*collapses on a shore of silver tiles*

I finished editing the horror serial (I vaguely remember mentioning it... or did I? *eerie music*) this afternoon. *falls over* Editing has sucked out my brain.


But anyway, "They Dreamed of Dead Ships" has been (wait for it...) shipped off. Ha ha.


I know, I know. Terrible. (I'm tired.)


Now I can focus on other things (one hopes) for awhile, including possibly that reevaluation I, ah, meant to get to this month. *cough*


Yeeeeah...

(Since I've been a day ahead of myself all month and feel like it's August--I have two hours to go, brain--I may have a recap post up tomorrow. Or, you know, before we're halfway into the month and I remember I was gonna do it on the 1st...)


~Merc of the random posts

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It's so shiny when things are offical

Believe it or not (go away, Ripley*, I wasn't talking to you), I'm a tiny bit paranoid about talking about acceptances in public.


Rejections are different--I prefer not to talk about them, for professionalism reasons, and I figure everyone already knows I get bunches of them (like everyone else) so why babble about it? :P


Anyway. The acceptances thing--I'll be honest: I don't want to jinx it. (What can I say, it's my one "superstition".) Also, it feels weirdly inappropriate (don't ask me why; but unless an editor has posted a "list of acceptances" as some do, I feel like I shouldn't talk about it until the story goes live--I'll probably feel differently with novels/agents in the future ;)).


But! Since the wonderful editor Christopher Fletcher at M-BRANE SF has made an official twitter post about it and gave talking about acceptances his official stamp of approval, I can say this.


My short sci-fi story, "Queen for a Day" will be appearing in M-BRANE's very shiny and cool GLBT-themed anthology, coming this fall.


*bounces off the walls*


I'm so very honored and pleased to have a story included in this collection. (Other names so far include Brandon Bell, Derek J. Goodman and Eden Robbins. I hear the TOC will be announced soon, and I can't wait!)


So yes. It's shiny when things are offical.


~Merc

*I named one of my zombie lieutenants Ripley, since he's so fond of ripping out brains. Somehow he got into the habit of thinking anytime someone says "believe it or not", that is now his phrase. I tried to educate him, I really did. But wouldn't you know it, rot in the cranium does strange things to comprehension sometimes. *sigh* And no, Ripley, I'm still not talking to you...

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"Shrewhead" published in Everyday Weirdness

My (very short) story, "Shrewhead," is now up at Everyday Weirdness, the 7/23/09 edition.

(I must thank the brilliant editor, N.E. Lilly, for the suggested revisions on this on--and for publishing it, of course. ;) But seriously, I'm so much happier with the story now. I love editors!)

This one is dedicated to Jeremy C. Shipp with the good-kind-of-blame, because it was completely inspired by his awesome stories.

Cheers!

~Merc

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The Passion of the Novel

My normal writing MO is, of course, to work on five different things at once. Whether it's short stories (which I did a lot of for the last nine months), or a mix of shorts and novels (only recently), I've always been a multi-tentacled--um, multi-tasking writer.

(You saw NOTHING. The tentacles behind my back do not exist. Move along, minions, move along.)

I have trouble actually remembering if there was ever a time I worked exclusively on one project for more than a week before I got restless and had to shake things up a bit. (NaNoWriMo does not count. NaNo is the mother of all exceptions. Except maybe having a Mi-Go steal your brain and can it...)

And yet, since the beginning of July, a novel has consumed my brain.

It started so innocently. Wolf, an antagonist from NECROMANCER FALLEN, casually petitioned me to write him a novella. (The whole history is going up on my LJ as I piece it together.) I said yes.

What harm could it do? I'd work on it off and on while doing "real" stuff. Easy enough.I began FERAL LEGACY thinking I'd poke it now and then.

Ha. Ha ha ha.

See, I laugh. I laugh TWICE.

The novel hit 24k yesterday. I started on 7/4/09.

(This may not seem like much, but given that in the last year, the most I've written on any one novel in a month has not topped 6k. You can figure it out from there.)

I love and adore this novel so fricking much it makes me want to squee. Yes, it is that cool. Yes, I am that passionate about it. I wake up wanting to write. Ideas ambush me at work. I lament having to go to bed because I want to keep writing.

This passion is something I haven't felt for a novel in a long, long, long time. Oh, yes, I like my other novels. (RIVEN, for example, is one of my preciouseses.*) But there's something about this new one that just makes me want to run around and download it into people's brains. Sorta reverse zombie tactics.

Coherency continues to escape me when talking about this.

Are you passionate about your current project? Why or why not? What about it makes you gibber in incoherent delight when the topic comes up?

~Merc

*I don't believe in calling novels "babies". That's a little disturbing if you consider what we do to them. (Bad parenting, anyone?) So, I refer to my "special" novels as preciouseses. I'll babble more about that later.

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Reevaluation II: The Reckoning (trailer)

They thought it was over.

They thought they were safe.

But someone is watching them… and they have nowhere to hide.

[Quick, staccato clips of STORIES looking around nervously in a barren wasteland as the music builds slowly and creepily in the background.]

STORY 1: H-hello? Is someone there?

[Camera follows STORIES as they creep about, panning above them to show they are seemingly alone in the wilderness.]

STORY 2: There’s no one here.

[A low, sinister chuckle echoes around them.]

STORY 3: Wait! Did you hear that?

[They peer about, spreading out as they search for the noise.]

They never thought they would have to face their worst nightmares.

[Camera focuses on STORY 1’s face. STORY 1 starts breathing hard and turns in a circle.]

STORY 1: Come out, wherever you are!

[Fade to black as text keeps rolling.]

They were wrong.

[Close up of STORY 1’s face.]

STORY 1: I’m n-not afraid of you!

[Camera pans back to show MERC standing behind STORY 1 with scimitar in hand.]

MERC: You should be.

[STORY 1 turns around and screams. MERC raises the scimitar and slashes down. Blackout.]

REEVALUATION II: The Reckoning

COMING SOON

In other words, I’m working on five different posts at once, but I will get to the reevaluation post. Like the inevitable sequel, it will come...eventually. B-)

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The LJ rises again from the deep...

(Argh, sorry, I keep forgetting to finish the next couple posts in my 'how to finish a story' series... *stabs tiredness*)

Anyway.

Some of you (you know who you are, Snazel) encouraged me to try daily writing updates of my WIP. I thought about this. (A dangerous pastime, I know.) I fed the zombies and thought some more.

Then, it occurred to me that my LJ (Zombies, Flamethrowers and Scimitars--so me) has been sitting there neglected and slowly becoming more and more dead (as opposed to merely undead), so I might as well scavenge it.

The experiment of daily updates shall begin tonight.

~Merc

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Non-books and productivity

I should give myself permission to write badly more often.

There is a definite difference in knowing "first drafts suck" (and trying to tell myself to just write, since all sins can be fixed in revision) and writing something I have no intention of doing anything with except writing for the pleasure of it and sharing with a few friends.

I call the later stories non-books. They're purely for the fun of it. And I realized again today how freeing this can be--I don't have to concern myself with tense consistency (much to the dismay of some), I can be as sloppy and unstructured as I want, etc, etc, etc. I can write bad because, in the end, it doesn't matter.

The current non-book is a novella about the antagonist in NF--it's Wolf's story about he became the broken, twisted, manipulative bastard he is. A lot of fun, and the best part is, it sucks and I don't care.

I wrote almost 4k on it today, pounding out two chapters and loving every moment of it. *sighs*

The lack of pressure, the lack of needing to meet my own standards, the lack of "rules" makes me incredibly productive.

Bed calls. More on this later. (Also, I will try to have the next "How to Finish a Story" post done tomorrow. The topic: deadlines. Mwhahahaha.)

Ta,

~Merc

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How to Finish a Story: Part 1, the Death Threat

I'm notoriously bad at starting and not finishing projects. Part of this is due to laziness, part of it is I loose interest in a project, and... various other environmental factors. (Running a zombie horde takes time, damn it.) It frustrates me, and I will not mention what it does to the people who, for bizarre reasons, get involved in reading my projects I suddenly leave in limbo for ages.

There are many reasons one might drop a project. Sometimes the story is simply too broken to fix; perhaps the puppy-love infatuation has passed and you now hate the sucker; or maybe you find the novel uninspiring and not what you want to spend huge chunks of time and your life (and brain) working on.

Let's say you want to/need to finish the story (be it a novel, short story, whatever) but you:
1.) lack ambition and enthusiasm to poke yourself along
2.) you have Perfectionist Anti-Draft Syndrome (in which you can't bear to work on it because the first draft will suck and This Cannot Be!), or
3.) you are distracted with a New Shiny but really should finish The Story (for any number or reasons--deadlines, for example).

So, if you're like me, and have trouble finishing something that needs to be finished (even if it's just because your readers will be breaking down the castle door with torches and pitchforks if you don't), I have a few self-proven methods.

This first of which is:

THE DEATH THREAT

(Also known as the 'Finish or I Will Kill Him' motivation strategy)

No, not threats against the author, as that is rather counterproductive. But! Characters are likely victims.

Several years ago, I was writing a first draft of my novel RIVEN. I waffled around at the 30k mark for several months. I knew where I was going, but I had Perfectionist Anti-Draft Syndrome and was frustrated by the complicatedness of the novel. (And yes, I was being lazy.)

Merc: Mweh, I wanna finish this but I'm stuck. *wanders around setting her hair on fire*

My friend and crit partner, Ardyth, was reading along as I wrote the novel. She was not impressed with my complaining.

Ardyth: Just write it, you can fix the bad draftiness later.

Merc: I know, but ugh...

Ardyth: *looking stern* Okay, that's it. You either finish RIVEN by the end of February, or I'm going to kill Leon. [One should note here that Leon is secondary character in one of Ardyth's novels. He reminds me of a half-wizard version of Enjolras in Les Miserables, except he doesn't die in the end. Or he didn't in the version I read--but Ardyth was rewriting the novel.]

Merc: *gapes* Nooooooo!

Ardyth: *smirks, chains up Leon, and puts a noose around his neck* I'll do it, you know I will. [This got no argument, since she is the Dreaded One, and really would do it.]

Merc: *gibbering incoherently* You CAN'T KILL MY FAVORITE CHARACTER!

Ardyth: Oh yes I can. Leon has already served his purpose in my novel. I can easily kill him in the climax and I will unless you finish Riven.

Merc: *more incoherent gibbering*

Ardyth: *raises an eyebrow* Well?

Merc: Okay, okay! Damn you, I'll do it.

Ardyth: Good. *smirks more*

Merc: *mutters dark and unprintable things*

So, with the life of my favorite character hanging in the balance, I furiously set to work writing the rest of my novel. I had twenty-eight days to finish the draft or Leon would be executed and the Dreaded One would post the death scene in public so the world would know.

I couldn't let Leon down! I wouldn't fail! (Did I mention he has a crush on me? It's... an odd relationship we have. *cough*) Leon was counting on me to save him, and I would. I had to.

It was an insane month. I wrote at work; I wrote during every spare minute, without looking back and re-reading previous sections. I think I got up at ungodly hours a few days to write while I had ideas and focus.

Ardyth was heartless and kept taunting me with how Leon could be executed and how much it would fit in the end, and... and... argh! I continued looking at her darkly and muttering darkly dark things, and writing my ass off.

On February 28th, I collapsed over the finish line, typed THE END, and declared Leon saved. He would live! I'd written over 60,000 words in the shortest month of the year, finished my novel, and proved to myself I really can produce drafts under pressure and threat of characterly demise.

(Ardyth and I recently repeated this technique last month, when I was working on the Ship Horror serial, because I wasn't finishing the shorts on time. In this case, she threatened to kill helpless ferrets in her anthropomorphic MG fantasy novel. But I finished, and REGO WAS SAVED! Ha!)

[photo credit Michael John Dunway]

How To Use the Death Threat Technique

What you need:

- someone who has written about a character you love, who would be willing (and will actually do it, if necessary) to kill said character if you fail. This is hugely important: the threat lacks any real impact if your partner in crime backs out at the last minute. Pick someone ruthless you can trust. (And no, characters who die anyway do not count.)

- a time frame for finishing your project (under threat of character death)

- a public declaration of intentions by both parties--so you can't back out of it. (In our case, we posted on CC's message boards.)

How to go about it:

Evil Partner in Crime: Finish [Project] by [date] or I will kill [Loveable/Cool/Sexy/whatever Character X].

You: *agree, panic, and write your ass off so Character X does not meet an unnecessary and grisly death on the page*


Results will vary. Either you:

- finish your project, declare victory, laugh in EPIC's face and dance in mad glee that Character X is saved, or

- you fail, watch in helpless grief and horror as Character X is brutally killed, all the while cursing your name.

And if, for some reason, you actually prefer to fail and watch Character X die that way... well, I'm not sure I can help you out there. The ghost of the character will return and IT WILL HAVE ITS REVENGE.

I'm just sayin'.

---

So if you're finding it difficult to finish your project, for whatever reason, you may consider the Death Threat option. Because violence does solve many things in fiction.

~Merc

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They Dreamed of Dead Ships--June Recap

Huh. That title might get swiped for my horror serial novella (which lacks a title). *snatches and runs*

(Yes! Do you know how difficult titles are for me? Damn things refuse to cooperate so I have to use stealth tactics and blackmail to get ones that don't incite eye-damage and bleeding from the brain. My title-poachers have about a 30% success rate, and high casualties.)

*cough*

June was an amazingly productive month. Despite the fact I must have spent most of it complaining endlessly to Sparky and Ardyth (who, if I didn't know their evil sides, I would say should get nominated for sainthood for putting up with me), I did actually get things done. (Shocking, I know.)

GOALS SET IN JUNE

- one chapter of NF (dark fantasy novel) in the Present plotline
(Mweh, didn't happen.)

- finish at least one short that is started but not done
(I actually this, I was so pleased with myself. I began an urban fantasy short at the end of May and finished it on the 2nd of June.)

- allow myself to write whatever the heck else I want for the month— i.e. relax and have fun.
(I did this, too. Mwhahaha.)

I should have added (since it was the top priority):
- Finish the horror novella serial thing (five connected short stories of 3.5k each) by the end of the month.
(And lo, it was done.)

WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED

Novels
I gotta say, I'm happy with progress on this front, minimal though it was. I managed about 4k on RIVEN, the first real progress since, oh, December. It may not seem like much (it really isn't, all things considered), but the main thing is I got back into it, I like the novel and am excited about it again, and I have my fingers crossed that this draft is The One That Works.

In an effort to bribe Sparky to work on a short story for submission to the Way of the Wizard anthology next year, I'm offering to write on my novel TICKING CLOCKWORK. The Feral Biologist apparently is quite fond of my psychotic, insane, pyromaniac gay acrobat MC, Kuso, and his gearwork jaguar companion, so the deal is I write more on TC and she works on a short story.

Bribery, for the win! (I managed about 1,200 words on TC. Kuso uses way too much alteration.)

Short Stories
I wrote five new stories (unconnected to the serial) with everything from zombie flash fiction to my foray into omni-POV with angels *looks around shiftily* to over-the-top weird fantasy (hail Maggot, whose world gets weirder every time I write about it) to dark and gritty fantasy about wizards to an experimental story using three different kinds of POV and two tenses. (It involved collecting bones! And I killed the MMC three times. I think.) Also a bunch of Twitter-length shorts.

Yeah. It was awesome. O:)

And then there is the serial, which I'm dubbing Ship Horror for now to save my braincells. It's five parts, each a short story (about 3.5k each) that can stand on its own (so goes the theory) but also is part of an overall story arc.

Let's say that it's a miracle I have any hair left after this. (I did let Sparky chop it off--whoo!--but that's not the point.)

But, behold, all five stories were completed in June. See Merc write. See Merc collapse in exhuastion.

Note: always back up edited copies of your work. Seriously. Email yourself when you finish or, like me, you may end up spending several hours editing a short, and then a few days later realize that it did not save at all and you've lost it and now have to redo it. Again.

Yes, I edited several shorts (one I had to re-do twice after losing all my edits due to #technologyfail) and nearly strangled my computer in the process.

Other Writing Stuff
Bits and pieces of novellas and other shorts got written, but nothing extensive. The twisted superhero novella progresses apace, and eventually I may even finish the goblin-POV non-short (dubbed, How to Drive a Necromancer to the Breaking Point Whereupon Many People Die and It Ends Tragically).

Random Trend of the Month
Not surprisingly, it involves death omen ships, killer dreams, and bringing protagonists back from the dead (more than once)--I just realized that in both Maggot's short and the experimental story, the MMC is killed off and resurected in the course of the story... and then I had that zombie flash... are we seeing a trend here, precious?

OVERALL

Totak word count (rounded off): 48,000.

Satisfaction level: high. I'm incredibly chuffed at all that happened in June, even with all the bitching I did. *looks innocent*

On the blogging front, I will be recycling several posts from the now-defunct Toasted Scimitar blog (R.I.P, TS) over the next few weeks and maybe that will inspire me to write some new stuff.

How was your June?

~Merc

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