How to be a GOOD Creative Writing Student...Whatever the Hell That Means

O'er another long hiatus...wait, what hiatus?

I believe I've mentioned not using this space to bitch about writing and stuff, but that inevitably happens anyway, so why are you surprised? Ha, ha.

I did, however, want to pump this out given that it's been bothering me something fierce, and it's an issue I think (though I hope) won't follow me for the rest of my writing career. But maybe it will.

I'm a creative writing student enrolled in a number of "fiction" writing courses at my college. I'm working toward my BA in creative writing, and I'm nearly there, though I can't help but see this problem being one that will plague me no matter how I'm dealing with the written word. Namely: what makes one a good writer? Or a good reader for that matter?

Let's start with the "good reader" aspect first: what's a good reader? By and large, I've been led to believe that a "good" reader is one whom is a serious reader, and by serious I mean reading serious works. So here's where I show my ass a bit: I'd define good works in terms of "classics". Say, Joyce Carol Oates (as I'm currently slogging through her novel "The Accursed"). Or Faulkner. I'm not going to lie--I just had to Wikipedia search whatever the hell Faulkner has written, but he's a "serious" author and he writes "serious stories" and I'm supposed to be all about that shit.

Or how about Lawrence? (whom I'm actually somewhat fond of) or Hemmingway (dear God, Hemmingway) or Flannery O'Connor (another favorite, no lie) or Steinbeck! Or...or..or--

Any of those.  Serious readers read the serious stuff, so they can write serious fiction and that's what you have to do to play the tug and war game of literacy. Good readers don't read Rowling back to front every other year because they're still waiting for their acceptance letters to Hogwarts because OF COURSE twenty-two year olds can still be trained to be wizards (it would be a directed study).

 Good readers don't waste their time with Stephen King, never mind that he's a brilliant writer himself and given this post here a damn "good" reader if I do say so myself, but COME ON. I'm still not up there. I've read the Hunger Games and Game of Thrones and lots of other books that are now major motion movies and hit shows on HBO. For Christ's sake I'm nearly through the TWILIGHT saga, and I've even read Fifty Shades of Grey. FIFTY SHADES OF GREY. There's got to be a crime against that.

Aside from my favorites of the oldies I mentioned above, I don't read the "serious" stuff voraciously. I don't wake up craving Tennessee Williams, nor do I need to go over that one chapter in Atlas Shrugged just to confirm that I think Ayn Rand meant to imply about whatever the fuck the book is about. I get up in the morning and reach for Gone with the Wind (yes, yes I know) and I don't think it's been a bad hour spent re-reading the sex scene from Diana Galbadon's Outlander. 

I suppose I feel at an acute disadvantage in my writing and reading life. In my creative writing classes, I feel this need to "present" the writer I think I should be. Why, yes, of course I've read this short story and that short story, and no I did NOT spend two hours last night on my illicit fanfiction piece, are you kidding me? I can't talk about my love for fantasy or sci-fi or even the occasional smutty romance. I mean, fuck genre period. "Good" writers don't do genre. That's muck stuff.

I can even remember such a long time ago in my freshmen year when my roommate brought an aspiring journalism major to our dorm. We did the introductory "what's your major" greeting tantamount to college socializing, and when he heard that I was a "fiction" writer he bent down to look at my bookshelf and went, "oh, genre. I like non-fiction stuff. Brain food."

I wonder what he thought when I told him "fiction" in the first place, but like I said, "good" fiction is Hemmingway and writing about contemporary people in realistic contemporary places. Maybe even historical fiction is good, but it's got to be historical. By the books. No crossing Henry the VIII with witches or making him travel to the future and meeting his long descended ancestor or something. That's not what good writes do.

So there's the line I straddle: perfect little literary-reading creative writing major by day, twardy, genre peddling bastard by night. The two worlds can't cross. They just can't.

So my writing is no "good" because my reading is "no good" and maybe I'm just fooling myself with this writing thing anyway. There's my dilemma.

Now, see, here's the thing, people: I don't completely believe that. I know that's all utter bunk, and who the fuck are a bunch of hoty-toty, Starbucks double expresso shot chai soy latte dweebs to tell me what to read and what to write? Why can't I be a writer who reads Hemmingway and writes novels about a space-dwelling team of rebels all caught in a political conflict with martial problems? Who said I can't be both things, or that both "things" must be separate in the first place? Who said all genre had to suck?

Who said literary stories don't suck?

I can't name specifics (because I can't remember) but I've come across "serious" stories that were just plain awful. I'm not a fan of Hemmingway, or Virginia Woolf, and I find Sylvia Plath to be depressing even for my sake. These supposed "greats" that lord it overly lowly little genre peasants like myself, aren't my cup of tea. So wha'st the problem here? They're supposed to make me a "good" writer and reader, yet I just can't drink the Kool Aid.

No me gusta.

Look, I think the score is this: there's a sad bias present in the literary world. Genre is dumb. Literary is too serious. Genre isn't serious enough. Literary is too critical. Genre could stand to be more "high" end. There is no middle man--either you stand on one side of the court or the other, and if you happen to find a middle ground, good for you, but why not choose a side? Why not "choose" to just stick with literary fiction and save those prospective publisher the grief of having to CARE about your YA novel about mermaids? You'd be so much happier.

I don't think so. I'm not wholly happy now. I can't even be myself, the writer I am, in class because I'm so afraid of judgement. I'm so afraid my instructor will tell me to forgo the fantastical elements in my piece because there are "stronger" aspects in my story that simply don't need it. Guess what? I have been told that before. Sometimes my instructor was right. Sometimes they were wrong. In the end, I was left with twenty plus pages of something I couldn't feel comfortable with, and instead of working to make it better I watched Netflix all night.

That latter bit might be my own folly, but I fear the day I'm in at a writer's convention, or book fair, and I'm surrounded by all these accomplish folks who stare at me in disgust because I tell them I'm currently writing a 1000+ page fantasy epic. I'm scared they'll instead ask me of my opinion regarding the symbolism in T.S. Elliot's The Invisible Man and my response will be: "four". I'm afraid I'll forever be afraid of my own shadow, especially if that shadow is wearing a black-t shirt that says "genre".

I know it's foolish. Really, to be a "good" writer or "good" reader, one must be simply that. Read everything. Write everything. Your natural sense of criticism, the muscles you build so to speak, in doing this will be your filter to discern what's "good" or not "good". And that's all without someone's prior opinion clouding your own.

It's just sad that I forget that a lot of the time. That I'd rather sit with my lips buttoned, pretending to be someone I'm not, while my heart's work sits on my desk in my computer, having to suffer this bias.

I think it will get better someday. It has to. There are just too many books out there to be read (good or bad) too many stories out there to be written (good or bad) and life's too short to sit around deciding what's right or wrong about that.

I just hope it will all stick one day.

So I know I said...

Hey self, and anyone passing by...

I know I said I was going to post my reviews of Twilight before, etc. and I'm pretty sure I will STILL do that, but current updates is that it's pretty slow going through the book because I'm fucking bored as hell and can't get through a few paragraphs without becoming irritated. All honesty here, though it's not so much a slight on the books themselves, and more so a general summation of my current feelings while reading.

I'm bored because Bella and Edward seem to be having the same back and forth conversation for far too many pages, and that's all undercut with Bella's over-analyzing every tiny thing said, lovingly interspersed with her admiration of Edward's godlike beauty and deathly pale skin. It's become a bit tedious, that's all.

The irritation comes in from Bella's own personality--how self deprecating she is, how clumsy she is, how much more perfect Edward is than her--alongside Edward's constant brooding of his vampirism. Again, I'm not necessarily saying the series as whole is irrelevant because of this fact (and more relevant BECAUSE of it) but, again, it's just my brutal honesty as a reader.

Funnily enough, while having trouble with Twilight itself, I'm nearly through with the so-called Twilight rip-off, Fifty Shades of Grey. While there is plenty not-so positive feelings rising inside me from my experience here, I'm nearly through and wondering if I should just post my thoughts on that.

Might as well, I suppose.

Just a thought...

So, I decided to reread the Twilight books (yes, that Twilight, those books) and then post my reviews/thoughts and overall impressions of my re-discovering the series here. 

What I can say, is that I feel Twilight has reached the status of similarly being "old news" and dare I even say legendary? For a trawl backward to see what made it so iconic in the first place. Now, the first book came out in '05, last book finished in '08, so that's been about six or so years (forgive me, my math is terrible!) ago. Pretty lengthy time, and I just felt the need to blow the dust off and compare how I look at the series now, being nearly out of college vs. how I looked at the series when I was in high school. 

I was an ardent-ish anti-Twi-hard back then. While I wasn't for burning the books (that's just a crime not even bad literature should suffer) or bashing Meyer online and declaring I would burn her house down or something stupid like that, I just thought the books were terrible. I attempted to read them, but I could never make it pass the first ten or so chapters. 

 Recently, I started the second book first, made it to the middle of the book, and then decided to pause and head back to the first. I enjoy the progression of a long story, seeing how it develops, what changes, etc.

It's for fun, I suppose, in the name of doing it for the experience and rounding out my dismal summer vacation with something vaguely constructive. What I could do is post my impressions of what I have read so far, though I wanted to finish the whole thing before moving on to the other books. 

Don't Know Why I Didn't Come

(on a small note, I've been thinking about passive-aggressively playing this song after some bad sex. I love you, Norah) 

Wanna know something funny? I just spent an hour so hunting down this article published on Buzzfeed. It was a list of authors/writers who use social media a lot (would still love a link). One writer in particular I immediately connected with: she hadn't written her book yet, but was still tweetin' and blogging about her efforts. I was trying to find her website to see if it was "okay" for me to put (what I consider) rather banal things on my blog. 

Doesn't that sound awfully silly? 

It does to me. An hour of my time wasted to look for validation. I'm always trying to do that. So many of us are always trying to do that, and while it's not such a bad thing, I realize that I could have just started writing and saved myself the trouble. 

I'm always trying to validate this blog. I'm always trying to validate my reasons for writing what I write on here, or find valid things to be written on here. I tell myself I'm "looking for inspiration" but I'm just wasting time. And I'm so tired at the end of the search. 

I'm going through something right now. I just am. That's hard to admit, but that's my life at this instant. I just got out a bad, bad relationship. An abusive one. Everyday, I experience these horrible flashbacks of what he did, or said, and I just sit and stare and get so angry. Or so sad. I feel trapped. How do I stop feeling this awful hurt? I try to talk it out, I try to engage those moments, but it's still like plunging back into a dark, dark hole. I hate being in that place. I don't know if it's natural or not; it just hurts like hell. 

I suppose it might be having some effect on my writing, but it's just having a plain effect on everything. I see his face, remember the way he smelled, or the feeling of his mouth on mine--I get so sick. I wanna cry. I feel this bad ache in my chest and I just wish it would stop. 

I guess I just needed to say that. 

HEY HEY HEY

I feel fantastic...hey...hey...hey....

No, I really don't, but ohmygod isn't this video CREEPY AS HELL

Mouth Piece

Hey all or mostly no one,

Anytime I've been away too long I start to feel really bad that I'm neglecting this space. I feel bad on a few levels, but most prevalently on a writerly level because a blog is supposed to be a writer's way of "reaching out digitally" and "using social media to market oneself" yadda, yadda. And I suppose that I could do a lot of shameless plugging on lots of other sites that I lurk about at times, but I will admit that the scared, awkward little teenager in me is afraid of the attention, and selfishly wants to keep this space for herself. Go figure--(you know...'cause it's on the internet and stuff -_-)

Quick anecdote: when I was a scared, awkward teen in high school, I kept a journal that I was so sure was going to be some kind of road map to my life if I died. Never mind that I had a fascination with death while I was a teen (and not in an emo-y goth-y romantic way, so draw your own conclusions there) but I felt that in detailing my most intimate and whiny thoughts I was creating a kind of scrapbook that people would read when I was gone. They would read it and go "gee, she sure was something, wasn't she? A real visionary, a real literary artiste! Why oh why she did have to die so young!" and then you know...I would be mourned and revered and maybe get my journal published because, yeah.

Major teenage arrogance there, I know, but cut me some slack. I was painfully lonely, painfully awkward, and, you know, writing was my anti-drug. Plus, when you're a teen you're convinced that the world gives a shit about you in this big epic way, and it's not until you're older and have been REALLY shat upon, do you finally realize in solemn and grim contemplation that, no, the world really DOESN'T give a shit about you and there's absolutely nothing you can do about it.

Anyway. I'm feeling like there's a really grim and solemn cow plop of shit sitting on my face, and it's only fair to say that I had some hand in slapping it there. Here we go again: another semester almost over, another year gone by, a little older, and I'm still looking at not going back to school again.

My mom said, like after my freshmen year: "Is this going to be an issue every year of college?" and I was like--no, 'cause I'm going to look for anything I need to supplant my tuition costs and stop worrying mom, 'cause I'm like going to be famous writer like JK Rowling and make tons of money have theme parts that serve fictional beverages from story, so nahhhhh!" And yep. Shit on my face. She was completely right. My mother was completely right and just saying that makes me want to die inside.

I guess I should have known better, but I'm stubborn in my own quiet way and I just plain don't want to leave the lovely city. I love it there, love everything about it's gritty mechanical noisiness and rude, fast-paced love em' or leave em' lifestyle and I want to embrace it like a coating of deep fried chocolate and become one with the shit in the sewers and the grubby dollars in the hands of hobos. I don't want to leave. I don't want to go back home. I don't want to be a failure. I want to fight...but I guess I'm getting a little tired of fighting.

One thing about getting older (and if you're wondering--I'm really NOT that older. Seriously) but I'm not a kid anymore either. I'm a grown up, can drink legally and all that, and I'm just beginning to get a bit wiser too, albeit in a rather painful regretful way. I don't want to leave my home away from home, but maybe I will this time. Maybe I won't make it. Maybe I need to be gone...right?

I don't know. I'm just not liking this shitty cowpatty pancake on my face. It doesn't smell so good.

I Think I've Got it...

It happened. I think.

It happened. It's scary to think about, but there's no earth shattering apocalypse or orgasm or even boatload of money coated in coke and wrapped in bacon covered in cheese...

It just happened.

Yes, I'm talking about writing again, but writing is my life right now. It might feed my family one day (*tries not to laugh hysterically*) but writing means---well, it means a lot to me so:

I realized something and it's pretty amazing:

I've been trying too hard.

I was aided most by this article and then maybe some of this one too. It's been a slow burn over the past few days--pssh--past few years but by George I think I've got it.

Here's what I tell people about my writing life: I'm currently working on three novels. "Whoa," they say, eyes wide. "That's intense." Hell, yeah, it's intense and I'd probably be done with two and working on the last if I were Stephen King. I'm not Stephen King though, BTW. I'm a struggling undergrad in a writing program who isn't even really "working" on three novels. Not wholly.

I've been wrapped up in three concepts for three stories that I was head over hills with turning into three novels. One I call my "steampunk sorta-maybe disel-punk-esque" story is about a twelve year old boy named Cole determined to cross the country to track down his missing brother when his father dies.

The second is my "sci-fi" story that has a bunch of characters and absolutely no plot. A few situations, some endings, but no plot.

The third is my "fantasy epic in part 3" about a young woman who falls down a well all Alice in Wonderland like and lands into a world that smacks her right into a tense political conflict between warring countries.

I think these ideas are pretty awesome and I've been hanging onto at least two for the better part of six years. They are all the babies I care to have right now and my dream is to have them turned into full length novels that I will one day feel in my hands and marvel at their sheer reality.

That's not going to happen now. Not ever, but not now.

Charles Finch sums it up in his article under boldly named "Patience" and "Focus". Alien concepts to me only a week or so ago. A WEEK. But like I said, I think I've got it now.

See, I have neither. Patience. Focus. I'm fresh out, sorry.

And it's weird cause, like, I think back to a simpler time. Back when I would stay up all night clacking away on a dingy keyboard that was connected to an old computer that was a 1998 Dell or something. Anyway, then I was totally focused, or at least a lot more focused than I am now. I would sit and write and write happily 'cause I was just so excited to sink my teeth into my story and see where it took me. I never realized that momentum was motivated by a need to just get it all on a blank Word doc and keep going.

Somewhere I lost that. Every word had to count, every sentence had to be perfectly edited. I had to write that epic the FIRST time around 'cause Lordy knew there was to be no second go.

My point is, I've been trying too hard to be this writer that is thrown into our faces 24/7. The JK's, the GRRM's, the Kings, the Collins, the Roths. These supposed "overnight" sensations that found literary success in what seems like no time at all.

But that's not how it happens. We know that JK was rejected a lot before the lucky publisher picked her up. As GRRM worked on The Song of Ice and Fire trilogy he met the challenge of a 1,800 page book that I'm sure wasn't written in a month. Roth details her writing struggles in her blog.

So Rome wasn't built in a day and I was trying to build three Romes. It was more out of a sense that the ideal writer was to be bustling away at a dozen different projects and simultaneously churning out finished projects than arrogance, but maybe it was arrogance too. I thought it could be done. I thought I was doing my work justice.

Six years later all I've got is a smattering of written info for each and not one chapter in sight.

I'm humbled now if you couldn't tell. I'm not Batman, and aside from being pleasantly surprised at the fact, I realize I can relax and be a normal human who works on one thing. I can write those hot sexy new ideas in a notebook and know I'll come back later. I can attempt a disciplined writing schedule that won't be easy (the attempts will probably fail more often that not) but I can try. I can take some pressure off; I can breathe, I can relax. At least a little.

Most importantly...I can enjoy writing again.

Maybe.