Spinwork Blog

As unheard of of two blogs in a week may be in recent years, yesterdays achievement is owed one.

After a lot of bitching, moaning, throwing things, and all the other crap I usually do that I’ll spare you when I have issues writing, I finally finished the first swath of Cloudnigh, bringing me just short of being ready to post. In retrospect its sort of horrifying that it took me almost THREE MONTHS to write THREE CHAPTERS (me, the dude who write 200 pages in four, once), but in my defense, this whole thing was a huge learning experience involving what it takes to get quality writing out of me, and the role editing plays in my process.

Over the next three-odd weeks, I’ll be editing what I have with Marina and getting the first episodes ready to post. By the looks of things, it turns out I’m actually going to be moving ahead with two-three updates a week, rather than bi-monthly as I was planning. I’ll have a definite one or the other closer to launching time.

Along with Cloudnigh, I’ll be moving house over to leophimstudios.com, and opening Leophim Forums, running on IPB. I don’t know when exactly the move is going to take place, since ‘Nigh is sort of the priority right now. ^^;

Keep an eye on my twitter for updates! Thanks for reading!

Spinner Cloudnigh, Daily Blogging, Site-related 2010, Cloudnigh, Editing, forums, launch, leophim studios, Site-related

School’s back in session again, thus returning me to the eternal struggle of finding the time to sit down and write. A lot’s been going on in both areas–what, with finding an apartment for the summer, finally getting passed some major Cloudnigh blocks that were making me about ready to make me stave in someone’s face, and this cute little idea I’m kicking around that may or may not sprout wings and crash into my window when I least expect it. So in short, all the usual.

I’ve been feeling a sense of impending doom lately about getting Cloudnigh going. The more I write, the more I realize how different the story is from anything I’ve done before. It’s weird to think of my writing and concepts in any sort of style, especially objectively–but if I did, ‘Nigh departs it in ways some of my other “off” stuff (like, for example, Shadower) doesn’t. I’ve come to consider my recent works–Hellion, Avondalius, and this new nameless one–to be more in the “innocently told, maturely realized” vein of things. In simple terms, I’m feeling a LOT of my Miyazaki influence coming out in those pieces. Again, really weird to think about it on those terms. Cloudnigh departs that completely. It feels more hardboiled, more serious, less escapist and more dystopian, real and intense. There’s a lot of irony in it–since I decided to rib every aspect of the music, politics and teen society that I could reach. On the whole, it’s been sort of unsettling to write. I like it

Speaking of changes and differences, expect a site move sometime in the near future before Cloudnigh goes live. Its been one hell of a task over three years to find a site name I actually like–maybe this time this one will settle well enough.

That’s all for now–thank’s for reading!

Spinner Daily Blogging, Site-related 2010, Cloudnigh, Site-related

It’s about 10:30 in the morning and it feels like its about midnight. Chalk it up to my World Issues professor deciding it would be a good idea to watch Wall-E at 8:00 in the morning instead of a final. Not that I’m complaining–Wall-E’s one of my all-time favorite movies, but one I like to watch after a long Saturday, or when I want to wallow in the movie’s unique atmosphere, not just after waking up from an involuntary all-nighter. The upside is I’m currently blessed with that clarity that comes with 2AM writing sessions, where everything makes that sleepy kind of sense and you’re less inhibited to pursue your muse through the pearly avenues of her perpetual acid trip.

I finally finished Atlas Shrugged last night after a near three-month struggle. I say struggle because Atlas isn’t one of those books you read–it’s one you excavate with heavy explosives. Where the effort in reading it was is difficult to say. It’s a long sucker, to be certain (1168 pages), complete with everything I was taught not to do as a writer–from long, expository passages (60 pages, long) to dragging explanations of character’s morals, sexualities, and stoicism against emotional trauma. Still, when it pulled me in, it pulled me in good, and hundreds of pages would fly by in a blink. I wouldn’t quite say its a page-turner, because there are times I had to reread entire passages with a feeling of, “wait, what the fuck did he/she just say?” The reward of being able to fist-pump on my favorite characters in the end was amazing, though (DANNESKJOLD! REARDEN!).

The book is, without question, one of the most intense, overwrought, annoying, hair-tearing, scalp-shredding, bitter-laughter inducing, inspiring, life-changing books I’ve ever read. There’s something masochistic about reestablishing my reading habit with two, 200,000+ word books in quick succession–books that have earned me groans of “you’re reading Ayn Rand? But she’s so conservative/republican/economically fascist/idealist/reactionary, and her prose sucks.” I don’t read books for their agenda. Every writer has an agenda. I have an agenda. I don’t force it down peoples’ throats, and I don’t swallow when writers try to force theirs down mine.

Virtually every criticism I’ve heard about both Atlas and Fountainhead focused on Rand’s views, and I agree. Rand is an idealist, and her opinion is conservative past realism. Her prose is clunky–although, in her defense, English wasn’t her first language–and not something I’d recommend to someone looking to improve their writing. What hooked me was her focus on character and her portrayals of the ideal man (and woman, in the case of Dagny Taggart), which, although hyperbolic and utopian as the rest of Rand’s themes, had enough “real” for me to latch onto, and sufficient “unreal” for me to suspend my disbelief. In a way, I think it was that hyperbole that drew me in. You can learn a lot from exaggeration. After all, it’s more or less the core of comedy. Apparently it works well in fiction, too.

In the end, its difficult to put into words just what the effect was. There were a lot of parts in the book where I’d read a scene or speech and be like, “I FEEL LIKE THAT SOMETIMES,” or “DAMNIT, I’VE HAD PEOPLE PULL THAT ON ME,” or at times, be  awed that such a complex story could be held together with such ostensible simplicity. Maybe the message and the meaning is meant to be mine alone.

That said, I’m continuing my reading extravaganza. I don’t know what I’m going to read next, but I like blogging about it. It gives me something to talk about that isn’t creatively whorish and expository (a use for this blog!). On my list right now are Slaughterhouse-Five, Anna Karenina, Les Miserables, Scarlett Letter and Stranger in a Strange Land. I should also look into finishing Snow Crash, but I haven’t been in the mood for sci-fi lately.

My semester’s over as of yesterday, closed with a read-and-edit of my friend Will’s book, Imperium, which he’s been working on about as long as I’ve been working on Hellion. It’s been really interesting seeing where he’s come from and gone with his stuff, and I’m really starting to see his story and concepts coming together, which is exciting. I’m just hoping he sticks to it. *stern look*

With the semester closed, the time’s come to do more work on Cloudnigh, which continues to stumble and swell in the relative semblance of growth. I haven’t done any actual writing on it in a few days, as the story seems to be demanding some background notes. Its sort of nice that I can finally identify the feeling of “what the fuck am I doing?” as a reminder to check my notes and see what I’m actually trying to say. When I look at the inspiration of my process, its sort of weird to see where I’ve drawn it from: Ayn Rand, Jonathon Stroud, Phillip Pullman, J.K. Rowling, Herman Melville, Fred Gallagher, my dad. I guess I make it work in my own way. Only now am I starting to realize how adaptable you have to be to plan a project. I’ve approached Cloudnigh in such a different way than I approached Lanternfly.

In that vein, I’m still working on Lanternfly–not as actively as I used to, but still. I’ve got a long term plan for that, and for Shadower. The gig right now is trying to execute Cloudnigh as best I can and see what comes of it as an online project. I’m finally at this place of relative confidence (90% acceptance of failure, 5% raw excitement, 5% stubbornness) where I can start to realistically plot out my course for the next year. With luck, that course will be Cloudnigh.

We shall see.

Thanks for reading!

Spinner Books & Reading, Cloudnigh, Daily Blogging, Hellion, Shadower 2009, Atlas Shrugged, ayn rand, Cloudnigh, fountainhead, Hellion, inspirating, Lanternfly, Rants, reading, reading list, Shadower

The other day, I had an in-between day, a rarity when I’m up at college. In order not to be bored out of my skull, I did something I haven’t done in a while: I curled up and read.

Reading regularly is one of the things I lost in high school. Something about reading 50-odd pages of this or that classic a night, followed by 45 minutes crammed with tearing it apart didn’t sit well with me, so I just stopped. Between then and now, I’ve only read a few books, which were usually stuff my dad would give me, or that my friend Marina would recommend. After a while, I began to feel like my writing was starting to suffer, so I knuckled down and began picking things up here and there–first, Cat’s Cradle by Vonnegut, which was fucking hilarious, and then Brave New World by Huxley, which completely changed my perspective on science fiction. Finally, I finally picked up The Fountainhead, which coincidentally, Marina gave me as a birthday present way back in 2007–and read it in about three weeks.

I’m not sure what it was about that book, but it’s since turned me into a voracious reader. At the moment, I’m trying to resist the urge to pick up more than one at a time–which I’ve already failed at by reading Atlas Shrugged and Breakfast of Champions simultaneously. In my defense, Atlas Shrugged is dense and long-winded as fuck, and the sex scenes–of which there have been several–remind me of British tea ceremonies interrupted by violent, individual-crushing, possessive ravaging. From the ceiling in the form of Batman. I’m taking it slowly, in doses, breaking to laughing my ass off at Vonnegut’s drawing of *ahem* beavers in Champions whenever Rand decides to spend 30 pages to detail Dagny Taggart’s quest to find the creator of some random static-powered atmospheric motor.

What? Yeah… pacing fail.

Nonetheless, breaking my reading phobia came at just the right time. This past summer was an absolute slog for writing. It was one of those times where I knew I had to make my process more adaptable, and was fighting tooth and nail to get writing in between that and my job. I think in all my sessions of muse-abuse, I’d completely forgotten the distance you sometimes need to put between yourself and your work, and that time can be just as constructive as the process of creating. That’s what’s always been detrimental to my working–I’m sometimes so fucking desperate to get something down that I’ll go into full tunnel vision and burn myself a new one. Hopefully reading will mean I won’t be so hard on myself, and that I’ll allow myself to do that rather than obliterating my sanity.

Or hang out with friends. I’d forgotten about that.

Thanks for reading!

Spinner Daily Blogging 2009, Atlas Shrugged, Brave New World, Breakfast of Champions, Cat's Cradle, reading, The Fountainhead

Once more, my desire to update this monthly is about as reliable as my hopelessly ditzy, alcoholic muse. Half the bloody time, I want to reach into my screen, take this blog and just throw it somewhere. Off a cliff. Anywhere but its current location. We all know how I feel about blogging. I flip flop on the damn thing as much as I flip flop on ideas. It’s like, “I hate you, but venting!”

The semester has been settled into, more or less. I’m taking four classes and working only  20 hours at Starbucks, which thus far is a wonderful break from last fall where the entirety of October/November was a consistant, sleep-deprived nervous break down. I am still convinced I didn’t have the rings under my eyes before last autumn. Oh, well ^^;

Besides that, the oscillation continues between Lanternfly and Cloudnigh, the culmination of The New Breed/Endoflux Theory/Fairchild, etc. As far as the former’s concerned, I keep returning to this place where my style evolves too quickly for me to pin down a means to write the book in. There are a lot of parts that make me want to kill myself reading them over. The book found its purpose in the writing, but making the book actually… you know, reflect that purpose… is about as easy as getting my muse to cooperate. I’m anticipating a slow process, which is why I’ve been investing the time I have in ‘Nigh lately. Actually, I’ve been investing a little more than time in Cloudnigh, but that’s for another time =)

Short entry… not much to say. Thanks for reading!

Spinner Daily Blogging

The temptation of understanding the creative process for me is similar to the medieval idea of immortality through alchemy. There are times where it drives me absolutely nuts not being able to have full control over things like my style, or how my ideas and the sentences that flow in my head don’t transfer onto paper the way I want. The latter is the worst part, because I tend to have a pretty narrowed down vision for the feel of my stuff. There are areas in Lanternfly where I strive to set a certain atmosphere, and lately I’ve been working on trying to kneed out one. Maybe it’s less like alchemy and more like emotional serendipity–because I can’t find the emotion I want–the one I started writing the book with.

Point is, a lot of my stuff has felt really forced lately. This happens to me every so often. The trick is usually settling into some kind of groove of understanding what I’m writing and where it’s going. After exploring some of my IS2009 material, I’m realizing that the writing is about 45% of how I want it. Usually my margin for salvaging when editing is 30%, so I can keep most of the crap in there. Maybe that’s what’s holding me back. All I know is that I’m approaching my writing with too many “shoulds,” and it’s starting to hold me back.

In other news, I finally did what I’ve been hemming and hawing at all summer–sitting down and doing a scene plan of what I have and what I need. What’s liberating about that is I now have a map of the book I can look at and mess around with, add to if I need, take away if I don’t. Maybe this will be a savior in getting the book to finally flow the way I want–so I’ll have all the plot material squared away so I can just write with it consideration without going, “this is poorly paced” or “this wasn’t something I wanted to write.” Yeah, shit.

Just a bitching rant right now, I guess. I’m actually reading Fountainhead by Ayn Rand at the moment. Marina gave me the book a few years ago, and I’m just getting around to reading it. I’m almost done, but the book was a challenge. The damn thing is about a third longer than anything else I’ve read, and pretty dense. But the way the plot flows and how naturally inspired me. I can see how a lot of people would sneer at some elements, and some that I can’t. I’ll finish it and see what I think. Then I’ve got Atlas Shrugged to read sometime after. Woo…

Thanks for reading.

Spinner Daily Blogging ayn rand, fountainhead, ranting, scene plans

I’ve been sort of sparse with the updating lately. At the moment, I’ve been pretty busy with latte-making and the like to do any significant work on Lanternfly. My main focus right now is getting concepts and behind the scenes stuff to a point where I feel comfortable mapping out the scenes I’ve got, figuring out what I need, and then implementing it all. On top of actually getting the manuscript the way I want it, I certaintly still miles away from actually finishing this beast.

The phase I’m entering with the book is completely unexplored territory as far as my developmental processes go. Already I can see places where I can speed up parts of my drafting to allay the amount of editing I know I’m going to have to do on this book in future projects. One of these things is chapter structure, which I’m ditching from the book entirely for the moment so I won’t feel bound by chapter lengths. That was a huge problem when I was working on the first draft and probably a reason why the book is so damn long. Given I have to add another plot line and a half (30,000 words, ballpark), that will come in handy when the time comes to start chopping away excess flesh.

In other news, I’m leaving next Tuesday for California, where I generally do my year’s best writing. In 2006, I wrote a major chunk of Salamander, and completed some of the main concepts of Lanternfly in 2007, and wrote some key scenes in 2008. It’s sort of rediculous that this is the third summer in a row I’ll be working on this book, and how much it’s grown since then.

As always, onwards! Thanks for reading.

Spinner Daily Blogging

In my last entry, I mentioned I was having trouble getting started on the second draft of Lanternfly. That hasn’t changed all that much in actual work I’ve done. Seems like every time I take more than a month off a project, I have to go through this period of reorientation where I need to remember just what it is the fuck I was doing with the book and all that. I’m still plodding through scratch outlines and bitties, trying to find a place to cut some things, and other places to expand.

On the whole, I think my focus has been trying to find a systematic, yet flexible way to work. One of my biggest problems is the tendency to get extremely frustrated and berate myself–which there has been an unhealthy abundance of lately. I don’t know, maybe I feel like I should be better at this after having done it nearly four times. Yeah, no.

So, to counter this, I’ve looked into some methods that will hopefully make my process a little easier, and also help improve the content and quality of my writing. The first thing I’ve done is trying to set aside time to write every day, in spite of my job. Another big problem I’ve run into is that I’m apparently a pretty good closer, meaning that’s what I get scheduled for the majority of the time. Given our store closes at 10:30 (mind you, the last freaking place on Church Street that doesn’t serve alcohol), and most of my shifts being 7-8 hours, I’m usually left with the late hours, which is usually when the most dicking off happens. So, I’ve started doing what is probably the most unthinkable I’ve ever undertaken in my life: I’ve started going to bed early and waking up at eight in the morning.

Those who know me personally know that I am by no means a morning person, and I’m almost infamous for being the only screen name on after 3AM on some nights. The downside of going to bed at dawn and waking up at 1, 2, 3PM is that absolutely no writing gets done, and that usually grinds at me after a while. So far I’ve had a little bit of trouble with it–my first morning, I missed the shot by about two hours. This morning it took me a half hour. We’re getting there, but slowly. Then there’s the problem of the sun in Starbucks acting like a laser and melting anything that sits in my seat before 11:30A. I’ll work on it.

The other new thing I’ve been doing is looking into research for Lanternfly. Now, I’m not a particularly good researcher. To be brutally honest, when it comes to writing, it’s the last thing I want to do. At the same time, I know its something my work really NEEDS to be what I want it to be. So, this morning, I sat down and made a laundry list of crap I need to look up to build on reality. I wound up with about a page of stuff–everything from flower arrangements to Apartheid, mopeds, Native American tribes and the British school system. In a way, I’m really happy I did it, and I even started looking up books on a few subjects. Maybe when I get adjusted to this new schedule, I’ll hop off to the library and see what I can find there.

I’m pretty sure there are going to be days where I’m absolutely going to hate this, but this is after all what I want to do for a living and my process is almost as important as the writing. Just gotta stick to it.

Thanks for reading!

P.S. The series title has been changed from Hellion to Evercoil. I’m not sure if this will be a permanent change, but it seems the best at the moment ^^;

Spinner Daily Blogging, Hellion draft 2, Evercoil, Lanternfly, laundry list, new methods, organization

I tend to learn something new about my process every day, even when I don’t write. Weirdly enough, I’m starting to think the times I’m writing and the times I’m not are equally important. At the moment, I’ve been wrestling with that feeling of utter stupidity I have from looking at the first draft of Lanternfly and going, “what next?”

Truth be told, I have a crystal-clear image of what I need to do, how I want to go about doing it–but I can’t. I don’t know if its that I took so much out of myself just getting the manuscript done, or that I’ll dig in and discover I actually hate what I’ve been working on for what’s going on (technically) five years. Whatever it is, I’m in this limbo of, “oh, come the fuck on, Ben,” and “eh… it’ll pass.” Maybe this whole process is like a diet, where you’ll always start it “tomorrow.”

Well, I’m technically on a diet right now, and that’s going terribly (in fact, the only thing I’ve managed to hold together is biking to and from work every day). I’m also stuck working full time at work this week, which also marks my one year anniversary at this job. All my shifts are closes, which means I literally have no time to anything other than wake up, go to work, make however-many hundreds of lattes, go home, and dick around until I have to do it all over again.

Of course, I COULD not dick off and actually plug in my flash drive and open up the manuscript, or at least crack my journal and get some concepts done. I COULD write down those ideas I’ve been batting around in my head for the last three days about book two and where that might be going. Or I could continue to sit here and get down on myself about *FINALLY* finishing a book after two years of being a recluse until I could actually get a workable idea rolling.

What I think I’m learning is that this part–just like starting the actual book, is probably a lot harder than it is. I’m gonna hem, I’m gonna haw, but at some point I’m just gonna quit my whining, knuckle down and do it. It’s not like I’m completely void of time. Seriously, I could have turned out some serious material in the time I just wasted on LOST (even though the words “wasted” and “LOST” can’t be used in the same sentence).

So, that said, sleep, and tomorrow–writing. If not, I give my ghost-readers every license to kill me.

Thanks for reading.

Spinner Daily Blogging, Hellion 2009, Hellion Book 2, Lanternfly, LOST, procrastination, work

May’s usually a transitional month for me. Aside from the obvious seasonal changes, its usually when I leave wherever I’ve been living over the course of the school year for New York, or a new place. This summer, like last, I’ve opted to stay in Vermont, so I’ve been spending the last three days or so packing up my old place and moving into my new one.

The housing situation at my school is sort of weird. We’ve got the usual dorms, and even the more higher-end on campus “suites.” Then we have Spinner Place (which nearly made me fall over when I heard the name, since that’s been my online handle since I was 11), which is two miles from campus and on the other side of a river. These are fairly high end, with a kitchenette, and four private rooms.  Crossed with the low rent and the fact that Burlington is an extremely beautiful place in the summer–it’s pretty much win-win.

The other day, I moved into the third room I’ve lived at in Spinner, this time with my good friend Will Ryan, a fellow writer (he writes cyberpunk–and the only way to describe it is to beat yourself into a coma with binary code). When we’re rounded out in the fall with my two other good friends, we’re gonna have quite the living arrangement. There’s something to be said about four nerdtastic, creative, metal-listening, game-consol playing psychopaths in the same room. Let the madness ensue.

Broke out my bike today for the first time in about ten months. I’m really intent on getting into shape this summer, and I think the only way I’ll do that is by biking as much as I can. Its a two mile trek from Spinner to my Starbucks, so I can easily see myself managing that on every non-rainy day I can.

I’m really hoping I can get back into Lanternfly soon. Some of the edits and stuff has me pretty psyched ^_^

Thanks for reading!

Spinner Daily Blogging, Hellion 2009, Burlington, Personal, summer