Unspoken Words

Happy New Year to everyone.

For me, 2010 will be the Year of the Novel. I set out at the beginning of 2009 with the intention of writing a science fiction novel by the end of 2010, and soon realised that I needed to put in some effort towards catching up with contemporary novel-length science fiction, adjusting my way of thinking from short stories to novels, and continuing to develop my general writing skills.

Authors I’ve read in 2009 include Ian M Banks, Alastair Reynolds, Neal Asher, Ken Macleod, William Gibson, Eric Brown and Richard Morgan, among others. I’m still reading science fiction short stories, too, and am working my way through a bunch of anthologies as well as recent issues of Analog and Asimov’s.  The likelihood of finding someone to publish my novel is small and may well depend on me being able to get some short stories published in professional science fiction mags, so although the novel manuscript should be written and polished by the end of 2010, getting it published is likely to be some way off yet.

Oh, and I joined the British Science Fiction Association late in 2009. My first copy of the regular BSFA magazine Vector arrived recently, and as a BSFA member I’m able to nominate for the BSFA Best Novel award (and others, including the Best Short Fiction award).

Of the non-SF novels that I’ve read in 2009, two stand out as being particularly memorable. One is Rape: A Love Story, by Joyce Carol Oates, and the other is The Woman In The Dunes, by Kobo Abe, which I’ve just finished reading (and absolutely loved). Both were new authors to me.

Back in December I took the train up to London for the Ride the Word event at the Cafe Yumchaa in Soho. I’d been wanting to go to a live reading event for some time and missed the Sparks event in Brighton the previous week because I came down with a bug, and the Short Fuse event in Hastings the following weekend because of a family issue. So, it was nice to get to the Ride the Word event, where a bunch of authors who had contributed to the Short Circuit book edited by Vanessa Gebbie read. As well as meeting up with Vanessa, it also gave me an opportunity to say hello to a few people that I’ve ‘met’ online over the last few years, including Tania Hershman, Sarah Salway and Alex Keegan. I also picked up a copy of Balancing on the Edge of the World, by Elizabeth Baines.

Just before Christmas the Goldfish Bowl writing group met up in Canterbury, and Don took the prize for the best short story on the theme of The Origin of Father Christmas. Katherine Spink also brought along a copy of the short anthology that she’s put together containing a varied bunch of stories by group members.

The Critters Bar writing forum kicks off with Flash League III in early January, an all-play-all flash fiction writing competition with weekly rounds and cash prizes for those with the most points at the end.

Whatever you’re up to in 2010, I hope it’s a great year for you.

What’s the best writing how-to book you’ve ever read?

What’s that? You don’t believe in them? Move along please. Thank you.

I’ve read a leaning tower of them since I began writing almost six years ago. Some I’ve found really useful, some less so, but all of them have had something to offer.

If you like how-to books, you’ll no doubt have your favourites, as do I. Without doubt this year my favourite has been Make a Scene: Crafting a Powerful Story One Scene at a Time, by Jordan E. Rosenfeld. Once in a while a book comes along that really makes a difference, and this – for me – is one such book.

Rosenfeld breaks the book up into four major sections:

• Architecture of a Scene
• The Core Elements and the Scene
• Scene Types
• Other Scene Considerations

Right from the first chapter I knew I was holding in my hands a book that was going to help me to prepare for writing my novel, and I haven’t been disappointed. It has affected not only my writing, but my reading, too.

More details available here:

http://www.amazon.com/Make-Scene-Crafting-Powerful-Story/dp/1582974799

If you’re like me and you’re making the change from writing short stories to writing a novel, add this to your list of wants for Christmas.

And feel free to share your own recommendations.

The Novel

Yes, yes, yes, I know I said I’d start writing it in June.

No, no, no, I haven’t started yet.

What’s it to you, Big Nose?

I’m still reading as much contemporary science fiction as I can, and mostly enjoying it. I’m also reading up on science fact – latest theories on time travel, black holes, worm holes, parallel universes and that kind of thing. There’s some really interesting stuff out there (no, really, there is). Anyway, I consider this to be an essential part of my preparation for writing the novel and won’t begin writing until I feel that I’m ready. Right now, I’d expect that to be just after Christmas. Maybe even January 1st. But if I’m not ready then, it’ll be when I am.

However, I still intend to have the novel written and revised by the end of 2010. That has always been the case and that’s still the case, so, even though the start has slipped by months, I plan to have it ready on time. How? Well, simply put, the original plan was really lazy and assumed a typing speed of around 30 words a fortnight with time off for good behaviour, or something equally as silly. I know I can write it faster than originally planned, comfortably in fact, so that’s what I’ll do. Okay?

Critters Bar

I love that place. But I haven’t been there in over a month. What? Well, Ian Rochford has kindly taken over the admin role (thanks Ian), and I’m taking time out not only from Critters Bar but from all such writing forums and online gathering places for a while so that I can concentrate on the novel. It’s hard. I do miss the interaction. But it’s got to be done. The last 12 months I’ve managed to set myself free from all kinds of things in order to free up time for the novel, and pulling out of Critters Bar for a while was the last step. I will be back, I’m just not sure when right now.

Goldfish Bowl

Still meeting up with other writers locally every couple of weeks, and last night we had a workshop on ‘the opening’, the second such workshop as we had one on characterisation a couple of meetings ago. Anyhow, it seemed to go down pretty well and though we were relatively light on numbers the discussion was very worthwhile and we ended up over-running.

Writing

The last stuff I wrote was during the July Blast story-a-day initiative in Critters Bar, and I think I managed about 16 or 17 pieces during the month, something like that. Not quite one a day, but still. Anyway, Dogzplot Flash Fiction took one of the pieces (Chrono-something) from the July Blast recently:

http://dogzplot.blogspot.com/2009/10/chromo-something-bob-jacobs.html

and the good folks over at The Pygmy Giant recently took one (Imperfectly Formed):

http://thepygmygiant.wordpress.com/2009/10/29/imperfectly-formed/

and Every Day Fiction are due to put one up (Broken Waters) on November 26th:

http://www.everydayfiction.com/

Yes, yes, yes, I know they’re very short. Yes, yes, yes, I know they’re very simple. If you want something longer and more meaningful you’ll have to wait for the novel, which is thirteen-point-something months away from being completed (let alone published). But it’ll be worth the wait. Honest.

And those places are all worth a visit if you’re looking for some short fiction to read.

Okay. That’s all for now, folks.

We’re always being told that if we want to write well we should read plenty. So I am. Of course, the more time I spend reading, the less time I have for writing. So, is it worth it?

It’s not enough just to read. I can read an entire novel and not remember much about it a month later other than whether I enjoyed it or not. I have to educate myself to analyse. How has this author approached writing this novel? How does it compare with other novels by the same author? How does it compare with novels by other authors? How else could it have been written? Did the author succeed? Completely? Mostly? At all? What was done well? What was done poorly? Could I do better?

That’s the big question, isn’t it: Could I do better?

If I’m serious about writing a novel – and I’ve been telling myself for six months that I am serious – then I have to believe that I can do at least as well.

And I can’t. Not yet. But I have nine months of writing ahead of me, and a year to go before I start the revision of my novel. The draft doesn’t have to be wonderful, it’s the clay that will be used to create the finished article. I have a year during which I can bring my craft up to scratch, and reading is playing an important part in that. It shows me where the bar is set. It shows me how other writers have approached their novels. It shows me what publishers and readers expect.

Because I’ll be writing science fiction, I’m concentrating on reading as many contemporary SF authors as I can. As a teenager and into my twenties I read a lot of science fiction, from Arthur C Clarke and Isaac Asimov to Larry Niven and Robert Heinlein. As good as that stuff is, modern SF is different. The genre has evolved. Fragmented, even. So many sub-genres.

Since I began writing in 2004 I’ve read a great deal of non-SF. Indeed, since then I’ve hardly touched SF at all. That time hasn’t been wasted. It’s opened me up to authors and styles that I would never have encountered in the SF world, and we learn from everything we read (good and bad). Now, though, I have to focus exclusively on SF, understand the genre, how writing SF differs from writing mainstream or other fiction (and it does differ).

I’ve been reading Alastair Reynolds, Ian M Banks, Neal Asher, Ken MacLeod, Robert Reed, William Gibson, Eric Brown and Richard Morgan. Also in the queue are Ben Bova, Peter F Hamilton, Stephen Baxter, Kevin Anderson and Toby Litt, among others.

In the last few years I’ve probably read four or five novels a year (and a lot of short stories). At the moment I’m getting through a novel every couple of weeks or so. It’s quite an education, and by taking time after each one to analyse, I feel that I’m getting a great deal out of it. So yes, I think it’s worth it.

What have you read today?

I’m guessing that at least one person who knows I’m writing a novel (it could be you!) will find the blog, so here’s what’s happening. 

After five years of online writing forums and writing short stories I figured it’s about time I started to take this writing lark seriously and wrote a novel. I sat down at the end of 2008 and came up with a plan. You know how plans work. It’s a road map of good intentions. You don’t have to follow the map, but it gives you a sense of knowing where you’re going if you at least stay close to it. 

The day job keeps me busy, so I’ve given myself plenty of time to write this thing. I’m due to start the actual writing at the beginning of July (2009), by which time I should have come up with an amazing idea and outlined it. I’ve assumed a weekly target of just 2,000 words, which should be achievable even for me. That’d give me 80,000 words (not set in concrete, but at least set in custard) which is about a minimum I’d aim for, for a novel. That takes me up to the end of March 2010. 

Next, the easy bit, stick it away for three months and forget about it. Maybe I do something else during that time, like plan the next one,  but the plan is to distance myself from the first draft and come back to it fresh maybe three months later. Then edit and revise, for up to six months, which takes me to the end of 2010. 

It’s a plan. I may deviate (from the plan), but it gives me something to work towards. 

So far I’ve spent 3 months coming up with ideas, and got about 13/14/15 that I thought might be worth pushing further. I settled on one and put some detail into it. Job done. 

As part of my preparation I’ve been doing a lot of reading, too. I’m planning to write a Science Fiction novel, as that’s what I’ve read for much of my life (almost exclusively until five years ago) and what I grew up on. So, I’ve been catching up on contemporary SF novels and authors. I’m getting through roughly a novel every two weeks, which is going it some for me, particularly to do that one after another. 

Is it helping? What have I learned? Well, I’ve learned that the idea I came up with isn’t one that I should invest 18 months of my time on. As pleased as I am that I’m getting to grips with the process of coming up with and fleshing out something longer than a short story, the idea I’d chosen isn’t original enough, or exciting enough, to run with. So, I’m still working on the idea, and still plan to have one in place and to have outlined it by the beginning of July. 

I feel good about that. To have gone forward with that idea would at least have been good experience at the whole novel writing process. But I’ve recognised that if I’m serious about writing something of a professional quality with any chance of having it published, I need something bigger and bolder. 

I’ll be back here to provide an update on progress with the novel from time to time, for anyone interested. I won’t be saying much about the story idea, the content, but at least how I’m doing against the plan. If the plan needs to change, I’ll change it. It’s custard, not concrete. Fortunately, my domestic commitments are lighter now than they have been for a few years, so I’m confident that I can complete a novel by the end of 2010. 

I’m also planning to write at least two or three professional quality short stories in that time and to seek publishing as high up the food chain as I can. I have a bunch of ideas for those, too, and I’ll let you know how that goes. 

Right. That’s enough blogging for now. Novel ideas. Go!