A.J. Maguire

Tag: Writers

  • The Editing Domain

    The single greatest lesson I’ve learned as a writer is how to eat humble pie.  Editing, even self-editing, forces me to look at my own silly nonsense and try to make it something readable.  I mean, there are honest mistakes like the one I ran across this morning …

    “Staring at hew as though …”

    Which should have read like this — “Staring at him as though …”

    (By the way, thank you Word Program for assuming I meant “hew” there.  Go team failure!)

    Typo’s happen.  I know that.  I write everything by hand first so when I’m actually typing things I’m not really looking at the screen.  So I can forgive myself — and often laugh — at such mistakes.

    But there are other mistakes that make me blush.  Mistakes dealing with a very broken mythology that require an Alpha/Beta Reader to come along and tell me the harsh truth in the nicest way they know how.  And really, my Alpha’s and Beta’s are awesome.  They know me well enough to know how to crush my soul without making me cry.

    Or … well … I cry on the inside.  But normally it’s a frustrated — “Why would I write that in there?” cry and not a “They all hate me and I want to go eat worms” cry.

    The editing domain for me comes in two parts.  The first part is the most extensive and it requires absolute focus.  I sometimes loathe myself for the fact that I have to print out the pages so that I can mark on them, but I try to make up for that by recycling.  (What can I say?  I have a Go-Green spirit and a ruthless work ethic warring each other.)

    Anyway, during that first editing pass I can’t split my attention between projects.  Which is frustrating because I like to have multiple projects going on at the same time.  But when I hit the second editing pass things go really quickly.  Generally, all the work is already done and all I have to do is transcribe it onto the computer.

    Which, in turn, frees up my brain power.  And since I’m on the second pass of Dead Magic right now I was able to finish the rough draft for Tapped this week.   I have to admit that I surprised myself with Tapped.  I wasn’t expecting to have it done until the middle of the summer.

    But hey!  It’s done!  That leaves me with Usurper to finish before the end of the year and a couple of mountains to climb.  I’m starting to think I didn’t challenge myself enough with my New Year’s Goals or something.

    All I can say is … I own 2013.

  • Deadlines

    If you’ve been following my Blog then you know I have a deadline of March 1st for my book Dead Magic to be edited and in the (virtual) hands of my publisher.  Dead Magic is the sequel to Witch-Born and, I think, the last book in the world of Magnellum.

    Probably.  More than likely it’s the last one.  We’ll see.  I said Sedition would be a stand-alone and I’m working on its third book now.

    In any case, I am right on target for my March 1st deadline.  So don’t worry!  (Trust me, if I were worried about it I wouldn’t be pausing to write a blog, I don’t care what the Marketing people have to say.)  But the whole deadline thing got me to thinking about how deadlines have really altered my writing habits.

    Honestly, if you’re one of those writers who just writes whenever and shrugs about when they might get their manuscripts finished, then you need to start making some deadlines.  I used to be that way, too.  Until I learned that a deadline — even a self-imposed deadline — means that I really do get more done.

    Some people might groan and say that stress can stifle their creativity, but it really does work.  Sometimes we need to stress ourselves out.

    It’s almost as good as the best advice I ever read about writing.  I can’t remember who wrote the book, but the advice was to write yourself into a corner.  By that I mean, write your characters into an impossible situation.  People don’t care about run-of-the-mill situations after all, they want to see what these characters will do when they are faced with impossible situations, terrible choices, and the like.

    Best.  Advice.  Ever.

    But next up is writing with deadlines.  Contracts are fun and they make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside when you can say; “Oh, this one is on contract so I have to get it done.”  However, even inside a contract you have to make deadlines.

    Rough draft done by December.  Edits done by March 1st.

    Those are really vague deadlines, but they work.

    So!  I highly recommend deadlines.

    And, of course, writing yourself into a corner.

  • “Swan Song”

    As with all the shows I watch, I had to pick out my favorite episode of Supernatural.  For Doctor Who it was Midnight.  For Quantum Leap it was the last episode — though I haven’t watched that show in ages so I might change my mind after a re-watch.  And for Supernatural it has to be “Swan Song.”

    I’m not going to give any spoilers — I hate spoilers — but I might hint at some things.  If you catch on because of my hinting I sincerely apologize and give you permission to revoke all my Netflix rights for a month.

    Now then, let me tell you why I loved “Swan Song” the best.  If you’ve already seen the show then you know all about the whole Apocalypse problem Sam and Dean (our two intrepid heroes) were struggling with.  The writers of the show managed to take a global threat — the end of the world — and turn it into the most intimate of problems by pitting Sam and Dean against each other.  (Kind of.  Watch the show and you’ll understand.)

    But the reason I love that episode the most is because of one line delivered by Dean.  One simple, heartbreaking line:

    “It’s OK, Sammy.  I’m here.”

    No, Sam’s not dying at that moment.  You’d expect that line to be delivered by someone holding their brother’s guts in with a towel or something, but that’s not what happened.  Not remotely.  In fact — mild spoiler alert — the line is delivered while Dean is getting the snot beat out of him.

    It was beautiful.  Everyone told me I’d start to cringe at the show when Angels showed up, but they were wrong.  The path the writers put these two characters on sort of required the other end of the spectrum to come into play (i.e. Angels and the God question) so it made perfect sense.

    (By the way, we can thank that nasty flu bug for me getting through all 7 seasons of Supernatural in the past three weeks.  I couldn’t concentrate to get any writing done and I barely managed to keep up on my homework, so that left a lot of hours to kill whilst bedridden.  I’m better now, so don’t worry.  Edits on Dead Magic are progressing at a steady rate.)

    So!  Swan Song is my favorite Supernatural episode ever.  It’s not one you can watch without seeing the road leading up to it, though.  If you’ve never seen the show, you should.  Start at the beginning and plow right through.  (It’ll help if you’re sick or something and can’t do much else.)  I promise, it’s worth it just to get to that moment with Sam and Dean.

  • Happy Thanksgiving!

    Well, as I tend to do a lot of top 10 lists, I think I should do the top 5 things I am thankful for this year.  I am an optimist, so I tend to be happy about … well … nearly anything.  If I got a flat tire I’d probably be less inclined to be happy, but I’d think something along the lines of; “Well, at least I have my cell phone to call for help.”

    But I still think it’s important to focus on the things that have really made your life a good one.  It’s just plain unhealthy to dwell on bad things and melancholy.

    So!  My top 5!

    1) Always and forever — I am thankful for my son.

    2) I am thankful for the rest of my family — including the one’s who are currently in the military and in dangerous areas.  I’m grateful that we haven’t had any distressing news from them.

    3) My chance to attend school.  This has been a major growing experience for me — even if it is a headache a lot of times with tons of homework to do.

    4) My cat.  I do love my cat.  He kills spiders for me.

    5) My writing.  I love the fact that I am a writer.  It means I’m a little weird and I see things differently than a lot of people, but the actual process of writing gives me too much joy for me to ever give it up.

    I hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving!  If you’re doing NaNoWriMo then hurry up and eat your turkey so you can get back to work!

  • “I hate Mars”

    As you know, I’ve been hard at work smacking Deviation into shape.  It’s my first science fiction attempt and, quite frankly, scares the spit out of me.  I am not a scientist, though I do find science interesting.  I’ll be sending Deviation to an editor on the 15th of February and sincerely hope she can point out where her suspension of disbelief was stretched a little too far.

    Also, on March 1st, I will be sending out a submission package to TOR.  It should take them 4 to 6 months to get back to me with the rejection letter and in the interim I will be working with this editor to tighten the writing and story line.  In the slim chance that TOR sends a positive note asking for the full manuscript, it will be ready for them.

    But what about my other works in progress?  I know I can’t leave you all with the way Saboteur ended.  (No, I’m not going to spoil it.  Those who’ve already read it are aware that there is a third book in the works.)  Rest assured, I am creeping my way through Usurper.  It’s slow going because all of the plot lines have to come together.  And it’s frigging huge.  But it is still coming along … albeit only 500 words or so at a time.

    Dead Magic, the sequel to Witch-Born has hit that critical turning point in the story line.  I have the last ten chapters mapped out and am getting approximately 3,000 words done a week on it.  I’d be doing more, but you know I’m in school, too.

    So!  Why have I titled this post as “I hate Mars”?

    I’m so glad you asked!

    While I was doing the dishes yesterday, I caught a “soundbyte” from the Deviation edit.  (Meaning I was imagining a certain scene and a snarky bit of dialog caught my attention.)  Because it amused me, I’m going to put it down here as a snippet —

    “I hate Mars.” Newbill said, his hands busily smacking another magazine into his weapon. 

    “Mars hates you back.” Chamberlain had to shout over the report of weapon fire. 

    “Something always tries to eat us!” Reloaded, Newbill took aim and fired. 

  • Holy Goodreads, Batman!

    So I’ve been following Emlyn Chand of Novel Publicity on Google+ for a while, and she started this thing that I’m just going to call the “Goodreads Karma of Awesomeness” where you basically get to meet all the other authors around and everyone just gets one big introduction circle of warm fuzzies and goodness … And I got to do it today.  It was awesome.  I got to troll a whole bunch of author’s goodreads sites and see what they’ve written versus what they’re reading and … yeah …

    I made a whole slew of new “friends” over there, too.  It was green.  Super-green!  (And now I must go watch The Fifth Element again.)

  • Ode to my Kindle

    I finished a book this weekend and was surprised to discover that I could rate it right from my Kindle. Super-fantabulous! I went in and gave it a review on Goodreads, too, but I had to use my computer for that one. I just thought it was great that I could rate the book right then and there. (Especially since my son was busy playing on Disney Junior — I swear, poor Eeyore will never get that tail back on if my son is in charge.)

    Also, I finished the synopsis and cover letter for my Deviation submission. The package has been sent out to a select few trusted individuals who might be able to give me some pointers to fix before my deadline of March 1st.

    I hope everyone has a fantastic Monday!