Lessons Learned

Last week, writer Julie Klumb, tagged me in her Lessons Learned post. Today, I was going to attempt a humorous spot at summarizing this week's failed attempts at writing, but since she was gracious enough to mention me, I'm going to answer the mail. So, this year I learned:

1. Writing is hard. Anyone can write. The physical act of putting pen to paper or keyboard to screen is easy. For the latter, at least for most, although I have some friends that might be more efficient with cave drawings, but that's another discussion. Point here, is that there's a myriad of factors that go into telling a successful story, not the least of which is coming up with words compelling enough to keep the reader turning the pages for the next twelve hours of their life. As with any profession, there are rules, gimmicks, tricks, tactics, and techniques. The writer has to know which is the right tool to use and when.

2. Life happens. At this point in my journey, I feel like I'm on the right direction. The goals I laid out for the year and ticking off nicely, and the rewrite of my manuscript is slowly progressing. That said, it's not progressing fast enough. My wife got a job, the kids go to school, and my job takes up about 20 more hours a week than I originally planned. The Army puts food on the table, the kids need help with homework, and I have to put more effort into taking care of the house. After all that's done, the writing gets squeezed out. For now I have to be happy with a couple hours of quality writing time a week. For now it's just the way things are.

3. Writing is a learning profession. I mentioned tools earlier. For years I was taught that passive voice was bad, evil, burn, burn. Now, I've learned that the right placement of passive voice in the right situation make the difference between 'I took the one less travelled by' and 'I chose the less travelled road.' Point is, you have to research the craft. It's that simple. Great writers are experts on grammar. I want to be a great writer, ergo I have a lot to learn.

4. Find and befriend other writers. This goes back to number three. And don't be above or below anyone. Help other writers when they ask, and don't be afraid to ask for help yourself. Usually, you don't know what you don't know until someone points it out.

5. Keep a sense of humor. Rejections hurt, critiques can be painful. You won't make the progress you wanted. You'll have doubt. It's a profession where success is often not attained for years. At some point you'll have to reevaluate to determine if it's worth continuing. Because of that you have to laugh. One way or the other, the ride is going to eventually end. You have to keep your spirits up.

That's it. I tried to stay general as much as possible. In the great Army tradition of Blue-Falconing' our buddies, I'm going to reach out and tag fellow OWG member Danielle LaPaglia.

You're it. No pressure.

The Weight of What's Right

I thought I was a smart guy. I had a great verbal. In college, I breezed through creative writing and literature courses. Over the years I continued to write, in professional and academic arenas, and was successful in both. Then I started my quest to publish a novel, and experienced writers and even some professionals have pointed out I had more good fortune in my first year than should be allowed an aspiring author.

So why does it feel as though I've learned nothing.

Case in point, I entered a YA contest over at Kidlit. The premise was simple, agent Mary Kole sifted through a few hundred openings, and picked her favorites. Mine was nowhere near the top five, and after reading through her winners, probably nowhere near the top fifty. The winner's opening, especially the top three, had voice that took on a life of its own. Compared to theirs, mine is weak, lifeless, and way too drawn out.

Fortunately, I've scheduled a rewrite.

One of my writing partners (here) unintentionally helped me realize I had a lot to learn about writing. It started with a lecture over passive verbs; she looked at my critique of another member and politely pointed out what I thought was passive tense, was actually past perfect. Like any good professional, I immediately went to school. As coincidence would have it, one of my favorite writer's blogs, Cec Murphy's Writer to Writer, recently addressed appropriate uses of passive voice.

Having spent an adult lifetime trying to crush the evils of passive voice, now I'm thinking I should reconsider. However, the hard part is when to pick and choose those special moments to actually use a specific style technique to achieve a desired effect. In reading Cec's opines of proper passive voice, I picked up his thoughts regarding use of progressive tense. What the heck is that? Now, I know.

Up to now I've simply been putting words on paper without giving much thought to using the actual structure of the sentence as a literary weapon. The second and third order effects have me reconsidering my use of an outline as more than just a story-planning device. As an old boss told me, words matter because they have meaning. How they are used is probably a close second.

Several months ago, my father, an avid reader, quoted me some unknown dead writer who was asked by an interviewer when he learned to write. The writer replied something to the tune of, 'It took a quarter million words for me to start learning.' I'm horribly paraphrasing, and Lord knows, I wasn't listening all that well (sorry, Dad), but only now I can begin to understand the point of his discussion.

Knowledge is heavy, and the more of it I pick up, the more there's an obligation to use it. You can put as much, or as little, as you want into your projects. You can throw a hundred thousand words into a program and call it a manuscript. You can even call your friends and tell them you wrote a book. The way I see it, cranking out the first 'book' was easy, and to date, I haven't really written anything.

But I'm working on it.