Wow.
It has been some time since something significant has been written here. Significant things have happened, though. I graduated and now have a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing. I cannot believe I successfully defended a collection of short stories. It makes me ridiculously happy. I have a couple of the stories floating around at various places in hopes of publication. In all honesty, I need to do another blitz and send out copies and copies of "Twilight Time," "Peas," "Crashing Against the Wood," "In the Terminal," and one of those other ones... But I'm not sure how much I want to focus on getting stories published, considering my goals have somewhat changed.
I've been thinking about what I want to write. I always knew I wanted to be a writer, but it never occurred to me that I had no earthly idea what it was I wanted to write. I never felt too comfortable in my literary sheep's suit, but I never really tried anything else. Literary was safe. It was the norm. Then it was brought to my attention by one of the members of my thesis committee that many of my stories--if tweaked a little--would fall into either the young adult or the "chick lit"* genre. I thought about it after graduating and decided I would take "Climbing Trees" and make it a YA book. Easy peasy, right? I proceeded to read a few novels by Sarah Dessen, who as far as I'm concerned is a leading voice in the YA world right now. I loved the stories and the characters. The books only reinforced my notion: yes, I can do this. I can rock the crap out of this.
Fast forward three months, and I still have about 5,000 words. Bummer. That doesn't include the original short story, so I guess that's the plus side of the 5,000 words situation.
I get very nervous starting new ventures, and I'm scared this will completely suck. I write bits and pieces down on paper and look at it a lot. But I'm too scared to open that blank document and give it a good old-fashioned try.
Point of the story: Writing Group starts up again tomorrow. We've lost a member--Lydia has decided not to rejoin in light of other opportunities/responsibilities in life--so it's just Pamela, Matt, Diego, and me. We tried to recruit other people but schedules conflicted. But I am pleased to say we inspired a second writing group; Jaclyn, who couldn't meet with us, decided to start her own group. I hope they have as much luck as we all have had with each other.
So Writing Group is back. I'm excited. I obviously still need that extra push to get my writing done. I don't like submitting less-than-stellar quality of work, and I just wrote about 3,000 words that will be turned in tomorrow. That brings the total up to 8,000. Yesss. I'll proof it one more time, try to ease out some of the kinks, and turn in something respectable. It is the first part of the first chapter of Climbing Trees (tentatively titled, my friends).
Writing Group also includes Book Club now. We're expanding. Our first read is Jhumpa Lahiri's Interpreter of Maladies, which, I'll be honest, I still have about eighty pages to finish before tomorrow night. So far, I really like it. I'm reading it rather critically--seeing how it won the Pulitzer and all--but it's interesting and engaging.
My plan is to post updates of my writing here. I think that was the plan all along. But now that I officially quit my adjunct position at UCF and I'm only tutoring part-time, I should have a good amount of time to write. Maybe I can write something substantial. It would be a change of pace, that's for sure ;)
*I am not offended by the "chick lit" brand, nor do I think anyone should be. Writing for women--usually by women--is just fine by me. I've read some really great "literary chick lit" lately, including Girls in Trucks by Katie Crouch. Read it. It rocks.
Monday, August 24, 2009
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
practice.
I went to the Julia Alvarez reading at the Union last night. I had to, because I was making my students go, but I went also because I did enjoy the book. Funny how I love something until I have to teach it. She read some poetry, and it was lovely. I really am starting to enjoy poetry now.
In any case, after she spoke and we got our books signed, I went to the bar/pub/shitty Wackadoos restaurant with Matt and Diego. We were talking about writing and how we're doing with our manuscripts. The three of us are in thesis hours, and we're slated to graduated in spring. The problem is that we don't feel ready for it, material-wise.
Matt is on a schedule with his thesis advisor, and he turns in one story every two weeks. He says they aren't good, but I doubt it. Diego and I are on more relaxed schedules with our advisor; we are also in a workshop with him this semester. So I feel like I'm turning in stories, even though I should technically be turning in twice as much as I am at the moment. I am officially on a turning-in schedule with Holly, which is great. We have to turn in a minimum of ten pages to each other every Sunday. We are keeping one another accountable until December. Although we both feel like we turned in shit last week. I digress.
I mentioned how I feel like I never write. When I try, my head gets in the way and I'm not productive. Shit, I wrote more when I was an undergraduate student than I write as an MFA student. It's ridiculous. During the first week of this semester, I said, "I'm enrolled in three thesis hours a week. It's still a class, even though I don't go anywhere. I need to set time aside every week and write." I never was good at online classes; out of sight, out of mind. It's the seventh week of the semester and I have yet to write during my designated writing times.
Diego writes a page a day. He makes himself do it. That's going to be my new thing.
I sat down this morning and I tried to write my page. I'm turning in a story on Thursday that I hate (and that I workshopped over the summer with the crew. I meant to post about that and never did. Maybe I will soon.). The story has gotten worse. So I tried to come up with new ideas. I read Steve Almond's My Life in Heavy Metala couple months ago, and I really liked it. I was trying to something edgy, and then I kept thinking, that's stupid. I'm not edgy. I'm Jessica. So I started looking for pictures or paintings to inspire me because sometimes that works, but I didn't find anything. Beesley came over to my big chair and curled up on my lap, so I had my hot computer and my miniature-schnauzer-heating-blanket distracting me. Then I went to the AWP website to see if the schedule was up for the Chicago conference, and it's not. Then I looked at the job listings and realized that I am NEVER going to find a job.
It was all very depressing.
So I traveled over to the Writer's Digest website. I used to get a subscription, but I found that most of their stuff repeated every few issues, and it wasn't too helpful. They have writing prompts on their website. It took a while, but I found a good one. And I wrote a single-spaced page.
It was a nice feeling.
And if any of it turns out to be good, I'll post it.
In any case, after she spoke and we got our books signed, I went to the bar/pub/shitty Wackadoos restaurant with Matt and Diego. We were talking about writing and how we're doing with our manuscripts. The three of us are in thesis hours, and we're slated to graduated in spring. The problem is that we don't feel ready for it, material-wise.
Matt is on a schedule with his thesis advisor, and he turns in one story every two weeks. He says they aren't good, but I doubt it. Diego and I are on more relaxed schedules with our advisor; we are also in a workshop with him this semester. So I feel like I'm turning in stories, even though I should technically be turning in twice as much as I am at the moment. I am officially on a turning-in schedule with Holly, which is great. We have to turn in a minimum of ten pages to each other every Sunday. We are keeping one another accountable until December. Although we both feel like we turned in shit last week. I digress.
I mentioned how I feel like I never write. When I try, my head gets in the way and I'm not productive. Shit, I wrote more when I was an undergraduate student than I write as an MFA student. It's ridiculous. During the first week of this semester, I said, "I'm enrolled in three thesis hours a week. It's still a class, even though I don't go anywhere. I need to set time aside every week and write." I never was good at online classes; out of sight, out of mind. It's the seventh week of the semester and I have yet to write during my designated writing times.
Diego writes a page a day. He makes himself do it. That's going to be my new thing.
I sat down this morning and I tried to write my page. I'm turning in a story on Thursday that I hate (and that I workshopped over the summer with the crew. I meant to post about that and never did. Maybe I will soon.). The story has gotten worse. So I tried to come up with new ideas. I read Steve Almond's My Life in Heavy Metala couple months ago, and I really liked it. I was trying to something edgy, and then I kept thinking, that's stupid. I'm not edgy. I'm Jessica. So I started looking for pictures or paintings to inspire me because sometimes that works, but I didn't find anything. Beesley came over to my big chair and curled up on my lap, so I had my hot computer and my miniature-schnauzer-heating-blanket distracting me. Then I went to the AWP website to see if the schedule was up for the Chicago conference, and it's not. Then I looked at the job listings and realized that I am NEVER going to find a job.
It was all very depressing.
So I traveled over to the Writer's Digest website. I used to get a subscription, but I found that most of their stuff repeated every few issues, and it wasn't too helpful. They have writing prompts on their website. It took a while, but I found a good one. And I wrote a single-spaced page.
It was a nice feeling.
And if any of it turns out to be good, I'll post it.
Monday, September 1, 2008
fail.
I got a rejection letter in the mail the other day. That in itself is no surprise, seeing as how I sent lots of copies of "Peas" and "Climbing Trees" out. The fun part of this anecdote is that I got it back eight days after I sent it.
That's a swift and unanimous "no" from the editorial staff, for anyone who's counting.
That's a swift and unanimous "no" from the editorial staff, for anyone who's counting.
Friday, July 11, 2008
revision: trust your instincts?
Revision is a hot topic for writers. For some, it's a dreaded process. For others, it's "easy" because all they do is change a paragraph here or there and take out some adverbs. For me, back in the day, revision generally consisted of adding two or three pages and fine-tuning things. Granted, that got me A's in undergraduate workshops, but I don't think I ever actively learned what revision was.
My opinions on revision have changed recently. For the workshop in which I was enrolled last semester, I did some massive revisions of my two short stories at the end of the semester. Revisions that took the stories by their shoulders and shoved them in a "good" direction. Each story (which originally clocked in at 4300 and 3000 words, respectively) came away with at most four pages of the original draft. In their current drafts, they are now 5200 and 3600 words.
I was googling recently and typed in the words "writing, revision, published" (I think...). One of the first websites that popped up was a blog (Wanna Be Published?) that featured an article written by Cec Murphy. I went to his website and learned that his passion is to stimulate people's minds and nourish their souls. That blog seemed to be along the same lines. Fair enough. In any case, this was the advice: "Trust your instincts." But how sound is that advice?
Let's think about this. If I were to trust my original instincts--which is the nature of instincts--I wouldn't change a thing. Everything I wrote down the first time is golden, and I can leave it that way. If people don't publish it, that's their problem. Such is the attitude of many undergraduate/novice/lame writers. (By the way, those adjectives are mutually exclusive.)
Solid revision comes from experience. I can't really say that it stems from anywhere else. I've been actively writing for three plus years as a creative writing student, and I just now started getting the swing of revision. I'm finally pleased with my revision process. Here's how it goes:
1)I leave the damn thing alone after I write it.
2)I go back, and I take no prisoners.
3)I try to focus on the creative elements at the heart of the story. If the story thrives on tension, I try to stay in the narrative moment. If the story is heavy on characters, I work on keeping them true to themselves and on their interaction. If it's mostly internal, I try to get out of my own head and into someone else's.
Like I said, I've based this on experience. I chose the creative writing major because I couldn't stand the idea of being actively involved with "the masses" for the rest of my life. Obviously, my part-time job at JoAnn Fabrics was tainting my soul, and my choice of major was the result. Writing is such a social process, and I feel for the writers who don't have a group to work with. I'm at the point in grad school where, while I still love working with a select group of fellow writers (a post all to themselves to come later) and I still crave their advice, I know what's wrong with my stories. For the most part. I don't need a workshop to tell me where the character lost her personality, or where the tension disappeared, or where the dialogue was stilted. I know. But I still need my small group of writers whose opinions I trust to give me feedback on the revisions I make. Because, guess what, there is such a thing as a bad revision.
In class we are told to "murder our darlings." It's a difficult piece of advice to swallow. But when you become involved in revision, and accept that it's not meant to torture you but rather it's meant to enrich your writing, it becomes easier. You understand that a better sentence will come from the one you deleted.
My opinions on revision have changed recently. For the workshop in which I was enrolled last semester, I did some massive revisions of my two short stories at the end of the semester. Revisions that took the stories by their shoulders and shoved them in a "good" direction. Each story (which originally clocked in at 4300 and 3000 words, respectively) came away with at most four pages of the original draft. In their current drafts, they are now 5200 and 3600 words.
I was googling recently and typed in the words "writing, revision, published" (I think...). One of the first websites that popped up was a blog (Wanna Be Published?) that featured an article written by Cec Murphy. I went to his website and learned that his passion is to stimulate people's minds and nourish their souls. That blog seemed to be along the same lines. Fair enough. In any case, this was the advice: "Trust your instincts." But how sound is that advice?
Let's think about this. If I were to trust my original instincts--which is the nature of instincts--I wouldn't change a thing. Everything I wrote down the first time is golden, and I can leave it that way. If people don't publish it, that's their problem. Such is the attitude of many undergraduate/novice/lame writers. (By the way, those adjectives are mutually exclusive.)
Solid revision comes from experience. I can't really say that it stems from anywhere else. I've been actively writing for three plus years as a creative writing student, and I just now started getting the swing of revision. I'm finally pleased with my revision process. Here's how it goes:
1)I leave the damn thing alone after I write it.
2)I go back, and I take no prisoners.
3)I try to focus on the creative elements at the heart of the story. If the story thrives on tension, I try to stay in the narrative moment. If the story is heavy on characters, I work on keeping them true to themselves and on their interaction. If it's mostly internal, I try to get out of my own head and into someone else's.
Like I said, I've based this on experience. I chose the creative writing major because I couldn't stand the idea of being actively involved with "the masses" for the rest of my life. Obviously, my part-time job at JoAnn Fabrics was tainting my soul, and my choice of major was the result. Writing is such a social process, and I feel for the writers who don't have a group to work with. I'm at the point in grad school where, while I still love working with a select group of fellow writers (a post all to themselves to come later) and I still crave their advice, I know what's wrong with my stories. For the most part. I don't need a workshop to tell me where the character lost her personality, or where the tension disappeared, or where the dialogue was stilted. I know. But I still need my small group of writers whose opinions I trust to give me feedback on the revisions I make. Because, guess what, there is such a thing as a bad revision.
In class we are told to "murder our darlings." It's a difficult piece of advice to swallow. But when you become involved in revision, and accept that it's not meant to torture you but rather it's meant to enrich your writing, it becomes easier. You understand that a better sentence will come from the one you deleted.
welcome.
Hi.
I started a blog a year ago in hopes of documenting my time in grad school. Turns out I was more interested in writing about music, celebrities and books than my classes and my writing. So, I've decided to start another space for this type of discussion.
I think the sending-work-to-literary-journals bit is interesting, and I enjoy hearing about other people's experience. Maybe my anecdotes can help other people, or at least make them feel like they're not the only ones getting rejected. Maybe if I write about it I can be held a little more accountable to actually send things out. Wouldn't that be nice.
Here's what I hope to post here: successes (yes, let's hope for success and achievement of all kind), struggles, excerpts of my work, and other writer-ly things.
In any case, I hope you like the ride.
I started a blog a year ago in hopes of documenting my time in grad school. Turns out I was more interested in writing about music, celebrities and books than my classes and my writing. So, I've decided to start another space for this type of discussion.
I think the sending-work-to-literary-journals bit is interesting, and I enjoy hearing about other people's experience. Maybe my anecdotes can help other people, or at least make them feel like they're not the only ones getting rejected. Maybe if I write about it I can be held a little more accountable to actually send things out. Wouldn't that be nice.
Here's what I hope to post here: successes (yes, let's hope for success and achievement of all kind), struggles, excerpts of my work, and other writer-ly things.
In any case, I hope you like the ride.
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