McAnally's (The Community Pub) > Author Craft
Author In Progress
som1luvsmi:
Hi Everybody! ;D
Well, it seems that I've had a little bit of a late start compared to some of the people here. I'm 28 and writing has always come pretty easily to me when given a topic, but it's not until recently that I decided to open up my imagination to others. I have four kids (3,5,7,and 9) so, most of my writing is done at night and in the wee hours of the morning. The story I'm working on now is, I guess, kind of an urban fantasy where all sorts of supernaturals reside along the edges of the mortal realm. The MC is a girl who's lost her memory and sets out to find her past. Obviously there's more, I just tend to get too detailed if I keep going. :) I've actually found Jim's LiveJournal blogs really, REALLY helpful.
I'm very excited to be in touch with other writers and look forward to talking to everybody!
belial.1980:
Hey, som1luvsmi, I'm sort of in the same boat as you. I'm a few weeks shy of 29 and have been writing on and off for most of my life. I really got interested when I took a writing course in college.
I wrote a few times a week, but didn't really start to develop good writing habits till about two and a half years ago when I started making myself write every day, even if it's just a page about how crappy my day was, lol. I've tried to read a lot more, as well, and I think that's really helped drive my imagination.
My first "manuscript" (if you want to even call it that) was basically Paradise Lost, as told through the eyes of the fallen angel, Belial. I hacked away at that for about 2 years, and somehow managed to crank out a 350 page monstrosity that's so rough it's barely even readable in some places. I like the concept and would like to come back to it, but I definitely bit off more than I could chew with that one.
My current project's coming along much better. I started about a year ago, and worked on it off and on between writing and editing short stories. After reading Jim's blog on writing, I picked it back up in February and have been at it ever since. My initial problem was that I didn't know exactly what I wanted to do, or who the antogonist was, and was trying to push too much character growth into too short of a time.
I wrote oodles of background information, and it came out much better than I'd anticipated or hoped for, and really helped set the flavor and tone of the narritive. Additionally I wrote some character bios, and without even trying to, managed to establish a lot of ties between characters, thereby giving them more motivation to do the things they do. So, at long last I've got everything pointed in the right direction. I'm about 220 pages in, and am starting to tromp through the deeper parts of "The Swampy Middle." I'm intimidated, but I know where I need to take the readers and I'll keep pushing till I get there.
meg_evonne:
--- Quote from: som1luvsmi on April 25, 2009, 02:23:19 AM ---:) I've actually found Jim's LiveJournal blogs really, REALLY helpful.
I'm very excited to be in touch with other writers and look forward to talking to everybody!
--- End quote ---
--- Quote from: belial.1980 on April 26, 2009, 12:28:33 AM ---So, at long last I've got everything pointed in the right direction. I'm about 220 pages in, and am starting to tromp through the deeper parts of "The Swampy Middle." I'm intimidated, but I know where I need to take the readers and I'll keep pushing till I get there.
--- End quote ---
Welcome to both of you. Isn't it great that Jim's set a place for writers to share? Delighted that you both have ingested Jim's writing craft postings. Reading those excited me and drove me to level up on my own craft skills. Keep us posted, okay? Best wishes.
thausgt:
Perrin Rynning, here. 38 years old, dealing with the itch to write for most of that span. My stories tend to come directly from the role-playing game sourcebooks that I read for enjoyment. Considering that RPGs are designed to help folks create interesting characters, worlds, etc., I suppose it shouldn't be surprising. This creates its own challenges: properly attributing (or hiding) the sources.
Yes, I have a few "dark urban fantasy" stories kicking about, usually focusing on magic-wielding modern humans; not real big on vamps, and I prefer my werewolves to be shamanic defenders of nature and spirit (thank you, Werewolf: the Apocalypse).
The most common themes in my work are "overcoming flaws" and "redemption". One story in my current pipeline features a wizard who specializes in sensory magic to compensate for the fact that an earlier encounter left him with no eyes. Another is set in a culture where vengeance is considered an art and a virtue. And, of course, more than a few of my characters wear longcoats and make their living by solving other people's problems (cue "Peter Gunn Theme"...)
By and large, I get positive responses when my work gets reviewed, so maybe I actually have picked up a few tricks about what does and does not constitute good writing. I tend to get scenes, snippets of dialogue, and other fragments of good stories on a very regular basis. My "writer's idea file" holds scraps going back for at least a decade...
Now, if only I could actually finish something I write, then *choke* fame and *cough* fortune would be mine! ;D
daylightdreamer:
Hey all!
I'm so glad I found this forum. I've been a Jim Butcher fan for a few years now, but just recently found his live journal and this forum. In any case...
Hey, I'm Erika and I'm a soon-to-graduate (graduating a semester early in December, hopefully) English Major with an Emphasis in Creative Writing (ooo, doesn't that sound fancy?). I've been interested in writing since I was in middle school when I had to do a lot of it for one of my English classes and I also stumbled into the realm of fan fiction. My teacher at the time told me I had a lot of potential, and writing soon became about all I ever wanted to do.
I've started (and shortly there after abandoned, after either getting lost in or scared of the GSM) several novels, but just lacked the commitment to continue with them. Plus, I'll admit, they really were terrible. I've discovered that writing high fantasy and writing in the third person are both difficult for me, so now I'm beginning anew after writing several short pieces of fiction and finding my voice in first person contemporary fantasy.
I'm currently working on a piece under the working title Stars Never Rise which I hope to complete this summer (lofty goal, but I'm a college student and other than work, I'll have plenty of time). I've got about four and a half chapters, but then I realized that I really haven't outlined this story properly, so in order to avoid getting lost in the GSM, I'm taking Jim's advice and doing some serious outlining at the moment. Then I'll get back to the fun part. ;)
In any case, Stars Never Rise is a story written from the point of view of Roderick, a vampire who's been exiled from his home territory on a false charge and his struggle to get back at the jerk who landed him out in Suburbia and get back home as well. It's a sort of Urban/Suburban fantasy set in the Chicago/Milwaukee area (because that's where I live currently and they say write what you know) and I'm really excited about it.
If you're at all interested, I've got the first chapter posted and some other random, mostly writing related journaling on my live journal, which can be found here http://starsneverrise3.livejournal.com/
Feel free to go and add me as a friend and pester me to look over your stuff if you have a live journal for similar reasons. :) I need more writer friends to keep me on task for this whole thing and I love reading what other people are working on and I'm always willing to give feedback. I've been doing it for my major in college for a couple years now, so I've been told I'm getting pretty good at it ;)
Look at me ramble...I'll stop now. Thanks for reading if you made it this far.
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
[*] Previous page
Go to full version