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Mar
9
Classic Characters
Filed Under animation, character development, writing | View Comments
I’ve often read that what makes a classic cartoon character is the character’s ability to fit into any time and space. Bugs Bunny could walk the streets of France, sing an opera, and run away from a (rather inept) hunter. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles can face the Shredder in modern-day New York, New York of the future, and cyberspace. Mickey Mouse can drive a steamboat, enchant brooms, and still find time to court Minnie Mouse.
It works that way in books, too. Look at the Nancy Drew books. Nancy solves cases all over the world, and has for decades. Children’s picture books like the Arthur series feature similar timeless characters who can move naturally between very different situations.
These characters are strong in their own personality. They’re defined more by what they do and how they do it rather than by where they do it, and that gives them a flexibility that allows them to draw viewers or readers in and drag them along on their adventures. That, in turn, gives them a timelessness that allows them to reach out to different generations, making them truly classic.
Mar
6
Create365: What Did You Say?
Filed Under writing | View Comments
I’ve spent part of today wandering back and forth through my house trying to work out why any of the characters in the manuscript I’m currently editing are involved in this story. Somehow, only the antagonist has a goal and an obstacle. Everyone else is just there to be the obstacle. It’s bizarre, even for me.
But I’m stuck on the opening scene, which is now back to being the opening scene because I have a wonderful friend to set me straight about these things. I was reading over both drafts of the scene, trying to decide if there was anything salvageable, and discovered that one character describes something that probably didn’t need to be discussed in such detail, actually revealing the treasure that’s the entire point of the novel in the process.
Her sister immediately responds with: So, the treasure is here? How are we going to find it?
I have no idea what I really wanted the sister to say, but I struck that line right out.
Now, I have what I feel are the best, strongest parts of both drafts pulled into a new file, and I have questions all over the place. Hopefully, once I find these characters’ goals and obstacles, I’ll be able to beat this into a better opening.
Mar
5
Create365: City Planning
Filed Under content development, education, writing | View Comments
I have this dream of someday pulling together my love of certain media and my passion for teaching to create multimedia math and science lessons. Occasionally, I’ll get an idea for a teaching moment and jot it down.
This one features an NPC who is the assistant to the player/learner’s city planner. She’s trying to help the student plan out space allotment through a percent lesson. It’s not good. It really is just a sketch. But it’s something to launch from.
ASSISTANT
25% of the population will want to live in this area of town. Hmm… How can we figure out how many people that is?Well, “percent” means “for every 100″. So 25 out of every 100 people will want to live there, or 25/100 people. 25/100 is the same as .25. So .25 of [town population] wants to live there.
.25 x [town population] means [answer] people will want to live there.
What about this 12% who will want to live in this other area?
The player/learner then has to figure it out and type in an answer, which will trigger an appropriate response from the assistant.
I wrote it in script form because I haven’t decided yet whether I would present this as text or as narration.
Mar
4
Create365: Hold
Filed Under writing | View Comments
At first, I wasn’t sure how I was going to handle today. Editing didn’t produce anything useful. But oneword, who isn’t supposed to be tweeting when words go live any more, tweeted that there was a new word. (Seriously, I’ll never remember otherwise.)
John took the rope from Alex, “What’s this?”
“It’s a rope. Now just keep it steady?”
He nearly threw the rope aside in frustration, “What are you going to do?”
“Climb it, of course. I just need it to not swing me against that rock face while I’m at it.”
Mar
3
Create365: Thanku Haiku
Filed Under writing | View Comments
The Challenge: Write a haiku about the things you are thankful for and put it somewhere to serve as a reminder.
It’s been a while since I wrote a haiku off th top of my head, but I managed to put this together for today.
Books, music, and stars
Friends and fam’ly far and near
Quiet solitude
Ta da!
Mar
2
Create365: Gave Way
Filed Under writing | View Comments
I’m in this phase right now where I’m trying to alternate between organizing projects and actual creative projects. Last month, I worked on organizing a notebook for all of my creative notes and projects. This month, I’m back to editing my old nemesis. It’s a cycle that works for the moment.
Tonight, I was working through the opening scene of the novel. I had the first draft and the second draft both open and was going through finding the stronger parts of both, which will eventually (or Thursday, whichever comes first) be woven together to make a stronger scene. But I found a darling that should have died the first time I read over the first draft…but somehow found its way into the second draft.
The night was starting to give way to the dawn when the forest gave way to a clearing.
It will be struck from the next draft if it dares to show its face!
On the up side, that sentence is a brilliant example of why NaNoWriMo is the best writing exercise in the known universe. It gives you permission to write awful sentences, paragraphs, and drafts. It does make the writing process that much easier.
Mar
2
Train at Your Level
Filed Under lifelong learning, writing | View Comments
I’ve been writing my entire life. There are days when I forget this, but I have been writing since I was very little. And when one has been writing since she was very little (and made a point of paying attention in English class to learn as many of the rules for both content and grammar as she could squish into her little head), one tends to naturally grow her writing skills. In fact, I’ve often been praised for being a pretty decent, readable writer.
But a few years ago, I decided to get “serious” about my writing. I was just starting to teach essay writing and I was editing fiction and fan fiction for others, and I thought that maybe I could use a better grounding in how to write. So I started reading writing books and blogs. I read a lot of writing books and blogs. For a while, it didn’t bother me that they all pretty much said the same things, because I was doing the “proper” thing and rading all of these books and blogs and learning more about writing.
Early last year, I started realizing that not only were all the books sayig the same thing, but I already knew everything they said. I’d learned most of it in middle school English class and then honed it in high school English class. So I started weaning myself away from both. (I think I’m down to a couple of books still on my to-read list and a couple of writing blogs that I happen to find entertaining.)
And then I sat down to revise my second NaNovel, which had been frustrating me for years for various reasons. But I sat down, and I tried to put my finger on what was bothering me, and then I completely rewrote the entire manuscript, outline to draft. I felt like I’d done something better. But I started to revise the new manuscript, and found myself walking off after a couple of paragraphs. I just didn’t want to read it.
I sent the old draft and the new draft to a friend, who identified the problem fairly quickly: The draft written before I started reading books on how to write was more interesting and more engaging than the one written after all of this reading. I was shocked. I’d been learning how to hone my craft, and had written something worse than when I was relying on my school knowledge. (I had noticed a similar problem developing in my blog posts, as well, but I thought I was just being lazy.)
Now, I have to get back my writing skills from a few years ago, the ones I was so complimented on. It’s like starting up ballet after being gone for years. The skills are there, the memory is rusty. Through practice, I’ll get back to where I was.
The lesson here, for me anyway, is not to stop learning. For someone just starting to write, who doesn’t have good memories of strict, exacting English teachers, writing books and blogs are a great place to start. There are some great ones out there for the willing student. The lesson I learned is that you need to train at the level you’re at. For me, I need to identify my weak spots (like that pesky, pesky character development) and then seek out more advanced material to help me correct my problems.
Feb
28
Create365: Idiot
Filed Under writing | View Comments
I’ve long threatened to write something that was nothing but dialgue, and today’s OneWord prompt gave me the perfect excuse.
“Idiot!”
“What? What did I do?”
“Just…give me that. Well, you broke it.”
“How? I just pushed the button!”
“I don’t know how. I just know it was working before you picked it up, and now it’s broken.”
Feb
19
Create365: Globe
Filed Under writing | View Comments
Tonight, I spent an hour reflecting on some editing notes I recently received, and on my own notes, and tried to come up with a plan to fix parts of the manuscript I’m working on. And then I berated myself for not getting anything done this evening. I have no idea what I was thinking. Editing is hard work.
But Alex is on my mind now, and so she helped me respond to OneWord:
Alex spun the globe, watching continents and oceans blur together. When it stopped, she closed her eyes and pointed to a spot.
It had been a favorite game when her father was still alive, his own weird way of telling Alex where he was headed next. She would try to predict it by spinning the globe, and he’d tell her where to go to find where he was really going.
She opened her eyes. “The Pacific Ocean, again?” Every time she’d played the game on her own lately, she found herself pointing at the same area of ocean. “What’s there?”
This has nothing to do with the manuscript…but it could develop into something of its own. Something that relates to another goal of mine.
I love a piece with so much potential!
Feb
16
Create365: Personals
Filed Under writing | View Comments
Prompt: You venture into the world of online dating. Browsing through profiles, you drop your coffee mug and it shatters on the ground – it can’t be.
My friends had been on my case to sign up for one of those dating sites. I couldn’t bring myself to cave in. I do have my standards, after all. But I’ll admit a certain curiosity, so I found a site that looked less smarmy and browsed for a bit. Seas of faces stared out at me, some so revolting I couldn’t fathom reading their profile.
And then I saw it. I was so revolted that I lost my grip on my mug. It can’t be. Warm liquid soaked my socks, but I couldn’t be bothered. Who would do such a thing? My face was staring back at me.
When I could finally move, I started picking up the shards of my favorite mug. My friends are so dead.
Thankfully, this isn’t autobiographical…but it could insert nicely into one of my projects.
