Writing Out Loud

(Note: Yeah, I know. Not very regular at posting. Have been continuing the writing though!)

Now I’ve used many different writing tools over the years. Many. Besides good ol’ pen and paper, the inevitable desktop, and things of the past, my primary tool for a very long time was the Palm and its derivatives. I started with the Palm Pilot Professional, then moved into the Handspring Visor and attachable keyboard (the GoType! was the one I preferred.)

The Visor went to Visor Pro and lived a long time. Despite the fact that I’d drop it on occasion from the docking cradle on the shelf above my desk, to the desk itself. Got banged around. Then one fateful Christmas (shopping) day, it (in its protective case) fell off the cart and onto the floor. The screen refused to respond though I could sync it still. So I started looking for a replacement. A Sony perhaps. Another Handspring maybe. I really wanted one for which I could get the favorite keyboard.

Then I went to the Alphasmart Dana. I loved Dana and her friend Dana Wireless so much. Long battery life (25 hours or so). Almost any Palm app I wanted to use (like Wordsmith and TextTwist). Nigh indestructible, my Dana.

All except for time.

Sure, she still runs great. Does all the old tricks. Replaced the battery once ($10 for the new one). She’s built to last….but unfortunately, not to upgrade with the times. She has stayed the test of time. She works, but she doesn’t adapt. I still use her, but I needed something with a bit more power and upgradability. I needed something to fit the Dana niche that I could put more on. That I could truly use as a mobile computing.

Sadly, there isn’t anything like my Dana out there but my Dana.

So I started looking at laptops. I already knew I was not interested in anything with Vista on it. I wanted as much portability as I could, wanted it to run World of Warcraft (my one big game), and have wifi. I wanted it small enough to tote around.

I could find some things that worked, but in the end, it was about $50 or more for the SAME machine if I wanted xp on it vs Vista. No thanks. I’m not paying a premium for the OS to work.

Then my dear friend Lisa pointed me to the eeepc by Asus. The eeePC is a pretty little thing. They now have bigger ones, but mine is the 701. 7″ screen. Tiny keyboard. 4g of drive space and 512 ram. And it runs Linux.

I did my IT stint in the 90s mostly on Unix varieties. Sun, SGI, the occasional FreeBSD. I supported Linux in concept but as my job moved me away from it and Linux hadn’t yet embraced some of the things I needed (or thought I needed) I never stayed up with it. Today’s Linux is a whole ‘nother beast in many ways.

The eeePC uses a version of Xandros. You don’t notice it much if you use the basic eeePC interface, designed to keep windows users from getting scared. I ran my eeePC in stock simple mode Xandros for several months, then decided to tinker with it.

And broke it. For reasons that have way more to do with me and not to do with the machine or its OS.

Thankfully, I’d backed up my writing data just before going into overdrive tinkering mode. Back up often. More often than you think.

And reinstalling is simply a couple of pushes of a button upon boot, so it all worked out. I had to reinstall (carefully) the things I needed, reset it back to Advanced Desktop, and rejigger fun things like my display fonts. Still, it was a frustration I didn’t want from my machine.

(My desktop is Windows and crashes. Dana very very rarely crashed, and if she did I almost always didn’t lose anything. And if I did, it was because I had to flush out the installed stuff, in which case a sync replaced everything).

Do I love my eeepc? Yes. Very much. It’s wireless works seamlessly, the tiny keyboard is a snap to get used to (even with my big fingers), and I can read the very clear screen easily. So why do I need to learn to love Linux?

Because Linux is a confusing mess when it comes to certain aspects of it. There’s a bazillion different distributions, and what works on one usually doesn’t work on another. Finding software to do what you want is based on whether someone else who can code wanted the same thing. Sometimes I can get new things to install. Sometimes I can’t. Searching for the kind of software I want can be hard if I don’t know the right keywords. Most software I’m familiar with isn’t available on Linux at all–to use it, I need to install Wine (which may or may not work with the software).

Firefox and Openoffice.org work just fine and have proper distributions of their programs. yWriter4, unfortunately, is not for Linux and didn’t work right under the version of Wine I installed. I had to take my entire novel out of yWriter4 because of that and use Openoffice. That made me cry. Even yWriter didn’t do everything exactly the way I wanted, but it was darn close. Yet I can’t have it on my eeePC.

In any event, lots of ranting to no real point. Except, I love my eeePC and you should too. And Linux deserves a little love as well.

Is usually the part I’m not working on at the moment. I admit it. When I’m drafting, I think that the editing is so much easier. When I’m editing, I long for the care-free days of drafting.

It just isn’t fair.

I think though, that it may be more common among writers than people say. Writers always like one better than the other, but I’ve roulette grand jeuganar dinero real portales internetpromociones casino internetcasinos portal webjugar gratis a la ruletajuego instantaneo onlinecasinos virtuales portal webjuego casino paginas webjuego seguro internetjuegos casino internetroulette pagina webjuego onlinejugar seguro webjugar al instante portalesruleta de la suerte jugarjugar gratis pagina internetganar dinero pagina internetcasinos espana portales webtrucos ganar ruletajugar al instante paginas internetlos mejores casinos onlinejuego gratis internetmaquina tragaperras portales internetganancias casinos portalruleta americana portales webjugar interactivo portales internetspiel onlinevideo poker gamemobiles casinokasino comfrench roulettecasino online bonus ohne einzahlungcasino games debwin rouletteglucksspiel gesellschaftcasino online deutschlandslotmaschine online spielenroulette spielanleitungonline slots spieleneigenes online casinoblackjack spielkostenloses kasinoscasino club roulettegratis casino spielenbaccarat systemкомпютриcasino games prokeno strategienonline casino betrugcasino bestkasino spiele online never paid much attention to see what they say at different points in their projects.

In any event, right now I like drafting more.

Editing my novel is proving more complex than I thought. I keep finding subtleties that need tweaking, plotlines that need expanding, and themes that need converging. It’s fun, but it’s *hard*.

But I must be back to it.

First off, I think they all deserve kudos for standing up for what’s due to them. And also, for forcing the networks to hold off on my TV stuff for a while. Therefore, I can get back to reading.

(I do miss my shows, though some still have some episodes to play. But as these pesky writers in Hollywood keep writing some good stuff that I just *have* to watch, well, it’s better that they go work on their spec scripts and wait for real pay for the good work that they do.).

So, anyway, I’ve been reading.

The list of the latest:

• Kitty and the Silver Bullet, by Odyssey’s own Carrie Vaughn: The best so far. The books just get better and better. This is the fourth in the series. The first was fun, the second had some issues, but the third was good and this was great. I liked the development of the characters, the resolution of several plot lines, and the overall direction. I really like Kitty and would want to hang out with her. That’s not always the case with the contemporary fantasy genre. Need I say that I’d never want to be anywhere near Anita Blake, for example?
• Cast in Secret by Michele Sagara: I’d never read her stuff before the first in this series (Cast in Shadow). I have picked up her other stuff but haven’t had a chance to delve into it. As she herself said when I cornered her and gibbered like a fan girl at World Fantasy in Austin, these are quite different from her other stuff. I adore them. A lot. The world-building is fantastic–a society that feels real filled with multiple races, magic, and with real street-level stuff. As in, street crimes and cops. The main character would love to stay at street level, but the world around her isn’t always that simple. Love them. Loved “Secret” so very, very much.
• Touch the Dark by Karen Chase: Hrm. I may have to give this one another run. I like the premise, like the feel, but I couldn’t get into it for some reason. The book starts with the character getting a death threat, but as she’s packing and trying to figure out how to get away, she spends five pages or so telling us why the bad guys want her. I have the feeling it may get better, yet…I just didn’t feel impelled to keep going.
  Ill Wind by Rachel Caine: I enjoyed this quite a bit. I picked it up at random at (I think) World Fantasy this year. As in, I bought it because it seemed interesting, not on a recommendation. I think the world in the book is quite interesting. Mother Nature is a mean lady, and the Wardens are what protect us behind the scenes. I liked the main character and felt for her. I’m most certainly going to seek out the others.
• The Devil’s Right Hand by Lilith Saintcrow: I avoided these because of the author’s name. It just seemed, as a pen name, to be trying too hard. Yet all I’ve heard are good things, so I picked this one up. I started it, and realized it wasn’t the first. I’m intrigued by what I read, but for now it goes back on the shelf while I track down the early ones.
• Blood Price by Tanya Huff: The second in the series that was turned into a Lifetime television series. I love this one. It has werewolves who are very different from any other kind of werewolves I’ve seen in fiction. I like how Vicki’s deteriorating sight is a big issue. And the focus is always on the mystery and how Vicki constantly works to solve it. I’ve got the others. I’ll post as I read them.

And just in case you think I’m all read and no write, I’ve been getting into that groove quite well this year. I’ll report more on that later.

I wrote a little flash story and sent it out and it got published. (In Coyote Wild this past fall). It was a story about a guy trying to cure Alzheimer’s and unable to do so.

Then I see a nice little news article about a treatment that may lead to a cure for that very disease.

Yay for finding a new clue that might help solve the problem. Boo for making my story slightly obsolete.

At least it found a home before then.

How many times have you had an idea for something then had it “taken” by a new novel or movie or TV show? Or worse, a new technology?

Just goes to show that you need to write what inspires you NOW and get it on the market NOW. No guarantee that it will sell before any of these factors beyond your control rear their heads from the sand, but you’ve got a better chance of beating the odds if you get that manuscript out the door.

Lisa L Hilton

A writer friend of mine (and co-founder of the Cat Vacuuming Society) has started her own writing blog.

Sometimes, you need to do a good clean of your workspace to help clear your mind and feel more relaxed. Keep it focused on your workspace, however, and don’t let it interfere too long, but even a 15-20 spurt of cleaning can be refreshing and allow your brain some room for creativity.

This assumes that you are like me, and keep a messy workspace.

Set a timer (I use a mix of fast-paced favorite songs I can sing along to timed for the alloted cleaning). Go to it. Concentrate on whatever is bugging you the most. Don’t spend a lot of time trying to get organized. Just get rid of trash, sort things into piles for more detailed attention later (which of course you will also schedule) and then begin your day.

As writing rituals go, it is a good one to practice.

Ok, I really liked Elantris, by Brandon Sanderson. It has a complex plot, fascinating worldbuilding, interesting characters.

Then I read his next book Mistborn and realized that Elantris isn’t all that in comparison.

Wow. Just wow.

I’d never make a great reviewer because I hate to give stuff away, but let us just say that this novel has it all: a caper, class wars, Evil Overlords, unique magic, crazy religions, things hiding in the mists, creepy mists, love, revenge, redemption, betryal, twists and turns I never guessed at (surprising and inevitable!), and much more.

It’s epic fantasy, technically, but it doesn’t feel like epic fantasy in the best possible ways. I am quite fond of epic fantasy, so this isn’t a slam on the genre, but where Mistborn should feel familiar it doesn’t, because things are turned on their ear. I love the world–it is developed as far as it can be, so that every little detail adds to the immersion in it. This is a world that feels whole.

One aspect of it all (as a writing lesson learned) is that everything in the world stems from some very simple core aspects. There was an event that created the Evil Overlord, and it and he shaped the world that now exists for the characters. So perhaps looking at the world you are creating from the standpoint of the most major influence and then seeing how that in and of itself would trickle down can be more cohesive. I don’t know, because I tend to go at it from character-up rather than world-down. I don’t know how Sanderson did it either, if he came up with Kelsier and Vin and the others and then built the world that had to have existed to create them.

Still, it is always useful to me to have another way of looking at creating a story.

And go read Brandon Sanderson’s books. Now.

The next version of yWriter–YWriter4 is out.

It’s a nice improvement on 3. All the v3 features plus a couple of nifty things. The promised change that allows me to use “#” instead of “* * *” to separate my scenes. A tracker for major items and locations. A better interface for keeping track of scene descriptions, notes, and the like. It now tells you what file name is attached to each scene. This is a boon to us Dana users, so we can quickly and easily find the files to transfer to the Dana for on-the-go work.

For free software, you aren’t going to find a better tool for building a novel (or novella, or longer short story, if you are a little creative with how you define chapters).

Man, it has been a crazy couple of weeks, hence the no posts here. Teaching summer camp ate all my energy. I do love teaching art, though I wish some kids were less….enthusiastic.

I’ve also signed on to teach additional classes via a local craft store. More on that as it progresses.

I’ve had a few computer issues lately. The Kid is buying my desktop, and I’m getting a laptop instead. Problem is, while he has the money for the desktop…I don’t quite have it yet for the laptop. If I didn’t need to play World of Warcraft on it…hehe. In any event, the Kid is often on the computer. Lucky for me, yWriter3 does run completely off the flash drive, so I can borrow one of my husband’s laptops (his job loves him lots) and work there on occasion.

I’ve found that as the novel has progressed and I have much more to keep track of, working on my Dana isn’t cutting it. Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE my Alphasmart Dana in ways that aren’t decent, but I haven’t found the best solution for keeping track of where things are and what’s going on the way I can with yWriter3. Short stories? No problem. Doing single scenes where I know what needs to happen? Fine. Just not the sort of “what part do I want to do next” kind of stage I’m in.

The novel itself isn’t progressing as fast as it needs to be to meet my self-imposed deadline of World Fantasy. I hope to rectify that as school starts and I don’t have to fight with the Kid anymore for computer time, plus the rest of my schedule will fall into place. I’ll be back to teaching after-school programs which are pretty regular for 8 weeks at a time, plus my own self-scheduled classes.

Lots of critiquing

to do, too. I get to read the full draft of the Kateling’s novel and critique it and that’s always cool. I like seeing the books in their huge form like that. $4.50 to bind at Kinko’s for 520 pages, after I double-sided it myself at home.

Any other weirdness going on? Well, our neighbors invited us to a BBQ and painting showing. Huh? My neighbors do painting? They’re nice and wonderful neighbors, but no one ever said we had something like that in common. So we went, and before the smoking drove me away (I’m allergic to the smoke), I got to view Poppy’s work (when you are bad at names, you call someone by what everyone else calls him rather than ask yet again). He waves it away by saying he’s only copying photographs, but he has a great eye for color, and generally chooses the kinds of landscapes I like. Way to go, Poppy!

I hope to also be back to a more regular posting schedule, darn it.