Arrant Nonsense

So that's a relief. I like the story way better. My Writing Buddy thought there was a much bigger story inside it trying to get out, and he might well be right, but I took a weed-whacker to it anyway and managed to get it down to 7800 words from over 8100, so. He's not wrong about there being a lot of characters in the thing, but they're all necessary. Anyway, I hope they like it at the antho.

And now I can concentrate on outlining the Next Thing, which will henceforth be referred to as "Addiction Vamp." I'm going to do my best to make this one creepy and atmospheric. It's not my usual genre, but I have done horror and can do it again.

I've also got five other outlines and a blurb to work up--that June NaNo push is going to jump out and bite me if I'm not careful.

But I think that's Draft. It is, at the least, END. That's 1400 words net on the thing on my day, and it's coming in at 8145.

Understand that the folks I'm writing it for want a soft 7500-word limit.

Also understand that I need to interject MOAR GHOSTS into the thing. Somewhere. Somehow. And it ends rather abruptly.

But it's a draft. I'm not real happy with it, but that's what editing is for. At least I'll have something for my Writing Buddy tomorrow.

This puts me at 42,500 completed, submittable words in the first three months of the year.

Understand that I wrote 36,200 completed, submittable words in all of 2012. And ZERO in 2011.

I have a meeting with my Writing Buddy on Saturday, assuming he comes out of his wisdom tooth surgery in any semblance of "with it" by then. He'll give me crit on Unquiet Neighbors. That's another 11,200 words.

I'm in the process of retroactively outlining Ghost Ship. Which will count on this year, at around 5600 words (which is where it is now; that number could go up or down, depending on edits), assuming I can beat it into shape and it's not irrevocably broken.

Then I've got the "inner workings" story for On the Premises, which will come in between 1000 and 5000 words (I hope).

Somewhere in there, I need to figure out what's wrong with Eldritch Plumbing and shove that out the door as well.

And then, in May, in between writing Inner Workings and fixing Ghost Ship, I need to outline five more stories for my June NaNo project. During all that, we're doing the Easter Jeep Safari at the end of this month, and I'm going to MisCon at the end of May. And then the Writing Excuses retreat in early June.

I'll just be over here flailing. I'm looking at it and going "dude, four stories, three of which merely need tweaking (ha), why are you freaking out." But I totally am, because it does feel a little overwhelming right now.

I can't even say "send booze" because I'm supposed to Edit Sober. And most of this is editing.

Fortunately for my sanity, I figured out that I've actually got two months before the end of May, when my two deadlines hit, rather than one, because Calendars, How Do They Work. So some of the pressure is off. Not all, but some. But deadlines are sneaky and I want to be On Top Of Them. So, I'm flailing. A little.

So I'ma post the story I wrote for that here. It will also go on the backs of my business cards, in rotation with the other two. I've decided I don't like the title much, so I'm excising that.

And, go:

Everyone loses the race against Death sometime, but I wouldn't go without a fight. I raised my sword, while he stared down at me in what might have been bemusement if skulls had expressions. "Dragon," he said mildly. "Behind you."

Oh, cra--

It swallowed me whole. As I splashed headfirst into the stomach, its heartbeat thundered from right. . . over. . . there. The stench was appalling. Funny, the things you notice.

I hacked my way through internal organs and armored hide and lifted my chin, dripping slime and blood. "Well?" Death nodded--and vanished with the dragon.

Yeah, I had fun with that.

In other news, I've incorporated some well-deserved crit into the Janni story (many thanks to texanfan!) and am about set to retroactively outline Ghost Ship fic to see where I went wrong. Deadlines wait for no writer.

And there is something wrong with it, but I can't put my finger on what. It's dialogue-heavy, but... I think that's okay, really. Maybe it's because there's not a whole lot of there there in between the dialogue. Blech.

I've also reformatted the Bear Story into a plain text doc for submission to this antho, seeing as they take simsubs and the place it's at right now is "notoriously slow" (their words) and don't mind simsubs. I don't like doing simsubs myself, but that's a deadline and if the place it's at is going to hold onto it for six months (with no web presence, wtf, it really makes me wonder, yes it does), well. It's getting simsubbed, and devil take the hindmost, you know?

I've got four other stories I need to flip as well, but I may wait and do a batch of subs once I have a couple more NaNo stories banged into shape for subbing. I also want to write something for this. I have an outline--another adventure for my spaceship crew--but I'll see if I want to do that or if I'd rather try to beat Ghost Ship into some semblance of shape.

I also need to poke the New Janni story some more (I have crit for it, at any rate), and Unquiet Neighbors is sitting there going read me read me read me. The Hubby read that one and actually had no input as to any glaring flaws. Considering that it's the one that had me pulling my hair out at the end of the NaNo project, that's not bad.

Tell you what, it never, ever ends. I guess this is what being a "real writer" is all about.

...still have not rebooted my writing brain. This is getting ridiculous. This morning, I looked at the notes the Hubby made for the ghost ship story and I'm just... bleh. I know how to fix it, but fixing it is going to require a good two thousand more words and I'm kind of tired of writing fiction that's not marketable because it's too damn long. It's already at 5500 words and I don't see how I justify another two thousand for a story like this unless I can turn it into some kind of commentary on the human condition instead of a rather silly and fun ghost story.

*headdesk x1000*

In other news, we saw "Madagascar 3" the other day and enjoyed it thoroughly. Anyone who's seen the Cirque du Soleil will recognize the set-pieces, which are visually gorgeous. Now I want to go to Vegas and see another show. The Hubby and the Boy have never seen it, and they need to.

Today, we're going to see "Brave." Which looks awesome. Pixar has yet to disappoint. And, I don't care what anyone says, I also need "Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter" in my life and will go see it next week when Hubby and Boy are at Scout Camp, because it's rated R and thus inappropriate for Boy, and Hubby doesn't want to see it. Horror's just not his genre. I may inflict "Cabin in the Woods" on him when I get it on DVD, because I thought it was brilliant.

I've got notes on the Ghost Ship story. They consist, when boiled down to their essence, of "SUCK LESS." So that's awesome. I've decided that I'm just goofing off today. I've got a meeting with my Writing Buddy for the Won His Soul story, and I'll be putting a final polish and edit on it starting either tonight or tomorrow. Today, I'm giving my brain a break except for fun stuff that doesn't really matter in the Great Scheme of My Career, Such As It Is.

But that didn't stop me from poking through the Plot Bunny Hutch. And the last one there is "He was an angry and bitter little angel." Which made me perk up and go "ooo." I even had insta-plot. And then I shook my fist and went "NO." I'm in an angel rut right now and don't need to write more angel stories. Won His Soul is actually the second one I've written for publication, and Ben is embroiled in angel and demon crap up to his eyebrows in the RP. Plus I'm working on one already in the collaboration. Sort of. NO MORE.

SO. My plan of action is to (a) edit Won His Soul to within an inch of its life and then send it to Writers of the Future. (b) edit Ghost Ship so that it stops sucking. (c) THEN go through the bunny hutch and find something new to sink my teeth into.

I just re-read the Ghost Ship story. It's about 5500 words long at the point I quit and decided it was broken beyond repair.

And I'm not sure I can't just... expand that last part a little and call it "the end" and leave that loose end hanging for later use in another story. I mean, this is a coherent sort of universe I've got going here. It's not beyond the pale to do something like that, I don't think, and that way the whole thing isn't wrapped up in a neat bow.

I think I thought it was broken because there's an extra climax (or there was meant to be) after they drop the coffins off where they belong, and suddenly it's not a story about the ghosts anymore, even though it should be.

Also, it needs more ghosts, because they are hilarious. I didn't use them nearly enough.

So. That's where I'm at with that. Just goes to show, don't ever throw anything away. You might come back to it someday and find out you had a really cool thing going there.

Fun was had, but I've got Human Interaction Overload.

Also, the Ghost Ship story is Broken like a big broken thing. So is Ben, poor fellow.

Saw "Avatar." Visually stunning, weak weak weak story and characters. A high schooler could have written a better script than that. There's not a single "twist" I didn't see coming five miles away, and it was a typical step-by-step "boy meets girl, girl saves boy's ass, boy and girl start liking each other (for no apparent reason), boy loses girl, boy gets girl back, blah blah predictable blah." I wanted to like it. Hell, I did like it. But I didn't love it, and it's not going in the DVD collection. It's a shame. It could have been great rather than merely good.

Anyway. There's no possible way I'm catching up with You All. If anything important happened, drop me a line and a link.

*hugs everyone*

and I'll say it again.

I have a weird S&M relationship with my own writing, and half the time, I have no idea who the sub is.

Today? It's me. I should make an icon, because damn.

I finally got a "your story sucked" letter from Writers of the Future, which, I guess, means that I can send the thing off to the next place. I guess I should, you know, make a list.

The novelthing mocketh me mightily. At least my Writing Buddy (who rocketh mighily) gave me a reason why my Bad Guy would put a starving vampire in a room with a helpless werewolf, so I should be able to bang out 500 words of effortless prose tonight. I hope.

Whether that will bring me up to my Weekly Goal is anyone's guess; I need to Do Math again.

The Ghost Ship story is stalled.

The re-write for the Abducted!Werewolf story is ... going nowhere. Yeah, I don't even know on that one.

The printer is giving me fits. Again. Maybe we should just scrap the damb thing and buy a new one. *glares* I was going to have Pages for my Writing Buddy tonight. And that didn't happen.

Feh. Feh, fie, and woe.

ETA: And my bad mood is gone, just like that. I should have checked my gmail BEFORE starting this rant, clearly. I just got an email from the handsome and talented editor of Darwin's Evolutions, he still wants the Werewolf Fic, and he's in the process of sending me cashy money.