Meta: Rambling About Learning Craft
Writing
Taking some time to study plot and characterization (as well as structure) is beginning to pay off in terms of seeing where I can improve. Now I can see the holes in my work--not enough plot/movement, lack of drama. I can see where I usually do well (atmosphere-building, flow, pacing), too. This is good! *happy*
Previously (aka Why I Had Writer's Block)
A lot of my WIPs have been stalled after the first chapter, mainly because I have an idea, a beginning, and a goal ... but getting to the goal has been difficult. I have ideas on where I want the story to go, what I want the story to say, what I want people to take away from the story, but it's all been a big jumble in my mind. Pearly Gates has been a big jumble of "what if" and "this should happen", but the chronology has been vague, and I've been thinking about motivations and possibilities without being able to actually force myself to make some decisions. Numbered has been me worrying about pseudomath and what I want to focus on while they search for Sai. In the case of Tezuka's Notebook, I'd discarded my original idea as too obvious (and somewhat OOC), but I hadn't been able to formulate a coherent plot to replace it.
Studying Craft: Talking About Plot
Starting with Nancy Kress's Beginnings, Middles & Ends, I got a general idea of what sort of things I might need to really tie together a longer fic, and I really enjoyed her explanation of throughlines. Ansen Dibell's Plot helped me see that even though I enjoyed simple "nothing really happens" stories, with something long, nothing happening is truly boring. Finally, I had a plan for the rest of Pearly Gates, but it was too nebulous and unstructured; Plot & Structure by James Scott Bell gave me a frame to hang the story on, and it already looks more promising. (Not to mention I now have a much clearer idea of what to focus on for PW!)
Putting It Together
I'm going to make a concerted push towards finishing my WIPs. With the exception of Letters to the Inter-galactic Agency and the Cogs and Gears universe (both of which are collaborations, and therefore not my own stories but rather shared ones), I'm going to be ticking off WIPs until I've cleared what's currently on my plate. This means Pearly Gates, Numbered, and Tezuka's Notebook. With what I'm learning about plot and structure, I should be able to make a good go of them. At least, I sure hope so.
Observations
I owe aishuu a lot. If she hadn't told me "You need to start writing longer stories", I would have stayed and splashed happily in my little sub-1000-words puddle, and never really thought about how to improve myself and bring my craft to a higher level. Shortfic and longfic really do demand very different things from a writer. When I was writing shortfics, it was fine for me to write little pieces with no plot focusing on characters and sketching out a general idea of a universe, or evoke certain feelings and surroundings while ignoring the idea of a real story. But readers demand different things from a 1000-word story and a 10,000-word or 100,000-word story. I want to write 100,000-word stories, and I needed to work on the "story" part of that. IOU, aishuu. And for that, you just wait Touya ... I'm coming to kick your ass in go. ^_~
Footnote
Though it felt like a lot more, I only really have three solo WIPs left. Maybe it felt like there were a lot more because I haven't published some of the ones I'm working on. Well, this definitely looks doable now! *cheers*
Taking some time to study plot and characterization (as well as structure) is beginning to pay off in terms of seeing where I can improve. Now I can see the holes in my work--not enough plot/movement, lack of drama. I can see where I usually do well (atmosphere-building, flow, pacing), too. This is good! *happy*
Previously (aka Why I Had Writer's Block)
A lot of my WIPs have been stalled after the first chapter, mainly because I have an idea, a beginning, and a goal ... but getting to the goal has been difficult. I have ideas on where I want the story to go, what I want the story to say, what I want people to take away from the story, but it's all been a big jumble in my mind. Pearly Gates has been a big jumble of "what if" and "this should happen", but the chronology has been vague, and I've been thinking about motivations and possibilities without being able to actually force myself to make some decisions. Numbered has been me worrying about pseudomath and what I want to focus on while they search for Sai. In the case of Tezuka's Notebook, I'd discarded my original idea as too obvious (and somewhat OOC), but I hadn't been able to formulate a coherent plot to replace it.
Studying Craft: Talking About Plot
Starting with Nancy Kress's Beginnings, Middles & Ends, I got a general idea of what sort of things I might need to really tie together a longer fic, and I really enjoyed her explanation of throughlines. Ansen Dibell's Plot helped me see that even though I enjoyed simple "nothing really happens" stories, with something long, nothing happening is truly boring. Finally, I had a plan for the rest of Pearly Gates, but it was too nebulous and unstructured; Plot & Structure by James Scott Bell gave me a frame to hang the story on, and it already looks more promising. (Not to mention I now have a much clearer idea of what to focus on for PW!)
Putting It Together
I'm going to make a concerted push towards finishing my WIPs. With the exception of Letters to the Inter-galactic Agency and the Cogs and Gears universe (both of which are collaborations, and therefore not my own stories but rather shared ones), I'm going to be ticking off WIPs until I've cleared what's currently on my plate. This means Pearly Gates, Numbered, and Tezuka's Notebook. With what I'm learning about plot and structure, I should be able to make a good go of them. At least, I sure hope so.
Observations
I owe aishuu a lot. If she hadn't told me "You need to start writing longer stories", I would have stayed and splashed happily in my little sub-1000-words puddle, and never really thought about how to improve myself and bring my craft to a higher level. Shortfic and longfic really do demand very different things from a writer. When I was writing shortfics, it was fine for me to write little pieces with no plot focusing on characters and sketching out a general idea of a universe, or evoke certain feelings and surroundings while ignoring the idea of a real story. But readers demand different things from a 1000-word story and a 10,000-word or 100,000-word story. I want to write 100,000-word stories, and I needed to work on the "story" part of that. IOU, aishuu. And for that, you just wait Touya ... I'm coming to kick your ass in go. ^_~
Footnote
Though it felt like a lot more, I only really have three solo WIPs left. Maybe it felt like there were a lot more because I haven't published some of the ones I'm working on. Well, this definitely looks doable now! *cheers*