Posts Tagged writing tips

9 results.

Did I Write This Week? – Finishing What You Started

by on February 7, 2017 at 4:53 pm
Posted In: Blogs, Homepage, Keith, Perspicacious Geek
20170102_172004

No context image, but somehow these Ghostbuster have their names Cyrillic script in a Canadian Walmart.

Did I Write This Week?

Yes! I did really and truly!

What’d Did I Write?

I wrote about half of the final part of my zombie story. The neverending stream of things to do with moving is finally slowing down, so the amount of time I’ve got for creativity is slowly returning back to normal. Did I mention I don’t have an internet connection at home yet? Well, I don’t. That’s kind of proven to be a blessing in disguise though since I’ve loaded up all the previous parts of “Fear and Loathing After the Bomb” onto a USB key and have been going over everything making little edits here and there that I’m going to use for the “definitive” edition when I release everyhing as an e-book.

All told it looks like it will be around 24,000 words. Or, about 1/3 of the first Harry Potter book. That’s not too shabby. And it only took me a little more than 5 years! At that rate maybe I’ll release my first book when I’m in my mid-50s! Hurray.

Shit.

To be fair to that timeline though there was a solid 3/1/2 years where I wrote literally nothing for the story (and was instead occupying my time by writing that blog that this blog eventually became). So, if I’m being optimistic, that means it took me around 2 years to write 24,000 words. That makes a somewhat more reasonable (but still incredibly daunting) 8 years to draft a 100,000 word manuscript.

Or, alternatively, if I manage to write 1000 words a week, 2 years.

I like the sound of that much better.

So What’s Next?

Well, now’s the fun part (well, I’m assuming that if you’re reading this you’ve got an interest in seeing the fruits of my labour). If everything goes as planned I will be completing “Fear and Loathing After the Bomb” tonight. And that means that after a nearly 3 year hiatus the final 6 parts of the story will be released starting the Friday. I’ll be spending the next 5 or 6 weeks editing and polishing the entire thing and then converting it into a free-to-download ebook.

I’ve decided that the versions that are published on the website will stay “as is” as of today (I’ve actually gone back and made a few edits here and there over the past few months) so that if you’re so inclined you’ll be able to compare the raw versions and the final form.

I’m excited.

Keith does all sorts of things here on 9to5.cc, he works with the other founders on 9to5 (illustrated), co-hosts our two podcasts: The 9to5 Entertainment System and Go Plug Yourself and blogs here as The Perspicacious Geek.

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Did I Write This Week? – Picking Music

by on December 6, 2016 at 5:44 pm
Posted In: Blogs, Homepage, Keith, Perspicacious Geek

musicchoicesDid I Write This Week?

I sure did! If you zoom in on that picture you can in fact see exactly what I wrote! The 18th part of my Zombie story. In theory, it was supposed to end at Part 19, but based on a few last minute revelations and the natural length Part 18 (which wrapped up somewhere around 1200 words) I’ve discovered that I’ll probably end up with 20 parts (or chapters or whatever). Which is nice. 20 parts seems like a much nicer number to end on. If all goes well I’ll have this whole thing wrapped up in the next week or two and will start releasing one or two parts a week while I figure out how to convert the whole thing into an e-book to give away to you for free! Won’t that be exciting! Everyone likes free things. Probably.

What’s Up With Writing This Week?

Finding the right music to write is a huge pain in the ass.

Sometimes I’ll take 10-15 minutes of just clicking through playlists on Google Play Music before I can actually settle down to write anything. It’s strange how much of an impact on my creativity the right song choices can have.

The first thing I try to do is to think about the tone of what I’m about to write. Now that I’ve worked out my story progression and I have a rough idea of what is going to happen in the part that I’m writing, I generally know the gist of what I’m going to be shooting for. For St-Brigid I tend towards a lot of 90’s Grunge Rock, but that’s not always the rule.

Lyrics can also be tricky. Sometimes I’ll get too wrapped up in listening to the lyrics of a song and just stop typing altogether. That’s not good for anybody. So yeah, I open up Google Play Music (because that’s who I signed up with ok, they’ve got all my preferences so that’s who I’m going to stay with forever) and start clicking around. Curated playlists, albums of artists I like, new releases. Whatever I think might sound like something I want to hear for the next hour or two while I hammer out some words.
Often I’ll use the “create a radio station” feature based on a particular song. Since sometimes I know exactly what I want to listen to, but it’s only a 3 or 4 minute song. That’s not really going to work for an hour long writing session (or longer). So I trust the algorithms. What a time to be alive.

Usually it goes something like this: mess around with the albums I’ve been listening to lately to see if there’s anything that fits the vibe that I think I’m going for, listen to it for about a minute and get frustrated that it’s not clicking. Repeat until I lock into something I like.

Anyhow, I have no idea if everyone listens to music if they write, but I find that it can really motivate you when you get the right matchup of music and subject matter. When I click into that magic zone I have so much more output.

Keith does all sorts of things here on 9to5.cc, he works with the other founders on 9to5 (illustrated), co-hosts our two podcasts: The 9to5 Entertainment System and Go Plug Yourself and blogs here as The Perspicacious Geek.

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Did I Write This Week ? – Perspicacious Geek

by on November 15, 2016 at 4:42 pm
Posted In: Blogs, Homepage, Keith, Perspicacious Geek
This is the coin slot from a washing machine in my building. Somebody really wanted to get those coins.

This is the coin slot from a washing machine in my building. Somebody really wanted to get those coins. It’s a metaphor for something.

Did I Write This Week?

A little bit. A very little bit. I was really hoping to have had time to knock out another part (only 2 parts left of my zombie nonsense, should be putting out the conclusion very soon) this past week, it just didn’t materialize. I basically reviewed a part and made some edits, and have nothing else to show for it.

Why Not?

Self-motivation is hard man. I literally watched David Blaine perform some card tricks on Jimmy Fallon instead of writing anything. I don’t even like David Blaine. I mean, they’re good card tricks but come on now, was that a good use of my time?

You know what I don’t like? I hate feeling guilty for not writing. But then again, if I didn’t feel guilty I would probably never be able to shame myself into sitting down and writing. It’s a tricky balance, right? I really hate how often a shitty feeling in my stomach is what actually gets me to sit down and force myself to write.

Through the course of working on this website I would say that I’ve added a measurable amount of stress and output based stress to my life. I get worked up about whether or not we’ll have a podcast every week (incidentally, every now and then I do the math and basically for the last 4 years 9to5.cc has put up a podcast week, that’s crazy). I stress about finding time to write creatively. I stress out about forcing myself to write this blog once a week. I stress out about getting together to write the comics. Is it even worth it?

I mean, I don’t kid myself. I know that not many people will read or enjoy most of what I do, so why bother? ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Did I Write This Week? – Perspicacious Geek

by on November 8, 2016 at 4:06 pm
Posted In: Blogs, Homepage, Keith, Perspicacious Geek
I took this picture this morning! It's the hospital!

I took this picture this morning! It’s the hospital!

Did I Write This Week?

Hey! This is pretty exciting really. Not only did I write this week but I also managed to get a bunch of backlog taken care of with the website. I cleaned up gigs and gigs of raw audio files from the podcast from months of accumulation and I also edited together our next very special episode of the 9to5 Movie Club.

Not only that, I’m even writing THIS VERY ARTICLE in advance. Say whaaaaaatttt? Man I really called it last week when I said I had the itch to hammer some stuff out this week.

It was a pretty great weekend.

What Did I Write?

I completed the 17th part/chapter of the gonzo zombie saga, that means only 2 parts left and as I chug forwards in the story the actual finale is becoming clearer and clearer to me. That means that if I can just find a few more hours to sit down and write I will actually finish a thing!

Something that I’ve come across as I try to wrap this whole thing up that’s kind of interesting is a new found respect for the old serial pulp authors of old. Does anybody still write ongoing serial-style fiction anymore? Is that still a thing? Does Doc Savage go on any more adventures? I guess the closest thing that happens in print nowadays are comic books.

Actually, that’s a good point of comparison. I now understand how story lines and plot holes creep up so frequently in comic books. I’m assuming that nowadays most writers have their overall story arcs all planned out before they start a run of any given title. It just makes sense. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Did I Write This Week? – The Perspicacious Geek

by on October 18, 2016 at 5:22 pm
Posted In: Blogs, Homepage, Keith, Perspicacious Geek
This photo, as always, has nothing to do with this post. I just like it and I took it yesterday.

This photo, as always, has nothing to do with this post. I just like it and I took it yesterday.

Here we are again, it’s Tuesday and I’m asking myself that question: Did I Write This Week?

Answer: Yes. But not very much.

Previously, I talked about how irritating it was to me when an author purposefully withholds information from the reader to artificially create tension. I brought this up on reddit and a user hit the nail on the head with what bugs me about the technique (u/vivifiction to be precise):

There’s talk of magicians in another thread here, so let’s think about that. I think writing is a lot like performing magic. If you’re watching a magician and you see one of their slights or moves, it ruins the whole trick. It’s not because you thought the magician was actually using sorcery and the disbelief has now been crushed—of course you know it’s a trick—but there’s a sense of wonder that accompanies seeing something you logically accept as impossible but also created.

It goes the same for writing, but it’s on an emotional spectrum rather than a physical one (meaning the magician is physically performing a trick). A scene like the one you describe can be executed well if the author has emotionally primed the reader for the revelation. As it currently stands, it seems cheap because, as I’ve said, the reader is left in a space where they realize, on some level, “The author knows who this is, the character knows who this is, but they’ve both decided to not tell me because they’re trying to lure me to the next page.” It’s the same as seeing the magician’s card up his sleeve, and you think,”well, that’s sloppy.”

That’s what I hate about the technique, it’s sloppy magic.

So, how did I do with the writing this week:

It’s nearly a constant struggle to try to make a little bit of time each week for a creative endeavour. This last week was no exception. In fact, if I hadn’t have forced myself to just sit down and knock out about 45 minutes worth of work, I would be stuck in a situation where the answer was no. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Did I Write This Week? – Perspicacious Geek

by on September 27, 2016 at 3:57 pm
Posted In: Blogs, Homepage, Keith, Perspicacious Geek
Pictured here, the top of a mountain that I hiked up this weekend. Feels good bro.

Pictured here, the top of a mountain that I hiked up this weekend. Feels good bro.

Did I Write This Week?

After last week’s terrible failure I can inform you happily that yes, I did get some creative writing done this week. However, it was not without its own special set of setbacks.

What Happened?

Remember how I told you that my goal was to actually finish off Zombies and Loathing? Well, it turns out that somehow I’ve lost an entire completed chapter/part. Which is a huge bummer. I literally sat down, loaded up Google Drive and wrote about 50% of the next part and wanted to go back to cross-reference something I had previously written only to find that I didn’t actually have it saved anywhere.

Not on my hard drive, not on my Google drive. Nowhere.

I don’t know what the hell happened but I feel like this has taught me a valuable lesson about double and triple saving things.

There’s a bit of a silver lining though in the fact that in my search across multiple storage mediums I found some old notes I took last year about the book that I want to right. It’s only a bit of a silver lining though since I’m really, really not happy with some of the ideas I had from a year ago. What the hell was I thinking? I mean, I guess it’s good that my ideas have evolved since then to places that I’m a lot happier with, but it’s like finding an old treasure chest and finding out that it’s just full of Canadian Tire Money or something. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Did I Write This Week? – The Perspicacious Geek

by on September 20, 2016 at 7:23 pm
Posted In: Blogs, Homepage, Keith, Perspicacious Geek

20160920_185856Well, did you?

Dear reader, whoever you are. I have failed you. Following last week’s incredible amounts of creative output this week the well hath doth runneth dry-th. From last to this Tuesday, other than the abstract act of thinking about writing, I have written nothing.

Well, what did you do instead? I hope it’s good.

I mean, sort of?

The first thing that comes to mind is that I worked a bunch. My day job occupied a lot of my time and when you’re busy at work it’s hard to come home and switch gears into a creative head space.

I also helped the Italian family that I married into turn 16 bushels of tomatoes into sauce. That kind of ate up my Saturday.

Also, Rocket League. There’s this new expansion where it adds Mario Kart style powerups to the beloved formula of rocket powered car soccer. I could go on, but that would be more for the old style “Perspicacious Geek” so I won’t. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Did I Write This Week? – Perspicacious Geek

by on August 30, 2016 at 4:27 pm
Posted In: Blogs, Homepage, Keith, Perspicacious Geek

20160830_135840Did I Write This Week?

YES! But not as much as I would have liked to.

What Did You Write?

Once again trying to flesh out and finish Zombies and Loathing, I’ve got about 700 words of the next part down. I’m thinking that when I’ve got 3 or 4 of the final 6 parts completed I’ll start posting them. So there’s that.

Last week I spoke about the struggles of actually finishing a project. Back in June I talked about how I generally try to stay motivated without someone breathing down my neck and the reality that in all likelyhood there won’t be any sort of financial payoff.

I’d like to (and who’s going to stop me) expand on that a little bit.

Last time I really focused on writing for the joy of it, not taking yourself too seriously and kind of forgetting that maybe, if you’re incredibly talented, motivated and lucky, you could make some money doing the creative thing that you love.

This week I’m going to let myself dream a little bit and imagine what it would be like if someone told me “Hey, I would like you to write about this, and I will pay you.” Or, more realistically “Hey, I would like you to write about this, and I will give you exposure.”

What do you do then? You’re doing this thing (be it writing, making music, painting, pro wrestling, or whatever) and you’re all about just doing it for fun and for yourself. Now, somebody comes along and is wanting to make it a little more professional, either offering you actual financial compensation or some other intangible reward (like exposure and recognition). ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Did I Write This Week – The Perspicacious Geek

by on August 24, 2016 at 4:35 pm
Posted In: Blogs, Homepage, Keith, Perspicacious Geek

diwtwAs promised, my weekly log/confessional about whether or not I managed to make time to write.

Did I Write This Week?

Yes!

What Did You Write?

I finally got around to writing Part 14 of Fear and Loathing after the Bomb. That’s exciting, right? Remember in 2012 when zombies were all the rage?

I thought it would be fun to take my own little spin with the zombie genre and inject a little gonzo style journalism into the mix. I wrote 13 parts between April 2012 and March 2013, which, all things considered isn’t too bad.

Anyhow, I’ve got a pretty big problem creatively and that’s that I can’t finish things. When I start a story, I’ve got this idea of an outline. I create the characters, the premise, the setup but I almost never know how it’s all going to play out. I enjoy letting the story breathe a bit and let it grow a little before I actively think how I’m going to tie up all my plot points.

It’s probably not the best way to write, but I’ve never really claimed to know what I’m doing.

At some point or another I figure out my ending and then I stop actually writing. Part of the joy of writing for me is figuring out exactly what story I’m trying to tell and I’ll admit, once I figure that part out the process loses some of it’s luster.

This has pretty much been a problem for me for as long as I can remember. My first “serious” attempt at writing something was some kind of a sci-fi epic about a space station built around the remnants of Earth that had been blown apart in a nuclear war. The explosion had knocked Earth out of the orbit of the Sun so humanity could no longer actually survive on its surface so humanity built this space station around the remnants of the planet. I’m sure the science doesn’t hold up. I’m also sure I was about 13. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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