Writing chronologically your thing, or being bold with back-insertions?

I understand that movies are shot out of sequence, perhaps not all, but definitely some. I have no idea why this happens, other than obvious things. Outside shooting would require the right weather; the actor needs to lose weight within the film (Cast Away's ending was shot at the beginning - it was easier for Tom Hanks to get really thin before the start of production, then take time off to bulk up for the early scenes); the director's preference; and other reasons beyond my knowledge.

It must be one of the greatest challenges of movie acting (other than the boring time sitting around between takes) with things so disjointed and each day's shooting unrelated to that of the day before. I really admire film editors, too, who give us the final product.

In Belle's blog recently, she expressed her dislike of writing out of sequence, the disjointedness of it. I'd never considered my feelings on it, but I've always done it. Long after I've completed chapters, an idea will pop up that simply has to be expressed in Chapter 2, or an event in Chapter 20 needs a reference to it in Chapter 10. In fact, I write about a quarter of the book, I'm guessing, out of sequence. I've inserted great chunks of dialogue into beginning sections, because I suddenly want to introduce some new event now, in this later piece of writing, and it needs an earlier clue. I imagine that all mystery writers must do this.

In a way, it's the opposite of revision, where we must remove irrelevant passages (despite how damned good they are). Just as I take out brilliantly conceived paragraphs, or even whole pages, I also need to insert things.

I'm surprised that writers would have a different take on this; I assumed everyone worked the way I do. I guess it could be perceived as scattered thinking, but life is scattered, when you think about it. We go along day-to-day, and things from our past unexpectedly come rushing in at us; events long-gone now intrude; memories temporarily blot out our present; a casual conversation reveals an unknown snippet of history that totally changes our view of someone or something. So it is with my writing.

In fact, during the writing process - not the "ass applied to the seat" work, but the internal writing, while I'm doing housework, walking, whatever - I am rarely thinking about the future content, other than the basic plot outline. I'm analyzing what's happened previously. Did he really say that in the right tone? Would she have done this willingly? Should she have spoken to him first, before acting on it?

Whatever method we use, it makes no difference to the final outcome, as long as we're enjoying the writing process - all of it. I don't like to hear that people are agonizing over their work. Of course it's brain-taxing, and often emotionally-draining, but it should always be a joy. It's temporarily painful to remove some of your brilliant words during revision, but I believe there should be nothing but love involved in adding to the original work. No tortured writer here.


A rather chicken-pecking word count yesterday - just 1600 words. They resented being put on the page, but are thankfully satisfying to read. It happens sometimes, doesn't it? The little writing muse tells us to back off a bit, take it easy. But I prefer Tally-ho! writing, the Boadicea approach. I have a feeling it will be back this weekend.

No changes to my stats this week. Still 9 Pending, 1 Partial, 1 Full, 10 No Response, 12 Rejections, for a total of 33 queries for Hafan Deg, my orphan in agent-land.

Have a good weekend, and - if you're lucky enough to have him in your life - show Dad you love him.

 

How Many Queries Are Too Many?

Very little work has been done on Strachan's Attic, you'll see. I'm moving into the main theme of the book now, and I need to get it right. I'm writing about the 1940s in some detail, and it needs to be spot on. I'm also reconsidering the use of that first person point of view. I feel strongly that Strachan has to be in your face, as it were, and I'm not sure if I can achieve that in the third person. But there are a lot of clever writers out there, including Melissa, who aren't fond of the current approach. I'll mull over it, ask Prof. Ostrom what he thinks - perhaps he'll write something about it to inspire me.

I've been researching more literary agents, which leads to a question that I should be able to find out myself, but thought one of you could answer immediately. How many submissions are too many at one time? I'm aware of the protocol in advising agents how many other queries are out there, but what's the acceptable maximum, if there is one?

I sent off two more queries in the last 48 hours, which brings the total distributed to twelve, and one of those agents wanted fifty pages, which is amazing; that's the most generous submission requirement I've seen so far. I've had no further rejections since the three I told you about on Monday. I am buzzing with adrenaline now, and want to send off more, but will wait to hear back from you.

They take a long time to compose, by the way, these letters, for those of you who aren't quite at that point yet. I have several synopses of from one paragraph up to three pages, and various styles of letters. But each agent is so different, so there's still customizing involved for them, re-reading, tweaking, before I push that Send button. The thing that occurs to me, each time I rearrange the words describing the book, is just how many aspects of the story there are. If you say this in the prescribed word limitation, perhaps you should have said this, instead. A lot of it comes back to your gut reaction to the agent's profile or blog, and the way their own words resonate with you.

I wish I could swing a deal with one of the people I've come to admire. I've wanted to say corny things in my letter like, "Oh, I so get you!", "I love all of Tom Hanks's movies, too!", "You're a Jobim nut!", "I thought I was the only one left who knew who Blossom Dearie was." Stuff like that. But these queries are meant to be business-like, and there's a fine line between that and slipping in fan mail that sounds gushy, taking into account the genre of the book. Well, that's my conclusion. Perhaps it would be fine with YA. If the rejects pile up, perhaps I'll rethink it.

Have a good, relaxing weekend. Be in love with your work.