another twenty-five hours a week to the reading and writing that I have dedicated myself to. My husband, who is a sporty health freak, thinks that I’m nuts. He constantly says to me, “You spend eight hours a day in front of a computer at work… how can you possibly stand to even start up your computer at home?”

Easily. I’m on a mission.

“If you don’t have time to read, you don’t have the time (or the tools) to write. Simple as that.” — Stephen King

 

The lives of our characters

A couple of my writing buddies very recently suggested that we set up a group on Facebook for our characters to interact in. I was a little confused to start with (sleep deprivation I think…) and didn’t initially understand the concept. Then another friend did a great blog post on it, which clarified the whole thing immediately. You can see her post here: Facebook for your fiction by Kim Koning.

Now there are a bunch of writers on Facebook with their characters running around… and with all those vibrant and eclectic personalities – who knows what sort of trouble our characters might get into!

Another writing friend of mine didn’t know it was my character, when my character asked her to be a friend on Facebook. I found this all rather amusing, especially when she was saying that he was a gorgeous lad, and basically asking if he was a Valentines gift for her.

It got me thinking about the fact that we all build characters for our creative writing adventures, but how many of us really know and picture them. When I start writing a new book, one of the first things I do when planning is a few character profiles. Each time new characters walks into the scene, I create a new one for those new personalities. Character profiling is one of the things I really love about the writing process. I take bits and pieces of personality from different people, or people I have observed, and mix them in together. Voila. A part of this process is gathering visual representation of each character. When I find good photos of people online (generally famous people) I can then start moulding personalities to them, and working out how these new fictional people can fit into the puzzle of the storyline and novel that lies ahead of me.

I have a million different character developing sheets that I use for this process, but when I’m drafting up a quick profile – I use this template to quickly get my ideas down: Quick Add Example

To store all the masses of information that I accumulate while writing, I use this incredible little system called Microsoft OneNote. Fabulous creation. It’s an electronic notebook that is part of Microsoft Office. You can build different notebooks for different things. I have one for each of my novels, each with their own tabbed sections, e.g. Plot Ideas, Character profiles, Research. Under each of those sections I have different pages built in – e.g. Wiki pages on a cathedral in Italy, or Skateboarding techniques and tricks. Honestly, it’s the easiest and most filing effective way I have ever encountered for my research. Then at the end of the book, I can either chose to dump it… but I prefer to PDF everything, and store it as a document bank in my back-up files.

In terms of having good-looking characters to play with? I might be a dreamer when it comes to character development… but at leave I’ve always got something decent to look at while I’m writing. J

 

Pandora, Summer, Ollie, Sebastian, and Gabriel

 

In a world of Urban-Fantasy

In the lyrical words of Chris Brown, “Where do we go from here… I want the whole world to show.”

Book Two

I am just about to finish off my first round of ‘cleansing’ edits on my second urban-fantasy novel by weeding out the rubbish words, and planting in new and brilliant ones. This book is part of a trilogy that I started writing in 2009. When I first started writing this fantastical series, I knew exactly where I was going with it. Now, shadows of doubt have started to ingrain their way into my writers mind. The series is probably starting to go senile since it’s taking me so long to write!

This is the first time I have ever tried to write urban-fantasy, and to be honest, I really struggled when I first started writing it. My friend told me years ago that I should try my hand at it, and so I eventually did. Traditionally, I write thrillers. This is a thriller series in a way, but I struggle with trying to form some sort of conclusion of each book without giving the whole plot away.

There are just so many different pathways that this series could tumble down. I could turn all my characters over to the dark side, or I could throw them all into the light. But I seriously doubt that they could eventually all come to an agreement to get on with each other for the rest of their lives. Differences in beliefs, lifestyles, habits, and all the rest of those human characteristics appear to be standing in the way. ‘But who cares,’ you say. ‘You’re only on book two – there is a whole other book that you can work out the finer details in.’

Quite right, there is another book.

I don’t want this journey for my characters to seem too obvious. It could be disappointing for readers. I never want to hear someone in passing say – “Oh, Leigh K Hunt’s work? Yeah, I could’ve written that rubbish. So predictable!”

It’s the writer inside of me that is wrought with worry. A natural response, since I want it to be perfect. But everyone knows that there is no such thing as ‘perfection’. A form of acceptability only comes with rounds and rounds of editing and refining.

So, anyway. Now that I have all this off my chest, I’m going to get back to finishing off my editing. Then I am going to seriously focus on which pathway I am taking. Brainstorming, mind-mapping, and listening to my own instincts will hopefully allow me to mentally walk all pathways. But who knows… my characters might protest and get the better of me, therefore taking me in a completely different direction. We will see.

But first, I need chocolate…