Tag: Hollywood

My Experiences In Seoul, My Novel & ‘Write What You Know’


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The expat scene in Seoul — at least when I was there — was an overheated caldron of creativity. And there were a lot — and I mean A LOT — of freaky weirdos running around. Myself included.

So many larger-than-life characters were roaming around that I often would look at one of them and say to their face, “You’re like a character in a novel.” Little did I know that many moons later I would make them characters in MY novel.

But here I am.

I find myself leaning into what I remember of those freaky expats as I develop characters in the latest version of this novel. My memory of those people is so vivid that when I find myself struggling to think up some colorful aspect of this or that character I just say, “Well, do I remember any expats in Seoul that would fit that bill?”

I’ve come up with a pretty direct way of being able to use these characters as well. One of the unique things about being an expat in South Korea is you’re always one disaster away from being kicked out of the country for good.

Anyway. Things are moving really fast with my revised vision for this story where it’s split into two novels, one story. Right now, I need to do a lot of reading and distract myself in some way so I can figure out how to fill up the second half of the second act before the sun goes dark.

Building A Mystery


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

So, everything is going well with this allegorical scifi spy thriller about the Trump Era I’m working on, but for one thing — I continue to struggle with figuring out how my characters will reverse engineer the “mystery” which is the whole point of why you read this thing to begin with.

But, thankfully, to date, whenever I get a “blockage” like this, after a few days I mulling things, it breaks and an answer comes flooding into my mind. I definitely feel a bit of creative constipation right now, though. Yet, occasionally, I’ll have a glimpse of a solution to all of this and that gives me hope that as long I write something, anything down then I can clean it up later.

The specifics of this story have changed a great deal since I thought it up but the general story remains the same, even if I keep splitting it and fusing it back together again and again as I struggled to figure out how to best tell this story.

And, yet, I’m feeling pretty confident. There is still plenty opportunity for someone to steal a march on me in some way, but as I keep saying — make decisions on what you do know, not on what you don’t know.

The key thing, I think, about this novel is a lot of the problems I’m having I would have with any novel I worked on and, as such, that’s one of the reasons why I keep plugging along.

I’ve come up with a great story split into novels and all I have to do is put the work into it for it to be a success.

Jessica Chastain & My Novel


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’ve entered a rough patch with the latest iteration of this novel because, well, I’m at something a lost as to how to fill the huge gaping whole in my outline in the second half of the second act.

But a few things are keeping me going. One is, the stuff that I have managed to figure out is really cool. Another is, there are elements of the novel in my mind I love so much that I’m willing to push forward until I solve the problems at hand. Among these is a character that pops up at the midpoint who is inspired by Jessica Chastain.

I really live her vibe as an actor and that vibe dovetails nicely with the OTHER woman I’m drawing inspiration from. So the character is something of a muddled mix of both women.

The main problem as of right now is the character is an FBI agent and I know jack crap about what an FBI agent might do in the situation I’ve put her in. But you can’t edit a blank page as they say, so I’m giving myself a pretty short deadline to fill my outline with something, anything that I can use to write a serious first draft with.

Each time I have one of these existential reboots of the novel, it gets significantly better. But each time I’m also reminded of how much reading I need to do to make this the best possible two novels, once story it can possibly be.

This Novel Is Shaping Up To Be An Extremely Fast Read


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

It’s times like these when I wince at how much time I’ve wasted on this novel that could have been avoided if I had a wife or a girlfriend. I’ve finally come up with a solution I’ve used before — splitting the story into two books with the first book being a cliffhanger — and now it’s beginning to sink in what a fast read I’ve come up with. This is a solution I suspect a wife or a girlfriend would have suggested years ago.

The first book uses the Hero as the protagonist and the second book uses the Heroine as the protagonist. This is something that wasn’t clear when it was just one big book.

The inspiration for this novel.

It was size that force my hand on splitting the story in two. I was all excited that I was at the midpoint of the novel when I looked at the scene count and realized the whole thing was just too long — 200 scenes. Even if you were charitable and said not every scene would be 1,000 words, that still probably would have gotten me to about 160,000 words which is just too long.

So, I decided to again split the story in two. Now, I’m going to be far closer to the “sweet spot” of 100,000 words and have some wiggle room to get to maybe 120,000 or 130,000 words so I can flesh out characters more.

I’m actually beginning to do the reading I need to do in order to flesh characters out, but it’s slow going. They say if you have time to write you have time to read and that’s what’s driving me to read more.

Anyway, I’m very pleased with the state of the two novels, one story right now. I keep struggling with how I could make this a trilogy, but the only way I can think of is to make one of the books a prequel that would explore the extremely well-thought-out backstory to this universe I’ve come up with. In fact, I could actually write two prequels, but that’s something I would only do if the first two novels in the series were a huge success and there was obviously some interest in seeing all this stuff only previously alluded to.

Zendaya & A Rebooting Of The ‘Alien’ Franchise


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

As it stands, almost all the major Hollywood franchises are either bloated or dead in the water from being stripped mined. We’re reaching a moment when a reboot for any of the major scifi franchises could happen and enough people would be young enough that it wouldn’t be seen as the sacrilege that it actually was.

This brings us to the Alien franchise.

What I would do is, be ambitious. I would completely reboot the franchise from the beginning, giving all the principles a three picture deal. That would be one way to assure consistency of tone. The actress I feel would be perfect to play the new Ripley would be Zendaya. She’s tall like Sigourney Weaver and it would take the franchise into the modern world to have a POC like Zendaya playing the heroine.

I would grab a good horror director and be on my way. The new Alien and Aliens would be simply modern reinterpretations of the originals, while the third movie would be what we were promised at the very end of Aliens — it would be set on earth.

The point of all of this is it seems to me that Hollywood is so wrapped up in trying to stop 9/11 via superhero movies that they are growing more and more disconnected from their audiences and what they want. People don’t want “woke” movies and they’re growing tired of superhero movies.

It’s time Hollywood went back to basics and told good stories with mass appeal.

‘Midpoint’


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Absolutely no one cares at this point about this novel I’m working on, but I have reached a significant milestone, at least for me: the midpoint of the first draft.

The issue is, the tempo of the novel changes at this point — as it should — so I’m introducing new characters and the story begins to have the elements of a police procedural. Sorta. I’m probably going to revamp the outline I have of this portion of the novel significantly as I go through it.

I’m trying to lean into my strengths with this novel, but when it comes to the second half I’m going to have to get outside my comfort zone even if I don’t really want to.

I have been at the midpoint of this novel several times in the past, only to have everything collapse on me and I have to start over. This time feels different because first I’ve kind of worn myself down to the point that I’m willing to do anything to finish a first draft so I can edit it and second my native storytelling ability has gotten significantly better.

Throw in that I’ve cherry picked the best bits of the original huge story I cam up with in the beginning and I’m feel pretty good about where I am. I’ve given myself a very tight deadline — I want to finish the rest of the novel by no later than June 1st. Then I will pause for a month and throw myself into the second draft around July 4th weekend.

This novel has taken significantly longer than I ever imagined, but it’s been a very fun struggle. I’ve been drifting towards this point in something of a vacuum and hopefully now I can speed up the process a great deal. I refuse to be one of those guys who works on a novel 10 years and STILL doesn’t finish it.

If I had a women in my life, I suspect development of this novel would have gone far faster. But those are the breaks, as they say. I have decided to throw myself back into this novel in a few days.

I need to distract myself some in the meantime. Do some reading. Reflect on what it is I hope to accomplish in the second half. The story in its second half grows far more potentially controversial as it delves into race a lot more. And I also really begin to wallow in some of the tropes of the Trump Era as well.

I’m aware that there’s a real danger that people won’t care about the Trump Era when I try to sell this thing, and, yet, to me, at least, it’s obvious that the problems of the Trump Era haven’t gone anywhere and, as such, a lot of people likely will want some sort of catharsis by reading a novel set during it.

Throw in how by the time I try to sell this thing people will really start thinking about politics again and I think I have at least a greater-than-zero chance of being within shouting distance of selling it.

The Fatal Flaw Of The Star Wars Franchise


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’ve written about this before, but I thought I would mention it again because it’s on my mind for some reason. I can pinpoint for you the moment the Star Wars franchise was dealt a mortal blow — when Lando Calrissian is introduced as a man in Empire Strikes Back.

That’s the moment when the whole Star Wars universe met its doom.

The reason — it’s natural for characters to pair off as a franchise matures. As such, Leia and Han pair off…leaving Luke Skywalker with nothing (or no one) to do. Just think, if Lando was a woman, you open the first movie of the new trilogy with a brown Ray.

Ta-da, you have a whole new avenue for the Skywalker family to go down.

But, obviously, that can’t happen now.

I honestly don’t know what happens with Star Wars now. I guess they just keep selling toys and blowing up bigger and bigger Deathstars until the sun goes dark or something.

Things Are Moving Fast With The Novel — Now To Do A Lot Of Reading


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

After spending the weekend in Cary, NC and chilling out, the first draft of the novel is now racing forward. I wrote probably five or six scenes today which equal roughly as much as 6,000 words.

That’s the thing that I’ve learned over the last three years — the reason why development is so important to me, personally, is I can write so fast once I know my vision. But the issue is I have to make sure I don’t wear myself out by writing shit I can’t use.

That has happened more than once over the last three years, even with all the struggle with development I’ve had to go through for no other reason than for much of the last three years I’ve had no idea what I was doing and because no one likes me and I have no friends I was doing it all in a vacuum.

More than once, if I had just had a wife or a girlfriend then things would have gone far, far faster. In fact, what I’m doing right now is a cherry picked subset of a far bigger story that I came up with over the course of one weekend.

But I’m trying to get into a groove where I do a lot of writing early in the day then turn around and do a lot of reading in the evening. It’s crucial that I read because right now some of my characters — most of them the villains — are just moods or ideas. I really need to flesh them out big time.

So, that’s the goal for the moment. I’ve got my note book and Sharpie and I’m going to go through a few books and find concepts that work in the context of the story. I’ll likely have a virtual bibliography in the Author’s Note of books I’ve read to punch up the text in this way or that.

There’s A Lot Of Momentum With My Allegorical Scifi Spy Thriller About The Trump Era


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

After about three years of hard work, I’m now really in the zone when it comes to this novel I’m working on. I’m well on my way to — in a few months — wrapping up something akin to a (proto) first draft. It’s not something I would want to show anyone, but it’s a shit ton better than the novel I tried to work on about a decade ago that was pure crap.

Should I finish this first draft, it will be the first serious first draft I’ve ever written. Then I can give myself a month to read and think and then throw myself into a real, honest-to-God second draft that I can then turn around and show beta readers.

There are still a lot of things I don’t know.

Given that the Trump Era is over, will anyone want to read a novel which uses gauzy allegorical subtext to rant about the excesses of that fucked up era. I think they will because if I actually manage to sell this thing, by the time post-production is over Congress will be in Republican hands and we’re all going to be worried that MAGA is going to come roaring back in 2024.

Ta-da! Instant audience!

But, in general, I’m quite pleased with how strong this novel’s structure is. I still have a massive amount of reading to do to shore up the characters. Right now, too many of them are just place holder “moods” rather than fully developed people you want to hang out with.

I have managed to get this far this time around because I’ve simply worn myself out. I’ve managed to get to the point where I’m not nearly as demanding upon myself when it comes to this first draft. It’s just a first draft and no one is going to read it.

It’s the second draft I have to worry about.

In 2024, The United States Either Becomes An Autocracy Or Has A Second Civil War


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The first thing we have to keep an eye on is someone being shot on the floor of the House. This kind of shit happened all the time between 1830 and 1860 (according to The Field of Blood, a book I’m reading) and it seems inevitable it will happen between now and the winter of 2024.

Having said that, we are so fucked. So very very fucked.

The Republican Party, by definition, sees any policy or legislation on the part of Democrats as illegitimate. Unless, of course, they can claim credit for it so they can win votes and strangle our liberal democracy once and for all.

Anyway, the point is, when the next presidential election cycle rolls around, I just don’t see the American political system being able to withstand its passions. Either we, at last, become an autocracy or there’s a civil war. There are no other options.

We simply don’t have the political strength to punt this particular problem down the road another four years, much less the 20 or 30 years necessary so the browning of America can take place and we get over the hump.

All I can say is, at least my novel will be timely again by the time I try to sell it. And if I do somehow sell it, post-production will push it right into the sweet spot of all my ranting against extremism being very timely.