Category: life

A lot has been said lately on the writing process. I thought that it might be helpful to compare notes on how we approach a daily writing session.

As my current project obsession is a foolhardy attempt to write a novel, I take extra care to stick to a regular routine in my sessions. I begin at the crack of dawn when I make a pot of coffee. This has to be done in a very exacting procedure that involves whole Colombian beans, a used sock, a ball-pein hammer, and a pot of boiling water. It takes a little extra effort, but the resulting cup is a rich, full-bodied poly-cotton blend.

When the coffee is ready, I sacrifice the goat. The sacrifice is entirely non-religious in nature — it’s just that, to me, there’s nothing more refreshing than a cup of fresh goat’s blood before a day’s writing. Because I’m a creature of habit, I have to pay close attention to detail: always use the same mug each day, and the goat’s blood must never mix with the coffee.

With two steaming mugs set each on their own cork pad, I sit facing the computer monitor. I often sit like this for at least an hour or so before I continue.

When I’m finished staring, I begin to sing show tunes in a falsetto voice. There’s nothing like a rousing rendition of Cabaret to start one’s creative juices flowing all over the place. I start simply, with “Willkommen”, and move on to “The Telephone Dance”. Neighbours across the street are often distracted by the sight of me bobbing my head merrily as I shout, “‘Table seven calling number nine, how are you handsome?’, ‘You mean me?'”, et cetera. By the time I finish “The Pineapple Song”, I’m ready to begin.

Then I empty the mug of goat’s blood over my head and turn on the computer. Shortly thereafter, I begin to type. In general, nouns seem to come to me more easily than verbs, and I eschew adverbs entirely. As for adjectives, they’re acceptable only if they contain several silent consonants and don’t distract me from the nouns.

At the end of a session, I have a great big list of words, which I then rearrange into sentences. Oddly, the plot always seems to revolve around water buffalo, but I have no recollection of typing those words.

And that’s how I like to write. How about you?

By yesterday afteroon, I reached 8,500 words in my story. I had wanted to hit that ten thousand mark just for the psychological significance, but I had to stop.

I need to go back and re-read chapter one to make sure that I haven’t completely missed the point of a novel, which is to be entertaining. So far, the two characters that I’ve introduced have had some nifty discussions about life, the universe, and everything, but very little has actually happened. Isn’t the first chapter supposed to be so riveting that the reader can’t put the book down? I hope the reader likes conversation.

Also, someone pointed out a huge flaw in the basic premise of the story, so I may have to put this aside and think about it for a week or two (or three or four).