NaNoWriMo reflections

November is the the National Novel Writing Month, as promoted by NaNoWriMo. I had an honest go at this, putting in about 28 days work. The support of a local group really helped with my motivation (even though I was only in contact with them via the forum). It also gave me confidence (proof, even) that it is possible for me to write something like a novel. So I'd glad to be part of it. There were a few notes that I made looking back at the experience though, which I thought I'd share:

• I felt I was a "pantser" (writing from the seat of my pants, in contrast to working from a plan). However, I had based what I'd written on journal notes that had characters, places and creatures for the setting - about 1,500 words were enough of a seed.
• I might have done better if this was a more structured "pitch" for a novel (instead of just a summary) - why a reader (or me as the author) might get emotional buy-in to it.
• Better planning  structure would have helped - e.g. laying down a 3 act structure with a central turning point (that raises tension), topped and tailed with introductory orientation and an epilogue.
• Specifically, starting with a definitive cast of characters would have avoided a problem I had as a pantser with the introduction new characters late on.
• The pitch and the plan could have been addressed to a clearer view of the audience than I had - seeing the fiction as creating the stage as well as the characters on it. Making assumptions or having to go back and clarify these later in the writing broke the flow of events and actions.
• That said, I felt I sometimes had an issue with slogging through too much "and then... and then..." to just communicate a basic sequence of actions. I could loosen up to make leaps and just give impressions at times.
• I also got tangled up with the way I wrote dialogue and rigorously avoided using numeric quantities - e.g. for time and distance. Maybe next time I'll just use units and try to let conversations flow more - it would be easy enough to edit these later.
• Likewise, there's no need to shy away from taboo content or themes. Writing is an exercise for me first; censorship can come when (if ever) it goes to a publisher.
• I felt I was leaning too heavily on real-world points of reference too - like medieval castles, druidry, the system of 4 elements, and a conflict between a monotheistic god of law versus polytheism or animism. As Adam Roberts said: "Whenever faced with something old and stale and conventionalised, think of a way to unsettle and rewire that staleness."

Restarting any old blah

Back in March, I started reading Julia Cameron's Artist's Way, and I followed its course through to the end. It helped me to feel a bit more empowered at the time, and looking back, I wanted some of that to spill over into this blog, so that I could share my experience and work. As part of that, I've published some posts that I'd previously left as draft - even if they're not perfect.

I'd also got a copy of Natalie Goldberg's Writing Down The Bones at the end of last year, which also inspired me to free up my writing. I'm not sure that either use the phrase, but they both encourage that principle "just turn up at the page".

However, I'm now coming to terms with a pragmatic realisation that I might never achieve my goal of writing science fiction novels. Adams Roberts' Getting Started in Writing Science Fiction and Fantasy did give me specific and practical guidance for this too. It has been a productive year since I informally set up a SMART target for 2017 of writing 100k words, without worrying about whether they were "right". But I'm admitting to myself what I've done always tends toward exposition of setting, not fun and exciting narratives that I'd want to read.

So that leaves me somewhere that I can just write any old stuff occasionally, enjoying the satisfaction of getting a few ideas down - as I have done since I was a teenager, writing a spontaneous journal without any guidance. It doesn't really matter whether anyone wants to read those ideas as long as I've got something from it myself. Also, I can't realistically see any negative consequences for sharing this kind of "blah".

By the way, as part of this restart, the page has had a bit of rebranding. I'd come to regret picking the previous Heretic Space Cadet title in haste. The new 'crow view' name was available and short (though I've also chosen in on the spur of the moment). It seems suitable as the name of my birthplace could have meant crows' clearing. I don't think of myself as a corvid (certainly not with the insight of Ted Hughes' Crow), nor do I think I've got some kind of better perspective from to top of a ship's mast. But I think it will do.

The Sacrifice

I wrote this as an exercise in Adam Robert's Getting Started in Writing Science Fiction and Fantasy. It is pretty derivative of Ursula Le Guin's Leaving Omelas, but that seemed to be the brief. I thought I'd share it anyway.

"What do make of the annual sacrifice?" Brione asked her younger sister, Carys.

"It's horrid, and I couldn't imagine any of us going through with it," the athletic teen answered.

"But think of the tradition's benefits. We live here in Eden wanting for nothing - taking bread-fruit from the trees, enjoying the meat of the beasts who offer themselves calmly to the butchers, cosy and safe in our marvelous ancient homes."

"I wouldn't mind a few leaks or patching the roof myself if meant we didn't haven't to pick some poor youth to give to the Great Demon each year," Carys replied earnestly.

"Ahh, you're still young and haven't started your time as a novice. Once you've spent some time in the Demon's temple, understanding His work, you might think twice. I see Him go forth from His statue at dawn, rushing like a wind to the six corners of the land. Yes, He repairs the roofs and everything else besides, and He sees to every tree in even the smallest village, and whispers in the ear of each beast that is ready for slaughter. But He cares for us in so many other ways. Without him we'd live in fear, prey to wild monstrosities and the armies of our foes. We'd suffer the pain and deprivation of the hundreds of ailments and injuries that His lesser demons see to. Children would be orphaned and left to starve, the elderly would suffer slow deaths. Without His fatherly presence, the city and the land would be miserable."

"But if He is so kind, why is it that wants one of us each year to suffer and die in his name? I bet with the festival so close, there's already some poor wretch pinned out breathing their last right now."

"Can't you see, Carys, that the suffering of that one poor wretch, hardly ever lasting more than a day, saves thousands from the misery and strife that could be just as agonising and last much longer. We can't begin to fathom why the Great Demon might make His benevolence contingent on this sacrifice - He is a divine being, and His mind is different to ours, but He too is subject to the greater laws of all creation, the laws that say the sun must rise, the flowers must wither, the seasons must cycle and the wolf must take the suckling deer."

"I guess," the younger woman conceded, "But I just would never be able to accept that it might be you, I or Arwen that might be called."

Brione looked down at her feet, and the atmosphere seemed to turn icy. She looked up guiltily into her little sister's eyes and clasped her hand. "Ahh, well, I am truly sorry to have to bring this news, but it is Arwen that's been chosen this year. I've just come from the securing ritual."

Carys leapt to her feet, throwing her sister's hand down. "What?" she screamed. "You can't have let them do that! Why didn't you dispute it? Why didn't you and her fight them off when they tried to hold her down? Our own sister! Our big sister who loves us and played with both of us all the years of our childhood!"

"I've tried to explain," Brione tried to speak calmly, folding her hands in the lap of her novice robes, "It's for the best, for all of us. Arwen understood. She cried, she was frightened, but she didn't fight them, and I wouldn't either."

The enraged Carys bellowed, "Well I will!" and with that, ran from the house.

She easily outpaced her sister, who ran after her, not breaking her stride in her sprint from their prestigious family home to the monumental temple to the Great Demon. She pushed through the regular pedestrian door, the huge Demon doors still being shut fast, ahead of the great reaffirmation rituals. There were few people on the wide marble tiled floor inside in congregational space, dimly lit by shafts of light from round apertures high in the gigantic domed ceiling. The general populace always stayed away if they thought the actual sacrifice was in progress. She gave no attention to the novices and initiates who were tidying the space, even when they frantically signalled to her to slow down and show respect.

She kept running to the back of the temple, then, heedless of her iconoclasm, scrambled over the decorative railings into the dark primeval cave whose mouth the temple had been built over. Though she'd only ever been here once, years ago for her coming of age, she charged down the unlit worn steps without hesitation, drawn to a hint of light coming from the deepest chamber.

She burst into the sepulchral cavern, seeing past the clutter of antique bric-a-brac lying around the natural crystal formations to spot her sister, seemingly unconscious, lashed to a sinister black stalactite twice her height, drying blood running down her pinned arms. A single initiate was on his knees before the gory scene, but he jerked to his feet at the sound of Carys arriving.

Clearly taking in the situation with remarkable speed and accuracy, the fearless initiate adopted a fighting stance and came at Carys. They met at a run. Carys dodged his blow then immediately landed a bone-crunching jab to his temple. The man crumpled to the floor before he could utter a sound.

Carys leapt to the sacrificial pole. Her sister's eyelids fluttered open and she whispered, "Carys? You shouldn't be here." At that moment, they both heard distant shouts and the rattling of the ceremonially sealed gates to the cave. More worrying to Carys's ears, though, was the whisper of a rising wind that could only have a supernatural origin.

Thinking quickly, she grabbed a heavy brass candlestick and threaded it through the chains restraining her sister. She twisted forcefully, and the restraints gave, causing Arwen to tumble forward into her arms. She gently laid the older woman down on the gem-encrusted floor before the pillar and attended to her sister's wounds. She realised they were deep, and the amount of blood lost may still be putting her sister's life at risk.

Remembering an emergency incantation that all well educated children learnt, Carys summoned a minor demon with a pop. The frog-like humanoid squinted at her, then at the prostrate form of her sister. "Whilst thou pay the price for this creature's repair?" it asked.

Carys urgently assented. "His Grace, in His Mighty Throne, is not going to like this," the creature muttered, almost to himself as he glanced up that the towering blood-spattered black column. Then Carys felt an agonising pain in her own wrists. She looked down at them and saw long livid bruises form, but then she looked to Arwen's, and saw the ugly injuries there shift, the exposed flesh pulling together into the pink line of a healing wound.

Clenching her jaw against the pain, knowing it was nothing compared to what her sister had endured, Carys choked out the ritual phrase that concluded the ritual and dismissed the demon, then gingerly put her hands behind Arwen's neck and shoulders to lift her up.

Her eyes opened fully now, and Carys thought she could see colour begin to return to her deathly pale cheeks and blue lips. Those lips smiled, and Arwen spoke in a dry whisper, "There will be Hell to pay now!"

Carys could still hear shouts behind her, but she didn't fear for herself now - she feared for the clergy who'd betrayed their promise to their Demon god. The wind was rising to gale force now, moaning through the caverns, rattling the icons and stirring the clinking chains of censers. She heard a crash and imagine the whole temple might be ruined before this angry divine wind blew out. "Oh well," she said to her sister, with a laugh despite the tear in her eye, "We'll just all have to get used to doing a bit more for ourselves."

Playful creativity

There's something about the Artist's Way creativity course that's about being more self-indulgent and playful (or that's how I've interpreted it at least). That's led me to buy some piece of Playmobil - inspired by something I was shown a while ago as an aid to real-world business story telling. So, here's an architect greeting a handyman and his friend, a DJ.

For me, these men could be characters in a book. I could think about their likes and dislikes, their skills and weaknesses, their favorite books and holiday destinations, their secret dreams and fears, their most embarrassing moments and so on. They look happy, but is that just them putting on a brave face for the world? What things would make them sad or angry? Equally, I could paint a pen-portrait of myself by answering those questions. Though I've lived a life's worth of such stuff, there are key headlines I could summarise.

I'm not promising to give the answers to all those (and more textbook character generation prompts) for myself or the Playmobil characters here. But I can see how this could be a creative exercise, and a potentially therapeutic one in a psychoanalytic way. What things might I project onto happy little figures in their toy world that are a bit too scary or ambitious for me in reality?

A sketched Muse

This is a sketch that I've just done of Tilda Swinton, which maybe captures an inspirational androgynous beauty. It's essentially just a copy of a photo that I found on the web, credited to Inez & Vinoodh here, so if it does, it's thanks to their original vision. I've been struck by Tilda Swinton's performances since Orlando, and more recently Snowpiercer demonstrated the presence that she can command, but I especially liked her suitably harsh Gabriel in Constantine. I was very excited to hear she might be the next Doctor Who - let's hope that it is so!

Now, before I was aware that she might be cast as the Doctor, I'd already imagined a character in a science fiction story that looked like her. This character was also a solitary interstellar traveler, who I'd named Mathilde, though she voyaged in a more mundane near-light speed spacecraft. Though she appeared human, she was actually of some alien race that was adapted to life in space, born from a vat (as in Brave New World). I wonder whether Tilda Swinton's has an otherworldly grace that inspired the Doctor Who programmers just as it does me.

Mild Druidry

I was thinking about modern druids, probably inspired by watching Jago Cooper with the Caribbean Taino people, who were recreating their traditional rituals based on patchy evidence and oral history. It seemed a bit sad, in a way - sitting in tatty jungle clearings play-acting at achieving trance states or shuffling about in circle dances. However, there also seemed something profoundly valuable in it - reconnecting personally with a significant cultural essence that has an enduring value, linking individuals to the shared continuum of a deep and unique heritage.

This resonates with my direct experience of current Western interpretations of shamanistic practices too. I attended the Winter Solstice ceremony at Glastonbury, which had a strong cohesive positive energy that I felt comfortable engaging with. In general, I like the way that inspiration is given primacy in modern Druidry. The Awen, as that divine breath of inspiration, seems a powerful idea, which links to the feeling that I often get at Glastonbury. This photo, which I took there on the solstice, reminds me of that (even though it wasn't actually taken at dawn).