A little news, and other things

So, the most interesting news is that Rock and Roll Over is available for pre-order on Barnes and Noble.com, and on Amazon. My story, Always Crashing In the Same Car is included in it. That story is also the first chapter of that novel, so I have sort of mixed feelings about it. But this is the first thing that I have been in that I've actually been able to order for the store, so while the cover is a little, um, well.. you'll see, I still feel sort of like a real writer.
I also just sold a story to an anthology called "Fem-fangs." Yep, it's about girl vampires. It's a story that I wrote way back at Clarion, called "Getting Fixed" and I'm happy to see it out. I remember I wrote it as an example of the reverse hero's journey, and it got fairly well bashed because vampires are so over done. It was at that moment that I realized that originality was not really high on my list of things to aspire to. Have a good story, make the characters real, and I don't care what kind of tropes you use to tell it. There are, of course, really good examples of that philosophy gone horribly wrong--Twilight comes to my mind, and probably to everybody's mind for that matter. She got the concept of using a tried and true cliche to tell her story, but she forgot to make the characters real, or even a bit likable. I wonder if she even likes the characters.
In a short story it's harder to give characters lives. you don't have the time. The thing to do is give the impression of movement. The character is going somewhere as the story starts, will be going somewhere after it ends. Charles DeLint does this by telling serial short stories. Read even one in the Newford series and you get a sense of the place and the people.
Anyway, I don't mean to knock Twilight. I'm guessing that there's other reasons why those books have become popular. I'm just glad that, in my case, somebody got the joke, and that story was finally taken.

Speak My Name... Just a taste.

The night started out quiet at Darks. I held up my side of the bar, between filling drink orders, and Ithuriel held up his on his stool. To the Mortals present, we looked just like they did. I, lean, light haired, grey eyed, dressed in an ancient Adam Ant tour tee shirt. Ithuriel, my opposite, with long dark hair braided prudishly down his back, dressed in jeans and a button down shirt.

Two guys chatting the evening away. Not what we were at all. Not ever.

There you go. That's the first two paragraphs of the book. I think, at the end of it, the title is going to be Speak My Name.

Pride

I've been turning this over in my brain for a while, so I'm not sure how coherent it will sound outside the skull. But here it is.

Last week one of my younger co-workers posted that as he was leaving the bookstore, he saw two boys--even younger than he--holding hands, happy to be together, you know, just like teenagers in love. He also noticed the people around them frowning, and generally looking uncomfortable with them. He said that he gave them a big smile because he was so proud of them for being braver than he was when he was their age. I thought, as I read his story, "That's just how I felt when I met him. Proud that he was so much braver than I was when I was young."

I was never brave when I was his age. I never said it out loud. Not to anyone. Not in my life, anyway.

The first place I learned to be honest was on the page, and then it took a long time. I was in my early twenties I started writing a book about a rock band. Back then, the main character, Asia couldn't admit, even to himself how much he loved the lead singer in the band. I couldn't admit it either. Not even to myself.

For me and Asia it was twenty-seven years before we were that easy with ourselves. That's longer than any of the boys in this story have been alive. I suppose that's progress.Things have changed, and my young co-worker has shown me that. He is exactly what he is with every single person he comes in contact with every day. And it makes me so proud of him, everyday, and envious of his courage.

Demons and Angels

I've been wandering again. There's something about being so close to the end, and yet not so close to the end that makes my focus falter. If it ever was that great to begin with. I've been scraping along in my not-writing life, just barely paying the bills--or not paying them, trying to deal with family, trying to make people buy my sewing... It's endless distractions. And I've heard three different people in the last week say that it's easy to avoid writing, because there are so many other things they'd rather be doing. Three. There's something fairytale-ish about that, isn't there? Like a warning. Like all I'd have to do to finish the book is bake three loaves a bread (one with a stone, one with seven kernels of corn, one with mouse fur, but that's another story). Or maybe I should go away for the weekend to a cottage on chicken legs, or....

It's so easy not to write. Because, as Natalie Goldberg says in The Thunder and the Lightning, writing is hard. Sewing is easy, it's finishable. Dishes are easy, they're finishable. Writing is... It's never ending. One story bleeds over into another, and they're all connected in the brain, right? In my brain, Ziggy lives in the same world as Mica and Frank, and the same world where my werewolf pack runs the North End of Flint.

Writing is hard. There's other stuff to do. Each time I hear that, I think, "That's not me." I would rather write than anything else. Anything else. So, why not this? Why write about writing the end, instead of actually doing it? I don't know. I'm stuck at the gates of Heaven. Not metaphorically, either. I'm right there. I didn't expect to be there, and I don't know what's going to happen if we go in....

If we do, will I be done? There's only one way to find out, I suppose.

Re writing

I know what they say. You should never rewrite anything until you're done with it. I know they have a point. I just wish I knew who they were... But anyway.

I think it's absolutly true that you should not rewrite until you're at the end of the novel. Sure, it makes sense. Except... except that I am rewriting now. Not after I'm done, but right now. I'm changing the story. Yes, I am.

I know. I'm not supposed to do that. But here's my thing: How do I go on and finish until I know were to go? I mean, I'm changing things now, so I really do have to wait to go on until I see how it comes out, right? It's not the speediest way to write, I know, but right now, 40ish pages from the end, one of the characters is trying to show me something. I have to listen, right?

Of course I do. That's why I get on this bus to begin with. I want to listen to what the characters have to say. Isn't that the point? I mean, I'm pretty sure that's what I read for too. Character. I'm not so invested in the plot, or the setting of a thing. It's the people that live there.

So, in Fall, one of the characters has just walked up to tell me that Lucifer has split personality issues. I have to listen to that, right? It's really what I live for in writing. I want to get to the end, sure, but I really really want to let the characters get to the end.....

Yay!

Luckily, the waiting is over. The first chapter of Ziggy is sold as a short story. I made the changes I offered, and that was it. More details when I get them....

good news and bad news

Well, it's been pretty okay for the week. It's Tuesday and I sold chapter one of Ziggy to an anthology. True, it's only for 25 bucks and a free book. But that's okay. I assume somebody will read it.

Now the bad. The editor emailed me within about a half hour of my accepting and asked me if this was about the "real" Ziggy Stardust. If so, they can't print it because they would be sued. I'm not sure that's true, but I didn't argue. I simply explained, that, no, it's not about Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars from the album. Here are the differences. You know, my Ziggy's from 83, not 73, he's from Ann Arbor, not London.... He's not spreading the false message of peace from space aliens and the audience doesn't kill him. And certainly not all in the first chapter of the book. Then I changed the name of the band from "The Spiders" to Black Light. Lame, I know. Sorry. Then I took out Ziggy's last name, and changed Gillli's to Ronnie. Yep. Blick. But I'm desperate not to be unpublished. What should I do about the book? Is this the way it's going to go now? I'm really happy that somebody wanted the story. In less than 24 hours, no less. Very nice. But now I don't want it to fall apart because of missconceptions..... The truth is I wrote the book because I missed the '80's. Still do. I wrote the book because I spent so much time lying on my bed staring at the liner notes on albums sleeves, memorizing, and letting the lyrics make up stories in my head. I wrote the book because of Asia, and because I know there are other people out there like him, and I want them to read it. It's the kind of book I really wanted when I was a kid. That's all.