Month: July 2015

Dealing With Dialogue + Chapter 6 Thoughts

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Every week when I post a sample chapter I go back and re-read it. Every time I do this, I learn something new about the chapter and think a little deeper about my process as a writer. My initial thoughts from Chapter 6–aside from the impression that I need to go back and weed out some adverbs!–was that the dialogue stuck out to me in this chapter.

Chapter 6 was one of the first chapters that is heavy on the dialogue. We have Runey, Elba, Vance and Mara together for one of the first times and I am just starting to give them their voices. Traditionally, I have always found dialogue a little challenging. If you have even skimmed some of my former blog posts, you will know that I find exposition very compelling, so it is hard for me to break from that and let the characters–literally–speak for themselves. Since I wrote a lot of critical essays in my English literature major in college, I was constantly writing pages of solid prose with no dialogue involved. Thus, dialogue did not come easy to me. I say this in the past tense, because after completing two manuscripts, this is simply not true anymore. While I do love my exposition, my characters’ conversations are easily implemented as well. So this is one area of improvement I have seen in myself as a writer since I composed Chapter 6 of Capacitance.

One other area that I have seen improvement is that my characters’ voices are perhaps a little bit cleaner now. It is a fine balance between giving each character a genuine voice and excluding some of the filler words which are natural in spoken conversation, but can be distracting in a written work. I am talking here about Elba’s “Um”s, Vance’s “Well, you know”s and things like that. We say them all the time in normal conversation, but the characters in a story don’t necessarily need to. As the story goes on, I do clean some of that up. I leave bits like that in if I think it really adds to the voice or the situation, but I think these fillers got a little overboard in Chapter 6.

My biggest insecurity about voice is that I am not going to differentiate it enough between characters and they will all end up sounding the same. It is a huge challenge to attempt to have one’s own voice as a writer and then have to balance the individual voices of all the characters in the novel. I think specifically Elba’s and Vance’s voices are two places I need to watch in Capacitance because I have a sneaking suspicion they may change just a bit as the book goes on, simply because I became more comfortable and in tune with them as characters. However, that’s another round of edits for another day as I am still knee deep in the initial edit of Inductance. With that being said, I am back to editing!

Capacitance: Chapter 6

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I hope everyone had a fun and safe weekend! I still haven’t gotten back to the “real world” (if it’s fair to so call the life of a writer, haha) after conference weekend followed by the holiday weekend, so I apologize for this post being a little late. In Chapter 5, we saw Mara and Runey meet for the first time at the group project meeting; Chapter 6 picks the meeting back up, but from Runey’s perspective. Enjoy!

Chapter 6

Runey noticed Mara’s light green-gold eyes lingering on him just a fraction of a second too long—hardly discernible as out of the ordinary, but Runey inwardly smiled indulgently. She can play aloof and cool but there is some curiosity there at least which may make my job much easier, he thought as he, like the other three slid out his phone to check the latest message. As he scrolled through to check his messages, he noticed with a pang that he had also received one from Juleia; it took a lot of his willpower to scroll past it to read later—as the day was progressing, his mind was taken over more and more by worry for Juleia, and concern at how she was handling the new situation. He feared she was not taking it well and half dreaded what he might find later in the message from her. However, she and her message truly were a matter for later, and Runey clicked his mind back into focus on the mission, the task at hand, and now, most immediately, the group’s message. He tapped the new message from the Board of Directors to open it and read:

“We trust you have already begun to meet and interact with your new cross-disciplinary group members. The purpose of this project is to give you some ‘real world’ experience of what it would be like to see a project incorporating the knowledge and expertise from all areas. That is your challenge and goal within your group—come together and create a project that uses each group member’s area of knowledge. We want to give you all the creative license and flexibility we can, so there will be very few guidelines. However, the one rule is that you must meet every Tuesday from 9AM to 4PM to work on your project and get to know one another. This project will last for the duration of this academic year; each Tuesday, you will receive a message with a general suggestion or encouragement for your group’s work together. Good luck!

Today’s Suggestion: Get to know one another! Talk amongst yourselves about your college, your classes, your friends, your current projects.”

Runey knew this message had The Professor’s influence behind it. By getting us to open up about what we are working on, he is hoping I will be able to get an early lead on just what it is that Mara from Science is doing that is so important, Runey thought, But I don’t think she is going to say a word about it today. Nice try, Prof. He could tell by her body language—the slight stiffening of her posture, the narrowing of her eyes, the way the hand not holding her phone clenched into a fist on the table—as she read the message, presumably at the mention of sharing their current projects, that Mara was defensive about the idea of sharing her secrets with her new group members. The message wasn’t very long, but Runey was an exceptionally fast reader, and after he finished reading the message, he scanned the other group members to gauge their reactions. Elba, the small pale girl from Technology, seemed vaguely interested, and Vance was nodding slightly and smiling interestedly—he would definitely enjoy the project and the chance to network with even more people. Ultimately, Runey was already trying to figure out whether or not he could convert not just Mara, but the entire group to the Restorationists.

“Well, I might as well start everything out! As you all already know, my name is Vance, and I am so glad we all get to work together—but I’m pretty sure you knew that already too,” Vance said heartily to start off the proceedings. “In the College of Politics, we break down the four years of schooling into four years of concentrations: the law, public speaking, ethics, and, finally, campaigning. So, since I’m a first year, right now I am knee-deep in learning about all the different laws of our nation. Might sound boring to most, but it is the foundation for the rest of my political journey so I find it fascinating—most of the time!” he finished with a laugh, smiling around at everyone. “In the college of Politics, we don’t have an assigned project or anything like that; after we graduate, we take our skills that we learned during the four years and apply them to campaigning for office. Although you can boost your chances of landing something big after school by doing other projects and volunteer work on the side; Politics has buses that take us off campus to volunteer every weekend if we want, and I usually make use of them—unless there is a really good party that can’t be missed,” he beamed around at them all again (Elba smiled back obligingly with a small laugh, and Runey laughed as well although he was actually amused by Mara’s expression of barely contained exasperation).

“I also am an aide to the University Board of Directors; although I am not important enough to have been let in on this little secret they sprung on us this week!” Again, small laughter all around as inside Runey’s mind raced into a whir; this could be an unbelievable in to the Board, he thought excitedly, the Professor didn’t tell me he had set me up with a jackpot group to convert. Mara must be the prize plum, but Vance is also someone I want to get on my side.

“How about the next time you have one of those high-priority parties you give me a call and let me know about it?” Runey asked Vance who nodded enthusiastically in response. “Well, I’m Runey, and I guess I have already told you quite a bit about myself before they sent us that email, so why don’t we move on to the next person. Elba?” Runey asked, purposely skipping over Mara.

Elba blushed on cue as all eyes turned to her, “Hey guys, I’m Elba. Um, in Technology we basically learn programming every year, although we go deeper and deeper into the subject with each passing year. During our final year, we are supposed to create a new program as our final project, so I haven’t worked on that yet but I do know I would like to develop something that is an anti-hacking device because I know…” she faltered, “how that can be very bad,” she finished weakly. She’s hiding something, Runey thought, interested. His thoughts were cut short, however, as Mara suddenly scooted her chair out, and shouldered her deep green leather bag.

“Hey, what are you doing?” Vance protested, shocked that she would interrupt Elba. Runey’s eyes gleamed; there must be something she really doesn’t want to tell us if she is willing to break the rules like this to keep it quiet, he thought excitedly.

“Vance, Elba, Runey, it has been nice meeting you all, but it appears this meeting today is hardly mandatory and I have some catching up to do in my lab. It sounds like we will have plenty of time to get to know each other over the course of our year-long project. See you next Tuesday,” Mara said in a clipped tone, a tight, fake smile on her face. With that she strode over to the door, pushed it open with a squeak and decisively walked out.

Runey sat there in disbelief. Even he could not believe she had such nerve to just walk out on a compulsory meeting. In their society, everyone was brought up to follow orders and obey directions from above, no questions asked. It was as ingrained as saying “please” and “thank you.” Either Mara was really working on something important, or she had a rebellious streak—or both. Any of those possibilities delighted Runey. He glanced around at the other stunned faces in the room. “But…but…we are supposed to be taking this time to get to know each other! The message said…” Vance was sputtering angrily. Elba just sat there with a dazed look on her face as she pulled out her phone and then began typing furiously—obviously messaging friends.

“Ok, you guys, ok; that wasn’t supposed to happen. Obviously,” Runey tried a smile on the others in the group—it didn’t work. “Don’t worry; we won’t get in trouble if we don’t carry out the full meeting time this week. I’m sure of it. Just look at what Mara said, we will have plenty of time to get to know each other.” He smiled again and was pleased to see that they were eating up his reassuring words even though there was no guarantee or validity backing them; the warm tone of his voice had brought the startled look out of their eyes.

“Well, maybe I should go after her, and, you know, talk to her. Make sure she will be more cooperative next week. Let her know we are on her side,” Vance suggested.

Runey thought it was an excellent idea, but not to be carried out by Vance, “Yeah one of us should definitely go after her. I might as well; we are on my college so I know the grounds and buildings best. Hopefully I can bring her around,” he said with a shrug of the shoulders. “But it’s too bad I won’t get to spend the rest of the time getting to know you two. Why don’t we meet somewhere this weekend and hang out?” He held out his phone. The other two in turn touched their phones to his and their contacts were instantly transferred. “I’ll be in touch! Maybe I can convince Mara from Science to join me and finally give us her introduction,” he said with a wink. With that, he was out the door, dashing up the steps, pleased he had left the other two very promising members of his group with smiles on their faces.

He took the steps two at a time with well-practiced footfalls—a fleeting image of him chasing Juleia down this very flight, catching her and pinning her down with his kiss on a table in Sculpting Studio B stole through his mind and nearly made him trip—but he made it to the rainbow foyer, the glass stairwell a DNA helix of color to his right as he slammed through the glass doors out into the yard. He was right to have hurried—as he correctly guessed, Mara from Science walked fast when she was determined to get to her lab. He spotted her already heading up the hill, almost through the glass tunnel, the squares of colored glass painting her retreating figure. All around him, groups were still meeting on the soft green lawn or in the buildings, so the sidewalk was completely clear. Runey kicked hard into a headlong sprint; unlike the others in his group he hadn’t bothered to encumber himself with a satchel or briefcase so his athletic frame took on the burst of speed with ease and he glided up the hill after Mara.

Before long he caught up with her and he decided to round on her with as much brashness as she had exhibited when she left their meeting so suddenly. Coming up behind her, he roughly grabbed her blue silk shod shoulder, “Hey, wait up Mara from Science,” he said, the sprint up the hill making the most minimal toll to his vocal capacity.

She wheeled around furiously, “What is your problem? I told you all back there I needed to leave, so let me leave! I will do my best for this little group project, but my time is far too valuable to waste a whole day socializing pointlessly,” she let the last two words drop off her tongue like they had a foul taste, and treated Runey to an incredulous glare as he failed to remove his hand from her shoulder.

“Ok, ok, ok,” Runey said soothingly, deliberately contrasting with his rough shoulder grabbing introduction, “We all just wanted to make sure we weren’t supposed to take that scene back there personally. It’s not too often we get to mingle with Science students, and one of the rare opportunities we get, she ends up storming off like we are a bunch of idiots. You’re obviously going to be a big part of this project if we want it to succeed; we can’t do it without your expertise. You see why we are concerned?” Runey continued in the pandering tone of voice, hoping to latch onto a thread of Mara’s self-importance.

Instead, her incredulous look just deepened into one of pure indifference, “Well if I am so important, let me go do my work. I will obviously be a part of this group thing—they are forcing us, after all.” She jerked her shoulder out of his grasp and resumed walking up the sidewalk.

Runey jogged back up to walk alongside her and tried a different tact, “If I may be frank, what is it you are going to work on now?” He asked, wincing inside as he knew he was going out on a limb.

Wearily, Mara paused in her walking and turned toward Runey, “Look, I left the meeting because I didn’t want to tell people about what I am currently working on, so what makes you think I would now tell you?” she said, shaking her head bemusedly and glancing at him. In that glance, Runey once again felt a heat behind those green eyes that he was sure wasn’t intentional but it was compelling nonetheless. His deep navy eyes met her gaze and the heat burned deeper, but all too soon she was continuing off on her way back to Science without him; her purposeful upright gait a clear indicator to him that he should remain behind on his own grounds.

From #AmWriting to #AmEditing : The In-Between Manuscript Process

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It’s been a little over a week since I finished up Inductance, but it seems like much longer! So much has happened since then, with my travels to Austin getting into the editing process. Being in between books is a strange and rather uncomfortable place for me now–I am used to always writing and filling parts of my day with putting words on the page. However, I think it is very important for me to take a little breath before I start writing the final book in the trilogy, Resistance.

The first reason for this is, I would like to have a bit more of an idea where the story is going and how it will get there. Right now, I have the first chapter planned out and maybe (maybe) ideas for the second chapter. Ultimately, I know where the story is going to end. However I am not sure how that will come about. As I work through the editing process, I hope to find inspiration for the final installation of my trilogy and have a better grasp of where it is all going. As a pantser writer, though, I don’t need too much direction before I begin!

Already, I feel the compulsion to begin Resistance. I think this is how one knows that the writer’s block and the insecurity and questioning whether you are really good enough to do this has passed. I am now a writer, it is part of my life and essential to my being. When I don’t write (as I haven’t this week) I feel the day lagging by as if some element is missing. So, it won’t be long, I’m sure before I am diving into the writing of my third manuscript. In fact, I already have the first line ready to go. Since it contains no spoilers, here it is: “The house was a beautiful glass prison.” With any luck, you are now asking, “Whose house?” “Why would a home be a prison?” and maybe you’re even intrigued by the conflicting imagery of an institution of confinement (a prison) made out of fragile glass. I’ve not had much luck with first pages before, but I think for once I am more than happy with this opening line. Hopefully the rest of the page, the rest of the chapter, the rest of the novel itself flows out with such confidence.

Until I let that stream of words flow, I am engaged in navigating the rocky waters of the editing process. The first ten chapters of Inductance were ROUGH. My goodness. I couldn’t even get into line by line editing them for content on the page. So much needs to be changed and refined. Refinement is the main issue here–at first I was just writing to write, to get into the characters and the narrative voice of another book. While it is kind of frustrating to look back and see so much work that needs to be done, I know that the reward will be worth it. I know the problems that the MS has presented and now I need to really get in touch with my characters and go back and give them the refined depth they deserve. All the concepts are right there on the page–they are just a little messier than I would prefer! However, I am happy to say that after Chapter 10, I have found everything much more pleasing. It is so crazy that even after having written one full book, it still took me some time with the second to get back into my true narrative voice. This is one reason I won’t be waiting too long to start Resistance; I need to keep the narrative voice fresh.

I hope all my readers in the U.S. have a fun and safe holiday weekend! I will be posting a fresh chapter of Capacitance on Monday! 🙂

Balancing Act: Writing With Two Main Characters

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I always knew Capacitance would center around two main characters–from the very first image of inspiration, I knew that the story would involve a romance, and I also knew that I wanted to explore both aspects of that love story, namely both the male and female perspective. By default, the more characters introduced into a story, the more complex it gets, especially if point of view jumps between more than one main character. I have spoke of J.K. Rowling’s masterful handling of this multi-main character challenge in The Casual Vacancy. My story is not as challenging as that since it only concerns two main characters, however, the balance is important to keep readers invested in each of the characters in their own right. 

While writing Capacitance, I more or less stuck to a basic formula of alternating chapters; I would have a Mara chapter then a Runey chapter. These chapters would compliment each other because they would build on the action, but not rehash it. If the narrator never follwed Runey’s tale, the reader would be confused as to Runey’s motives for pursuing Mara, and the love story would not be as fleshed out. By allowing readers to see both sides of the story, they are given more insight and validation for what is happening between Mara and Runey. 

The male protagonist is something that is not always commonly seen in novels. By and large, the majority of today’s readers are women, thus selling to that market is most profitable in the way of book sale numbers. Even in many of today’s bestsellers, the male co-leads are somewhat shallow; you know they are the love interest, and the female lead is beyond dedicated to them, but the story doesn’t really flesh out their characteristics or qualities which make them so compelling. I wanted to create a complicated male co-lead for this series; one that the readers would come to know as innately as Mara. Thus the chapters from Runey’s world show insight into his emotions and way of thought. Writing from the male point of view is a challenge, but I really enjoyed writing Runey’s segment of the story. He has flaws and he makes big mistakes, but ultimately, he becomes a better man for it. 

While writing, I sometimes found myself enjoying Runey’s segments even more than I enjoyed writing Mara. In Chapter 4 we see the first really emotional, inward action on a character’s part, and that is Runey laying in bed with the realization of his loss of Juleia trickling back to him. I related to this scene so deeply and with Runey himself that at first he seemed to almost be taking over as the main character. However, as the story progresses, as you will hopefully someday see, the two really come to balance out and the storylines become equally as compelling, even though I stress out a lot over one not being as exciting as the other. As is so often the answer, the characters will work and speak for themselves and make the story flow as it should. 

One final thing worth mentioning about maintaining this balancing act between two main characters is the use of third person point of view. Since the reader is not being forced to bounce back between two narrative voices, the book has more flow and continuity. The third person narrator bridges the gap between Mara’s chapters and Runey’s chapters creating a cohesion which guides the readers along in a much less disjointed manner. This also makes things less confusing in segments where the two are physically together when a first person voice narrator could get a little tricky. 

Today may be the day I start the final book of the trilogy, so hopefully I can keep my character balance going strong through the final act! I will be posting more on my current writing progress and the in-between books process tomorrow, so stay tuned! 🙂

Stieg Larsson’s Millennium Series (The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo)

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I am sorry for the lack of posts this week–everything is off balance with my travels of the past weekend, but I am going to try and get back on track with the traditional Wednesday post about a book which has inspired me. Today I am talking about a series. A series which was tragically cut short and is very different from any of the other inspiring books I have written about on here. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, or Millennium series. I picked up the first book in the series randomly one summer when I was in college and looking for a snappy read to pass a long road trip–the book perfectly fit the bill. Not sure what to expect, I was instantly swept into the action and the non-conventional characters. Aside from being a compelling thriller that is sometimes physically impossible to put down, the three books in this series have lessons that all writers can take inspiration from. 

First and foremost are the characters–they aren’t your typical protagonists. Lisbeth Salander, the tattooed, bisexual, computer hacking genius with a photographic memory is not the standard archetypal female protag. And Mikael Blomkvist, while on the whole a very classic, likeable protagonist, is not without his confused, rather infuriating womanizing tendencies. Thus, these two protagonists are presented to readers and given ultimately compelling situations and challenges, making the reader invested in them, even when they don’t deserve it. These kinds of characters which blur the line between black and white right and wrong are, in my opinion, some of the most interesting types of characters–readers indentify with them, trust them and root for them while in reality, if they were to meet these people on the street, they might shy away or be judgemental. Through the art of writing and the act of reading, one is transported to a much more open-minded place. 

Next, I must credit Larsson for his treatment of controversial issues. He is not afraid to introduce rape, murder, and socio cultural issues onto the page. He shows this underbelly of society which most people might not want to talk about and makes it front and center to his plot line. Larsson’s advocacy for women in these books is incredible; through Lisbeth Salander, he shows a woman being put through hell and by placing her in a contemporary setting, he reminds readers that her story is not fiction for some. 

Larsson’s treatment of the contemporary setting is something I take inspiration from as well. Many of the books I read are historical or fantasy, so it is important to read things set in the present. Larsson does this in a very gripping manner. The reader feels like they have actually visited Sweden after reading the book, and (in my case anyway) leave the reading feeling very inclined to actually make a visit over. The books portray the very essence of how an American feels after traveling to Europe–that they have just experienced something very familiar and yet distinctly foreign. 

The only aspect of Larsson’s series that I don’t enjoy is that fact that it ended. The ten books originally planned are now just three due to the author’s untimely death. I read somewhere online that the outlines for the remaining seven books exist. I was talking to my Dad about how I was cheated out of the remaining books and said I hoped someone would write them for Larsson someday based on his outlines. Dad’s response, “Maybe that someone could be you.” If only I could do them so much justice!