Meandering on Monday with Janet Lane Walters #amwriting

Another week has pass the past week there were so many meanders impinging on me that I'm not sure where to start. The first is contests. I've been busily reading books and partials for two contests. Next year there will be a third. I did drop out of judging one contest since I found it one that was difficult to handle when the second came into line. So next year there will be three again. Hopefully spaced a bit better.

The second meander was about a talk I'd like to give and that's on World Creating. A sudden inspiration struck. No matter what genre we write, we are creating a world. There will be more on that later. Now to busily sketch that idea out. Do I have a special insight. Who knows.

The third meander was something I kind of disagree with. A fellow writer said the only reason to go with a publisher is for the editing factor. I'm not sure I agree with that, but then I don't like the idea of doing the entire mss myself. Art work, formatting, editing. Not sure I want to hire people to do these chores or learning to do them myself. Part of this has to do with age. Doing these things takes a lot of time and I have a lot of books that still want to be written.

Continuing to type the corrections into Lines of Fire and should be done by the the month or into the beginning of December. Will come close to my target word length. Am re-working what is not The Goddesses of Er and the new twist seems to make the words much faster. Just finished a fight scene and felt as if I'd been the fighter when I finished. Being part of an imaginary scene alwys tells me I'm on the right track.

So enough meandering and it's back to work.

Wednesday's Writer's Tip ala Orson Scott Card - World Creation

There's much of interest in the bit I read about creating a world and I had to think about how it applied to other forms of fiction other than science fiction and fantasy. When having an idea for a story, one has to look at a lot of things Taking an idea from that small grain to become pages of words takes thought and planning.

The first thing is to look at the rules of the world you are creating. In a way, all works of fiction are fantasies since the writer's view of the world is what is shown. So what are the rules. In writing speculative fiction, the writer has to create these rules. In other genres, the rules are there but the writer has to decide which ones belong to the world they're creating. Take historicals there are certain conventions that apply to what the writer hooses to show. Customs change and there's nothing more troubling than to be reading a historical and have a modern kind of rule or convention creep in. Pulls the reader out of the story. The same goes for other genres. So the writer has to discover the rules. In contemporary fiction what does the law say about say wills, but is this the same in every state or country. Learning the rules via research is important.

Another important area is the scenery. Writing speculative fiction allows the writer to dream us worlds with more than one moon or with none. There are other areas where the writer can invent and explore. Scenery is an important ingredient of all fiction and the reader needs to be able to step into the scene and be there. Details are important and specifics rule. If you're writing about a hospital, a courtroom or any other setting be sure to bring in the senses so the reader will find familiar things in an unfamiliar setting.

So jotting down bits and pieces as you plan the story will add spice later whether the story takes place on a strange new world, the past or in the world where you live.