Learning How to Write Well

As I'm writing Journey to Artemisia, I feel like a beginner. This is actually my 4th novel, not including the failed ones that never amounted to anything. But the first 3 were an emotional impulse. I was emotionally compelled to write them.

This time there's no emotional impulse, other than the joy and pleasure of writing, and exploring themes that interest me. So it's a completely different experience. I keep asking myself, what about other books draws me in and holds my attention until the end?

I would say first and foremost it's theme. But theme alone can't carry a novel. Beyond that it's the writing and the characters. Plot is of minimal importance to me if I like the themes, writing, and characters. Though I do want to feel that the characters are changing. Characters who have no problems or never change are boring. If the characters are affected in some way by what's happening in the novel, then there is at least a minimal plot.

I expect the process I will go through is to write over 400 pages, then go back, cut out the boring stuff and tighten up the plot.

It's unfolding a bit haphazardly, which is fine, but I'm working on a summary now because I want to be clear about what I'm trying to accomplish in this novel.

I've decided on three books to study for the purpose of learning more about how to write well: Oryx & Crake by Margaret Atwood, Dune by Frank Herbert, and The Sea Priestess by Dion Fortune.

I think part of what Margaret Atwood does so well is stay in a scene for a while with lots of interesting details. She writes a whole six-page chapter describing her character waking up, not feeling well because he's got a hangover, and thinking about food. It's the concrete details she uses that draw me in. And there's conflict. He's hungover, the only human left on the planet as far as he knows, living in a tree, and he has no food. He has to learn how to hunt and gather. In those pages, she manages to weave together seamlessly the past, present, and future.

We also see what kind of person he is: he's crude, drinks too much, but he's also intelligent, loves language, used to be a writer (before the world ended), he's compassionate enough to take care of the genetically-altered humans who are very primitive and childlike but grew up in a bubble and are now out in the wild. He's a resourceful mess. He misses the woman he was in love with (but it was a strange relationship). She was a sex slave from a young age who then became his best friend's lover, and they were having an affair.

It's amazing how much Atwood manages to accomplish in 6 pages when all that's happening on the surface is the character waking up, climbing out of the tree, looking at his supply of food, deciding to go on a scavenging trip, then setting out.

I'm going to stop there before it's too much too absorb. This clearly is not something that will be resolved in one day, but I feel like I'm making some progress. In the next chapter I write, I will use the chapter in Atwood's book as a model for weaving together theme, backstory, character development, conflict, and setting, and see if I can rise to that level of storytelling.

Agent Blogs

I'm back to my attempt to write this blog on a regular basis. Since I finished The Magical Diaries of Lilith Fyerider, I'm now focused on sending queries to agents. I've been reading agent blogs, so thought I would collect a few links and post them here.

http://queryshark.blogspot.com/
http://jetreidliterary.blogspot.com/
http://arcaedia.livejournal.com/
http://theswivet.blogspot.com/
http://bookendslitagency.blogspot.com/
http://waxmanagency.wordpress.com/
http://www.therejectionist.com/
http://www.bookcannibal.blogspot.com/
http://elainepenglish.blogspot.com/