Journal Entries
Writer's Block 13
Posted Apr 21, 2013
At my writing workshop, it's usual for everyone to submit at least 2,000 words of writing. Each month three people are invited to submit 5,000 words. I volunteered to submit 5,000 at the end of April and promptly regretted doing so. 
I am coming up to the climax of my story and thought I knew what ought to happen. Steve goes off to stay with his friend Andre Ricaud, because he's fed up with his parents after Alison told him she was thinking of leaving. (I decided Alison had to tell Steve - partly because Steve is 16 and old enough to have his own ideas what he wants to do, and partly because relations between father and son have got bad enough for there to be potential for violence.) When he comes home, an argument breaks out between Steve and his Dad, during the course of which Steve blurts out that his Mum has another man. When Alison comes home, Brian confronts her with an accusation of infidelity and a row ensues, in which Brian hits Alison, she bangs her head against the freezer and is knocked out. Steve finds his Mum unconscious and phones for help.
That, I thought, would be enough drama to fill 5,000 words. But, when I tried to write it, I found it very difficult. My first scene, where Steve goes to the Ricaud's, is serviceable enough. But the scene where Brian rows with Steve simply developed too fast. The scene where Brian hits Alison amounts to a few hundred words of dialogue. The dynamics between the three people are obviously wrong. I need to slow the arguments down, build them up more gradually. Maybe Brian would brood over Steve's revelation that Alison has another man over several days, and only confront her when something else triggers the row. 
But I've only got until next Saturday to finish this piece of writing. I'm beginning to panic! 
Discuss this Journal entry [12]
Latest reply: Apr 21, 2013
Writer's Block 12
Posted Feb 7, 2013
I'm into the last section of my story - act three, if you like, where all the events and characters should come together in a climax, followed by a resolution.
Tim and Helen have visited Alison and told her that she needs to sell the house, an idea that Brian dismisses out of hand. I'm now at the point where Alison tells Francois of her predicament, and he suggests she leaves Brian. Here, I have options. Alison could go back to her house and tell Steve that she's thinking of leaving his Dad. Steve is quite old enough to decide what he wants to do. But Steve is angry, because Francois's daughter Nathalie has already told him that her Dad and his Mum are lovers. Steve decides he's so fed up with his parents that he goes to stay with his friend Andre. It is when Andre's parents return Steve home that Brian gives him such a telling off that Steve loses his temper and tells his Dad that Alison is about to leave and go and live with her lover. This brings about the climax.
But I don't know that Alison would leave that easily. Even if there's a room above the bar at Francois's restaurant which Steve could occupy if he wants, it's a big step for Alison to take - openly living with her lover. It has all sorts of repercussions - what will Francois's family and his other staff think; what will Alison tell Tim and Helen, and what happens to the relationship between Steve and Nathalie?
Discuss this Journal entry [19]
Latest reply: Feb 7, 2013
Writer's Block 11
Posted Dec 14, 2012
It's nearly two years since I had an idea for a story, called Dreaming in Stone. It centred on an old house in France, and the English family who buy it, to renovate the barns as bed and breakfast accommodation. But the house is crumbling, they haven't enough money, and they don't understand the French system.
When I started, I didn't call it a novel, even to myself. I called it a story, a project, even 'this thing I'm writing'. It was only once I'd drawn up a proper plot and some character studies, that I began to think of it as a novel.
I recently counted the words of all the pieces that I might use, and it totalled 26,000. I've written more than that, but there have been so many variants I've tried, characters I've taken out, pieces I've cut. And, worse than that, I thought I was nearly at the end of the middle section. I know what has to happen in the middle section. Alison tries to find work, gets a job in a restaurant and falls for the chef, Francois Allombert. While Brian tries to think up ideas for raising money, Alison and Francois become lovers. Then Alison's brother Tim (from whom she's borrowed money) arrives and tells her that her financial position is hopeless and she needs to sell the house. But 26,000 words at this point is too short for the story to be a novel.
Then I handed 5,000 words in to Susannah, the tutor of the Advanced Writing Workshop course that I'm following. People said that the scene where Alison and Francois become lovers was too quick, too early. It needs to be a slow-burning romance, said Susannah. Neither Alison nor Francois are the sort of poeple who jump into bed with each other at the first opportunity. And Francois is chef of a busy restaurant, while Alison is washing up.
I have already rewritten these scenes and taken the sexy bit out. This of course, makes the story even shorter. I shall go plodding on, I suppose. But I feel a bit like a person who's waded into a river, without realising how deep it is. I can't go back, but I don't know how i shall ever get to the other shore. In particular, I'm worried about the character of Brian, who is self-deluded. I suspect he's unrealistically stupid. What's more, I ask myself, am I going to do with this thing (allright, let's call it a novel) if I ever finish it.
Discuss this Journal entry [9]
Latest reply: Dec 14, 2012
NaJoPoMo November 2012 -minorvogonpoet
Posted Nov 1, 2012
Rather than telling everyone about my boring life, I'm opting for a haikuthon. Two haikus a day, making 62 in all.
Here's the first:
Houses through raindrops
waver, cease to be solid.
No-one comes or goes.
A late summer rose
flourishes scarlet blossoms
defies dismal sky.
Discuss this Journal entry [132]
Latest reply: Nov 1, 2012
Writer's Block 10
Posted Oct 7, 2012
I went to the first session of my new course - Advanced Writing Workshops, held in the Writers' Place set up by New Writing South in Brighton. I'd met up with a few of my group outside. We went in to find ourselves in a seminar room which was only just big enough for the table it contained. With all of us round the table (16, I think) there wasn't room to move.
Susannah Waters, our tutor, said that her objective was to get us moving forward with our writing. She challenged us to write a page a day, and encouraged us to keep notebooks. I'd bought a notebook specially, but it was too big to carry in a pocket, which was the idea. (Actually, being a senior I need not only a notebook and a pen, but a pair of glasses, too.) She also read from Paul Auster who said that the idea of producing great literature is the enemy of writing. He said it took him ages to write a paragraph. Even for the best writers, writing takes two elements: ideas and a load of work.
I know I tend to write and rewrite, which is why it takes me so long to get anywhere. I think, if you're writing fiction, your understanding of your characters and the world they inhabit grows as you write. My people have acquired friends and likes I didn't know they had; my plot has developed extra complications along the way. That's why the process of writing is so interesting - it's a voyage of discovery.
Susannah asked us all to read a few pages of the story we're working on. Unfortunately, this exercise took too long and we ran out of time. It's hard concentrating on people reading aloud for any length of time, so the stories tended to merge into one another. If I'm going to blow my own trumpet for once, I might say that mine was one of the better ones. I write visually - I like to have a picture in my head of the scene and the people in it - and this may come out in the writing. I would like to think of myself as painting landscapes with figures.
Anyway, I've written my page for today. I've got Brian buying an old clock at a vide grenier (the French equivalent of a jumble sale) and thinking he can make some money selling it. Brian sees himself as an ideas man, but many of his enthusiasms are short lived or ill informed. Meanwhile, poor Alison is working all hours at Les Saules restaurant. Her relationship with Francois is beginning to develop...
Discuss this Journal entry [31]
Latest reply: Oct 7, 2012
minorvogonpoet
Researcher U3099090
Write an Entry
"The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is a wholly remarkable book. It has been compiled and recompiled many times and under many different editorships. It contains contributions from countless numbers of travellers and researchers."