tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-55260833474118636922012-01-31T23:10:58.955-05:00Get back to work.E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comBlogger961100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-43731850223524111832012-01-31T23:10:00.001-05:002012-01-31T23:10:58.960-05:00

Wrote during three focused 25-minute chunks (okay, maybe the second one got interrupted by a cheese-and-crackers mission) thanks to Freedom and now I have a 4,600-word first draft. High fives and back pats all around. A bit shorter than I'd anticipated but a story is only as long as it needs to be to tell it. Maybe it'll get longer during revisions, maybe it won't. The important thing is: draft!

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-15594830668143958822012-01-30T23:40:00.001-05:002012-01-30T23:41:38.791-05:00

Just when the Toronto Star (through its entertainment site toronto.com) claims that Amanda Hocking's e-books may change the face of publishing, Ewan Morrison presents a compelling argument for its bust in The Guardian. Morrison makes some good points, but I think the most interesting details are that Hocking writes paranormal romances (very popular right now, in case you've been living under a

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-56689255112112155722012-01-28T12:03:00.004-05:002012-01-28T12:09:41.886-05:00

Just shelled out $10 for Freedom. It blocks the internet for the time period that you specify, and that's all it does. You can download a trial version. After two tries and an hour of focused writing time, I was sold.  Through Freedom's website I also discovered The Pomodoro Technique, which is essentially working in 25 minute chunks separated by short breaks. Freedom recommends using its app

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-62608395683696217042012-01-17T21:56:00.002-05:002012-01-17T21:59:21.874-05:00

Word count: 3,184. Last sentence written: "That's why the titian-haired chit has so many friends." Offspring: asleep, thank the teething gods. --- Finally found that outline, now writing the story backwards, like a good mystery. Am also back to writing on a good ol'-fashioned laptop now that the milk train has stopped running. I don't think I could have continued writing this story on an iPhone

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-14577988481360369012012-01-11T21:47:00.001-05:002012-01-28T12:04:18.192-05:00

I bought this print because I'm going to hang it on the wall to remind myself that my stories take place in this city. (Would make a glorious wrap-around book cover, wouldn't it? But I'm sure someone's already bought the rights.)

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-3569582182560817972011-12-31T04:28:00.001-05:002011-12-31T07:22:05.771-05:00

It's four in the morning, the end of December. A minute ago I heard someone whistling; I thought they were out in the hallway or in a neighbouring apartment but it's quiet enough that they might be outside. Two little white ridges have breached the offspring's gums and he has settled back into a routine again, thank heavens. Am sleeping reasonable amounts again, more or less. (Tonight being an

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-75713263394965624632011-12-25T19:57:00.001-05:002011-12-25T20:08:35.464-05:00

And what have I done? Not much, that is to say, no more than I do every day now. Days pass in a blur of shoveling food into the offspring's mouth like a mama bird. Although mama birds have the right idea; they don't have to wash dishes afterward. I don't know why I'm bemused that I don't get today off. You know who else doesn't get a day off, besides moms? Writers. So be nice to them. Buy their

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-72594443267896114402011-11-30T00:36:00.001-05:002011-11-30T04:25:12.360-05:00

Zero progress due to sleep-deprived state brought on by teething. The offspring's, not mine. There's a metaphor for writing in there somewhere: restless, sleepless fussiness, often months before a tooth will actually appear. I learned something new the other day: the tooth does not cut the gums when it sprouts, gums cells die off to make a gap for the emerging tooth. Babies are fascinating, and

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-14135974392764513812011-11-23T03:31:00.001-05:002011-11-23T08:00:15.929-05:00

When I was about 14, I saw a Bakka flyer downtown advertising that Anne McCaffrey would be making an in-store appearance. I think it might have been stapled to a telephone pole, although by then I was making regular trips to the store. Well! You might as well have announced that the Queen was visiting. I knew that Anne McCaffrey lived in Ireland--it said so on the inside of the back covers of all

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-30138926746223317982011-11-20T21:10:00.001-05:002011-11-20T21:10:16.217-05:00

It seems that The Dragon and the Stars, in which I have a story ("Threes"), won an Aurora award. Thanks to those who voted, and congrats Derwin and Eric for having their hard work rewarded! (At first I accidentally typed "The Dragon and the Stats." I think that's a different, less interesting book that involves university-level math.) --- Interview with Umberto Eco on CBC Radio's Sunday

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-60765216137537335972011-11-19T16:05:00.001-05:002011-11-19T18:29:47.473-05:00

Thinking lately about where one gets ideas. I mean, that seems to be one of the most frequently asked questions of writers (not that anyone's ever asked me). Where do you get your ideas? people ask, either out of sheer curiosity, or as many writers suspect, because the questioner wants to get ideas too. I think it's the wrong question to ask; it's not a matter of where, but how. For me it's a

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-1653154646916641802011-11-16T20:07:00.001-05:002011-11-16T20:08:21.344-05:00

The weird thing about working on an iPhone is that I'm now used to this tiny screen. Pages for iPhone zooms in on text instead of word-wrapping, so it's hard to see the context of what you're currently writing. So I was overwhelmed this morning when, during a brief and rare moment on my laptop, I opened up Girl Reporter. So many words on the screen! Such a large page! And so much white space,

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-83493053738761691122011-11-15T08:06:00.001-05:002011-11-15T08:06:15.476-05:00

Quentin Rowan explains why he plagiarized. I'll tell you why. It's because he thought he could get away with it. Isn't that why anyone plagiarizes?

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-74867301546113578402011-11-14T21:43:00.001-05:002011-11-14T22:16:49.053-05:00

Hey, look - it's mini-interviews with Tesseracts 15 writers Shen Braun, Michele Ann Jenkins and yours truly. (It's really annoying to type HTML tags on an iPhone. Sigh. First world problems.) --- Conceptual breakthrough with the novel: realized that the protagonist needs to be younger than I had originally intended, because it's really a YA book. And with that, everything becomes so much

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-58969462995411862692011-11-11T16:05:00.001-05:002011-11-11T16:10:27.534-05:00

994 words total, laid down here and there during feedings and between making notes elsewhere as the story takes shape. Wasn't going to read Kelly Link but I found my copy of Stranger Things Happen and got sucked in. Am reading it a page or two at a time out loud to the offspring, in a voice and intonation normally reserved for Dr Seuss and Guess How Much I Love You, which actually kind of works

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-68915747900889959612011-11-09T14:08:00.001-05:002011-11-09T14:08:50.468-05:00

A whopping 360 words on a new old story, or old new story, whichever makes more sense, code named Girl Reporter. This will be an interesting experiment: taking a story I'd written years ago but retired (I opened the manuscript file and the address was two apartments ago) and rewriting it completely in a style, tone and voice that is more in line with how I write now. One thing's for sure: this is

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-34754363636226486782011-11-07T20:45:00.001-05:002011-11-07T20:51:52.009-05:00

EDGE has organized a pretty cool Tesseracts 15 multi-author online book launch over at Bitten by Books. I wasn't able to commit to participating due to the offspring (who'd've thunk babies would be so time-consuming?) but I've managed to peek in at the lively discussion going on the comments about YA, sf and writing.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-67293803966224776842011-11-05T03:22:00.001-04:002011-11-05T04:08:32.836-04:00

Hoped to make it to 40,000 words by the end of this week but it was not to be, partly because it was a moving target due to the last several hundred words being outline notes, but mostly because the offspring had other ideas. These days I'm having trouble writing one-handed as he tends to thrash while I'm feeding him like he's practicing frontcrawl, so I have to arm-wrestle him with my spare hand

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-122821898620097242011-11-01T21:53:00.001-04:002011-11-01T21:54:40.354-04:00

Eureka moment: although I've reached the part of the novel in which I'm convinced it's all crap, I'm starting to see the bigger picture. Aha! This is why you have to keep writing, even though it's crap. All the crappy bits can be fixed later now that I know what the larger picture looks like. I used to think that writing was linear, whereas painting (at least for me) is done in layers. I see now

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-23231908568117199432011-10-28T17:46:00.001-04:002011-10-30T10:31:11.015-04:00

Have reached the part of the novel in which I'm convinced it is absolute crap. Plot is crap, characters are crap, and what's more, the writing is crap. Crap word count: 37,908. Crap last sentence (which I'm pretty sure I used before): "For the first time in my life, I was scared of him." Nothing to do but accept it's all crap and push on. --- Another year, another NaNoWriMo, and I find myself

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-24073248060568123162011-10-27T07:59:00.001-04:002011-10-27T09:43:30.518-04:00

Heard on the radio this morning that Kobo will be offering e-publishing solutions much like Amazon, cutting out the middleman (ie traditional publishing houses). How much has changed in the past five years. Who knew that e-books would become so popular? I certainly never thought people would be willing to read off of an electronic device, but now I own a Kobo reader (not the new fancy touch ones)

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-86059222490156242132011-10-19T19:58:00.001-04:002011-10-19T20:03:32.931-04:00

Received my copy of Tesseracts Fifteen yesterday. It's always a pleasant disconnect to see one's work in print. I wrote that? Huh. And then I read the first couple pages of "A Safety of Crowds" to the offspring and he yawned and fussed so I put it down and picked up Goodnight Moon instead. Sheesh. Kids these days.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-4727613656867339732011-10-18T09:07:00.000-04:002011-10-27T09:44:08.302-04:00

For a few thousand bucks, you can self-publish your book through iUniverse and get it on the shelves of your local Chapters/Coles/Indigo. You can even get a package that includes a book signing. Folks may argue for the rising democratization of creativity due to new media, but this raises my eyebrows because it's still the same old scam: exploiting and profiting from others' dreams. I wonder

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-41716158304230522782011-10-17T16:17:00.001-04:002011-10-17T16:44:52.806-04:00

Word count: 2,054. Last sentences written: "'There's a second Bay station [**above or below?] that was originally supposed to be part of the *** line. They use it for film shoots now.'" Obviously a few things to look up. --- Bummed to have missed the Toronto SpecFic Colloquium on the weekend. Had a rough night with the offspring so was in no condition to go the next morning. (Anyone want to

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-60515805803175153432011-10-14T08:43:00.001-04:002011-10-14T08:49:10.811-04:00

The offspring is sprawled across my lap as I write this, sleeping. Haven't made much progress with the novel due to him not wanting to be fed as much the past couple weeks, but it seems his hollow legs have emptied out and he's back on the milk express train again. All aboard. Have also been working on the new story (code name: Panda Suit). 1,626 words so far, but can't post last sentence(s) as

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-69432354629321983552011-10-06T21:46:00.001-04:002011-10-07T09:12:34.995-04:00

I wasn't going to say anything about Jobs's death at first since my social streams are already overflowing with tributes and memories: the Stanford commencement speech; the "Here's to the crazy ones" commercial; Obama noting that most of us found out about it on the very devices he popularized; Stephen Fry's always elegant ruminations. Even now at 3am a sports commentator with a Maritime accent

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-63586896654425236692011-09-30T17:13:00.001-04:002011-09-30T17:31:22.001-04:00

Word count: 33,482. Last sentences: "There is a way, a voice whispered in my head just before I fell asleep. The voice sounded suspiciously like Seymour." --- Starting to burn out on the novel. Have to remember to pace myself and stop mid-stream instead of trying to write as much as possible in one day and close off a scene. Closing a scene makes it harder to start a new one the next day. I

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-65649634266218168052011-09-28T17:25:00.001-04:002011-09-28T17:25:11.834-04:00

One disadvantage of writing in Pages for iPhone: accidental deletion of a couple of lines called for Undo, which is achieved by shaking your phone. Undo surprisingly only brought back one word at a time. I think I've now dislocated my wrist.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-31992920223653640472011-09-28T12:36:00.001-04:002011-09-28T12:36:27.700-04:00

Restless, tired and distracted, even though this would be the perfect time to GTD--that's Get Things Done, not Gym, Tanning and Debauchery. The offspring is sprawled across my lap, dead asleep and covered in crumbs from the Triscuits I've been snacking on. Don't judge me. And now I remember why I stopped blogging, because it made me feel like I was productive because I was writing, even if it

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-45341702254821697552011-09-26T16:39:00.001-04:002011-09-26T17:04:14.844-04:00

Chester Brown's graphic novel Paying For It was pretty much what I expected: droll, rational, introspective, fascinating, provocative, simply but beautifully drawn, extremely readable, and for a memoir about prostitution, totally unerotic and surprisingly not voyeuristic. I've felt dirtier watching Jersey Shore. (Not by choice, I swear.) I still have a knee-jerk creeped out reaction to anyone who

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-53238055583467665702011-09-25T07:51:00.001-04:002011-09-25T16:05:55.484-04:00

Am sadly down to one lagomorph as, after the O.B.'s increasingly failing mental and physical health, we came home to find him collapsed and unable to get up. The vet, who had just seen him a couple of weeks ago, advised that it was time to make the most difficult of decisions. And so I did. It is not something I want to do again, but may have to when the original Beast reaches the end of his life

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-5057825274992426022011-09-19T15:06:00.001-04:002011-09-21T08:37:43.460-04:00

Word count: 25,632. Last sentences: "'What's a vibrator?' Mui-Mui asked. 'Never mind,' I said. 'Go back to sleep.'" Amount of shit goin' down: not enough.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-10580250432847536932011-09-17T17:42:00.001-04:002011-09-26T17:04:06.877-04:00

I always feel a bit awkward at book launches. I'm very touched and gratified that people want me to sign their books, but I can't quite wrap my head around the fact that I am, on occasion, E. L. Chen, Author-with-a-capital-A. I'm just me. As I was leaving Bakka-Phoenix though it struck me, with some shame, that I am pretty damn lucky and privileged to be able to say I feel awkward at book

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-78551706623227513332011-09-15T17:21:00.001-04:002011-09-15T17:21:53.310-04:00

The cardinal rule of plotting is, "Things get worse." After finally watching the first season of Game of Thrones, though, I'm thinking the director and screenwriters' rule of thumb was "Shit's goin' down" (and sometimes "Awwww yeah, shit's goin' down" and occasionally "Awwww yeah, shit's goin' DOWN muthafuckas"). Which isn't a bad writing guideline to follow. --- Status Word count: 22,967. I'm

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-32612445735108989752011-09-13T13:08:00.001-04:002011-09-13T14:35:28.995-04:00

Word count: 21,006. Last sentence: "The sweeping flashlight beam sliced through a lean, dark-haired figure wearing wire-rimmed glasses." Reason for stopping: the offspring has fallen asleep on me so I am going to try to put him in his crib and then wash dishes like a good stay-at-home mom. Still, 1300 words since yesterday, despite a lot of time spent schlepping various small household members to

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-76541677059471815072011-09-13T05:50:00.001-04:002011-09-13T05:50:08.614-04:00

It looks like the Toronto launch for Tesseracts Fifteen is this Saturday, September 17 from 3-6pm at Bakka-Phoenix. At least Tony Pi and I will be there, so that's critical mass for a launch party. I reserve the right to pop out at any time and feed the offspring, though, as he gets a little screamy otherwise.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-92020367037445830422011-09-12T06:26:00.001-04:002011-09-12T07:05:21.214-04:00

Slowly mastering the art of writing with one hand on my iPhone while I nurse Fussy McSquirmersons. (I find it easier to type one-handed on my phone than on my laptop.) It helps that Workflowy is optimized for mobile so I can read my outline easily. I might actually finish The Good Brother this year. Eat your heart out, Alice Munro. Was skeptical of Pages for the iPhone at first, despite my

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-73174743030407736202011-08-29T16:22:00.007-04:002011-08-30T08:56:20.568-04:00

Heard Jonah Lehrer, contributing editor at Wired, talking about his article on how spoilers actually make the reading experience more enjoyable on CBC Radio's Q last week. It provides a possible explanation for why readers tend to prefer novels to short stories, and why even I have trouble committing to reading a collection of short stories as opposed to a novel. A short story is a risky

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-2844096269391881682011-07-27T12:36:00.008-04:002011-07-27T13:01:01.198-04:00

The anthology The Dragon and the Stars, edited by Eric Choi and Derwin Mak, has been nominated for an Aurora Award for Best English Related Work, so to to hopefully help inform your vote here's an excerpt from my story "Threes". You can find excerpts and full texts of the other writers' stories via Eric's website.Information on how to vote and on the other award nominees can be found on the

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-27686233847792410882011-06-13T21:50:00.003-04:002011-06-13T22:02:57.333-04:00

My personal singularity is approaching, fast. Roughly one month to D-day. I underestimated the third trimester; it's not just fatigue, but a mild swelling of the hands that has made computer use very uncomfortable. We also have a million things to do before the baby arrives. This is it for writing, for now, and has been for a while.On the bright side, Pages for iPhone and the announcement of

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-78161072768087309782011-04-15T20:29:00.005-04:002011-04-15T20:38:19.801-04:00

Two things are working against me: increasingly sunny days as we enter spring, and decreasing energy as my second trimester ends. Lugging my laptop to an indoor location is becoming less attractive. Today I skived off and went for a rambling walk instead at lunch. And looked at baby stuff. Damn maternal hormones.It may be time to pull out the iPhone and sit in a (much closer) park and leave the

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-72466244890228562262011-04-09T21:41:00.004-04:002011-04-09T22:08:57.823-04:00

Another Ad Astra drop-in come and gone. As much as I love watching panels--bringing to mind Margaret Atwood's assertion that a Canadian would rather attend a panel discussion on Heaven than go to Heaven itself--I have got to get back to being a panelist, if only because everyone I want to talk to for more than a minute is hiding out in the con suite. Wandering the halls is only good for awkward,

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-27544678966164436452011-03-29T22:09:00.005-04:002011-03-29T22:31:51.335-04:00

Worlds collide! Over at the99percent.com, a creative design site I read frequently for day job-related reasons, there's a good article that also applies to writing: "How Mundane Routines Produce Creative Magic".But the chances are you're living proof of one of the great paradoxes of creativity: that the most extraordinary works of imagination are often created by people working to predictable

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-89648773752363118172011-03-22T02:17:00.002-04:002011-03-22T02:20:01.150-04:00

At long last, the full TOC is up. Some names I recognize, some I don't. Looking forward to digging into it once it's published.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-898975510023266202011-03-21T13:04:00.002-04:002011-03-21T13:21:06.453-04:00

Word count: 14, 407. Last sentence: "Egan shouted; I think he had shouted my name, but he sounded so far away."Personal status: Home, sick. Trying to make myself write but would probably be better off sleeping.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-87746975417162839942011-03-15T19:06:00.005-04:002011-03-15T19:18:49.725-04:00

As gleaned from the EDGE Science Fiction & Fantasy Facebook page. Nice artwork by Michael Oswald.As soon as I saw the cover I thought, "Hm, I wonder if Tony Pi has also sold a story to them?" And lo and behold, he has. And so has Claude. So I'm in good company.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-52593261407026321602011-03-15T01:23:00.015-04:002011-03-15T02:09:47.430-04:00

I am delighted to inform you that we would like to buy your story, "A Safety of Crowds" for Tesseracts Fifteen: A Case of Quite Curious Tales.Awww yeah."A Safety of Crowds" is the William-Gibson-Meets-Caitlin-R-Kiernan story I was writing, appropriately, on my iPhone last summer and fall. I was worried that not spelling out exactly what was happening in the story (following the principles of

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-17303919388937554012011-01-20T20:02:00.002-05:002011-01-20T20:05:15.246-05:00

Word count: 11,510. Woo! Hit five digits. Last sentence (which I will probably rewrite as it feels like passive-aggressive storytelling): "Then again, there were a lot of things in the past that I had made myself forget in the last month."

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-86473760315408065622011-01-15T15:10:00.003-05:002011-01-15T15:31:49.467-05:00

Word count: 9,878. Last sentences: "There was someone standing to my left, as well as my right. I staggered backward and would have fallen into the bathtub if I hadn’t grabbed the edge in time. I sat down with a thunk."---I also remember at the Getting in Done panel at SFC Ontario (obviously a panel that resonated a lot with me), someone said that Cory Doctorow writes only 20 minutes a day. The

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-15133934895201599932011-01-12T19:20:00.006-05:002011-01-12T19:56:11.212-05:00

I told myself I was going to get a lot of writing done during the holidays; of course, that didn't happen, but I got a lot of other things done instead, as well as a lot of eating and sleeping. No matter. It's January and I'm back on my lunchtime writing schedule again, like clockwork. It helps that my workload is currently busy but predictable and manageable; that helps make everything else

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-972362121900377622010-11-29T12:57:00.000-05:002010-11-29T12:58:27.317-05:00

So slow. Word count: 5955. Last sentence: "I had felt no grief, only shock--and eventually anger when I realized that Seymour being dead was not much different than him being alive."

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-78703436997584605012010-11-22T09:27:00.001-05:002010-11-22T09:27:01.121-05:00

"...not as monstrous, just off, which makes things Freeport."Just discovered one of the hazards of making writing notes with one's iPhone.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-75847070010822008762010-11-13T22:16:00.001-05:002010-11-13T22:19:40.934-05:00

Word count: 2516. (Just 97,584+ more to go. Baby steps.)Last sentence: "I had never seen it before but I knew what it was and why it had been in Seymour’s mouth."

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-90891018474813718932010-11-13T07:48:00.006-05:002010-11-13T22:24:37.622-05:00

Slightly bemused as I think I'm eligible for one of those Aurora nominee pins--I was shortlisted for Artistic Achievement in 2006--but not sure how someone goes about informing the proper authorities. How does one raise one's hand and say, "Er, hi, can I join the club?" I can't find an email address on the Aurora Awards website. (Well, there is one, but it looks like someone accidentally folded a

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-21321475499240382672010-11-09T20:31:00.001-05:002010-11-09T20:34:23.537-05:00

___ happens. The protagonist tries to stop it by doing this: ___ But instead this happens: ___ and it gets worse.Rinse and repeat.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-34074598020328134072010-11-09T17:41:00.006-05:002010-11-09T18:24:46.314-05:00

Stumbled upon a couple websites today that made me think of writing.F**k My B**k encourages aspiring art directors and copywriters to submit their job-searching horror stories. I read through the first few pages, and...they really aren't horror stories at all. I mean, I know it's shitty that no one called you back, or the agency gave you a nonsensical excuse for not hiring you, but this is what

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-27908761878668985682010-11-08T19:40:00.004-05:002010-11-08T19:52:27.801-05:00

Tearing through this initial, unfinished draft, that is. I'm skimming through it and summarizing each scene in a notebook, so that later I can create an outline and get a bigger picture of where it stands--and hopefully gain insight into how the big picture really is supposed to look. 120 pages in and so much will have to be scrapped: scenes, characters, you name it. I have a lot of rewriting to

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-84070303684603264482010-11-05T23:28:00.004-04:002010-11-06T00:00:21.331-04:00

I seem to have only two states: Not Busy and Frickin' Busy. This month is the latter. Despite other commitments, however, I'm reluctant to let the momentum die. I'm itching to start the novel. I'm itching to make my protagonist hit bottom much harder than she did in my initial unfinished draft, itching to prove that I am a much better and crueler writer than I was when I first started writing it.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-56645064849739298272010-11-05T03:06:00.004-04:002010-11-05T03:17:52.913-04:00

Unable to sleep and playing with Workflowy, which seems like it would be awesome for writing outlines. My only concern is that as of yet there is no export feature, and there's a maddening lack of information about their future plans.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-63504289492170836752010-10-31T21:16:00.002-04:002010-10-31T21:20:11.329-04:00

...is a dream come true. I want to weep with joy and relief when I hold it. It's that effortless to use.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-72940512655974200832010-10-24T01:35:00.006-04:002010-10-24T02:13:35.014-04:00

...from the Toronto SpecFic Colloquium if I'd still had a Twitter client on my phone:Julie Czerneda reporting on publishers' descriptions of Canadian science fiction: "We're more comprehensible than the Europeans."Bob Boyzcuk: "Writing workshops have a lot of chicks."Peter Watts: "Consciousness is like the pointy-haired boss in Dilbert who gets memos after something happens and then takes credit

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-51400534811268409412010-10-21T13:14:00.002-04:002010-10-31T21:15:07.868-04:00

I know I said that a tool is just a tool, but sometimes the crappiness of said tool can add to a writer's distractions and frustrations. I'm about to smash something; netbook froze, took forever to restart and then crawled as it connected to wifi. I'm actually typing this on my phone, as it's faster. Making story revisions on my phone would be faster. I've lost 10-15 minutes of writing time,

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-16023118899574765212010-10-20T18:07:00.002-04:002010-10-31T21:15:36.748-04:00

No, a new laptop won't make me a better writer. But it'll make me a less cranky one, and with less shoulder pain from carting around the current one.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-35485233832137653622010-10-19T19:49:00.003-04:002010-10-19T19:59:23.684-04:00

Finally made a breakthrough in the William-Gibson-Meets-Caitlin-R-Kiernan story. WWELCD? She'd let it sit for a while, working on something else, and then force herself to figure it out in a quiet place. Took the antagonist's motives and flipped them, and I think it'll now be a better story, one that E. L. Chen would write.Otherwise trying to get back into the swing of things. The lunchtime

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-43949886446299333362010-09-22T13:06:00.002-04:002010-10-31T21:15:20.124-04:00

I finished the Wm-Gibson-meets-Caitlin-R-Kiernan story but have stalled. Too many questions left unanswered. I still don't know what the antagonist's motives are ("just being crazy" isn't good enough). And it's not really a story, it's a narrative experiment that's not going to get me a sale anywhere.So I thought, "What would Caitlin R. Kiernan do?" There'd be a dramatic showdown. Stuff and

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-68788406830406008912010-09-22T12:18:00.002-04:002010-10-31T21:16:31.629-04:00

...netbook and notebook and all, and I have no idea how people do it. It's so noisy.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-41580132864122301232010-09-12T15:38:00.001-04:002010-09-12T15:42:44.022-04:00

I know the netbook crawls sometimes, but if you spent as much time writing as you did looking at other laptops online, you'd have finished those two stories by now. Suck it up, princess.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-4284370081774131062010-09-08T18:18:00.002-04:002010-09-12T15:44:19.931-04:00

Damn. Thinking I should switch back from first-person past tense to third-person present tense. All this I-I-I sounds like my voice when it's supposed to be the protagonist's voice.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-76997949660685292112010-08-28T20:44:00.003-04:002010-08-28T20:48:36.795-04:00

...the more I think, "Damn, I should've bought a laptop with a bigger screen instead" and start looking at MacBooks and cheap Dells. But then I have to remind myself that a tool is just a tool is just a tool, and no laptop is going to make me a better writer (unless Steve Jobs has got a trick up his sleeve).That being said, a full-sized laptop would at least make me a writer with less neck pain.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-60821699766259216072010-08-27T06:15:00.007-04:002010-08-28T19:14:18.776-04:00

Had a series of dreams last night that were straight out of a Claude Lalumiere story. Two surgeons cut open a pale mottled baby-like creature and sample the milky contents of its stomach. Milk and Froot Loops, one decides. Meanwhile, the surgery's time has run out; the baby closes its eyes and dies. The surgeons shrug. Either before or after this, there is a crow sitting on high with needle-like

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-21941104495197129422010-08-15T21:02:00.003-04:002010-09-12T15:43:12.734-04:00

Always write stuff down, because no matter how good or obvious an idea you're never going to remember it later. Damn it. And now I still don't know what my antagonist's motives are.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-32507836001989790212010-08-13T19:12:00.005-04:002010-11-08T19:55:13.179-05:00

...that Doc2 on my iPhone is working out pretty well. The only drawback is that large files require a lot of scrolling to get to the bottom, so it starts to get a bit annoying when I reach the 2/3 mark of a story. At the moment I've split the two stories I'm currently working on (Code names William Gibson Meets Caitlin R. Kiernan and White Trash Vampires in Regent Park) into halves. This is

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-85861561116776571002010-08-06T23:58:00.003-04:002010-08-13T19:32:34.897-04:00

...I'm reminded of Clay Shirky's book Cognitive Surplus as my husband watches Jersey Shore. "Where do people find the time?" a television executive once asked Shirky about the rise of user-generated content on the web. "You know very well where it comes from," he replied. To think, what could one do in that half hour instead of watching TV? Me, I'm in the bedroom with my netbook. The downside

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-76316030177518199302010-08-06T17:10:00.012-04:002010-08-06T20:45:41.648-04:00

There's an essay by David Sedaris that was alluded to in an article I read recently. Namely, the part that hit a nerve (with the writer of the article, and myself) is this stove metaphor for success that Sedaris gleaned from a friend:"One burner represents your family, one is your friends, the third is your health, and the fourth is your work.” The gist…was that in order to be successful you have

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-87177800435429059062010-07-29T13:08:00.003-04:002010-08-06T20:48:42.761-04:00

I will try to recapture all that I lost before my iPhone battery dies.Hm...there's something kind of existentialist about that statement.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-47150975761958399242010-07-29T12:49:00.003-04:002010-09-12T15:43:35.083-04:00

Save early, save often, especially when working on your phone. My finger slipped when I received a text message and I got booted into Messages, thus losing 30 minutes of work in Doc2. Arghhhhh! I can see now how multitasking in iOS4 would be handy (but a no-go for me as I have a 3G).

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-6979680880912089302010-07-27T13:37:00.002-04:002010-08-06T20:48:19.642-04:00

...that most of this story is being written on my iPhone as mobile phones play a huge part in it, as a lens through which people view the world.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-54522101662636338702010-07-25T22:19:00.004-04:002010-07-25T22:41:04.295-04:00

... I'm a slow writer. Only 500 words tonight, each one of them heavy and awkward and painful. It's like building a pyramid and all the other slaves called in sick.The old pressure to ohmygodihavetowriteanovel is back. It's like a sour little old lady knitting in a corner, occasionally serving up passive-aggressive comments. Fine, you don't have to write a novel, she says with a sniff. You go

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-9503951992223717882010-07-23T21:29:00.003-04:002010-07-23T21:32:36.449-04:00

...is writing. As it's commonly said, "It's just one damn word after another."

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-23333255662318022122010-07-22T21:21:00.002-04:002010-07-23T19:10:12.632-04:00

Trying out mindmapping to scope out my thoughts around a story I'm describing in my head as "William Gibson meets Caitlin R. Kiernan." It's helping, although I think I need to make it digital so that I can push nodes around. Hm...this is where having an iPad would be handy.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-48889155894092468022010-07-18T18:41:00.002-04:002010-07-18T18:45:05.054-04:00

Realized I need to switch the story I'm currently working on from third-person present tense back to first-person past tense. Crap.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-68271001492675623092010-07-13T19:10:00.014-04:002010-07-14T11:17:08.633-04:00

Real writers make time to write, as we all know. So I bought this little Dell Mini back at Christmas as a present for myself, envisioning myself writing during my lunch hour at coffee shops. Only problem is that I work in Agency Hipster Land, where coffee shop space is scarce and the likelihood of running into someone I know and thus have to make awkward time-consuming small talk is high. And I

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-20546175776490856912010-07-08T10:27:00.005-04:002010-07-08T10:45:29.797-04:00

I know there's been some kerfuffle over the cover for The Dragon and the Stars, and I thought I'd weigh in. Sure, I was surprised they chose a dragon in the European tradition; I would've thought that a Chinese dragon and a red and gold cover would attract readers/buyers by its exoticism. I was actually dreading the anticipated Chinoiserie. But frankly I'm just glad there isn't a scantily clad

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-58665114801906331312010-07-07T18:27:00.002-04:002010-07-07T18:43:59.021-04:00

"Checking out the competition?" Lorna asked. The horror or mystery writer-type sitting at one of the tables looked up from her Macbook with a baleful stare. I was probably being too loud, too ingratiating. Anyhow, the mission to the Merril was successful, and yes, I was indeed mentioned in the 18th and 20th editions of The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror, for "Tickling the Siroko's Chin", "The

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-32340894173438832722010-07-06T20:11:00.005-04:002010-07-06T20:53:20.447-04:00

Lately I've been feeling like I'm in a holding pattern; waiting at work, waiting in life, waiting for the next milestone. Not that there's anything wrong with that. It just feels weird to have lost my trajectory. So to shake that feeling, I have put foot to backside and am working reading and writing back into my routine. I had thought, Well, one of these days I'll get back to it. Well, I'll

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-57193660316690237722010-04-14T21:09:00.009-04:002010-07-06T17:20:08.875-04:00

I'm staring at the Blogger posting window wondering what to write. I attended Ad Astra on Saturday; I feel obligated to report on it. But this reporting of events is something that doesn't come naturally to me anymore since I stopped blogging. What is the point? I think now that I'm older I'm comfortable with my place in the universe and don't need to namecheck anyone or assert that I am part of

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-13927441605377550122010-02-15T09:25:00.008-05:002010-02-15T17:05:45.015-05:00

Hm. It has been a while, hasn't it. I do mean to migrate this site to WordPress and make it more of a website and less of a blog, since I don't have time to blog anymore. But that has fallen by the wayside of a very lengthy to-do list.Anyway, my story "Threes" will be appearing in The Dragon and the Stars, an anthology of SF by Chinese writers around the world. The anthology is edited by fellow

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-86590830802243662242008-11-15T09:02:00.008-05:002008-11-15T09:30:52.069-05:00

...is now out, which means I really should update this blog to reassure people that I am alive."The Story of the Woman and Her Dog" is about relationships between men and women, the Arabian Nights, and parades. It's the most ambitious thing I've ever written, as well as the most personal - although it wasn't ambitious because it was personal, if that makes sense. There were things I wanted to

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-81226099114448806012008-03-08T06:53:00.001-05:002008-11-15T09:32:06.132-05:00

Forgot how to ride a bicycle.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-64476979350974845662008-02-06T06:18:00.000-05:002008-11-15T09:30:52.069-05:00

I haven't made quite all my selections yet, but I can say with great pleasure that I accept "The Story of the Woman and Her Dog" for Tesseracts Twelve, to be published in autumn of this year, in time for World Fantasy Convention in Calgary.Sweet.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-28902285412505406542008-01-14T19:13:00.000-05:002008-11-15T09:31:33.911-05:00

I had forgotten how excruciatingly everything writing is, like pulling teeth. I had said I had stopped writing because I didn't know what kind of stories to write anymore, but now that I am writing again, I'm really not sure why. What is my motivation? When I was younger, that other lifetime ago, I think I wanted glory. I wanted to matter. Now - I don't know. Sure, obsessive-compulsion

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-55075085925549196892008-01-09T20:24:00.000-05:002008-11-15T09:31:33.911-05:00

...and I am writing again, because I promised someone I would, and that someone is actually not me. And now I remember why I used to blog--to procrastinate, because blogging feels like I'm writing and hence am getting something done. But I'm not.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-68987686878162632132007-06-11T21:23:00.001-04:002008-11-15T09:34:24.899-05:00

Via BoingBoing one finds Fantastic Toronto, which I won't go into detail about because everyone in the SF community likely knows about it already. I just wanted to say that I am pleased and gratified to be included. Toronto is a very mythic place for me and I really do make the effort to include it as a character in my fiction.It's been a while since I've re-read my old stories, so it was also

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-21785537284105664432007-04-29T21:21:00.000-04:002008-11-15T09:32:26.188-05:00

I accepted that I was going to be a harder, colder, leaner, crueler writer, and that it was okay to be hard, cold, lean, and cruel. I might even be savage if the mood strikes me. Peter Watts would be proud.Speaking of Peter, some months ago I noticed an outdated poster for a Blindsight signing at Bakka, and I'd had no idea that Blindsight was out, let alone that he was at Bakka. I realized

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-24614137983607995892007-04-29T06:45:00.000-04:002008-11-15T09:32:26.189-05:00

I lost my faith in stories. Stories have a beginning, middle, and end, and I learned that real life does not. I stopped reading, and reading is writer porn; it's a voyeurism that makes you want to do it. I stopped reading for several reasons: I did not believe in stories anymore, they had let me down; my eyes are simply too tired at the end of the day to read; I found myself going out and

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5526083347411863692.post-34692962575266011162007-04-28T11:18:00.000-04:002008-11-15T09:32:26.189-05:00

...four years of my life in words, gone. It was about time.

E. L. Chennoreply@blogger.com