crash & burn

[lagilman]

As suspected in my last post, the good mood didn't last. I have, in parlance, crashed and burned. And not even cookies and cream chocolates are making a dent... okay, they're making a small dent in the mood.

I may be the only person in the world who hates Fridays. Don't ask.

But I did manage to get another chunk of the YA project done last night, ending when I realized I'd swerved off-plot and would have to decide if I wanted to retrace or plow forward on this new direction. Also realized it was after midnight, so I went to bed instead.


My life is so unbelievably boring. I should make something up to entertain y'all.

Comments

[msagara.livejournal.com]

You're not the only person in the world who hates Fridays, although my particular case might have something to do with the current employment situation at home :/.

Was the big swerve in plot one of those with killer momentum, or can you back it up? (I usually can't, but everyone's process differs, so I'm curious.)

Either way, from the outside, your life doesn't look all that boring; or if this is your idea of boring, I'm really curious about the entertaining life -- I think it would kill me...

[lagilman]

The swerve was realizing sudenly that I was having fallout from B when A was what had happened earlier. Part of the skills I learned as an editor is the ability to say "I'll fix that one the second draft." So it's not a momentum killer -- just a writer-annoyer.

What happened tonight (see later post) was more of a problem -- I sort of 'forgot' that something was supposed to happen, and had to go back and add it in so that later events make sense.

Sometimes I love working to outline. Sometimes I don't. :-/

[msagara.livejournal.com]

This is interesting to me because I've been assured by several editors (like, oh, a dozen) that no one -expects- the writer to actually turn in a novel that resembles the outline.

But... if I've sold something based on the outline, there it is. I can't crawl around it, I can't look past it; it's just there. Matrice said she'd accept book pages instead of partial and outline (I asked why the outline was needed, and she said the art dept. needed it, and on paper, so I offered half a book instead, and she was Angelic, and said that was fine).

This is probably why I've only ever sold something based on an outline once...

of mice and men...

[lagilman]

Oh, I don't think anyone really expects word-for-word adherence. Or even more than vague "this is what I said would happen." But I'm a logical beast, and when I say A goes to B I tend to want to go from A to B, just to make things easier for me in terms of plotting. I may make a stop at A.2 along the way, but hey, that's how word count is built, no?

Then again, the second book for Luna was totally not adhering to the original outline. The characters staged a total revolt, and I had no choice but to go along with them....

Re: of mice and men...

[msagara.livejournal.com]

The letting go of the outline? That's the part I really, really couldn't do -- once it was on paper, I just -choked- for a month. And given deadlines? That was a special form of near-suicide *wry g*.

Another author told me just to send them my synopsis, cleaned up, and I had to admit that I don't have one. And CJ Cherryh, when she was in Toronto for a con, told me how to write an outline -- and it was exactly what I would normally do; describe the background situation, and a bit of the characters and their motivations, but no more. As in, no plot.

Which doesn't really work, at least for my agent *wry g*.

When you were doing more editing, how many of your writers did plot outlines (the standard 10-12 page ones that seem to be what's required)?

Re: of mice and men... (class is in session)

[lagilman]

When you were doing more editing, how many of your writers did plot outlines (the standard 10-12 page ones that seem to be what's required)?


Um.... Some did, some didn't. Some told me what the story was about, some gave me chapter by chapter breakdowns. And in at least once case, a writer I had worked with for umpteen books told me over the phone what the story was about and I typed up a synopsis so we'd have something in file to satisfy the contract payment requirements.

Some writers needed to have an outline, so they didn't go too far insane. Others, I could trust to go their merry way and I'll see you in six or nine or twelve months when it's done. So long as the author and I were both on the same page about what sort of book was going to be handed in, everything was cool.

Want to know a secret? The outline is required for three reasons.

1. so art and copy have something tow ork with when the manuscript isn't available (an sometimes even when it is, if you have a lazy art or copy department, so it helps to send an updated synopsis when things change significantly).
2. So that they can hang a payment on something being delivered (thereby stretching out the delivery times, and I can't blame them, but that may be another post entirely, someone remind me later).
3. So that, in case the writer screws up magnificently, or the publisher is going down in flames, there's a wy later on to say "hey, we bought it off X and you delivered Y and no, we won't accept that we want X." That's the one most authors fear, but it's also the one most rarely put into play. I've certainly never done it, although I had to threaten once or twice to get the revisions that were needed.

[msagara.livejournal.com]

Others, I could trust to go their merry way and I'll see you in six or nine or twelve months when it's done. So long as the author and I were both on the same page about what sort of book was going to be handed in, everything was cool.

This is me. Except for the six or nine or twelve months <wry g>. Otoh, it's been 8 books with DAW, and I'm fairly certain my editor there knows exactly what to expect. In tone & general substance. I do talk with her if I'm looked at a sudden structural decision I hadn't anticipated, but other than that, tend to just write.

Want to know a secret? The outline is required for three reasons.

1. so art and copy have something to work with when the manuscript isn't available (an sometimes even when it is, if you have a lazy art or copy department, so it helps to send an updated synopsis when things change significantly).

This is pretty much what I was told, minus the lazy art or copy part <g>. I'm used to something slightly different -- and I imagine this differs on the basis of publishers across the city. I send in whatever I've finished at the point that it's needed, and that partial is forwarded to the artist; she often phones to find out where I think it's going, and then to ask me technical clothing questions (time period, mostly, and no, I'm terrible at answering them).

2. So that they can hang a payment on something being delivered (thereby stretching out the delivery times, and I can't blame them, but that may be another post entirely, someone remind me later).

This works for me, although I did offer to just defer payment upon acceptance for that amount, and was told that the outline was necessary for reason 1.

I'd be curious (this is a personal flaw of mine <rueful g> to know how you feel about the payout structure on the other side of the desk, though.

3. So that, in case the writer screws up magnificently, or the publisher is going down in flames, there's a wy later on to say "hey, we bought it off X and you delivered Y and no, we won't accept that we want X." That's the one most authors fear, but it's also the one most rarely put into play. I've certainly never done it, although I had to threaten once or twice to get the revisions that were needed.

I saw that done once to another writer (I think it was Walter Jon Williams, for some reason); I believe he turned in a finished book, and they didn't ask him to rewrite or revise -- they simply said it was not the book they thought it would be, and they wanted to pay him half, retroactively, of what had been the contracted amount. It's not why I don't like outlines, though.

More common, in the decade past, was the cancellation for non-delivery. And I remember being told by my very first agent, back in the eighties, that the two least important things on the contract were a) the length of the book and b) the due date. Things have really changed.

[msagara.livejournal.com]

... and of course, in preview, I miss things. "if I'm look-ing- at" is what the first paragraph should have said.