2011: My year with writing

This time last year, I reviewed where I was in my writing career.

I thought I had written the penultimate draft of Steampunk Assassins. I was writing the first draft of The Greenwich Problem. I was planning to write a romantic comedy termed Baking Lawyer (which I abandoned due to fatal flaws). I determined that Military Monster needed a complete overall (which is still awaited.) And I put everything else on hold.

And then 2011 happened.

In January, I finished the first draft of The Greenwich Problem for the BBC’s Laughing Stock competition.

In February, Realm Pictures won the Raindance/Pepsi Max competition. This started them on the road to The Underwater Realm.

In March, I was longlisted for Laughing Stock, which caused much excitement.

In April, I attended the London Comedy Writers Festival, got some great advice and met some awesome creatives. I also wrote another feature script for Script Frenzy.

In May, Realm House hosted the first UWR big production meeting.

In July, Dave, Jon and I went on the first UWR feature script retreat.

In August, I made a wiki for Realm Pictures.

In September, I created my first storyworld.

In November, I went to the London Screenwriters Festival. I got more great advice, and met more awesome creatives, and I pitched my scripts to three producers. I’m waiting to hear back from one of them about The Greenwich Problem. I also wrote an 80K NaNoWriMo novel that I will start editing in January.

In December, Realm launched their Kickstarter. The fund is currently at 85K and climbing. An absolutely amazing response.

Wow, what a year!

So, in 2012, I will:
- Final FINAL draft Steampunk Assassins and send it to producers
- Edit my Cyber Crime Sleuth (NaNoWriMo) novel and send to publishers
- Finish my Asylum pilot, enter it in Red Planet Prize, and send it to producers
- Make a short film
- Get an agent
- See Realm Pictures take Raindance 2012 by storm
- Get married XD

NaNoWriMo 2011: Wordy

80,370 words.

41 chapters with eccentric titles, including “Mama Told Me Not To Come”, “Dial ‘M’” and “Down Corridors Through Automatic Doors”.

956 instances of my protagonist’s name. 580 instances of his partner’s name.

72 “killer”s and 25 “victim”s.

40 “murder”s and 15 “gun”s.

52 “cop”s and 27 “detective”s.

451 “ifs”, 2,538 “and”s and 547 “but”s.

26 “fuck”s and 16 “shit”s.

30 days of heartache and toil and blood sweated.

100% worth it.

The Importance of Relaxation to the Writer

I’ve done well this week.

I’m on 48K of my 80K target for NaNoWriMo, which puts me bang on track. I caught up while working night shifts, despite the upheaval of being abruptly pulled off nights yesterday and thrust back into a day shift today. The neurones don’t fire too good on four hours sleep mid-afternoon.

I’ve also heard back from one of my Speed Pitching contacts from LSF, so I know my script has safely reached the hands of a reputable production company. This gives me butterflies, but We’ll See.

So, tonight, I’m going to kick back and watch Children in Need with an extortionate pizza. Sure, I could eek out another two thousand words of novel, but I have the whole weekend to write and I’ve earned my pizza and my Doctor Who trailer.

When you work a day job, it’s easy to feel pressured to spend all your free time writing. I firmly believe you should write every day, or you should think about your writing and your future writing every day (proper thinking now, not that morning shower contemplation of ‘hmm, what if my hero fought a giant space duster?’).

It is, however, equally important to recharge. Take the evening off. Hell, if you’ve been especially awesome lately and the next deadlines are weeks away, take the whole damn weekend. You can’t write if you’re too tired to hold a pen. You also can’t write if you’re not living life.

This is my anti-guilt letter to myself when I feel bad for taking time out. Let it be yours as well, good writery folk, because we’re nervous types and we need encouragement to let loose now and then.

And who knows? Your relaxed brain may be the perfect nurturing place for that Next Big Thing idea that happens along while you’re doing that living.

NaNoWriMo Owns Me

I originally started this blog at the end of 2009, when I wanted to write 100,000 words of my Apocalypse novel in two months, Nano-style.

That novel’s word count currently stands at 18,041. That’s because someone pointed out to me that the concept was exactly like ‘Good Omens’. Disheartened, I shelved that novel and moved on to screenplays.

However, I’m still passionate about the novel, and when I got the idea for an agoraphobic, techno-whizz detective and a streetwise ex-con fighting crime, how could I say no?

And, oh look, it’s November. And hey, I’ve won Nano twice before – 2006 (Vivid Images – never edited) and 2007 (Deus Ex Machina – partially edited, one of my favourite stories). So, I think to myself, I can do this 50k thing. Why not make it challenging?

80,000 words. That’ll be a walk in the park.

Yeesh.

I’m only 5k behind schedule, giving me, at this moment, 21,859 words. Which, for those of you who can’t count, is 3,000 words more than that Apocalypse novel.

Meanwhile, it seems every competition under the sun is calling my name. Immersive Writing Lab, Jesting Around, Red Planet Prize, The Sitcom Mission…

I think I need to lie down.

The Writer on Holiday

If, like me, a week away from your laptop and constant access to Twitter fills you with dread, here are some tips to appease your creative sensibilities while still getting some much-needed downtime.

1) Scribble on paper and then lock your notes in the safe

A paper note can be a refreshing way to examine your ideas and help you make connections you might not have otherwise grasped.

As for the safe, this is not because some would-be plagiarist might steal them (see Lucy V’s post here), but because the maid might be disturbed by the carefully planned murder laid out on hotel stationery.

2) Mobile apps are your friend

I drafted this post in the bar with a cocktail. Evernote, Celtx, Dropbox – make sure they’re synced and ready to go. Also, take advantage of any hotel wifi for a quick glance at email (though I dutifully set my auto-responder) – it’s particularly good if there’s a time limit to the thing, for those of us too weak to stay disconnected.

3) Research material

I’m aiming to bring an amateur detective to life in November, so my holiday literature consisted principally of detectives’ first outings. The rest were thrillers – get yourself in the mood. The same applies to the in-flight movie – pick something genre appropriate.

4) New locations, cultures, characters

A hotel, resort, or campsite is the perfect place to meet your cast. You’ll see the same folk by the pool, on the slopes, at the buffet, in the bars. And you may pick up a setting or the whiff of an exotic idea you’d never before contemplated.

Steampunk assassins was first conceived on a holiday to Sri Lanka, and I’m not entirely sure it could’ve been born anywhere else. Fawlty Towers is based on the Pythons’ stay with a grumpy hotelier in Torquay. Keep an open mind.

5) Remember to relax and switch off

Take some “me” time. A quick massage, a round of crazy golf, or even an extra helping of dessert can set you up wonderfully to start anew when you get home.

And maybe ditch that monitor tan for something people get from that sunlight thing.

A criminal mind

I haven’t got the head for crime.

Stomach, sure – I’ve been watching CSI over dinner for years. And the heart, certainly: Castle, The Mentalist, Poirot, Sherlock are amongst my firm favourites.

But the brain-juice? Not so much.

I just finished Jeffrey Deaver’s latest Lincoln Rhyme novel “The Burning Wire”. Deaver’s a genius and I’ve loved every single one of this series. But, once again, I couldn’t see the twist coming. Or the second twist. Or the final twist. Or the one after that (and that may not look logical but, trust me, it is truth – the man’s RELENTLESS with the TWISTS).

I NEVER see it coming. I can never get the bad guy. Once or twice, I’ve guessed it. That’s from watching about twelve seasons of CSI: Anyville, the above-mentioned shows, and numerous crime novels. Once. Or twice. Maybe three times tops.

Normally, this wouldn’t be a problem. Congratulations, you might say, the girl gets the fun and horror of surprise from every crime. Huzzah!

Except I want to write a crime novel.

I’ve got my detective and her sidekick. I’ve decided on her city. I know how she gets involved in the work and what she brings to the table. I’ve even tentatively started outlining a villian and his victims.

But if my brain can’t follow someone else’s crimework, how am I ever going to construct my own? And, sure, maybe it’s something you can learn. But until I understand how it works, how the reader picks up the clues and puts the guess together, how can I replicate that experience? Short of simply coping someone else, and that’s beyond cheap.

So I’m re-reading my favourite crime books. I’m rewatching all of Castle (oh, the hardship!). But when I read The Bone Collector for the second time, I managed to fall for the same misdirection as I did last time. I thought I was being clever, remembering the twist – but it turned out that I had been drawn in AGAIN. Fool me once, etc.

Maybe I’m just not cut out for crime. Time to get back to something I actually understand – maybe that Steampunk Assassins script, eh?