That reality check never did come
So, I finished the latest Ninja and Roommate story this weekend.
And it's not online.
And won't be. No other new stories, either.
Publishing stuff on the internet doesn't work for me very well. I've talked with people, and talked about, posting original fiction in the past, and reasons for the general apathy (usually the prime reason is "not actually very good"). My lack of audience seemed to be due to a bunch of reasons: not writing gay porn, not having made a name for myself as a fandom writer and thereby creating a pre-existing audience, not really having a pre-existing community to draw on, and my own inability to promote myself. A couple friends would read some stories and wander off: that was basically the best I could hope for, beyond a couple friends who've been remarkably supportive and continue to be. This, of course, meant next to no feedback, which isn't what writing is /for/, but it's an incentive. One which has dwindled to basic nothingness since I started writing /more/ back at the end of May.
So, online publishing and Ingrid: not a big success.
But that isn't why I'm not going to be posting Ninja and Roommate stories anymore (I'm leaving the website up, for the moment - it's an awesome lookin' website). It's just something that makes this easier, a sort of "Why not?" because posting stories and not posting stories have the same result - actually, not posting stories has me a lot less gloomy and worried about the quality of stories, which invariably happened when I would post stories and go days without there being so much as a blip from anyone.
I don't think I'm a bad writer, not really. I think I may even have some skill, something that I can, with a lot of work and diligence and tearing revision, maybe polish into something resembling real talent. And Ninja and Roommate has evolved, in my head, from it's initial experimental writing stuff down with these two characters for a lark phase. It has a definite ending - not just, you know, an ending when Erik will no longer be in school, but an /ending/ ending, an ending to Erik's confused character arc, an ending that will hopefully show some small growth occurred. To myself, I've taken to referring to Ninja and Roommate as a comic coming of age story where the protagonist never truly realizes he's supposed to be coming of age. And the more I realize where I want to go, the more I realize there's things I'd want to do in the earlier parts of Ninja and Roommate, to make it cohesive, to more logically bring a reader to the conclusion.
It's not much. It's no great work of literature. It doesn't have the comforting shield of genre to cling to, to give it purpose. But it's still a story and it's one I want to try and get published as an actual novel at some point. And if I want to even think of doing that, I have to ... not have the entire thing freely available on the internet.
I know it'll be a hell of a lot of work, with lots of rejection afterwards, and may be years before I see any kind of success, if ever ... but dammit, I've gotta face facts that everything I've done in the past five years or so has just been me avoiding the fact that all I've ever really wanted to do is write. So.
If anyone out there is really that interested in the ongoing adventures of Erik and Ray, touch base somehow, because I certainly don't mind sharing word .docs.
Art and random and book reviews and whatnot will continue to be posted.
I've finally gotten around to looking through some of the stuff over at He Wrote, She Wrote, Jennifer Crusie and Bob Mayer's online writing workshop, which Ven linked me to I can't remember when. I'm not familiar with Crusie and Mayer's work - although I've been meaning to look into Crusie's novels, since I've heard nothing but good things about them from multiple sources - but they're very good at making the basics of writing really clear. Crusie also has the excellent taste to present Terry Pratchett's Going Postal as an example of the ideal use of the third omniscient point of view.
Of particular interest is this entry on narrative structure; specifically, down at the very bottom, where Crusie answers a question about serial stories/novels where each chapter is, essentially, a short story. Since this is how I often find myself writing, and I don't know a lot of modern authors who use the style, it's good to see some acknowledgement of, uh, its existence.
And it's not online.
And won't be. No other new stories, either.
Publishing stuff on the internet doesn't work for me very well. I've talked with people, and talked about, posting original fiction in the past, and reasons for the general apathy (usually the prime reason is "not actually very good"). My lack of audience seemed to be due to a bunch of reasons: not writing gay porn, not having made a name for myself as a fandom writer and thereby creating a pre-existing audience, not really having a pre-existing community to draw on, and my own inability to promote myself. A couple friends would read some stories and wander off: that was basically the best I could hope for, beyond a couple friends who've been remarkably supportive and continue to be. This, of course, meant next to no feedback, which isn't what writing is /for/, but it's an incentive. One which has dwindled to basic nothingness since I started writing /more/ back at the end of May.
So, online publishing and Ingrid: not a big success.
But that isn't why I'm not going to be posting Ninja and Roommate stories anymore (I'm leaving the website up, for the moment - it's an awesome lookin' website). It's just something that makes this easier, a sort of "Why not?" because posting stories and not posting stories have the same result - actually, not posting stories has me a lot less gloomy and worried about the quality of stories, which invariably happened when I would post stories and go days without there being so much as a blip from anyone.
I don't think I'm a bad writer, not really. I think I may even have some skill, something that I can, with a lot of work and diligence and tearing revision, maybe polish into something resembling real talent. And Ninja and Roommate has evolved, in my head, from it's initial experimental writing stuff down with these two characters for a lark phase. It has a definite ending - not just, you know, an ending when Erik will no longer be in school, but an /ending/ ending, an ending to Erik's confused character arc, an ending that will hopefully show some small growth occurred. To myself, I've taken to referring to Ninja and Roommate as a comic coming of age story where the protagonist never truly realizes he's supposed to be coming of age. And the more I realize where I want to go, the more I realize there's things I'd want to do in the earlier parts of Ninja and Roommate, to make it cohesive, to more logically bring a reader to the conclusion.
It's not much. It's no great work of literature. It doesn't have the comforting shield of genre to cling to, to give it purpose. But it's still a story and it's one I want to try and get published as an actual novel at some point. And if I want to even think of doing that, I have to ... not have the entire thing freely available on the internet.
I know it'll be a hell of a lot of work, with lots of rejection afterwards, and may be years before I see any kind of success, if ever ... but dammit, I've gotta face facts that everything I've done in the past five years or so has just been me avoiding the fact that all I've ever really wanted to do is write. So.
If anyone out there is really that interested in the ongoing adventures of Erik and Ray, touch base somehow, because I certainly don't mind sharing word .docs.
Art and random and book reviews and whatnot will continue to be posted.
I've finally gotten around to looking through some of the stuff over at He Wrote, She Wrote, Jennifer Crusie and Bob Mayer's online writing workshop, which Ven linked me to I can't remember when. I'm not familiar with Crusie and Mayer's work - although I've been meaning to look into Crusie's novels, since I've heard nothing but good things about them from multiple sources - but they're very good at making the basics of writing really clear. Crusie also has the excellent taste to present Terry Pratchett's Going Postal as an example of the ideal use of the third omniscient point of view.
Of particular interest is this entry on narrative structure; specifically, down at the very bottom, where Crusie answers a question about serial stories/novels where each chapter is, essentially, a short story. Since this is how I often find myself writing, and I don't know a lot of modern authors who use the style, it's good to see some acknowledgement of, uh, its existence.