National Novel Writing Month

November is National Novel Writing Month. Maybe November 12th is a bit late in the month to be mentioning it, but this article kind of got preempted by all the political news last week.

National Novel Writing Month is when writers all across the country attempt to write an entire novel in one month. It's an admirable goal and one that I don't intend to achieve. I am however going to put a renewed focus on the novel that I am currently writing. That means that there will likely be a few less articles on I'm Not A Rat this month. I love writing on this website but the reality is that it sometimes cuts into my creative writing a bit much. I have a certain goal in mind for how much I would like to have finished on the novel by January and if I'm going to achieve it then I need to shift some of my writing time around to put a little more emphasis on fiction instead of non-fiction.

I hope you, my loyal readers, understand and cheer me on in this endeavor. I've got some great articles coming up, they're just going to be a bit more spaced out.

Writing Fiction for Love and Money

I know that to some of my less regular readers, a topic like this one might seem a bit off topic for this blog, however writing is a means by which I would love to someday facilitate my exit from the rat race.

I've read a couple books on the subject of writing now and the best so far and by far is Holly Lisle's Mugging the Muse: Writing Fiction for Love and Money. I have never read any of her other books but reading this one made me want to. She so eloquently describes the nature of being a writer through the sorrows and joys and the triumphs and failures. She is a woman who has had more than her fair share of troubles in her life and has really poured that into her writing and made something very positive out of it.

I mentioned many months ago in an article about another writing book I had read titled $30 Writing School by Michael Dean. While Dean's book has some useful information in it and I did enjoy reading it, so much of the contents of the book are fluff. He comes across as being a bit stuck on himself and a little preoccupied with sex (more than a little, which is apparent to those unfortunate enough to go to his website). Dean also had his share of troubles in life but most of those were of his own doing.

My point here is to simply draw a contrast between two writers of writing books. Holly Lisle's book has left me feeling inspired in my own writing and wanting to spend money on her other writing. Michael Dean's book was informative but self-indulgent. I don't even remember how many times he tells you to buy his other books and plays it off as seeing examples of how he did things.

Dean does give more specific details in regards to dealing with editors than Lisle does. The one very minor drawback of Writing Fiction for Love and Money is that when a subject is approached that the auther has no experience with, she simply states that she doesn't have experience with it and moves on without any further help to the reader. Honesty is great but in Lisle's case it doesn't make a comprehensive book on writing. It would seem that thing to have done would have been for her to consult someone who was an expert in the areas she was inexperienced with. But these were only in very minor industry related items that for most people probably wouldn't be applicable anyway.

So if you are looking for a book on the subject of writing that is written by a real writer that has fought and struggled and climbed her way to a respectable status in the writing world then Mugging the Muse: Writing Fiction for Love and Money is for you. If however you want a book that is more of a "punk rock" approach and has some useful information then you might want to check out Michael Dean's $30 Writing School, but only if you pay much less than $30.

Chapter 1 Complete

I do 90% of my writing on my lunch breaks at work using a bluetooth keyboard paired with my smart phone. Tonight though I'm sitting up in bed writing late at night. I've gotten only about 6 hours of sleep in the last 48 hours but I needed to stay up and do this. After many months I finally finished the first draft of the first chapter of my first novel. Now you are probably saying to yourselves, "It took you that long to write one chapter?" Yes I know it's pretty bad but I'm proud of myself none the less. At 3,988 words it is the single longest piece of fiction I've ever written. And now your probably saying "that's the longest thing you've written and you're trying to do a novel? Your mad I say, mad!" Okay hopefully no one gets that worked up over my blog. Part of the reason that I'm jumping into writing a novel without writing too much other fiction is because I just can't seem to wrap my head around the idea of short stories. All of my story ideas are of such a larger scope than could possibly fit into a short story. And probably 85% of short stories and novelettes that I've read by other authors all feel like they are just a chapter in a larger story that they author couldn't quite write so they just pasted some ill-fitting ending onto the story and it ends like a car wreck. I definitely want to avoid that.

And while 3,988 words over the course of several months probably doesn't sound like much at all, I feel the need to mention that during that same time period I wrote more than 20,000 words on this blog. So I'm not quite as lazy as it may seem. But those kind of lopsided numbers do call into question how I spend the time I have available to write. I enjoy writing non-fiction but I love writing fiction. There's something about crafting a good story that lights a fire in a person's soul.

At this rate I will probably have the novel done by the year 2012. Which is no good at all. I do hope to increase my writing productivity but I'm also realistic. I've seen some authors say that a book should take about six months to write. That's fine if you make your living as a writer. But for us aspiring writers, we have to keep normal jobs that pull us away from writing if we would like to continue to eat. It took me four months to write the first chapter. I'd like to write the next one in a month. That would be like quadrupling my productivity. Ask me on September 1st if I achieved my goal.

A Disciplined Approach To Writing

The funny thing about the title to this article is that as I sat down to write the article, I really didn't feel much like writing. Sometimes that is what it's like when you are an aspiring writer though, you need to write as time permits and sometimes that means writing when you aren't in the mood or even when you are sick.

Several years ago while attending a small music school outside of Memphis Tennessee I was taking a creativity class of some sort and wrote a short story for it. A couple days later the professor offered to take me out to lunch where she then encouraged me to think about going to college to be a writer. This was meant to be a compliment to my writing skills, not an insult to my musical abilities. I was pleased with the compliment but I never did go to college to be a writer though being a writer is something I've wanted to do most of my life. I don't believe that any one needs to go to college to accomplish this task. You simply need to be reasonably good with spelling and grammar and be able to craft a good story. There are dozens of good books available on the subject such as $30 Writing School by Michael Dean and On Writing by Steven King. In addition to books there are many more resources available. A few that I like are Writing Sci-Fi and Fantasy by Jeffrey A. Carver, Fictional Discipline by Stan Man X, yes I borrowed the idea for the title of this article from him, and Writing Excuses.

Taking a disciplined approach to your writing is the best way to improve your writing ability. I spent years thinking up great ideas for stories but then never getting those ideas out of my head and onto paper. That's not writing, that's day dreaming and anyone can do that. Without dedication to see an idea through to completion you won't ever be a writer. I used to always struggle with story length. I could come up with great ideas but somehow couldn't expound them into anything approaching the length of a book. I always felt like I was trying to add fluff to my stories just to make them longer instead of actually having any real content. Something strange has happened though as I have started to write on a consistent basis: The length of my writing has consistently increased without even noticing the change. If you want to see some proof take a look at the first month of posts on this blog and compare the length of the entries to the length of entries I am doing now. Like any other skill you must work at writing consistently if you want to see improvement.

I'm not going to pretend to have this writing thing all figured out because I certainly don't. I'm just trying to find my way in this craft and hoping to help other s along the way. Of all the things I've written only one piece was ever published beyond self-publishing that I've done on the Internet. And that was a poem about 5 years ago in an Art festival's literature magazine. If I ever do get out of the rat race, I certainly hope that writing is a key element in that but it will take consistent dedication and perseverance for it to become a reality. Spending all your time saying that you want to be a writer without actually writing anything will never get you anywhere. Put the effort in now not later. You'll be happy you did.

Writing Tip: Something that I have found very helpful while writing is to not look at the screen at all. I find that I get easily distracted and what I do write seems to come out slower than if I simply stare blankly at the keys. I don't need to see the keys to type but it's the best place I've found to look while writing that won't encourage outside distractions to slow me down.