The Six Ws… or, What Went Wrong, and What Went Write… ha!

I had planned to do the novel writing month for a while, but it wasn’t until October 31 that I really convinced myself that it was going to happen.  I was tempted to give up before I started, thinking it would be too hard–blah, blah, blah–but then I remembered how much I hyped myself up for it, and started thinking about how many other times I’ve said I was going to do something and then didn’t.

Then, I started to think about everyone else who says they are going to do something and then doesn’t.  It happens all the time.  Did I want to be one of those people?

I knew this was it.  I was going to use the month of November to prove to myself that I could actually write something decent of some significant length.  I want to be a writer — and if I chickened out before it started, well, it would become quite clear that a writer is just not what I am.  At that point, I made a deal with myself:  if I didn’t do it, no more writing, ever.  (This might seem harsh or unreasonable, but I was going to let myself off the hook.  It would mean I could allow myself to stop feeling guilty whenever an idea didn’t get written.)

So on November 1 I actually sat down and wrote, and it didn’t go well but I kept at it.  As the week went on I realized it wasn’t as hard as I thought and I managed to stay above the daily word count goals.

The second week was harder, and third was torture.  The fourth was sporadic, until it fizzled out over Thanksgiving weekend and I got stuck at the 40,000 word mark until yesterday, when the month ended and I was 10,000 words short of the goal.

So if the deal to myself was that zero words in November meant I could no longer pursue writing, and 50,000 meant I was on my way… once again, I’m left somewhere in the middle.  Which is hard for me to deal with.

Just wanted to check in regarding my status for NaNoWriMo.

After tomorrow night, (assuming I come home and write) I’ll only need 10,000 more words.  That’s about 2,500 words on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, which is totes doable.

However, at this point I kind of feel like I did when I went to the doctor as a child right after I peed.  One time the doctor told me to go pee in a cup and I looked at my mom panic sticken and announced that I had already gone, and she just shrugged and said, “you can always squeeze out a little more.”

The story is kind of like that to me.  I feel like I already let so much out that I don’t have any more, but I have to keep squeezing and pushing out the stuff that might not be ready to come out yet.

So.

That’s a great analogy.

Anyway, I’m still feeling accomplished, though I’m quickly coming to recognize how naive it was to think “I’m writing a novel in a month!”  Yes, the novel will be done in the sense that it has a beginning, middle, and end–but damn, there will be so much more to do when it’s done.  At the end of the Pep Talk book for this project, it even says, “Now that’s your done… are you ready to spend another year with this story and it’s characters?”

When I read that today (I skipped ahead), I was surprised.  I mean, I knew I was going to go back and add and expand and rewrite, but when I really map out everything I want to do that to… yeah, a year seems about right.  And that’s a long time.  I’m not sure I have the patience to give this novel what it needs to really become what I want it to be.  But I suppose I can try, and take it one day at a time like I did this month.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I feel incredibly accomplished at reaching the half-way point of this project.  I gave myself lots of pats on the back when the word count crossed the 25,000 mark.  It’s like climbing a mountain (sort of, I guess), because if you’re half-way through your journey that means it’s all downhill from there.  “The worst is over,” and all that.  So, yay.

“The worst,” in that sense, has been one of the biggest obstacles in the way of this goal:  that little voice in my head that says whatever I’m writing is total crap.  Chris Baty, who started the whole NaNoWriMo thing, wrote sort of a pep-talk book you’re supposed to read the month before (which I did), and he calls this voice “your inner editor.”

It’s much easier said than done, but once you “fire” this inner editor it’s a lot easier to write, and the more you write the eaiser it is to get further and further away from the voice until a new one comes along that’s even a little encouraging.  I’m happy to say that’s happened for me.

I’ll rekindle with the more cynical inner editor on December 1st, but right now I want to celebrate the half-way point by posting another excerpt before he gets back and calls it total crap.

Click here — it’s a PDF this time, with copy protection enabled, because someone told me I better do that else some shady character comes along and claims my work as his own.  So you can’t print it or export it into Word… but you should be able to at least read it.  I mean, that’s the goal.  So if you can’t, please let me know.

This picks up about 17 hours after Clay has been trapped in the elevator, or about 10 hours after the first excerpt (I think).  Don’t worry too much about spoilers, because a lot will change in the re-write, and the only thing that’s really given away at the end of this is that Clay is having a rough time in there.

Thanks for reading!

I posted the excerpt from the novel on the NaNoWriMo page as well, and someone read it and sent me the following comment and I had to share it because it totally made my day:

Adam,

Your excerpt is great! I love Stephen King and I think you do a great job of emulating his ability to create relatable, human characters, while nevertheless retaining your own voice. Keep it up!

Well alllllright!

I’ll be halfway done on Sunday, though I’m realizing what I’m writing is probably going to end up being nothing more than a pretty coherent outline.  To really make it the novel I envision, 50,000 words just isn’t enough.  I’m going to try to go back and expand on things to get the word count closer to 100,000 – 120,000 after the basic story is worked out this month.

Anyway, thanks again for all the kind words and support through email, Twitter and DM, and NaNo mail.

I’ve been having fun writing everyday, and honestly 1,667 words a day is really not that much.  The problem is falling behind, as I did this past weekend, so when you miss two days in a row suddenly on the third day you realize you have to write 5000 words to stay on target, which is not so easy.

There’s good days and bad, and on the bad days I can still eek out 500 or so words so I’m still treading water.  I’m only about 2000 words behind, but plan to do some catching up this weekend.

One person has asked to read some, so I’m going to post some below.  This sort of violates the rules since by showing people it sort of cements the scene in place and makes it harder to edit later if need be, but I feel like the scene is pretty solid as it is.

Anyway, I condensed a 10 page scene down to 3 pages and posted it below.  To give you an idea of word count as it translates into length, the excerpt below is about 2500 words–or about a day and a half’s worth of work.

Read the synopsis of the novel in the last post if you’re not familiar with the plot.  This excerpt picks up about 6 hours after Clayton got stuck in the elevator.  And if you can’t view the word count graph in the last post but want to keep track of me, you can go to my NaNoWriMo page here and click “Stats.”

Hey, thanks for reading.  Comments & critiques welcome, as always.

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What you see below is a graph charting my progress in NaNoWriMo.

NaNoWriMo stands for National Novel Writing Month, and you can read more about it here.  After two years of coming up with various excuses (actually, there’s a JulNoWriMo, too, every July, so I’ve had make excuses 4 times now), I’ve realized a very important life truth…  you will not have time for something unless you make it.

So this year it’s all or nothing:  either I prove to myself I can write, or I give up that dream.  Even though I am purchasing a house and moving this month–which would actually have been a good excuse–I’ve comitted to this.

The graph below updates automatically so you can track my progress, if you choose.  The yellow bars are my word count for the day and the blue bars are the daily goals, all the way up to 50,000.  It will be humiliating to have said all that and then crash and burn in the middle of the month, so part of the reason I post this is to keep myself motivated.

See you at the end of the month!

UPDATE: So there used to be a graph here, but it apparently didn’t work. Anyway, I have a little widget on the right side of the screen that tracks word count.

What’s the novel about?  Well, I have a rough idea.  So far I’ve put together this little blurb, recognizing it may change as the story develops.

After years of pestering her boyfriend to propose, when the day comes Bethany Kibler says no.  She immediately regrets her decision but when her boyfriend fails to come home from work the next day and doesn’t return any of her phone calls, she is forced to accept the fact that he has moved on and she should, too.

Except he hasn’t.  Clayton Ross would love nothing more than to go home.  But he is stuck, trapped in the elevator on his way out of the office.  He can’t get out–and it’s a holiday weekend, with no scheduled building activity.

Both are forced to evaluate the kind of relationship they have with one another and themselves, while confronting their very worst fear: belong alone.

Until, after a failed escape attempt that leaves a hole in the ceiling of the elevator, Clayton starts to convince himself that he’s not alone–not really.

Because from the darkness above, something keeps looking at him.

I don’t call myself a writer, because I think that in order to go around introducing yourself as a writer you have to actually have written something–and in this case I’m going to put “something” in quotations because that “something” is not nothing but rather something, that something being publication, or, though I don’t know what it would be, some other kind of validation from a qualified second-party that says what you’ve written can actually be called “writing.”

Got me?

Basically:  you can call yourself black but if everyone else see’s a white guy when they look at you… then you just look foolish.

Anyway, I’ll reserve calling myself a writer until I publish something… that’s my own little rule, and it’s fair.  But I’ve been thinking a lot recently about what kind of writer I might end up being, and what I’ve written so far, and through the course of that have made some interesting discoveries.

For example, a few weeks ago I set out to really define what exactly the difference is between science-fiction and fantasy, and more broadly what exactly the difference is between “fiction” and “literature” and what it means for me.

Here’s what I’ve come up with, without actually citing any sources:

A science-fiction story incorporates something fantastic and extraordinary, something that doesn’t exist or doesn’t exist yet but could in theory, and explains it rationally and scientifically or, if it doesn’t, the reader can infer enough to have it make sense in his head.

Fantasy also incorporates something fantastic and extraordinary but instead of explaining it, simply wraps it up into “laws of the universe,” or some other explanation that, as long as it’s consistant with the story, the reader accepts as truth.

Example:  A Unicorn appears in a field.  A science-fiction story would go on to say that the Unicorn was the result of gene-splicing between a horse, donkey, a house fly, and the flu virus, or something.  A fantasy story would say that the Unicorn exists because Unicorns have always existed, and that’s all you need to know about it.

Kind of obvious, but there’s enough overlap–something extraordinary that doesn’t exist (yet?)–that I see why they are lumped together, and honestly I appreciate fantasy a lot more because I branched out and actually read some of it.

As for what makes something “fiction” and what makes something “literature,” well, the difference I’ve been able to identify is that if a Professor at some Literary Elite University (or Oprah) says it’s good, then it’s literature.  If it’s just something entertaining, it’s fiction.  If it teaches you a life lesson and makes you see the world differently (or you at least pretend that it does), it’s literature.  If you can study the author and what he was going through in his life at the particular time he wrote the story and spend time deciphering all the metaphors–it’s literature.  If you can’t, “it’s fiction.”

Not all fiction is literature, but I think all literature is fiction.  I, for one, don’t go into the “Literature” section much, but don’t necessarily have anything against it.  I enjoy “fiction” more than literature, because the stories I enjoy most and the stories I enjoy writing the most are meant to entertain, and that’s it.  Any life lessons I might derive from it are an added bonus and, I think, a natural consequence of studying other fictional people going through life.

As a side-note, I know someone out there is reading this and is thinking about making the comment, “If you have a rule as to when you can call yourself a writer, you might add as a prerequisite that you actually venture into the literature section because that is the only true form of writing.”  To them, I say, go and continue to be a member of the Literary Elite and let the rest of us enjoy the guilty pleasures of Twilight.  (And I can feel your blood pressure rising.)

Anyway — this is all a long winded way of saying that most of my life I’ve considered myself a science-fiction guy, and so as an extension I’ve classified most of my stories as science-fiction and even at some points forced the stories to be science-fiction because it’s where I think I’m most comfortable.

However, as I study the distinctions between genres more, I’d actually hope to call myself–when the day comes–a horror writer.  And I didn’t see that coming.

The stories I’ve written that I’m most proud of would all be classified as horror, and most have nothing to do with science-fiction.  Two great examples are Foundations* and Heartbreakers*–and they are great examples because I don’t cringe as much when I think of people reading them like I do when I re-read other things I’ve written.  There’s a third example, Monsters in the Closet* , which I thought was science-fiction when I was writing it but now know is not, since it only happens to feature what you’re led to believe is an alien but could actually be a demon, shadow walker, human in the last throws of radiation sickness… even Unicorn. (That particular story has a more subtle twin in Ground Level*, which I wrote knowing full well it was not science-fiction.)

All three of these stories feature something necessary for a story to be classified as horror:  the unraveling of the norm to expose the gritty reality behind ordinary things.  What you thought was truth is not–and maybe you knew it all along!

Steven King says there are three subsets to the Horror genre:  terror (that feeling you get that immobilizes you), horror (the escaped murderer is coming to get you!), and revulsion/gross-out (worms coming out of your eye sockets, or bugs eating you alive).  I’d like to think those four stories above fit somewhere between the first two.  And if I can pull off this NaNoWriMo project next month the way I want–I’ll have another doozy for ya.

All of this also has the added benefit of explaining why the movie Signs is my favorite… yeah, it’s about aliens, and that’s maybe why I thought I liked it so much–but ultimately we’re not even really sure it was aliens.  And it’s not necessarily a science-fiction movie.  Most of it’s draw was the spooky aspect of it, the horror.

People poo-poo all over the God-Did-It ending, but I’ve always thought maybe we called the creatures in the movie aliens because they fit the stereotype so well–but perhaps they were actually demons, and, yes, God turned the water into holy water and it corrupted their essence and so they dissolved back into the Netherrealm, or whatever.  And don’t bother telling me you’re sure it was aliens because M. Night Shyamalan told you it was on the back of the DVD, because that doesn’t matter.  It’s a story and his interpretation is just as valid as mine–he just happened to write it.

Anyway, that’s all.  Just wanted to get some of my thoughts down.

“My belief [is that] no one is exactly sure of what they mean on any given subject until they have written their thoughts down; similarly, I believe that we have very little understanding of what we have thought until we have submitted those thoughts to others who are at least as intelligent as ourselves.” -Stephen King

* = These were all written at various points in the past few years and are first drafts, never revised, and may even end up being excerpts from longer stories, so take them for what they are.  Also, two of the stories have an “afterward” that appear on the last page, so even if it looks like the story is over be sure to scroll down to the bottom to be sure.

You may or may not get the impression I’m getting in over my head with this one. I do, but I’m confident in my ability to tread water as long as people are waving me in to the shore (nice metaphor, there). Anyway, I said when I started these that they may be used as a means for me to formulate ideas and use them as rough outlines for future stories, which I think is what I’m doing here. What I see in my head as I formulate this is a novel. But don’t let that discourage you from voting… your choices will matter and potentially take the story in different directions.

Some of the scientific stuff in this one may be way implausible or totally impossible. I’ll ask you to bear with me and, in the future, if and when I develop this more, I’ll be sure to do more research. Other than that, I’m always interested in constructive criticism, or things you noticed or think would have made the story better.

And as always, if this is your first visit, part 1, part 2, and part 3 should be read before this.

***

You hesitate, then shuffle a bit in your seat. Unsure of what you just heard, you are dumbfounded. “Sorry, did you say… a bomb?”

“Nuclear bomb.” Channing nods but has a smug look.

“Ah,” you start to catch on. “I see. Clever, clever. Testing my unconditional loyalty, huh? Well, I suppose I’ll have to—“

“—no, this is not a test.” He grabs the bag from Beth and opens it. He reaches in, and pulls out a rectangular box about the size of his palm. He gently opens it, and a small tube filled with blue liquid falls out. He handles it carefully. “This is real.”

“Stop playing with him,” Beth says as she checks the progression of her bloody nose. “It’s not a real nuclear bomb,” she tells him.

“The reaction is nuclear, and it’s a bomb,” Channing says. “I never said it would do any damage.”

You nod. “What do you mean?”

“Do you accept the position?”

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I’ve been listening to this song all morning on repeat, and it has not yet lost any of it’s creepiness.  It is the Swine flu gene, somehow mapped out so that all the little oogies and whatsits that make up it’s very DNA are assigned a musical note, and this is the result.  (Get more info at his blog).

I interpret this to mean that the music you are hearing is inside the Swine flu.  Each note that you hear is an integral part of it, just made into sound.  Granted, the composer could have used any sound to represent it, so there could be many versions of this that all sound widely different, but this is just as relevant as any other.  It is amazing to me that something so oddly beautiful could come from a deadly virus.

I keep thinking that if the Swine flu really is the next “plague,” this would kind of be the Song of the Apocalypse, gently playing in the background, orchestrating millions of deaths.

Update:  The more I think about this, the more I think what is creeping me out the most is that a human did not write this music.  All the composer did was assign an instrument to the notes, but the notes were already there.  Who, or what, wrote them?–and if they’re there, they’re in everything.  Heavy.

I am endlessly fascinated by things like this, or when music becomes so… physical.  There are other examples, all of which have blown my mind equally.

The first is an Alien book, called Music of the Spears.  In it, a twisted composer wants to harness the sounds of a screaming alien to compose a “Symphony of Hate.”  As you can imagine, with an Alien involved, death, chaos, and all around weirdness ensue.

The next is another book, a 6-issue arc in the “Umbrella Academy” series called “The Apocalypse Suite,” where the main villain–The Conductor–wants to compose a symphony that when played in the right key would unravel the fabric of reality in much the same way as a high pitched noise can unravel, or break, glass.

Lastly would be Battlestar Galactica, of course, when the music that has been in our characters heads for the past two seasons comes to a climax when Starbuck’s attempt at decoding it results in giving her the coordinates to jump the ship to the fabled Earth.  (Even if you are not a BSG fan, check this out):

A coincidence here is that the next part of the ongoing story I’m posting will have a lot to do with this concept.  If you read it you might think it was inspired by this post but it’s actually the other way around.  The reason it’s taking so long for me to write between segments is that I’m finding writing stuff like this is extremely difficult to do well, and you kind of have to know a bit about music in order to put it into language, which I am still learning about.

Posting schedule finalized: every other day, it is. Unless I am traumatized by a dying kitten or play soccer to the point where I can’t move my arms. Then, it’s whenever I’m healthy enough to make something. 

If you just surfed in, welcome to the party—be sure to read part 1 and part 2 first.

***

There’s something alluring about the strangers waving you in, and behind them the back door on the limo pops open. You have to make up your mind quick, before the other handcuff locks your wrists together.

Am I actually contemplating running from the police? You think. You allow yourself a moment to smile at the absurdity of the situation before taking a leap of faith. In one motion, you push off with your right foot, using your body’s leverage to break away from the officer and scoop up the bag.

The officer shouts at you and yells into his radio, and you feel a swell of panic at the realization that you have just unwittingly become a criminal. Any chance of explaining the misunderstanding and getting an all clear has been wiped away.

The two strangers spring into action, and sprint toward the limo at the opposite side of the street. The man holds the door open as the female dives in, and he waves you in. You leap over the fence and run into the street, paying no attention to the traffic, which is forced to brake and honk.

You dive into the open door and are greeted with a rush of cool air. You hear the door slam behind you and feel the force of the car peeling away before you can turn around, pull yourself into a chair, and look at the strangers.

The man who held the door open for you is seated nearest the door, and across from him sits the woman. You sit on her side, but on the opposite end of the limo. There is another woman sitting beside the man, and someone else directly across from you.

“Greg Channing,” you whisper, upon recognizing the CEO you were supposed to be interviewing with. You look again at the girl next to him.

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You tell me—is three days between segments too much? My mojo was much better when it was daily, but not everyone visits the site every day. What works best for you?

If you just surfed in, read part 1 here.

***

Before long, a crowd has gathered around Beth. The limo driver has exited his vehicle and is standing behind you. “She was chasing someone,” he says.

You turn your head and look up at him. “Did you see where he went?”

“Down that alley, to the left. I was looking at him, wasn’t paying attention.” He has a panicked look on his face. “Christ, I’m sorry.”

Trusting him, you get to your feet and instinctively put a hand on his shoulder. “I’m going to go after him. You stay here, okay?” You hastily move to the other side of the limo before taking off in a run down the alley. You shout over your shoulder, “and don’t move her until the ambulance gets here!”

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“Real integrity is doing the right thing, knowing that
nobody’s going to know whether you did it or not.”

The morning sun is rising behind you, but it’s reflection from the top of the glass skyscraper almost outshines it. You’re a block away from the looming building and are weaving your way through the sidewalk traffic like a pro even though this is only your second visit to the big city. Refusing to take the bus has its advantages—not only do you stay on your feet, which you do as much as possible since you’re not on the track team anymore—you also get to know the city a whole lot better.

Rounding a corner, the logo for the Omega Integrity Corporation makes your heart skip a beat. You quickly calm yourself… you wouldn’t be walking into the building for a second job interview if they didn’t think you had what it takes.

You approach the reception desk, which is already buzzing with activity even at 7:30am. A young, blonde female with an office phone pressed against her ear smiles at you as you rest your elbows on the marble surface. You casually take a candy from the dish in front of you, even though you don’t really want it, and pop it in your mouth. A few seconds pass, and the female, who appears to be around your age, hangs up the phone and approaches you.

“May I help you?” She asks.

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“The Omega Constant” is the name of the next story, and I’ll post it tomorrow morning.

Same drill as last time, for the most part.  There will be a voting module at the end of the post and the choice that gets the most votes by the time voting ends, will win.  If there is a tie, the general consensus in the comments will be the deciding factor.

It will be every three days this time around, too.  Once a day seemed to be too much for people, and so did every other day.  So voting for tomorrow’s post will end Monday evening and the next part will go up Tuesday.

Good luck!

That went well! Everyone seemed to enjoy the story so I’ll definitely be making a new adventure soon. Real soon. Check back later in the week for part one.

Here are the completed parts of each segment:  Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4. I’ve also edited together the entire story and posted a seamless version here.

In the old Choose Your Own Adventure books, one benefit was being able to turn back the page and start over if you chose a path that got you killed. I didn’t really want that option here, because it kind of takes away from the integrity of the story. But at the same time, it’s only natural to wonder “what if…” so I thought it might be fun to see where we might have ended up.

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Note:  This story has been finished and voting has been closed.  The wrap-up can be found here.

Well, as you know, the results for the last chapter resulted in a tie.  Thanks for the suggestions as to what to do in such a situation.  Ultimately, I’ve decided that the comments will serve as a tie breaker. For example, this time, Dave was the only one who commented, explaining why he is choosing to swim away.  Since all things are equal, I’m going to use the comments to tip the scales.  I think this is how I’ll do it in the future, too, so if you feel passionately one way or another make sure to post a comment with the reasoning behind your vote in case it ends up in a tie.

I was going to hint last time that one of the choices would result in your death, in the spirit of the original books.  So read on to reveal your fate.

****

“Come on, kid!”  The rental agent moves to float on his back, and it is obvious he is seriously wounded.  The water around him has turned a dark, murky orange—a result of the green water mixing with his blood.  He starts to use one arm to backstroke away from you.  “I don’t have much time, I’m seeing shit, let’s move.”

“You see it, too?”  You stammer, trying to keep your chin above water.

“I see us dying out here if we don’t move, and we don’t have time to wait for the sharks to show up for my blood,” he is paddling away now, and you glance backward at the corpse.  At this point you are unsure if the man who came to rescue you even sees it.

The corpse does not look the same anymore, furthering your suspicion that it is actually a hallucination.  You feel lightheaded, as if you’re dreaming.  It now looks less like a corpse and more like a live person.  Color has returned to it’s face, and it’s features are so plain you cannot identify it as male or female.

“Please come,” it says, and actually looks sad.  “I have questions.”

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