About Fear...

Last month, I wrote about fear.  Fear of embarrassing oneself is often a hitch factor in creativity.  "What if this idea is no good?"  "What if people laugh at this idea?" are pretty common ones, and that sort of fear can be paralyzing. 


But it's also exceedingly common.  It takes a long time to overcome that fear of failure, that fear of not being good enough.  Many people, and I'll add that many successful people retain that crippling fear that what they make is not fit for public consumption, and that makes them hesitate. 


Which is not to say that creation is easy, or that everything that we make is fit for public consumption.  Nickolaus Pacione has taught me that, if nothing else.  But I'll never get anywhere if I don't start.  I'll never develop good ideas if I don't work through the bad ones, and have enough of each to recognize a bad one when it presents itself.  More importantly, if I hadn't cycled through a bunch of ideas, I'll never get comfortable with the concept that ideas are easy to come by.  Ideas are cheap.  Good ideas are plentiful.  Being willing to discard mediocre ideas means that I spend less time wrangling them. Because experience has shown me that if I wait five minutes, a better idea will come up. 


Is also seems that, after five years, I'm going to hit 20,000 views of this blog.  I'm aware that the majority are Google search hits, and that I have yet to break a thousand hits in a single month.  But thank you to everyone who has read this strange personal/writing blog.  

Song of the Vikings

For a good time?  Go to an author's reading.  The Northshire Bookstore recently had an author signing for Nancy Marie Brown who has just released Song of the Vikings a book about the very interesting historian/skald of Iceland, Snorri Sturluson. 
I learned a lot, just in an hour.  I knew, for example, that my 'escapist' reading eas looked down on when I was in college, that Tolkien had only a grudging respect in academia in the early 90's because he had written part of the Oxford English Dictionary, and because his books had sold so well.  How much more frustrating it must have been earlier, when he didn't have the cache of being so popular.  He was only an Oxford Dean, back then.  


I love my Tolkien.  I love my Icelandic saga.  While they are not the same, they go hand-in-hand with a certain number of sensibilities.  And those have been passed onto a few generations of writers.  And I consier that a good thing. But it's always interesting to understand the origins of something I enjoy, as well as it's influences.  It's why I'm totally hooked on movie commentaries and extras.  What was the process that lead to the creation of something like the Lord of the Rings or Pan's Labyrinth?   

Snorri Sturluson was a poet and powerful landowner in 13^th Century Iceland.  He wrote many of the stories we clasically associate with Norse mythology, and laid the foundations for the early modern view of heroism. But Snorri's story also has unexpected moments of connection to the work of Tolkien.  For example, the day of his death.  September the 22^nd.  Which is, for the non-Tolkein fanatics out there, Bilbo and Frodo's shared birthday.  Hm. 

Nancy Marie Brown is a good speaker, interesting and informative.  She really knew how to hook me as a listener in.  She was pleasant to speak with and clealy knew her stuff.  Who wouldn't want a book or two signed by her?

 


According to her blog, what prompted her to start writing this book was reading Neil Gaiman's American Gods.  Neil Gaiman, if you aren't a long-time reader, is, in my opinion, the second-most dropped name in English.  I can't wait to dive into Song of the Vikings. 

Not as Other Men

A strange experience today.  The Boss was talking about the need to come up with an idea for a store Christmas tree.  He didn't want one that was loaded with merchandise; he's done that on previous occasions.  And there's been a problem with the stuff under the tree getting wet.  So he asked me if I could help, since I'm 'artistic.'

Which I don't really consider myself.  I can paint miniatures in a way that's not terribly embarassing, but I'm massively the suck when it comes to putting anything in two dimensions.  Nevertheless, within fifteen minutes, we had a concept that he was pleased with.

What I don't understand is how I'm different from him.  He could have easily come up with  the Donkey-Kong Christmas Tree.  Princess Peach at the top, Kong 'throwing' barrel decorations down the tree, perhaps with a garland to indicate the platforms, and Mario at the bottom.  It's a simple idea, which I got from looking at the Donkey-Kong themed energy drinks in the cooler.  And my quesion is, why didn't the Boss have this idea?  Is it because I spend time coming up with stuff?  Because I pay more attention to my surroundings (ie am more easily distracted)?  Is this sort of thing innate?  Something I've developed where the Boss never did?  Am I less afraid of failure so I start and am confident that if one idea fails another will be useful because that's the way I work? 

But it was all so easy.  Just chunk up one idea and then another (my first was to have a Pac-Man tree.  Inspired by the Pac-Man energy drink sitting right next to the Donkey-Kong drink.  The next pitch was likely to be a Red Bull treee).

It's just strange to me. What do people do if they can't come up with ideas? 

"You Only Fail If You Stop Writing" --Ray Bradbury

I came close to failing.  I haven't updated my blog in close to two months, it took me those two months to write a 3,000 word story.  I had stopped working on my novel, and was considering getting out of the writing game. 

Writing is work.  It is not fun.  It is the terrible opportunity to sit down in front of a mirror and look at yourself.  For hours.  On the other hand, I feel better after I have written.  I find myself with greater clarity, a greater capacity to concentrate, and overall have a sense of accomplishment I fail to get from my work life.

I love reading.  Writing seems, in some ways, to be my self-medication.  The problem is when I don't have the motivation to do it, I fall apart without that activity which centers me.

I used to try to count the number of attributes someone needed to be a writer.  I've lost count.  Someone needs an ability with words, good ideas, that special dedication that lets them pump out words on a daily basis, a thick skin that doesn't take rejection to heart, an ego that believes it needs to be heard, a compliant enough personality that allows others to mess with their manuscript, a cheerfulness that is undampened by hours spent alone with only their own words for company, the tireless energy it takes to self-promote, even when the publisher is doing so.


Some of these things come naturally to some people.  Others must work on several aspects.  I'm still working on several.  But I'm back.  I'm working on my feelings of isloation by having a Pathfinder group meeting at my house.  I'd say it might cut into my writing, but I'm barely getting any done at the moment.  And it's nice to have people in the house.  They're a good group, and they make a pleasant change from the social interaction I get at work.

I've sent some short stories out, "A Poor Sinner's Hands" to Atomic Age Cthulhu, "No Small Dreams" to Aetherial Publishing, "Nicaragua 1986" to Anthology II (which I didn't get in to) and "Between Two Living Gods" to Epitaphs 2.  But I've also got a number of stories basically sitting around and I need to get them back into circulation.  I also need to finish my novel, because I'm having ideas for the next one, and that's the most fun I've had for a couple of months. 

So Happy Halloween.  May scary things happen to you, and may you enjoy them.  I'm starting to, again. 

Challenge Failed...

I didn't manage to get the story written by Sunday.  I've got the nugget of a first draft, but it needs to be about a thousand words longer to get into the anthology I'm aiming for.  But I've got the storylinwe down, I just need to fill it out, and possibly add another scene. 

"Oh Bother," said Pooh As He...

Yes, I should be writing my story. 

Have you ever created something completely off the cuff that went beyond all your expectations?



Some time ago, RPG.net's Tangency section was having a lot of difficulty being civil.  So I created a topic: Finish the sentence:  "Oh bother," said Pooh, as he..."

.   I had hoped it would give the forum-posters something to not argue about.  And it did.  the thread has gone on and on and on. 

   

Warning, it's not safe for work.  It's all words, but good heavens, there's a lot of dear old Pooh Bear having sex, murdering people, getting involved in necrophilia (generally with other inhabitants of the Hundred Acre Wood). The sheer breadth of topics it covers contnues to astonish me.  From Back to the Future to The Matrix, Quantum Leap, Quentin Tarrantino, drug abuse, mass murder, to Lost. Because it's a nerd forum, there's also a pile of Lovecraftian references, Paranoia nods, zomibes, WWII references, recutrsive time loops, political digs, free-verse poetry,  Star Wars, Shakespeare, fanfic, wingfic,  iPhones, Doctor Who, and House of Leaves. 



I starred it in 2004.  Let me give you some perspective.  Doctor Who hadn't been revived yet.  The Halo franchise had just released video teasers for Halo 2.  I wish I could take any sort of credit for the length of the thread's endurance, but it's really due to the people who grasped the concept and ran with it.  Still, it's kind of interesting to look at. 

I Challenge Myself to Write...

I challenge myself to write my Atomic Age Cthulhu story, provisionally "To the Hogs" in a week.  To be done by Sunday, September 2^nd.

I say this here, so that people will know, and I will pressure myself to do it.  Anyone who reads this and is curious has my permission to ask me how the story is going. 

Sale!

I'm proud to announce that my mad airships, steam biplanes, and a world without royalty story "Pain Wears No Mask" as been accepted into Glynn Barass and Brian Sammons' Steampunk Cthulhu.  I'm in some pretty awesome company here: 

Those Above – Jeffrey Thomas

Blackwold Horror – Adam Bolivar
No Hand to Turn the Key – Carrie Cuinn
The Reverend Mr. Goodworks and the Yeggs of Yig – Ed Erdelac
Carnacki – The Island of D. Munroe – William Meikle
Pain Wears No Mask – John Goodrich
Before the Least of These Stars – Lee Clark Zumpe
The Promised Messiah – DJ Tyrer
Unfathomable – Christine Morgan
The Flower – Chris Geeson
Tentacular Spectacular - Thana Niveau
Fall of an Empire – Glynn Owen Barrass & Brian M. Sammons
The Baying of the Hounds - Leigh Kimmel
Mr Brass and the City of Devils – Josh Reynolds
The Source – DL Snell
Happy Birthday, Dear Cthulu - Robert Neilson
The Strange Company – Peter Rawlik
Steel and Bones – Lois Gresh

 

Cover coming soon.  

Click

Click

click click click


That is the sound of me setting my sights a little higher.  

I'm A Horror Writer, What Do I Fear?

It's been a turbulent couple of weeks. First of all, my brother and sister-in-law came up, and we went out to play with birds again:



Which was really fun.

As for the writing, well there's a story. One of the things you're told never to do is put a story/novel/whatever down, because it's difficult to pick back up again. And there's a certain amount of truth to that. My current novel has been put down and picked back up a couple of times. Last week, I got wind of a very attractive anthology, and I had a good idea. Unfortunately, the idea does not work within the tmeframe of the anthology.

Which leaves me with a dilemna. Do I want to try another story (I've already got an idea) or do I want to go back to the novel?

The problem with going back to the novel is that it scares me. I'm almost done, at which point I'll have to revise my previous novel, and start on my next one. And begin looking at publication options (you know, that stuff from my last post). And yeah, I've got that feeling in my stomach, that I'm once again stepping into unknown territory, and I don't want to do the wrong thing.

The funny thing is that I didn't feel this nervous, or I don't remember feeling this nervous, last time I finished a novel. But it might have been that I had less expereince with trying to get a novel published, or that publishing wasn't in quite so much turmoil.

And I don't blog well when I'm all confused about stuff. Sorry. But hey, NECON at the end of the week. I'm hoping for some good advice.