So much awfulness carrying over from that abominable Year of the Snake. Now that we're cresting the wave of the Fire Horse, anyone else feeling a major change since this morning's blood moon?
Only hoping it's for positive, liberating change. I, for one, have had quite enough of the bullshit.
5 more pages, 130p and 22,950.
Nothing like a little light sexting at work to make things awkward...
Things still going at a (for me) glacial pace. 6 pages Thursday, 3 more just now. 125 pages, 22,120.
A tentative step forward? Or is she still just running in place?
And just like that? Another 11 pages in the can. Inspiration strikes when and where it will...
So cue up your AI rejections, put your assistants to work rubber stamping yet another pass on whatever I send, whatever subgenre, subject or style.
Because I'm going to keep bombarding your asses until one of you wakes the fuck up & smells the coffee.
I'm coming, like it or not. And I don't quit.
bear all the costs and negligible profits themselves, presumably as hobbyists while working some full time drudge job like the one I left for this? Then congratulations, folks. You're doing one hell of a bang up job at it.
Unfortunately for you, I have no options remaining. And I am a survivor.
Yes, I am tired. I have never gone for such long stretches without writing, felt quite so dispirited when I manage to force myself to return to the keyboard.
If agents main goal these days is to beat down authors and prevent their work from ever being published (unless they publish, market and
soulless AI filters and corporate boardroom-driven "product" designed to capitalize on xerox copies and pointless sequelitis to prior successes, there simply is no one left with the vision to embrace the new, that which hits the important beats without surrendering to slavish copycatting formula?
around us, and here I am with a literal lifetime worth of publication just sitting on my shelf, unread and unheard outside of writing groups and those I share scenes and queries with outside that.
How can I not be tired? How can I not feel despair on some deep level, the feeling that in an age of
alike. I've garnered agent rejections numbering in the hundreds, now, with very few seeming more than standard form responses. Those that weren't were filled with effusive praise, even a full MS request...but always with that caveat, that ultimate rejection.
The world is literally burning to ash
With fellow professional authors and amateur aficionados alike, to effusive unanimous praise and high comparisons to established authors of note. I've been told in no uncertain terms my works deserve streaming adaptation, seen and heard the gut punch emotional reaction to shared scenes and queries
This past several months has been the first true dry spell since I started this journey towards publication, late summer of 2023.
In that time, I've written, edited and have ready for publication 25 novels, the 26th of which is still in production. I've done all the "right steps", vetted the work
AI specialist Shelley Palmer dropped this tidbit of not exactly unexpected confirmation:
Another 6 pages, 19,100 and 105p now.
Time to hit the gym!
9 more pages today.
We are living in a Shaw Brothers period picture, and I don't mean that in any good way.
That is all.
True, that's often how I start. But what I'm saying is when I'm low on inspiration, I keep laying down the bricks and foundation until I hit that golden well once again.
Can't ford the river? Start building a bridge. You'll be on the other side soon enough.
They usually occur to me somewhere between 25 and 100 pages, as a rule. Titles tend to take inspiration from an important bit of dialogue, nods to hoary aphorism or classic literature and/or ironic wordplay that comments on the story and events taking place therein. I have to find them as I go.
I always stop when inspiration flees me, but lately it's been a harder start, a lot more emphasis on bridging scenes (or to misquote David Lee Roth, "how do I get there from here, baby?") than diving right in to the meaty stuff. Plenty of jokes, social commentary & non sequitur keeps it lively.
Normally speaking (i.e. prior to last Fall) I'd get anywhere from 6-20 pages per session (on a particularly inspired day, I might get in 2 or even 3 sessions!)
Oh, and it's finally got a title, and as usual, it's a clever bit of wordplay...
My last three novels have gone excruciatingly slow by my standards. Too much happening in both personal and national/global life to settle in to relationships, romance and happy endings. So yes...I've been taking a lot of mini-hiatuses in place of my usual daily dose of creative goodness.
Closing in on 75 pages, 18,500.
Everything gets so complicated when you aren't sure of your own motivations, huh?
Banged out a few more pages. Between this and Wednesday, we're now at 13,100 and 61 pages.
Halfway through breaking him in.
No, not like THAT, get your filthy little minds out of the gutter.
The fun stuff comes later.
More pages and polishing scenes yesterday. Just not in the mood today, those Congressional hearings yesterday turned my stomach. We live in an age of monsters, where money & connections purchase absolute license.
I hear the sharpening of the blades. On whose heads they fall is entirely up to us.
51 pages, 10,950 now.
Well, okay, I guess this one IS going to be my second sports-adjacent novel...
The new and improved pairs are about to get into it.
Not what I'm doing stylistically or in genre, but the principle clearly applies.
Just 20 rejections? Rookie.
Got in another 6 pages or so, now 45 pages, 9650.
You know, I'm not sure whether friends playing matchmaker is a blessing or a curse, sometimes...
Finished up that blocked out scene from the other day, 40 pages and 8220 words now.
Things are about to shift into a higher gear.
Evidently, agents:
Make that 7k and 34 pages. Drafted out the better part of the next scene.
