My Writing Creed

I listened to a webinar hosted by Jeff Goins a little while ago that was incredibly inspiring to me. There was nothing new that he said that I didn't already know but just the way he said it, how he pieced all of those thoughts that I've had, things that I learned and writing beliefs that I held into this wonderful picture that made me believe that:

I AM A WRITER!!

One of the biggest things I got from his talk was that you write for yourself first, never worry about who will read it or what they'll think of it. If you love writing YA then write YA but if you are only doing it because it's popular right now and it will be your best chance at getting published then for God's sake

STOP FUCKING WRITING RIGHT NOW!!

He had a lot of other great tips as well, one of them was about creating a writing space. In theory this should be easy, find a spot in your house, fill it with inspiring pictures, quotes items as so forth. I would love to do this but unfortunately there is no where in the house that I could call my own. Also in the spirit of Mr. Goins I decided not to make excuses but instead find solutions so I am making a portable office!

I have a mailbag, leather file folder, pens, pencils, notebooks and my archaic netbook (which when at home I will attach to a monitor and keyboard). I am printing out my creed and putting it in a frame along with pictures of my family. I am also going to get a Lego figurine (long story) as my coach. Also in my portable office will be my worn copy of The World According to Garp and a Webster's Dictionary. No matter where I am writing I will set up my office and that will be my space (okay, it may be a little awkward on the bus if I start bussing to work).

Now, about my writing creed. That picture has the authors that have inspired me, 

• Ernest Hemingway - his beautiful way with words that were sparse yet never lacking.
• Hunter S. Thompson - Truly gonzo and never giving a fuck about what people wanted him to write but instead wrote exactly what he felt needed to be written
• Stephen King - The first really adult author I got into and still love to this day
• A. Lee Martinez - He takes characters and settings to places that completely turn the rules of fantasy on its head without breaking them
• Steve Umstead - His style and skills with SciFi are as great as any contemporarily published author yet he is independent. He opened up the world of self-publishing to me.
• Everette Powers - Another independent author who made me believe that I didn't need to be traditionally published to be read and also someone who proves that self published authors are truly as great as their traditionally published peers, if not better.

My other inspiration is The World According to Garp by John Irving. I bought the copy you see in that poster while I was in the Solomon Islands at a used book store. I have probably read it at least ten times and each time I read it I love it more. The character of T.S. Garp resonates with me as a writer and although his backstory is nothing like mine (I grew up with two loving parents and have never been to Vienna) his writing style and voice is very similar to mine or perhaps I have unconsciously emulated him, either way as a writer I relate more to him than any real writer.

My creed:

There Are Over 7 Billion People In This World

One Of Them Is Bound To Like My Shitty Prose

I Will Write For Them

What it means is that somewhere someone is going to like what I write and I only need to write for them as opposed to writing for the masses. It also means that even if I am the only one who likes "My Shitty Prose" then that's fine I will write for myself.

I hope that my favourite readers will take a moment and go to Jeff Goins' blog. If you sign up you get a really great download called The Writer's Manifesto.

I think it would be great if all writer's made their own creed, if you do one please share it, I would love to see it!

Thanks for Reading

I don't write #SciFi… or do I?

For some reason lately I have been thinking a lot about the NaNoWriMo story I wrote in 2011.  When I was done I hated it.  It was supposed to be a sexy, funny space adventure full of quirky characters with a little bit of political and societal commentary.  It was none of the above.  I just seemed to dredge on and on without hitting the marks.  My characters were indeed quirky but never lived up to their potential and even though I created a whole universe and laws and so forth ─The Complete Idiots Guide To The Universe (And Beyond)─ I just couldn't do it.  Maybe it's because I wasn't a fan of SciFi as a kid.  I am now but not with the same love as someone who was a fan all their lives.

Another issue is that writing comedy is hard.  I think I'm a pretty funny guy (feel free to disagree with me) but keeping that up through a whole novel is really hard.  I have read very few books that were truly funny, James Herriot comes to mind as does this gem by Christopher David Petersen called What The Hell's Up With Heaven?

It was so taxing writing this and I was so disappointed with the end result that I took a break from writing for a month (which turned into a whole year).  During this time I lost most of my writing in an unfortunate series of events including a crashed laptop which I used to back everything up (this was ironic as I don't store anything on my writing laptop because I'm always afraid it is going to implode and never does) as well as a flash drive that decided it was going to take all my files and translate them into gibberish.  I wasn't to sad about losing my NaNo story.  Now I am.  Maybe it's that absence makes the heart grow fonder (or is it absinthe makes the smart go wronger anyway…).

What I really should be doing now if focusing on my current WIP and just letting this one ferment but I can't help it so I am going to take a moment here to introduce you to that SciFi story I was working on and maybe later I will come back here and look at this and it will kick-start a new story.

James Styne Goes To Space (working title)

Synopsis:

James Styne is a career soldier in the Earth Navy Mars division and in his vary last year of being eligible to be the commander of his own ship.  His career had been halted by an unfortunate incident with a Generals daughter during his training and has plagued him ever since.  Running out of excuses his superiors finally assign him a ship and crew but do so with the full intention of failing.  The ship is a relic from the Americas and his crew are a bunch of misfits that the Navy has been hiding because they don't know what else to do with them.

The Good Guys

Characters:

Name: James Styne

Rank: Captain - Probationairy

Race: Human

Home Planet: Earth

A womanizing smart ass who questions authority.  He is the greatⁿ grandson of Allan Bartholomew Ian Styne, the greatest mind in history and the man that actually uncovered the truth of the universe.  He wrote The Complete Idiots Guide To The Universe (And Beyond).

Name: Reggie Cross

Rank: 1st Mate

Race: Human

Home Planet: Mars

Best friend of James since military school who rose through the ranks and joined the training program.  He joins James' crew to save James from himself taking a rank reduction in the process.

Name: Crissy Blane

Rank: Civilian - Empath

Race: Unknown Humanoid

Home Planet: Unknown Found on Mars

Crissy Blane is an empath but with severe limitations.  She can read minds but only if she is connected to the person sexually and them to her.  She can see the future however when she has a vision she goes into a convulsive orgasm and is unable to communicate until after the event has happened.

Name: Howard LaMonde

Rank: Private - Mechanic

Race: Formerly Human

Home Planet: Earth

Jake Howard is a ghost that has been attached to the ship, ENM Washington D.C. since he died in an unfortunate accident over a hundred years before.  No one including him knows why he didn't cross over to the beyond.  The army had no protocols for what to do with a trapped spirit and were unable to release him from service involuntarily so they were forced to keep him.  He is more useful than you would think as he can travel throughout circuitry.  He is able to use and move objects even though he is completely transparent.

Name: Gork

Rank: Private - Gunner

Race: Gork

Home Planet: Unknown

Gork is a seven foot tall three hundred and fifty pound hairy beast with short horns and an extremely limited vocabulary (I had actually created a gork/english dictionairy).  No one is quite sure where he came from or even how he ended up in the Navy.  His job as a gunner is to man the turret guns which are housed in a pod designed for a small human but for some reason Gork loves it in there even though he can barely move.  He even sleeps in his turret.

Name: Brian

Rank: 1st Officer - Helmsman

Race: Zygod

Home Planet: Unpronounceable (The actual official name the Milky Way Alliance gives it, only Zygods are able to say the actual name)

The Zygod's planet is just on the outside of the territory of the Milky Way Alliance (MWA) and are enemys.  Brian's father was a prisoner but what they didn't know was that, A) Male Zygods carry the children and B)Brian's father was pregnant.  He is very humanized with an affinity for 20th century Earth culture including 1970s rock and roll and pot.

Name: Sippertawn "Zippy" Ironthorpe

Rank: 1st Officer - Navigator

Race: Ironeze

Home Planet: Carbondale

Zippy's planet was destroyed by an asteroid but some of it's inhabitants were saved by the MWA.  At first the carbon-based refugees, Carbonics were believed to be the true inhabitants and the Ironeze thought to be robots as they were metal and filled with wires and ran on electricity.  The Carbonics were actually built by the Ironeze with artificial intelligence who had seen a chance at their survival by easily convincing their rescuers that they were in fact the true natives of the planet.  Many Ironeze were either not rescued or destroyed before the ruse was uncovered.  Zippy is one of only fifty Ironeze that exist.  His home planet had electricity in the air like Earth has air and must recharge himself regularly to survive.

Name: Theresa Godall

Rank: Private - Communications Officer

Race: Human

Home Planet: Mars

Former lover and current caretaker of Crissy Blane.  She is the only one who can detect with even mild certainty what Crissy's prognostications mean.  She is also a former one-night stand of Reggie's.

The Bad Guys

Name: General Maxwell Gregg

Rank: General, three stars

Race: Human

Home Planet: Earth

James had had a sexual encounter with his daughter resulting in a pregnancy which James never knew about. General Gregg has done everything in his power to try to court marshall or dishonorbly discharge James including plans which had resulted in his own inability to obtain his fourth star and be able to relocate back to his beloved Earth.

Name: Super-General Octavid

Rank: Super-General (Octopus Revolutionairy Army)

Race: Octopus

Home Planet: Earth

Within fifty years of social experiments on the highly intelligent octopuses they have formed a society which unbeknown to humans is attempting to take over the world.  Super-General Octavid is the leader of this movement.  His ability to not give in to his sexual compulsions has granted him a very long life (male octopuses die after ejaculation).  He has been pretending to be an ally to the MWA but only so that he can place spies throughout the organization.  He has had little success until he befriends General Gregg and convinces him to allow an ambassador to join the crew of the Washington D.C.  Octopuses can communicate with each other over infinite distances using telepathy.

The Ship

The ENM Washington D.C. was formerly the USS Washington.  It was in service before the Earth became one central government.  It is outfitted with similarly speced propulsion systems of modern ships however no one with the exception of Howard LaMonde knows how to repair them and as it was made in a secret factory on Mars which was destroyed during the American uprising no parts are available.  All of the systems are in an antiquated measuring system called the US customary units which cause great confusion.

Writing all of this has got me thinking again, dammit!  "FOCUS ON YOUR CURRENT WIP"

Anyway…

I'm sure we all have lost projects that keep popping into our heads, what is yours?

Thanks for Reading