Warning: the excerpt is not for the faint of heart. Allusions to serious violence and the like...

Nothing too extravagant tonight, but wanted to put in a little excerpt like Shelle's been doing. This is kinda a random scene just so that I could get to writing something (instead of doing prep work). I kinda think that the scene I just wrote (including this clip) might be the opening to the book. If so, I'll need to do that trick that some authors do - bouncing forward and backward in time through flashbacks and the like. (Think Pulp Fiction.)

*****Excerpt:

I have to get the fuck out of here.

I stand on shaky legs and stumble over to the industrial sink. I turn on the water and start to scrub the gore from my hands.  Next, I splash the icy liquid over my face to try to help me focus. As the water drains away I see that my face too must have been covered in blood.

My t-shirt is in tatters. There’s more holes than material. What little material there is, is stained dark red. Is this my blood? If it’s not, whose is it?

Once the rest of the Diablos hear about this, they will hunt me down and kill me. Slowly.

I scrub faster.

I pull off the t-shirt and go to my bag. I have another t-shirt, but it stinks to high hell. I’ve rinsed it a bunch of times, but it needs to actually be washed. Fuck it, I think as I pull it on - it’s not covered in blood.

(Edited to fix a couple of painfully obvious errors.)

A long time ago, Mark and I had a discussion about movie creation methods, and he said something that I've been thinking a lot about recently as I start to put this book together.
The basic idea was this: There are films that are written, like Gone with the Wind. They're lovingly crafted because there is a story that is crying to be told. Then there are movies that are engineered. Think of any Steven Seagal movie ever. There's a formula to be followed and at the end of the line, you have a "movie" (or in my case, a book) that should be some level of popular based on prior data.
Of course I want my book to be more Gone with the Wind and less Steven Seagal. The problem is that my personal tastes and (I think) writing skill are far more Seagal.
Hell, even as I'm starting to put the book together, the skilled writers among you may have already noticed that there's a sort of assembly happening. Here's the setting points I want to get across. Here's the character development points. Here's what I don't want the book to be.
Not one mention yet of the story's plot. No thought yet to the timeline. Well, not enough thought to put it down on paper anyway.
It wouldn't be the worst thing in the world if this turned out a little more engineered than written, but I suspect a good deal of how well I will feel I did will be wrapped up in how far away from the engineered end of the spectrum I manage to get.

Going to just try writing for 1/2 hour today. Been too long, and I need to do more blogging. If I try to keep the time limited, maybe that will help get me to just do it and not procrastinate.

More Thoughts on the Patch Book

• It's the 80s. I really want to create the feel of the 80s in the book. A lot of books that I read 'hold up' really well when compared to t.v. shows. Part of the reason is that there isn't much that provides a sense of the time period. I want to fix that in my book. Reading the Jack Reacher series and the Harry Bosch series of books both have small things: more smoking of the characters, and the use of pagers, for example that denote the era the book takes place in, but even those aren't huge. They don't pull you as the reader into that time period. It's more like stage dressing. For the 80s? I'm thinking about description writing - clothes, hair styles, etc. More zeitgeist-y stuff like opinions on drug use, people slowly becoming aware of AIDs, breakdancing.
• It's Detroit. Here again, I want to give a real sense of the setting. Not just some light "it's a major metropolis" feel like SO many books do. The Dresden Files start to cover what I'm thinking. But there's a catch, and that is:
• Patch is not a rocket surgeon. It's too tempting for many first time authors to make their Mary Sue characters 'perfect'. They think of the right answers just in time. They do the right thing whenever facing a challenge. Yes, Patch originally was based (very loosely) on a teenage me, but I want him to be more compelling than that. One way I hope to do so is by making him far from perfect. He'll have many faults, starting with the simple concept of him not being a genius. No, I don't want to make him a mindless brute, but he's just not always going to put 2 and 2 together perfectly. He will be more in the "If at first you don't succeed, break shit."  mindset. Well, later in the book anyway. At first, he'll be more of a scared runaway teenager mindset. Which brings me to the idea:
• Patch is just a scared, inexperienced kid. There's a ton of YA coming of age stories out there ever since... well, since way back, but I think that the combination of the ubiquity of access to the internet and the Harry Potter books have created a boom in this particular niche. This book won't be within the genre. At least, it won't be in the genre as I currently understand it. It will be graphically violent. It will involve characters making bad choices and having to live with the consequences. It will be... rough. While most of the YA stuff I see out there wants to believe itself most of those things, my sense is that they tip the hat in that direction and then run the other way.
• Depth of character will be important. I kinda hinted at this in my previous post about this theoretical book, but I wanted to bring it up and think about it again. Whether the character is Patch, one of the villains, a random npc, Patch's motorcycle (which he will first encounter here), or the local diner, depth (and arguably breadth) of character will be important to me. I really don't want a superficial/fleeting feel to things. That seems like a clear sign of an amatuer writer. The trick (it may be obvious, but I want to get it down in black and white) will be brevity while creating that depth. I do not want to be grotesquely verbose in order to create non-superficial characters.

Thoughts on How I Want to Write It

• Write fast, revise often, and get good feedback. I'm listening to a lot of writing and self publishing podcasts. One theme that seems to come up frequently when the people being interviewed are surviving on their writing money is the way that they have removed the illusions of the 'traditional publishing world'. An example? Authors who create a series need to write fast. While I really want to avoid my first book having the "Holy crap - he clearly wrote this for NaNoWriMo!" feel, I do want to come up with a process where I could (if I love writing long form as much as I think I will) produce rapidly. This combo (fast, but good) seems to be best done by doing two things:
  • Writing consistently, and fiercely. In truth, I'm thinking of taking a bit of the NaNo mindset here by writing for an hour every day, or at least 5 days (to give myself a 'break' weekly). Maybe more, depending on how my drive holds up.
  • Reviewing / editing a lot. When I listen to these interviews, you can hear what isn't being said. The authors will gloss over things like the editing process. Or rather, how they talk about it tells me volumes.

Ok, I actually want to write more (and maybe I will later tonight) but time's up so I have to put the pen down.

Tonight was the 10th Annual WSTW Homey Awards ceremony at World Cafe Live in Wilmington. We jokingly call it the Music Prom because everyone from the Delaware, Philly, South Jersey and Baltimore original music scenes get together and get dressed up and celebrate the cool shit we all did this year. Yeah, there are awards, but even if you don't win, it's still a really cool, warm, celebration. (Trust us. There've been years we didn't win. It was still great.)

This year we were nominated for 7(!!) categories and took home three(!!) awards, which is blowing my mind. We won:

• Best Live Act (we also won that last year-- holy crap!)
  
• Best Collaboration with Jake and the Stiffs for our punky punky song "New York Drama." (We also won that last year with our EDM parody song with Todd Chappelle called "This is Our Hit Song")
  
• And I won Best Lead Singer, also for the second time, but it'd been two years since I won that. I am reeeeeling. (I'll post photos and links to songs later... but if you wanna see photos, the event hashtag on Instagram and Twitter, which barely anyone used, but enough that you'll get the idea) was " #Homeys10 "
  

There was a funny running gag throughout the night-- when we were announced for our first award, Joe Trainor jumped up on stage to accept the award for us saying, "Hot Breakfast is sorry they couldn't be here tonight so I'm just gonna..." and then we dragged him off the stage.  So for the rest of the night, anytime we were called to the stage (even to present awards or to play), either someone else would stand in for one of us and the other would say, "Jill's sorry she couldn't attend" or "Matt wishes he could be here, but..." or something along those lines. It was good and silly.  I love our people very much. 

Anyway, we were also nominated for Song of the Year for "Kids Today," which we were fine not winning, so much so that even I voted for the band who won it (Wave Radio, for their song "Unbreakable") instead of voting for my own song. But because we were nominated for Song of the Year, we had to play it live (rules is rules). It was fun to play for our peers.  Later on, one of our favorite bands (Glim Dropper) were playing the closing set of the night and asked us to jump in on three Bowie tunes: "Star," Hang On To Yourself," and "Ziggy Stardust." Glim Dropper uses in-ear monitors, so the sound guy forgot to give me and Matt (and Kevin Niemi who also joined in bass) any monitors until the middle of the second song.  (If you attended our CD release show, Glim Dropper was the band who backed us up. We LOVE them, and they are honestly probably the best musicians I know, period, hands down.)

Anyway, I wanna tell you more about it, but Matt's folks are gonna be at our house in less than 7 hours because this weekend is our "we don't buy each other Christmas gifts and instead pool our money and spend a nice weekend in NYC seeing a play, an opera, and eating some good food" weekend. We're taking the train up, so we're on a schedule.

See you on the flip side!

ps: oh! My iron infusion went well. I was achy when I got home (normal) so I slept for the rest of the day/night, and woke up today still craving ginger (so my pica wasn't completely eradicated yet) but hour by hour I'm feeling better and have more color. After next week's infusion I'll be rockin' extra hard at 110%. Yay!

OK, bed. 

Happiness!

(x-posted to xtingu.livejournal.com)

But I have gone and cast my primary vote for Bernie Sanders today. \o/!

A weekend ago I was at a rave. There I met a fortuneteller. She read the cards for me. "You will find a worthwhile undertaking," she read, "It will likely bring you fortune."

"You will find true love, a sole mate" she continued, "It won't be just 'some guy', but the real thing, a deeper relationship that you've ever had before."

"But first," she said, "First you must visualize with your third(?) charka these things, and what you really truly want."

But she didn't promise me many bambinos to go with the fortune and love, as that gypsy had 23 years ago. Times change.

*I'm starting up a new blog tinkeress.com So for a while I'll be double posting, there and here.

Another unsolicited dick pic! 

and, speaking of shooters, whoops, I mean outdoorsy sportsman types...

Our office building at work is a converted school. It's four corridors built around a large-ish courtyard, with a lawn, a few trees, and a concrete terrace. It's a nice place to get some fresh air during the workday. 

Around 1 or so, someone (unknown) walked out to a tree in the middle of the courtyard and stuck a soda can in between its branches, then walked away. Stranger things have happened, so nobody commented. 

A few minutes later, someone said, "Did you hear that? It sounds like wood breaking." 

Someone else said, "I was going to say it sounds like a pellet gun." 

The soda can trembled, and fell out of the tree, riddled with holes and finally torn open on one side. 

I wasn't there when this happened, but I saw the soda can. I had finished eating lunch and was going outside to look for Precious (the local cat).  A crowd was gathered by the courtyard door. "Don't go outside," they said. The holes in the can were larger than the ones I'd see in the paper targets at the rifle range at summer camp, where I tried to teach myself to not be afraid of guns. I'm no Annie Oakley, but I ended up being a pretty good shot with a .22 rifle.  Still, I don't enjoy guns. 

Everyone was very calm and watchful. The police conducted a search through the offices. It's a multi-purpose building, and none of the offices are open to the public with unlocked doors. You have to be let in or use a code.  

Basically, someone who had access to one of the offices facing the courtyard decided that lunch time at work was an appropriate time for target practice. 

So, yeah. What did you have for lunch? 

*I'm starting up a new blog tinkeress.com So for a while I'll be double posting, there and here.

KID: “Whats that in the trash?”

ME: “Bones from the chicken stock.”

KID: “Did you save me the wishbone? I want to wish for us to be mermaids. Except on Tuesday, when we are fairies.”

—  —  —  —  —

MAKING/MADE: Kid’s nightstand, chicken stock, BigBall

READING: Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie

PLANNING: Vacation Trip to Los Angeles (April), Wickerman Burn (June), Pennsic Wars (August)

I’m still trying to find the rhythm of life now that I’ve downshifted from the daily corporate grind. I’m attempting to move forward on some project every day. Or at least on most days – I give myself the permission to have do-nothing days.

Anyway, Monday, and I want to look back on the week.

• Monday: Snow day – entertained kid, built legos
• Tuesday: Sick day (me, not the kid)
• Wednesday: Polyurethaned the nightstand, and touch-ups; Pennsic garb research
• Thursday: Polyurethaned the nightstand – calling it done; Submitted BigBall art grant request
• Friday: Chicken Stock; Kid was sick, so a lot of quiet nothing time
• Saturday: Do nothing Recovery day!
• Sunday: Sugar Cookies (with Kid); Recruiting help for BigBall from friends

<fin>

As usual, I have roughly 9,873,407,654,870,923 ideas for projects running around in my head. I will sometime record voice notes for the different ideas while I'm working (it's tough to write while driving, but a voice memo...). Sometimes I even have the focus required to transfer those voice notes to written notes in Google Keep. (Side note: I LOVE me some Keep. If you like Evernote, but want something faster/simpler, I can't recommend it highly enough.)

Anyway. One of the myriad of project ideas that keeps floating to the surface (especially when listening to writing focussed podcasts) is that of writing a Patch novel. It would be a kind of 'origin story' - telling readers how he comes to be the character than many of you already are familiar with. But he's still young. He's probably in his late teens at the start of the book. By the end? He's a werewolf vigilante.

It's the 80s. With the whole DARE campaign (and others of its ilk) in high swing, drug 'pushers' become his primary source of income.

With that basic structure in your mind, I've been working on a list of things that I would like to incorporate into the story. These aren't plot points, or story arc, or... well, they're just elements that I think would help to make my story stand out. In  most cases because I haven't seen these elements anywhere else.

• Patch won't know he's a werewolf. This is usually an element (in most of the wereworf stories I've read anyway) that is glossed over. The character will say something like "I keep waking up with blood on my mouth the morning after the full moon. Holy shit! I'm a werewolf!". Except here's the thing: If that was to happen 'in the real world'? There's no way you would assume you're a werewolf. Werewolves don't exist. You would come up with a large number of (perhaps even more terrifying) reasons, but you would not think you were a werewolf. I kinda love torturing Patch, and this is likely to be a good source of material for that.
• The audience won't be able to say for certain if Patch is a werewolf or not. If I write it correctly, Patch will come up with reasonable enough explanations for things, or there will be enough 'evidence' that maybe he's just really fucking nuts. Well, he is, but maybe that's all that he is. Maybe.
• Patch won't know what he's doing. He's a kid. He'll be up against some very bad human beings. Things won't go well. He'll make a LOT of mistakes. Again - most stories I read, there's a training montage, and suddenly our hero is bullet proof. Ummm... no.
• The villains won't be 2D. This is one which I have seen done well elsewhere, but it's important to me. Mostly because I've never accomplished it properly elsewhere. I've always written about Patch as an outlet for my... aggression. As such, I didn't really want to think too much when it came time to write. That tends to have meant very generic bad guys. This would be a serious effort and thus a little thought/planning is well called for. This brings me to:
• Life is not black and white, but almost entirely shades of grey; Patch, in his youth and ignorance, however, only sees black and white. Again with the idea of realism in the characters, I want to make young Patrick into the brash "I know what's right, dammit." sort that I was in my youth. He's got a lot to learn in a lot of different senses.

There are a bajillion more, but this is a start for the list. Of course now that I'm trying to think of the long list that has been in my head all day, I can only come up with 5.