Weekend Writing Warriors #17

Hey all! Thanks for stopping by 🙂 This snippet is from my WIP, Nightfire, and a direct continuation of last week. You can check out other snippets from this book, or my other book, Ember, here. To meet some new authors, read some great writing, or join in the 8-sentence fun, stop by at Weekend Writing Warriors!

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This makes his smile widen. “And that’s why I like you.”

Mina snorts. “When you wake up with your guts spilling out of you, I’m going to say I told you so. Ferals only know how to deal with blood and bullets, and that’s all they’ll get from me. She’ll have a bullet in her brain and I’ll be long gone, guts intact.”

I like this one. At least, when she wants to kill me, I know how to handle her.

______

It’s not quite the end of the scene, but thought that was a good place to stop while still giving a good impression of their personalities 🙂 I have one more post planned before my break. Thank you so much for reading, and look forward to your posts as always. Happy 8sunday!

 

Blog Post and Novel Excerpt © Victoria Davenport and the Coffee.Write.Repeat. blog

Why I Don’t Write Every Day

Yes, you read that right. While practically everyone else is telling you “write every day” like a mantra to be repeated until you are getting very sleepy, I am telling you the exact opposite.

Why? Why not write every day? Isn’t practice the key to  getting better? If all the bestselling authors say it, isn’t that the secret to becoming a brilliant author?

Yes, and no. I think “write every day” is good advice for those just starting out. When you are just starting as a writer, you  need all the time and practice you can get to develop yourself as a writer, which can only really come from getting words on the page. So if you are new to writing, by all means, write every day. If you are anyone really, and you want to write every day, by all means go for it!

I am not here to stand in the way of anyone who wants to write all the time. That’s awesome, go do it! I am here to talk to those who beat themselves up because they don’t.

First of all, writing every day assumes a lot of things. You don’t have a full-time day job, or three kids, or a full class load, or a social life, or basically anything else. It assumes you have time to sit down at a computer and pour your soul out, every day of the week. Even if you can find time to wedge writing between the conference calls and cleaning spit up and cramming for a test, do you really want to write right then?

You sit down and stare at that blinking cursor on a blank part of the page, and it seems a lot less like your passion and more like another one of the day’s many chores to cross off your list. I don’t think anyone should ever feel that way about writing. When that happens, you have stopped being a writer, and become a machine, going through the motions.

Yes, there will be days you don’t feel like writing, and you shouldn’t let that stop you. You shouldn’t use lack of motivation or inspiration as an excuse, but sometimes it happens. Sometimes you just don’t feel like writing, and you shouldn’t force it. You shouldn’t force it because then your words will feel forced, which the reader can tell, not to mention you end up starting to hate everything to do with writing.

The only time I have ever forced myself to write (almost) every day was for CampNaNo. Honestly, I would never do it again. I was exhausted, and every time I sat down to write I started to hate it more and more. The words suffered for it, too. I am still cleaning up the mess of some of those scenes I wrote, and probably will be for a while to come.

I don’t write every day because writing every day sucks the life and joy out of it for me. I start to dread it, feel obligated, and guilty when I don’t. I hate that feeling. When I sit down to write, I want to feel excited. I want my mind to be whirling with all kinds of scenes and voices and images that I just can’t wait to put on the page.

Now one thing I will tell you to do (almost) every day is read. I learn more in an hour of reading than I do in ten hours of writing, and I could never get burnt out.

Writing every day works for some people, which is great (but we secretly hate those people). For those of you who it doesn’t work for (like me) don’t worry about it. Write as much as you can, as often as you can, but never let it take away your love for writing.

 

Worthy of the Week

Hey all! Here is this Friday’s Worthy of the Week, a weekly breakdown of things worth sharing. If you like what you see, feel free to join in! Just post your link in the comments, and I’ll stop by 🙂 Check out the others here. 

Inspiration

I don’t usually do a video for inspiration, but thought this video was so powerful, and had so much story in it. Something about the little boy in a doctor’s coat, treating battle-torn adults not only tugged my heartstrings, but made my writer’s brain churn. Definitely worth the watch, though be warned it is about the Syria conflict and is rather violent and graphic.

Issues

Though I really have no connection to it, Ferguson really affected me. So much so that I wrote an entire post about it. But I recently found this post which highlights the issue around the Ferguson events, and that this is not just a one-time tragedy, it is a pattern. And clearly, a large part of it is about race, whether we want to admit it or not.

Words of Wisdom

You’ve probably heard this quote before, but I think this is important for writers. This is part of what I love about books and what I try to do through my writing. Everything else will fade, but words and their feelings remain. Despite time, distance, and language, words never cease their ability to connect us.

 

To Build A Story: Nameless

Names can be tricky. Sometimes I’ll go days, weeks, or even months without being able to choose a good name for a character. If this happens, I use some kind of placeholder, usually the first name that pops into my head. It works in the mean time, but it’s just not right. 

Right now, I have two characters in my WIP Nightfire. They are ferals like my protagonist Kera, which means they are basically a native people who mostly live in tribes outside of civilization. They are brother and sister, and skilled warriors. The girl is small, sharp-tongued, and quick, and she loves knives. The brother is large and strong, serious, blind, and very spiritual.

As of now, their placeholders are Namri and Nayo. They work, but they just don’t feel quite right for these two. I have been working on a lot of world-building lately, and have started to base the feral culture around Eskimo and Inuit people. I’ve started adapting the Eskimo languages into words and phrases I can use in Nightfire, and would love for these two characters to have Eskimo based names.

Now it’s your turn to help me! I’ll put two polls below, one for the brother and one for the sister, with some of my options and their meanings, though some have been chosen just for how they sound. Choose your favorite, and hopefully we can find the right names together 🙂

A Whole New World

Hey all, sorry for the relative silence! I’ve been busy with classes starting and everything, but I am trying my best 🙂

I’ve said before that characters are the most important thing in a story. What is the second most important thing? Not plot, but world. But how can it be a story without a plot?

The reason I say world is more important than plot is because I think plot is relatively easy. Yes you have to come up with something different and interesting, but it’s point A to point B to climax to end. I say world instead of setting because I think it is just that–a world. It is the living,  breathing world that is not only where this story takes place, but could go on with its own stories afterward. I think world-building takes a lot more skill, and is a crucial part of the story that a lot of writers miss.

There can be many different approaches to world-building, but they all basically have the same goal: create an environment that feels real, no matter how imaginary.

When I first started writing books, world-building was something I more or less neglected entirely. Yes there was a setting–a futuristic city–but there was no world. There were a lot of nondescript hallways and buildings and places that probably made no logical sense but I used them because they worked for my plot (which I always put first). They did not have a world, but a shell. They were actors on a stage, with only a flat backdrop behind them.

Through reading, I learned that the stories I fell in love with were not the exciting ones, but the ones that completely enveloped me in this other world, so much so that I lost myself in them. Two of my favorites are The Hunger Games and Shadow and Bone. Shadow and Bone is probably my favorite example of world-building. I mean, wow.

Here are some of the things I have noticed that great world-building books use:

1. Details. The kind that you probably don’t even notice. The line about a rat scampering off into the darkness, or the smell of the salt air. These flesh out the world, and give the reader a sense of the world being alive, tangible. A good tip for details is to use senses, especially those other than sight, ones you don’t always think about when writing, like smell or taste.

2. People. No, your characters don’t count. This is a big thing I have noticed in successful books like The Hunger Games. There are mentions of people we never learn the names of, but they are there. Specific people, not just a crowd or group. A young woman and her children at the market, an old man sitting on a stoop playing cards. Your world does not just have your story, it has a hundred other stories in it as well, each with their own protagonists. Your characters cannot be the only real people, or their world feels empty.

3. Location. This one is a little bit trickier. What comes to mind for me is Shadow and Bone, when they are travelling, and each town or village has a name and something memorable about it. Some are harbor towns, others farming villages, some trading towns. But I think what makes it feel real is that each one of these places is established. The characters are not going from point A to point B, they are going from Townville to Villagetown, and each one has its own set of people and details to go with it. Think of each place as its own little world, with its own stories that will continue on as they always have, with or without your characters there.

4. Culture. This one is huge, but can be difficult. Every world and every society has some type of culture. This is everything from art and music, to laws and crime, to language and social expectations. It is difficult because it can be complex, and hard to be unique. It doesn’t have to be completely out there, though. You don’t have to create an entire language and law code and unique method of art. I think considering social structure and expectations is the easiest and most effective way to establish culture. It can be simple, such as how women are treated or how separated the classes are, but just taking the time to think about how these people live their lives can make a huge difference.

These are the four main things I have noticed, though each one can have different elements within it. I will write another couple posts on world-building, specifically how I have learned and used it in my WIP, Nightfire, which is something I am pretty excited to share with y’all 🙂 I hope these have helped. Do you agree? Did I leave something out? Let me know what you think!

Weekend Writing Warriors #16

Hey all! Thanks for stopping by 🙂 This snippet is from my WIP, Nightfire, and a direct continuation of last week. You can check out other snippets from this book, or my other book, Ember, here. To meet some new authors, read some great writing, or join in the 8-sentence fun, stop by at Weekend Writing Warriors!

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His smile lingers. “Your eyes–they don’t hide anything, unlike most people, I like it.”

I feel heat rise up from somewhere—whether anger or shame, I can’t tell. I was prepared for civilians to hate me, to try to kill me. All my life, anything outside of Mother and Hana has been dangerous, and deadly–I can handle something trying to kill me, but now I am faced with something that isn’t, and I am clueless.

I harden my gaze instead, boring into him. “Then you are stupid–It is never smart to trust. Anyone can kill you, even if you like them–I would kill you, and not even blink.”

______

I’ll post one more snippet from this interaction to finish, then I am debating one more post before I take a break. Thank you so much for reading 🙂 Look forward to your posts, and happy 8sunday!

 

Blog Post and Novel Excerpt © Victoria Davenport and the Coffee.Write.Repeat. blog

 

 

From The Outside Looking In

You have probably heard of the recent chaos that is Ferguson. If you haven’t, I suggest you read this post. If you have, I suggest you read it anyways. I know this is totally non-book related, but I just had to get this out. Since I first heard of it more than a week ago, I keep reading bits and pieces of each side of the story, usually conflicting and confusing. I have yet to read something that breaks the whole situation down, and looks at both sides. I hope to do that here, and in the process sort out this tangle of thoughts and feelings I have about Ferguson. I am in no way an expert in any of this, but both sides of each point are taken from real arguments and points I have seen made.

Side 1: Michael Brown was a criminal and thug. He stole cigars from a convenience store and matched the description of the criminal. The cop who shot him feared for his life, and shot in self defense. 

Side 2: Michael Brown was a 17-year-old boy who was about to be the first in his family to attend college. The security footage which is pointed to as evidence of him robbing the store has also been used to show he paid for them, or that it’s difficult to identify him in the video at all. Even if he had stolen the cigars, the penalty for theft is not death. Self defense is understandable, but Michael Brown was unarmed at the time, and was shot six times. According to one of the autopsies, one of those bullets entered the top of his head, indicating he was already face-down on the ground. Autopsies also showed he was not at close range (read: not dangerous) when he was shot. Also, why six potentially fatal bullets? A tazer or shot to the leg would have stopped him, without having to kill him.

Side 1: People started riots and looting after his death, and many used it as an excuse for violence. Force is necessary in return to keep order and protect the people.

Side 2: The majority of protesters were entirely peaceful, with only a handful who were violent in any way. Yet, SWAT and military trucks, assault rifles, and tear gas was brought out in full, threatening force. Many were held at gunpoint and arrested including media, and both tear gas and rubber bullets were fired on peaceful protesters. Also, some looting was out of need–such as protesters who broke into a McDonalds to get milk for those who had been hit with tear gas.

Side 1: They are trying to make everything about race. Why does no one care when it is black-on-white crime? 

Side 2: Missouri, and specifically Ferguson, apparently has racism deeply embedded in its history. Many witnesses and protesters reported police officers and dispatchers calling them racial slurs when they tried to get information, or to talk peacefully. There is also a long precedent of police officers discriminating against those of color, and that has sometimes ended in tragedy, such as the recent death of Eric Garner who was choked to death by a police officer. They are making it about race because at least some part about it is, the world just doesn’t want to see it. (Also, have you noticed how few of the police officers are not white? I have only seen one man of color in the entire force.)

Side 1: Why don’t the media and protesters just go home? They are just stirring the pot. They want the attention and excitement.

Side 2: Yes, they could go home, but their problems wouldn’t go away. Maybe for the media–but it is the media’s job to show the world these things, especially the things that people try so hard to hide and keep from the public (such as the lies about tear gas and corralling media away from action). They have every right to protest, and they are angry. They want to be seen and heard, because they are tired of the way things are and they want change.

 

So far, I think those are the main controversies that I have observed (please point out anything I might have missed). From someone who is relatively detached from the situation and conflict, I find myself siding with the protesters. The police have lied, kept secrets, used unnecessary violence, shot rubber bullets at protesters, violated first amendment rights, and shot tear gas at peaceful protesters including children (and lied about it). For me, there are too many tallies against them that I have a hard time seeing their side, even when I look at the facts. And I did try to weigh both sides, and see how they might be justified.

But the truth is, none of this is. Even if Michael Brown had been a criminal who robbed a store and been shot by a cop acting in self defense, even if there were looters and rioters, even if they’re making this about race and trying to stir the pot, does not justify a police force that looks too much like an occupying army in an oppressive regime. Attacking unarmed and peaceful civilians? Taking away rights, violating the first amendment, and enforcing their rules with an iron fist?

Really, it makes me angry. How could we as humans do this? How could we let this happen? It makes me want to get there on the front lines and chant for justice right along with them.

It is shocking that this could ever happen, that it is still happening, and that we haven’t really done anything about it. And honestly, it is terrifying. To see how easily this did happen, how fragile our system and our little world is, and just how close we are to real life dystopia.

My thoughts and prayers are with those in Ferguson this week, and I really hope this gets resolved soon, for all of our sakes.

 

 

This video is a quick, factual, and clear breakdown of the situation and some of the factors behind it.

Also worth checking out: This news interview, these pictures, and this article. 

 

What’s Up Wednesday

Hey all! It’s been a little while, but I’m back for this week! 🙂 What’s Up Wednesday is a weekly blog hop created by Jaime Morrow and Erin Funk, to help connect writers on this writing journey. If you’d like to join us, check out the blogs each week, get to know some of the other writers taking part, and spread some writerly love! 

What I’m Reading

Just finished Siege and Storm by Leigh Bardugo and LOVED (of course). Ruin and Rising is next, but I think I’m procrastinating because I don’t want it to be over yet. If I could only be half of a fraction of her amazing, I would be content.

What I’m Writing

Between leftover CampNaNo burnout (yes, still) and having an illness relapse (you can read more here and here), the words haven’t happened much lately. They’ve happened somewhat, but still not anywhere near my normal. I did get a couple good 1ks in, so I’m not too bad, but I was hoping to get this draft finished by the end of summer–and seeing as classes start on Monday, that’s not going to happen. I’m about 15k short, so hopefully I can knock it out pretty soon 🙂

What Inspires Me

Lately, my CPs have been especially brilliant (impossible, I know). We’ve had some amazing brain babies (brain storming sessions) lately and not only have we made some great progress on my own WIP, but listening to and working on their projects can be just as helpful and inspiring.

What Else I’m Up To

I am all moved in! I have been staying in my first apartment for a couple weeks now, and am loving it. Of course, being close to my CPs now helps too 🙂 I will probably regret this in a week, but I am actually looking forward to classes starting. Now that I am in my third year, my classes are all related to my major and career and I find them interesting and even enjoy them (shocking, I know).

Hope everyone has a great start to the new school year, and have a great week!

Spoons

Wow, I cannot thank y’all enough for your amazing response and support to my last post about my chronic illness. It really, really means a lot to me. But I also realized how little some people understand or realize about chronic illness, so I thought it would be important to talk a little more about what it is really like.

First, it is unpredictable. I may feel relatively “normal” for a week or so, then the next week because unable to even get out of bed (like this week). It hits without warning, and without reason. I might take all the precautions to be healthy, avoid certain things, stay hydrated, etc. but that can never stop it from happening anyways.

Second, it is nothing like normal illness. If any of you have ever had a bad case of strep, you may know that feeling of being completely drained, where your whole body aches and all you can do is sleep. That is kind of what it can be like having chronic illness, only all the time, in varying degrees. Chronic means chronic. It isn’t going to go away, or even get better. There is no cure in most cases. I can’t get healthy by working out more or juicing or meditating two hours a day. Making healthy choices can help my symptoms, but it will never truly go away.

Third, everyone is different, and no one can judge someone else’s experience or illness. One person might look relatively healthy or normal on a day-to-day basis, like me. Another might have visible symptoms such as bruising, hair loss, or need for a wheelchair or walker. Just because I can look healthy, doesn’t mean I am or even am feeling well. On the other hand, just because they look sick doesn’t mean they are useless or less than anyone else. Oh, and not judging someone else also means no advice or solutions, even if they are well-intentioned. Instead, they usually come off more condescending and hurtful than helpful. “Why don’t you try working out more?” sounds more like “If you weren’t out of shape, you wouldn’t be sick.” Not to mention, see last line above.

The Paper Butterfly showed me this great explanation of chronic illness, called the spoon theory, written by Christine Miserandino of the But You Don’t Look Sick blog. You can read the full post here, but here is an excerpt that really breaks it down. It is a little long, but absolutely worth the time.

I asked her to list off the tasks of her day, including the most simple. As, she rattled off daily chores, or just fun things to do; I explained how each one would cost her a spoon.

When she jumped right into getting ready for work as her first task of the morning…I quickly took away a spoon and she realized she hasn’t even gotten dressed yet. Showering cost her spoon, just for washing her hair and shaving her legs…Getting dressed was worth another spoon.

I stopped her and broke down every task to show her how every little detail needs to be thought about…I think she was starting to understand when she theoretically didn’t even get to work, and she was left with 6 spoons. I then explained to her that she needed to choose the rest of her day wisely, since when your “spoons” are gone, they are gone. Sometimes you can borrow against tomorrow’s “spoons”, but just think how hard tomorrow will be with less “spoons”. I also needed to explain that a person who is sick always lives with the looming thought that tomorrow may be the day that a cold comes, or an infection, or any number of things that could be very dangerous. So you do not want to run low on “spoons”, because you never know when you truly will need them. I didn’t want to depress her, but I needed to be realistic, and unfortunately being prepared for the worst is part of a real day for me.

We went through the rest of the day, and she slowly learned that skipping lunch would cost her a spoon, as well as standing on a train, or even typing at her computer too long. She was forced to make choices and think about things differently. Hypothetically, she had to choose not to run errands, so that she could eat dinner that night.

When we got to the end of her pretend day, she said she was hungry. I summarized that she had to eat dinner but she only had one spoon left. If she cooked, she wouldn’t have enough energy to clean the pots. If she went out for dinner, she might be too tired to drive home safely. Then I also explained, that I didn’t even bother to add into this game, that she was so nauseous, that cooking was probably out of the question anyway. So she decided to make soup, it was easy. I then said it is only 7pm, you have the rest of the night but maybe end up with one spoon, so you can do something fun, or clean your apartment, or do chores, but you can’t do it all.

I rarely see her emotional, so when I saw her upset I knew maybe I was getting through to her. I didn’t want my friend to be upset, but at the same time I was happy to think finally maybe someone understood me a little bit. She had tears in her eyes and asked quietly “Christine, How do you do it? Do you really do this everyday?”

I explained that some days were worse then others; some days I have more spoons then most. But I can never make it go away and I can’t forget about it, I always have to think about it. I handed her a spoon I had been holding in reserve. I said simply, “I have learned to live life with an extra spoon in my pocket, in reserve. You need to always be prepared.”

Its hard, the hardest thing I ever had to learn is to slow down, and not do everything. I fight this to this day. I hate feeling left out, having to choose to stay home, or to not get things done that I want to. I wanted her to feel that frustration. I wanted her to understand, that everything everyone else does comes so easy, but for me it is one hundred little jobs in one. I need to think about the weather, my temperature that day, and the whole day’s plans before I can attack any one given thing. When other people can simply do things, I have to attack it and make a plan like I am strategizing a war.

It is in that lifestyle, the difference between being sick and healthy. It is the beautiful ability to not think and just do. I miss that freedom. I miss never having to count “spoons”.

If you are healthy, you can never truly understand what it is like to be chronically ill, and I am really glad you don’t have to. But having an open mind and being educated can be a step towards understanding what someone goes through, and being able to better support them. It really does mean a lot.

Weekend Writing Warriors #15

Great to see some familiar and some new faces this week 🙂 This snippet is from my WIP, Nightfire. You can check out other snippets from this book, or my other book, Ember, here. To meet some new authors, read some great writing, or join in the 8-sentence fun, stop by at Weekend Writing Warriors!

In this scene, Kera has begrudgingly teamed up with the hunters, Torren and Mina, to search for her sister, Hana. Mina is wounded with nightfire, from the Shadow attack. They have stopped to rest, and eat, and address some issues:

_________

[Mina] growls, “Great. We’re wandering around in the wilds, risking our lives, and the feral doesn’t even know where we’re going.”

Torren looks up to meet my gaze, chewing a bite of their ration bread, strikingly similar to my own loaves, “Do you know where we’re going?”

I look away, my eyes towards the trees: They swirl with a strange-colored smoke, visible only to my eyes, connecting their trunks like threads–a trail. The earth’s hum resonates in my bones, stronger here–stronger everyday, the farther north we go. “Sort of.”

Mina laughs mirthlessly, “How do you know she’s not just running us to death?”

I dart my eyes back towards her, “If I wanted you dead, you would be.”

This makes Torren smile, though I don’t know why–he really is a strange human, “If she says she knows where she’s going, then she knows where she’s going; we just have to trust her.”

My eyes snap to his face, “How can you trust me?”

______

I wanted to share a little bit of their personalities, since the previous snippets have been a lot of action, and I really love the characters and voices in this one. Hope you like them as much as I do 🙂 Thanks so much for the continued input and support, the WeWriWa community has been great. I am debating one more snippet from Nightfire, before I take a break from WeWriWa for a little while. My experience has been great, but summer is about to end, I am moving into my first apartment, the semester starts soon, and I need a little break 🙂 Look forward to your posts, and happy 8sunday!

 

Blog Post and Novel Excerpt © Victoria Davenport and the Coffee.Write.Repeat. blog