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RichardB posted a new activity comment 7 years, 5 months ago
I know exactly what you mean about The Fear, both in general and in the specific form you mention. Encouragement: a few days ago I fixed a problem in my old revived MS that I’d been shrinking from for, literally, years, si if I can do it you certainly can.
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RichardB replied to the topic NaNoWriMo in the forum Coffee Shop 7 years, 6 months ago
Yes, there is that. An idea that added a whole new dimension to one of my novels once came to me while I was laying the table for dinner.
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RichardB replied to the topic NaNoWriMo in the forum Coffee Shop 7 years, 6 months ago
Not when you’re playing Freecell…
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RichardB replied to the topic NaNoWriMo in the forum Coffee Shop 7 years, 6 months ago
I think it’s just human nature. Before we moved MrsB was a Beaver Scout Leader for twenty years, and over that time I lost count of the number of Beaver/ Cub/ Scout leaders I heard carrying on about what horrors their charges were, what a hard time it all was, and generally giving the impression that they were being put upon and they would rather…[Read more]
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RichardB replied to the topic NaNoWriMo in the forum Coffee Shop 7 years, 6 months ago
Yes, if you tell someone that you play, say, the guitar, they don’t normally up and ask you if you’ve got a recording contract, do they? Though I don’t think I’ve told anybody outside my immediate circle of close friends and family that I write.
Apart from you lot, obviously.
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RichardB posted a new activity comment 7 years, 6 months ago
Speaking of armrests. When I’m in the armchair reading, and puss wants to be stroked/scratched/ generally mauled about, she’ll come and sit on the armrest. If i try to ignore her she’ll stretch out her front leg and put her paw on my face. if that doesn’t work, she’ll do it with her claws out. I told you she was shameless.
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RichardB posted a new activity comment 7 years, 6 months ago
Fraid not. Our cat, though she’s a shameless attention seeker, doesn’t do lap-sitting.
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It’s ok if said cat doesn’t mind being an arm rest, which one of mine doesn’t. He’s a daft bugger. But I have resorted to the cozy cardboard box next to keyboard option at the moment.
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The current lap sitter has allowed me to move the keyboard from under her head and use it – although it’s rather uncomfortable (for me, not her). The other thinks moving fingers are an invitation to play…
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Not without growing your arms a bit longer…
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Speaking of armrests. When I’m in the armchair reading, and puss wants to be stroked/scratched/ generally mauled about, she’ll come and sit on the armrest. If i try to ignore her she’ll stretch out her front leg and put her paw on my face. if that doesn’t work, she’ll do it with her claws out. I told you she was shameless.
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Our Timmy does that sometimes, too, Richard. He’s got a stare you can FEEL…and if you ignore it, he’ll give a little ‘mew’ and stretch out his paw towards my face. Glad to say when his claws come out, he usually saves that for my arm…
The teeth he saves for when he’s hungry, and he always goes for the soft bit of my upper arm.
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RichardB replied to the topic NaNoWriMo in the forum Coffee Shop 7 years, 6 months ago
Or to put it another, slightly less discouraging way, if you’re writing fiction that’s coming from inside your head, right? So anything outside that is Real Life.
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RichardB posted a new activity comment 7 years, 6 months ago
Yes, I know that Debi (for one) works like this. so there’s a published author as an example.
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RichardB posted an update 7 years, 6 months ago
Editing: they say cut cut cut, don’t they? Hmm. I don’t work like that. When I finished the first draft of my ghost story six (My God!) years ago it was only 47,000 words long. When I submitted it two years later it was 74,000 words. Now its creeping up to 80,000. Mind you, there’s some rather drastic cutting needed near the end.
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I think it works like that for some, doesn’t it? Writing the bare bones first and then fleshing out. (I’ve always hated the term ‘fleshing out’ – too many dissection classes and JEkyll and Hyde stories!)
I seem to always end up at roughly the same word count – cutting a lot and feeling all pleased with myself, then realising I need whole new scenes…
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Yes, I know that Debi (for one) works like this. so there’s a published author as an example.
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RichardB posted a new activity comment 7 years, 6 months ago
I like it! How were the plums?
Oh, and your news. I like that too.-
Delicious. So sweet, and so cold. Unlike the novel which is bitter and very, very long
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that is bloody amazing @daedalus! Congratulations 🙂 What a lot of plums…
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Yippee Daeds! Hope you are going to take the day off to celebrate.🍒🍾
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Haha I wish
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This is awesomes Daeds. Both the achievement and the plums. I want that meme back, it was the best.
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RichardB posted an update 7 years, 6 months ago
Call me weird if you will, but I do love picking a passage apart and putting it back together again, better than before. So satisfying.
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That’s not weird, Richard. I didn’t think I could be the only one who preferred working with an existing draft to creating a new one
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Two different types of adventure, I think. I enjoy both but creating a new draft can be like swimming in very rough seas.
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Definitely. Editing is a craft. Writinf a first draft is an extreme sport
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I like that analogy. If it’s skiing, then I am currently uphill xcountry skiing, stuck in those parallel ruts and not sure whether they are heading in the right direction…
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RichardB posted a new activity comment 7 years, 6 months ago
One day you’ll be glad of this. Better sooner than later.
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I’ve also completely lost control of the days of the week. I think’s it’s just been both Tuesday and Friday simultaneously.
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Sympathies, Raine. I had to spend the best part of a day retiming my plot because I got the days wrong and ended up with things happening on a Sunday when they couldn’t
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I’m thinking of launching a campaign against the need for books to have to do days of the week at all.
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Or to have any internal coherency whatsoever. Who cares if my MC left the house in trousers and was wearing a skirt by the time she got on the bus
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I recall that Joseph Conrad had to make some rewrites to Under Western Eyes at a very late stage when someone realised that the entire plot took place over one extremely long day
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@janeshuff there’s a possibility of that happening in my current wip – only more likely shorts -> trousers as the MC is a he.
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@athelstone Hurrah. It’s time we writers broke free from the shackles of continuity.
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@janeshuff this looks like another case where bbpress is hiding replies (for space and tidiness) but not providing a ‘show all replies’ button. So although I can see there were 8 replies, I can’t actually view them.
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Neither can I!
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RichardB replied to the topic TV appearance – Quest, 'Wings of War' in the forum Podium 7 years, 6 months ago
Spot on, Kaz. That’s exactly what he is.
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RichardB replied to the topic TV appearance – Quest, 'Wings of War' in the forum Podium 7 years, 6 months ago
Well done indeed, Daeds. Authoritative, erudite and lucid. Once again you display that knack you have of making technical things clear to the layman.
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RichardB replied to the topic What shape are your ideas? in the forum Blogs 7 years, 6 months ago
Before I start writing (these days, anyway) I need to know the beginning (obviously) and some idea of the ending, but not necessarily everything that happens in between. Nothing is set in stone, though, and either may change before I’ve finished, depending on what happens along the way.
The two novels I’m prepared to own up to came about in quite…[Read more]
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RichardB posted a new activity comment 7 years, 6 months ago
Finished redoing that chapter. Now for the other two…
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RichardB posted an update 7 years, 6 months ago
Dunno about NaNoWriMo and word count targets, but in the last two days I’ve revised and rewritten 4,000 words, which is pretty good going for me. I’ve almost finished changing an entire (long) chapter from one POV to another. Remember that exercise in the S-E course? Like that, only longer. Much longer.
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That’s great Richard! Looking forward to seeing the results
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Me too 🙂
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Finished redoing that chapter. Now for the other two…
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RichardB posted an update 7 years, 6 months ago
Just about to take murdering darlings to a new level. There’s this paragraph I posted for one of the exercises in the S-E course. Debi was impressed, and helped me make it even better. And now it’s got to go. The whole para. (Sobs.)
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You have my sympathies. But keep the cut lines somewhere, Richard. You never know when a version of them may turn out to be useful in another piece.
In the meantime, here’s a hanky 🙂
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Thanks @richardB. “Shrinking from” – that’s exactly it!! I know I just need to take a deep breath, and step in. Quit worrying about the outcome and just engage with the process.
I have four clear hours tomorrow morning to work, so hopefully I will make some progress. Out of interest, Richard, what was the problem and what was your fix? (if you…[Read more]
The problem was the one I mentioned a couple of days ago: the bloated chapter full of stuff the reader already knew. I was shrinking from it because there were several threads/issues involved and it was going to be hard work keeping track of them and figuring out what I could get away with losing. I solved it by being bloody ruthless – something…[Read more]
Oh well done on the ruthlessness! And that sounds like such an important thing to have fixed. I wonder if part of our Fear can come from the sense that if we try to change tricky elements in the MS, the whole thing will fall apart….