Untitled Writers' Group

Nice News--Steven Harper Piziks

Phobos Books, a medium-sized publishing company, is starting a series of science fiction murder mysteries set on the moon.  I just got the news that I'm writing the first book.  Working title: DEAD MAN IN THE MOON.

Yay!

Deadline's July 15.

Yikes!

Idea Whap--Steven Harper Piziks

Yesterday on my way home from school, an idea for a stand-alone novel hit me hard.  The premise dropped into my mind with almost perfect clarity, and I fine-tuned it on my way home, at which point I ran to the keyboard to get it all down before I forgot any of it.  It was very exciting.  You know how it is--you can't type fast enough, and more possibilities come to you with every word.  What grand fun!

Now it's sitting at the back of my head, simmering.  I have a few scene snatches.  I know what the main characters look like and their basic personalities.  I have a plot.  I have settings.  I don't have a name for my antagonist yet--he's remaining stubborn about that--but it'll come.

Interestingly enough, this book would probably be marketable more as magic realism than fantasy, which is mega-cool.  Wider audience and all that. (And yes, I maintain that the difference between magical realism and fantasy is the marketing department, but I can only do so much to change the
publishing industry.)

--Steven

Critiquing--Steven Harper Piziks

I was thinking about the following in Esther Friesner's newsgroup on SFF.net and thought I'd repost.

I'm trying to think if there's anyone in the group whose advice I listen to more than anyone else's, and I don't think there is. Sarah tends to pick out character flaws. Lisa is the queen of continuity. Jonathan is the "have you thought of =this=?" guy. Erica gives the bird's eye view. Catherine is the real-life lady (as in, "No real-life person would do this"). Karen is good at rating the enjoyment factor. Anne is the style maven. (Her most memorable line to me so far has been, "That was a sorry excuse for a sentence.") So who I listen to most depends on what I need to know about a story.

--Steven

A Moment of Fame--Steven Harper Piziks

Last night a friend of mine turned thirty, and his wife had arranged a small surprise gathering at an entertainment complex he likes. The complex has games that range from video to VR to skeeball to shuffleboard. Sort of a Chuck-E-Cheese on steroids and cocaine.

At any rate, the group of us was waiting to start a game of Battle-Tech, a shared video game in which a dozen participants climb into small booths to control video robots which go around shooting each other. You give your robot a screen name so the other players know who you are (allowing you to kill your friends with greater efficiency), and I chose "Kendi" for mine. When the game operator asked where the name came from, I said, "It's a small magical lizard from Australia. I named the main character in my books after it."

A bit later, the game operator asked The Annoying Question. "You said you write novels. Have you had any published?"

Marion Bradley hated this question. "No one asks a plumber if he's ever fixed a sink or a doctor if she's treated a patient," she always said. "Why do they ask writers this question?"

"Nine books and counting," I said. In the course of this explanation, I added that I'd written a Star Trek: Voyager book.

"What was it called?" he asked.

"THE NANOTECH WAR."

His eyes went round. "=You= wrote THE NANOTECH WAR? That was =you=?"

This took me a little by surprise. Most of the time when I mention my books, the novelizations for IDENTITY and EXORCIST: THE BEGINNING get the big reactions (at which I usually give a small mental sigh). NANOTECH never gets more than a polite nod. This guy was giving me the whole enchilada, and I had a small inkling of how Stephen King might feel.

"That was me," I said.

"I haven't read it yet," he said, which cooled my initial reaction, "but all my friends have, and they keep telling me I've =got= to read it because it was one of the best Trek books ever! Now I definitely have to read it. This is so cool!"

Okay. I'll take it. :)

--Steven

Leave 'em Satisfied

Both of my parents are aspiring fiction writers, so we quite frequently chat about writing on the phone. The other day my dad startled me by saying, "I've figured something out. When you're writing, all you have to do is get the reader interested, keep them interested all the way through, and leave 'em satisfied." It startled me, because it's SO true. This is a revelation I had a couple of years ago. Forget the "rules," forget style, forget plot, forget character. All of these things are just ways to reach the ultimate zen of "keep 'em itnerested, leave 'em satisfied." So easy, yet so hard. I was surprised, though, that my father had come to such an identical conclusion as I had. Is this something all writers figure out at some point? Or are my father and I exhibiting father-daughter brain-likeness?

I told my dad that I thought the "leave 'em satisfied" part was hardest. It requires knowing and understanding what the reader is after and giving it to them, often in spite of their own conscious wishes. Tricky stuff. How about everyone else? How do you keep 'em interested and leave 'em satisfied?

Analog Publication by Catherine Shaffer

My story, "Midnight on Tabula," is in the current issue of Analog (October). Get thee to a book store, while supplies last! It will be easy to find, because for some reason my name is on the cover. Yeah! Woohoo! Yippee!

I tried to avoid reading it, then accidentally flipped to the first page and got sucked right in, not because it's the best story in the world, but because I was obsessively proofreading. *smack* Bad writer! To my disappointment, they didn't choose to illustrate it. But my name IS on the cover, so I won't complain even one tiny bit.

This is my first "big time" pro sale. I am now a professional sf writer by every standard. SFWA. Writers of the Future. Campbell Awards. It's very exciting. Of course I've been at it long enough to know I shouldn't wait for an avalanche of fan mail, or probably any response of any kind, at least not for some months. At some point perhaps a review will appear in Tangent or Locus. If I'm lucky the review will be good. I am not unexperienced with negative reviews, so I think I won't die if that happens. I think.

But for most stories, unless they get onto an award ballot or get reprinted in best-ofs, they have their day in the sun and then quietly disappear. I'm prepared for that, too. There's more stories where that one came from. I've been waiting seven years since Clarion to get to this point. I've got

A Day's Writing--Steven Harper Piziks

Lately, my writing schedule has been like this:

Today I rose late, took the dog out for a nice, long walk in the woods with birds singing and the air still cool from the previous night, and had a leisurely breakfast of home-made hashbrowns. Then I got out my laptop and headed to the back yard.

Tricksy Trickster--Steven Harper Piziks

TRICKSTER is a nominee for the Spectrum Award:

http://www.spectrumawards.org/2004.htm

The list of finalists and the winner will be announced at WorldCon.

--Steven

Erica Schippers - Gah! Gah, I say!

Well, I'm stuck. I have this story that is 80% done, and it's been 80% done forever, and final 20% is just eluding me. Part of it is that the story isn't really linear, so there are more than the usual number of options for placing pertinent information, and the placement of information necessary to produce a story that builds effectively to the conclusion is therefore trickier. A huge part of it is that I have to describe a profoundly transformational experience in a way that both conveys the experience and isn't built of woo-woo 'explain the unexplainable' cliches. Huh, while writing this I have come to realize that the reason these cliches kept popping up is that I don't have a good idea of what the experience would be like and have not been drawing on my own spiritual experiences when writing about it. I think I'm no longer stuck....so, there you go, the writing process in action.

By the way, I am more than happy to have any advice about writing spiritual experienes (even though that isn't precisely what I'm writing about), or any sensations/recollections/feeling tones from similar things in your own lives. I have a feeling that scene will still be a bear to write.

Steven the Master--Steven Harper Piziks

Next month I get my Master's degree in writing popular fiction from Seton Hill University. This has got to be the biggest scam in all of academia! I write books and get a degree for it.

Of course, I chose this program because it would allow me to continue my education (as required for teachers by the State of Michigan) without adding much to my already formidable workload. It just feels like a scam.

For my thesis, I had to write a novel in two and a half years. I told my advisor, "I don't know if I can write that slow, but I'll try." Trickster, my thesis novel, was finished eight months later! I love it.

--Steven