Tag: novel

Things Are Moving Smoothly — For The Most Part — With The Novel At The Moment

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

So. I have wrapped up some scenes — for the most part — in the early part of the first act. Now, I can breeze through the rest of the first act (again) until I get into the second act of the novel and yet again find myself wallowing in reworking things to fit my new vision.

The first act — which is pretty much the cherrypicked elements of an entire novel I could save in the context of what I’m doing — is almost done, I think. As done as I’m going to allow myself to think it is until I go through AGAIN and edit everything for consistancy.

I gave the first chapter to a would-be reader today. I wish she would be my regular reader, but I have *very* low expectations on that front. I just never can find someone to read my novel on a consistent basis outside of a few people who are graciously willing to do so. And I have lost one person recently who I think was disappointed in me for writing something so spicy.

I’m kind of uneasy about what happens if my would-be reader wants to read the second chapter. The second chapter is when some — spicy — things happen in the novel and I can just see because of the context of what’s going on the young woman I gave the first chapter to read getting turned off by what she reads in the second chapter.

It’s not smut, but it is spicy and maybe a bit provocative. And I pushed the first spicy scenes as far into the novel as I could. Turns out it was the second chapter. I keep thinking about pulling the first spicy scenes out of the novel altogether because I’m afraid they come across as gratuitous, but then I keep them in because I like them or they help the structure of the novel.

I probably will, no matter what, rewrite these specific spicy scenes before the process is over because I know I can write something better. I can’t be one-and-done with the spicy scenes just because writing them takes a lot out of me.

An elderly woman also wanted to read the novel, but I told her she could when I finished it — she just isn’t the audience of the novel and I’m afraid she’ll be really offended or flummoxed by the spicy scenes. So…what’s the point?

I just feel a little bad for snapping at her when she asked, I guess. I hope no harm no foul. She’s an otherwise kind old lady. I just would rather not get sucked into having deal with her reading the novel as I write it and her complaining that there’s too much sex in it.

The Struggle Continues To Be Real

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

So. I’ve pretty much finished the first chapter. Almost. At least to the point that I feel comfortable showing it to people who, of course, will inevitably never get back to me about what think think about it.

Anyway, it’s now the second chapter that I’m having trouble with. I understand what has to be done, but the actual process of doing it is a real pain in the butt. I have juggle a lot of different things in my mind because I have more than on POV within a chapter.

This is something turns off a lot of readers, but people read Stieg Larsson’s work and he did that, so fuck those people. Just don’t read the fucking novel, then. Those kind of quibbles really annoy me because the whole point of some elements of the way I’ve structured the novel is to draw in people who *did* like — or could at least tolerate — how Larsson went back and forth between different POVS within a chapter.

I just need to clear my mind and write some scene summaries before I actually do some writing. I hope to zoom through the rest of the first act after wrapping up the first act, then in the second act….oh boy, do I have a lot of writing and rewriting to do.

From What I Understand Of Hollywood Actresses, They Will Really Like This Novel If It Ever Sells

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Hollywood actresses’ reasoning sometime seems to be totally different than everyone else, hence what Emma Stone was up to in the movie Poor Things. I guess I understand why many — but not all — Hollywood starlets are so eager to do spicy and or nude scenes in movies.

Naomi Scott would make a perfect heroine of the movie adaptation of my novel.

Well, this novel certainly has enough of those type of scenes in it for some ambitious starlet to get into. I did not mean it to be that way, but once I said, “Hey, wouldn’t it be cool if my heroine sometimes stripped?” the rest took care of itself.

Now, obviously, some people are turned off by spicy scenes in novels — especially mine! But I can’t help where the muse takes me and so here we are. I just have to be careful not to get too excited about the prospect of this or that actress playing a character in the film adaptation of this novel.

Just *getting a literary agent* given the various headwinds I face will be like winning the lottery. For the novel to get sold and to *essentially* be an instant success is yet another amazing thing that would have to happen.

So, at this point all this talk of Hollywood being interesting in this novel is just mental masturbation used to keep my creative juices flowing. I just want to finish something, anything, and get into the querying process…at last.

This Novel Could Still, Like, Suck & Stuff, You Know

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Just because I’ve been working on this novel — or some variation of it — for about a decade now, doesn’t mean it won’t suck. Sigh. One problem I have to this day is my dialogue is too on-the-nose.

But, I believe in this novel. All I want to do is see how far I can get with it. I want to finish this version, which is a murder-in-a-small-town and then query it. There is a lot going on with this novel and there’s a lot to juggle. It even has an element of scifi to it, which I’m really going to have to prepare the reader for.

And the entire third — at least at the moment — is a complete disaster. It’s a mess and I’m going to have to give it a lot of thought. It helps that it’s been years since I’ve looked at it (I put it aside to work on a different novel in the same universe that I fused back with a version I cut it from. (I hope that makes sense.)

Anyway, I’m feeling pretty good about this novel. I have very, very, very low expectations. As soon as I start to query, I think that’s when I start to shift through the different scifi novel ideas I have and see which one is good enough to devote my entire attention to.

Of course, it’s possible that I’ll get sucked into the second novel in the same universe as this thriller I’ve been working on, even knowing it’s highly unlikely I’ll ever sell it.

One of the advantages of having no friends and no one liking me is I have no one to tell me “no.” I can just keep working on this novel long after anyone else would have been pressured into giving up by a wife or a girlfriend.

But, in all fairness, I’ve actually finished at least one novel, about a year ago. And there have been different “eras” of this project which is what has really slowed me down.

Still Spinning My Wheels Near The Beginning Of The Novel (Sorta)

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I have the first act pretty well gamed out. But there are a few scenes I need to really mull some before I dig into them. This leads me to just zoning out and staring out into space for a few hours as I try to contemplate what to do.

But I’m pretty sure that very soon, within a few days, I will get back to into the second act and where I *definitely* will have a lot of writing and rewriting to do. I’m feeling really centered at the moment, which is good.

And, in all honesty, if there was some way that I could pull some focus away from the main passion project novel to work on the more marketable scifi novels I’ve come up with, I would. But, at the moment, I just can’t figure out on an emotional basis how to do that.

So. I’m going to sit down and sketch out some scene summaries then start to work on some scenes in the first act so I can get into the second act.

Querying This Novel Will Be A Whole Different Creative Era For Me

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’m going into querying totally, and completely, oblivious as to what to do. Whenever I start to query, all I will have is a finished novel and that’s it. I have a general idea of some of the elements of querying, but, in general, I have no idea what to expect.

Well, actually, I do know what to expect — it’s probably going to suck.

There are a lot of reasons to believe this. I’m too old. I’m demonstrably a kook as my writing on this Website can attest. The list goes on. Also, the closest novel I know to “comp” my novel to is about 20 years old now.

As an aside, I have noticed that the most recent novels put out by the Stieg Larsson estate seem specifically designed to be as marketable as possible…even though I’ve not managed to get through any of them.

Anyway, that was the whole point of starting this process all those years ago — I wanted to see how far I could get before I had to give up and or piviot to a different novel. I’m not getting any younger, so I should be working on a backup novel right now…but what I’m probably going to do is start work on a second novel once I start to query this mystery-thriller.

I write because I have to, not because I want to, so there.

May Have Gotten The First Three Chapters Of The New Version Of The Novel Straightened Out

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

After a great deal of deliberation and screw ups, I think I *may* have finally figured out a smooth first three chapters of this novel. It’s taken me a lot longer than I would like, but it’s done.

Now, I’m going to reread the “finished” chapters then see if I can finish up the first act again before I get back into the second act where I’m going to have to do a huge amount of rewriting. I have already do a lot of futzing with the outline of the “fun and games” part of the novel (the first half of the second act.)

But my goal of just finishing something, anything and then querying it remains. I don’t know how long I’m willing to stew in my juices when it comes to querying, but I do know that at some point I’m going to start to work on a new novel, even while I’m waiting for querying to pan or not pan out.

Querying is going to be a whole new era for me. I really will have no idea what I’m doing and I know I’m bound to make, many, many, MANY mistakes. But, maybe in making so many mistakes I’ll know how to do it right the next go round.

I am a little uneasy that my first novel is a mystery-thriller while most of the other novels I have rolling around in my mind are just Andy Weir-like scifi.

The Mysteries Of My Webstats

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’m completely obsessed with the Webstats of this site to a ridiculous degree. So when I see someone randomly pop up pinging a specific URL without any referring site…it makes me wonder.

From what I can tell, only about maybe 30 people — at most — look at this site on any particular day. And, yet, I think because some people access the site in a way that looks like a robot is looking at it, I don’t see some views on the backend.

So, I suppose it’s reasonable to presume that the FBI or NSA looks at this site on occasion just to keep an eye on me because they think I’m some sort of crazed nutjob from some of my rants. (Trust me guys, I’m harmless.)

And instead of only about 30 people looking at this site, it may be closer to 100.

Anyway. blah, blah blah. Nothing matters. I just need to work on my novel.

There’s Nothing Worse Than A Dry Drunk

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

It’s growing more and more clear to me that I need to cut back on my drinking — maybe entirely. I’m not getting any younger and I keep getting some pings from my body that maybe…drinking is no longer in my future.

And I know a number of people around me — maybe all of them — think I’m an alcoholic and I hate that so much that just proving the point to them that I can stop drinking is, unto itself, enough.

I keep thinking about how Stieg Larsson dropped dead within days of finding out his novel(s) had sold. I just don’t want that fate to happen to me. But, I suppose, I don’t really have much control over it other than trying to live a more healthy life.

So, I’m going to *try* to either stop drinking altogether or cutback significantly to the point that I’m essentially sober.

Taking A Critical Look At The Novel I’m Working On

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I pretty much took a break of a year working on this novel because I was moping because no one liked the finished novel I produced. They generally said it was too spicy — with one person almost being embarrassed that I would even ask them to read it in the first place.

But, after a year of moping, I’m back at it. This latest version of the novel is not nearly as spicy on a consistent basis — even though there are some spicy scenes early on. In general, though, I think I’ve come up with at least an interesting novel, if nothing else.

If I can get people to read all the way through is a different matter. The novel isn’t really a thriller, it’s more of an intriguing murder-in-a-small-town mystery. But I really have enjoyed working on it and this time I swear I’m going to just query it, no matter what.

If it’s clear that it’ll never get published traditionally, I guess I’ll finally put it aside and focus on one of the numerous other novel premises I have rolling around in my mind. But I’m going to give it a few months, if nothing else, before I throw in the towl.

I am well aware that it will be like winning the lottery to get a literary agent. But I would rather fail in a spectacular manner than just write little short stories that can be dismissed.