John Green talks about the writer’s folly and letting your novel retain its promise by quitting now. Or giving up on the great notion that one month’s worth of furious writing is going to produce very much more than a month of furious writing.* It ain’t about the art, it’s about the work. And showing up and staying to the end. Or rolling off the back of the truck and hiding in the bushes before the others really notice you’ve ditched them, then dusting off and walking back down the road whistling your favorite old tune.

http://www.nanowrimo.org/node/3882883

Why don’t I quit? I can’t see any reason to–straight ahead writing isn’t that hard (and believe me, I’m one of you who looks for any reason to procrastinate while proselytizing** out of the other corner of my mouth). The NaNoWriMo goals aren’t that hard to meet, especially if you start each session by putting on your Alfred E. Newman “What, Me Worry?” mask (which really freaks the kids out, by the way. It’s great, cathartic fun–after all, those little rats are the real reason you put off becoming a serious writer for the past decade or two, right?)

*You’re only one monkey at a typewriter, after all, not a million monkeys.

**Don’t just read “proselytize,”  say out loud it like your Uncle Tuck or Aunt Sunbeam from rural West Virginia would, relishing every syllable.

I recently stumbled on a Huffington Post blog entry* crapping on NaNoWriMo from a guy holding up the Art end of Writing all by himself and calling on others to help. (I exaggerate a little, but it was the kind of silly huffy post some might write in a fit of indignation–which like other fits, usually involves at least a small amount of spittle.) My personal response is, it’s not the tool that matters, it’s how you apply it. Thankfully, there is no right way to start writing or to write. The point is to do it and use whatever you tools you need to make that happen, as long as there’s no hidden surcharges and minimal surveillance except by nubile young college girls sure that the unshaven older guy in the corner of the coffee shop is Writing his Novel.

The rest of NaNoWriMo (which awkwardly sounds too much like Robin William’s Nanoo nanoo) is, well, whatever the rest needs it to be, and employment for the few people who make it happen. Frankly Surely (my favorite hermaphrodite), I’d hate to be an agent or publishing house editor in the weeks following.

*I like the Huffington Post but that doesn’t mean I think the aforementioned blog entry deserves a link back.

***

The “structure of show” article linked here, is spot on, at least for me. Writing fast has often meant going “cinematic,” where I apply just enough character interaction and introspection  to move the plot along. At first I spent too much time worrying about the lack of depth or reader involvement in the characters, the story feeling like just another piece of prose skimming along to Soggy Bottom. Helpful to see that this state of draft is not uncommon and that, as I figured in the moments in which I figure, subsequent drafts start poking around in noggins in ways relevant to plot.

I’m writing by hand so far, pages and pages until I can almost no longer recognize my scratch. My biggest fear isn’t finishing, it’s going back and being able to read what I wrote so that I can type it up. It’s likely that I won’t recognize all of it and will end up rewriting, which is what needs to happen anyway. Where I know that I’ve written a gem worth saving–even if it doesn’t end up in this story–I draw some fast lucky charms around it (you know, moons, stars, and other marshmallow shapes) so that I don’t lose it.

Note on writing a  story that leans on personal history–it’s really easy and in my case wrong to let the past steer the story. This morning I’d reached the end of my beginning and wasn’t sure where to take key characters or aspects of the plot. I knew the beginning and have a strong possible ending. And I started thinking, well at this point in my life, my family did this, so how do I overlay that onto the story.

Didn’t work worth shit. People on my morning bus commute (where I usually have enough time to fill a page between the burbs and downtown, where I work) probably wondered why I was scowling so much, probably thought I was going to leap up and commandeer the bus, if I looked on the outside like I felt on the inside. I stuffed my notebook back in my pack, pulled out my little MP3 player and turned on Middlesex, where I’m nearing the end. Some fiction writers say that they can’t read fiction while they’re writing. To each their own–I find that I can and often need to read, if I’m very selective about the reading choices, and I only read in small bursts when I need to recharge, or refocus. (The other book I’m reading is the second book in Patrick Ness series called Chaos Walking (book 1, The Knife of Never Letting Go; book 2, The Ask and The Answer), a YA series set on another planet colonized by religious expats, where a local germ causes all men and animals (but not women) to broadcast their thoughts. The prose is often very effective and rich, especially for such sparse prose, which helps the techniques stand out.)

It was actually the beginnings of Middlesex that helped me move forward. Grandparents figure in my story, informing the plot and the protagonist with their own histories. Some of my favorite parts of Middlesex cover the lives of the narrators grandparents and parents, from their start in Cyprus in the early 1900′s to their migration to the US (fleeing the Greco-Turkish war) and their tragedies and successes. I realized that the best way to get unstuck was to start writing about the lives of those grandparents in my story–at least the portions that I think matter to the plot and its narrator. So there I go again (just like Mr. Gorbachev and that big haired lead singer from the 80′s band Whitesnake.)

* * *

While the piece by Aime Bender linked below was written for the NaNoWriMo crowd, it applies to writing long fiction in general. I saw Aimee Bender at Wordstock–she’s very sharp, very creative, and I thought pretty pragmatic about the process. This piece reflects that. And she’s right–follow the writing, because when I try to make the writing follow me, it just sits down in the path and refuses to budge. If I bribe it, I can get a little further, but the scenery turns drab and the mood turns sour till I let it have its way, let it stop to look at everything along the path and suddenly run off into the woods. It’s exactly like a smart child or dog.

Why That Pesky Tangent May Be a Vein: A pep talk from Aimee Bender

Two things:

It’s easier to respond than to originate. A lot easier. A sustained origination like writing a novel* that eventually provokes a response is even more rare.

Writing a novel is like starting and maintaining a controlled burn. You don’t want it to get rained out (like a good ball game) and you don’t want it to take to the tree tops (creating a “fire tornado” that uses up all its fuel and then some and leaves a smoking wreck behind).

I’ve been thinking about fire. It continues to be a theme in this current work.

*An exercise in unhygienic literary self-exploration.

Progress of my Zeroth Draft: http://www.nanowrimo.org/eng/user/695780

The National Novel Writing Month site is either incredibly popular or not well served by the Amazon cloud. If your browser responds with a timeout or MySQL error, try again–it eventually resolves the URL.

Don’t Explain

(B. Holiday/A. Herzog, Jr., as told by Nina Simone)

Hush now, don’t explain
There ain’t nothin’ to gain
I’m glad that you’re back
don’t explain

Quiet baby, don’t explain
there is nothing to gain.
Skip back the lipstick
don’t explain.

You know that I love you
and what love endures
all my thoughts of you
for I’m so completely yours
Don’t want to hear folks chatter
’cause I know you cheat
Right n’ wrong don’t matter
when you’re with me my sweet…

Hush now don’t explain
don’t you know you’re my joy and you’re my pain.
My life is yours love
don’t explain

int…

All my thoughts of you, for I’m so completely yours.
I don’t want to hear nobody chatter
’cause I know you cheat,
right n’ wrong don’t matter
when you’re with me my sweet.

Hush now, don’t explain
you’re my joy, you’re my pain
My life is yours love
don’t explain.

I’ve signed up for National Novel Writing Month, where I’m contracted with myself to write 50k+ words between Nov’s 1 and 30, copy editing not advised till December.

(Hey, it’s December, kids, and you know what that means–that’s right, December is National Copy Editing Month. Kiss a copy editor you know, but make sure your spouse isn’t watching! Better yet, get to editing your own work. Especially if you wrote a mountain high enough in November.)