Friday 28 March 2014

In three days time...

Camp NaNo starts and I have decided that yes, I am going to take part. Until University has finished however, there shall be no details on what this piece is, just know, that I am doing it for my degree. *sigh* Anyway, I have decided to take part and it will be the case of writing a second draft of the story (I did the first draft in November) so, after a few months of thinking about it and hating it, I will be re-writing it.

Yeah.

I also have an ask.fm acount - go find it on my "About" page if you guys have any questions. They can be anonymous or not.

But yeah.

So, next month should be full of updates of me writing, banging my head against the wall, more writing and so forth.

Happy writing.

Thursday 20 March 2014

April NaNo?

Should I do April Camp NaNoWriMo? I have been asking myself this question since it first appeared in my Twitter feed at the start of the month. This is my final year of Uni and despite how tempting it would be to do NaNo, should I try to put my effort into my work first?

But NaNo is a way for me to get some really, good writing down in a limited space. So it could serve as a welcome break from Uni.

But what would I do? A second draft of Redux? Something else? Something new? Do I want to add that stress to my mind? I already have 50+ characters running around in there, do I want more?

Ugh..

I'll decide on April 1st - when I panic and start hitting buttons.

I wonder if you guys are going to take part?

Happy Writing.

Sunday 16 March 2014

I think I did it.

Finally, after sitting and staring, thinking, re-starting, muttering, cursing, sighing, wincing, pulling faces and internally crying, I think I managed a new start to Redux. Aries. 

As I said, I wanted to get a new start going before March ended and it's only the 16th. So I have succeeded. I also said that I would show you the new start, so, here ya' go. The fourth/fifth attempt at starting Redux: 


Charlie focused her blue eyes on the vastness of empty space before her and tried not to think about the lack of coffee in her cup. Despite the fact that it was nearing one in the morning and she’d be warned by Rhodes, their on board head Doctor, not to drink caffeine at such irregular intervals. But Charlie loved the dark substance too much.
            And they would be back on solid ground in less than three days anyway. A smile curled her lips as she sunk further into the pilot’s seat. Her feet were crossed at the ankles and propped on the control panel, a bad habit she’d picked up from Zach, her pilot, and let her close for a brief moment. She let the light hum of the ships engines lull through her, settle deep and low in the depths of her bones and provide a comfort to her. It wasn’t anything noticeable, but once you’d been flying in space, deep space for years, a person started to feel it.
            She opened her eyes again and looked at the screens in front of her. The entire wall before her was a slight with four large screens that showed the view to each side of her ship Redux. Once they were back in flight the views would change to the front of the ship across all four screens. The stars winked at her. They spoke of untold secrets waiting to be discovered. But the stark contrast of the pervading black turned her stomach with an uneasy jump. The black went on forever.
            Those thoughts were shook from her head and replaced with the idea of fresh oxygen, rather than the recycled air the crew were forced to breathe so far away from Earth. Fresh food rather than the re-heated food packages. And Arreton lake. It had double in size over the years and Charlie loved to spend her time off in the quiet areas of Hale Common. The small area had withstood time and despite the fact that it was quiet and almost deserted at the best of times, it was one of the few places she could keep to herself.
            The cup that sat in her hands, cradled against her chest to trap some of the warmth inside, was brought to her lips. She pushed a loose strand of blonde hair behind her ear and eyed the little clock in the corner of the bottom right screen. Twelve fifty three. Usually one of her pilots would be on duty, but both had been pulling awkward shifts that she hadn’t authorised. The first few days back on Earth were always spent with them sorting out their sleeping and Charlie would often shoo them to their rooms. Her sleep cycle could be sacrificed. Theirs couldn’t. 
            She sipped at the last dregs of warm coffee and pulled the still warm cup to her chest with pursed lips. 

Happy Writing. 

Thursday 13 March 2014

Always awkward

One thing that I always find awkward about writing, which I'm sure all of us have had to face at one point in their life, is the need to act out a scene. 

You stand up and pace around your room, kitchen or bathroom as a character in a scene you're stuck on because that's the only way to go forward. You can't just sit and stare at your laptop or computer screen, waiting for the scene to take place in your head. 

Even then you find yourself sometimes lying/standing/leaning in awkward positions to see how it would physically feel to be that character. I'm sure we've all done silly things where nobody could see us right? And why? For the sake of writing! 

It only becomes even more awkward when somebody walks in and your halfway through doing something and you stand there, you make eye contact, you smile awkwardly and try to brush it off as doing something else, something not so weird

If you tell me you've never done any such thing, I'm gonna call you a liar. We're all guilty of this, or at least, most of us are to a degree right?

Happy Writing. 

Tuesday 11 March 2014

14 weeks

There are 14 weeks worth of words for you guys to read and like/hate/dislike/never recommend of my work in progress weekly writing project The Youngest Guardian.

Seriously, it would mean a lot if you guys could check it out: http://penguinsandninjas.wordpress.com/ That's the website. If you want to see the first week of the actual fiction piece, here ya go: http://penguinsandninjas.wordpress.com/first-draft/week-1/

Thank you.

Happy Writing.

Tuesday 4 March 2014

Two ways to approach writing characters

I may have discussed this before, I may not have. But I want to talk about it now. In my opinion, and in my experience with talking to people and discussing this kind of topic, I want to summarise the two approaches I think a person can take to writing characters.

1) Write out the character. Know the character. Be the character. Basically, you know everything there is to know about your character from the way they fold their arms to the way they make a cup of tea. Everything. From this there will be a problem that will allow you, as the writer, to come up with a plot to help the character fix this problem.

From character comes problem or situation which comes plot.

2) Surprise. (my personal favourite which I've touched upon before) Know the basics - their name, their rank or job even (maybe not even) hair colour, eye colour (or maybe not - I still don't know what colour eyes half of the crew of Redux have.) But if you are the kind of person, like me, who doesn't want to know everything there is to know about your character, who likes to be surprised by what they do or what comes from them, then don't know anything about them and see what they tell you.

Surprises can be troublesome (explained through the Third War that Zach escaped - I may or may not have an idea what this is) but they can also be great fun to play around with. (McCallister will overstep his duties as First Officer/Second in Command to tell the Captain to have some sense/tell her she's wrong - that was meant to lead somewhere.) My point being that surprises can help spice up your story and give it a little more depth or something that you've been missing. It can also create more problems then its worth but you, as the writer, need to make the decision to what is best left in or taken out.

Happy Writing.

Saturday 1 March 2014

1st March and something

It is the 1st of March. No, there isn't anything significant about this date. But, from here on out, I will be working on Redux. Aries. which I may just all Redux. The problem with it is that I have a start, kind of, and I have a direction to how it gets to the all 'got stuff to do' part, but there's just something. I can't explain it but as a writer you will sometimes sit there, for hours, for days, or maybe seconds (sometimes weeks), staring, at the screen of piece of paper. You know what you want to write, you know what's going to happen, but there's just something that isn't quite there, that isn't quite right and you know, somewhere deep down, that when you start, it'll be wrong.

This. This is my problem right now. (Along with a ton of Uni work suddenly making an appearance) But right now, there's just something about the start that I can't quite get my head around and I don't know why.

My goal for this month, to have the start fixed. To have something written down solidly.  And when that happens, I will show it to you.

So, I have 31 days to re-write (Again, again, again) the start of Redux.

Happy Writing