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Aug. 14th, 2018
Lake Lewisia #195
Aug. 14th, 2018 05:08 pmAlternative energy had quite the following around Lewisia and the encouragement of the city’s planning department. Homeowners chose among rooftop solar panels, lunar panels, wind turbines (outside city limits only), astral mills, and dream-fueled generators. The main issue remained storage options, with batteries and black stone tablets having their limitations, and yearly contests hosted by the college offered incentives for development.
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LL#195
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LL#195
five years and the depth of ignorance
Aug. 14th, 2018 06:19 pmToday is the five year anniversary of my first self-published fiction. Like, up for sale on Amazon, has a cover and boilerplate and everything, P U B L I S H E D.
And I have known this date was coming up, and I have expected it to cause unwelcome emotions. After all, I know to expect a drop every time I publish something, just from the adrenaline letdown; a reminder of my cumulative publications seemed likely to cause more of the same. And I'm hormonal and overworked right now, so my resistance is low. It's just that the emotions aren't coming from the direction I expected.
I expected the distress to be about how much I have or have not published in five years. It is not a lot! I am not well pleased by this, it's true. Especially when I very much need to transform myself into the sort of person who writes and publishes such a goddamn deluge of fiction, I can afford to live on that alone and stop killing myself in restaurants. Not producing fast enough is, like, my top anxiety gremlin.
Mostly, though, I was struck by the continued depth of my ignorance. Whatever I have learned about the practice of writing, from dozens of classes and articles and events and podcasts and mentorship, it does not seem to have made a dent. Writing still frequently feels like a mystery.
How do I get myself to write? Faster? More? Smarter?
Why do some stories finish in an instant? Why do some have endings that evaporate as I search for them?
How does plot work? Structure? Pacing? What are the reliable mechanics of story?
Why do some stories that seem to rush, burning, straight from my heart turn tepid and saggy when I try to revise them? Why do I need to tell some stories yet cannot make them work for anyone else?
How can I surprise readers when so much seems to have been said and done already? How can I surprise myself? Why is surprise necessary?
Where is the market for the stories I want to tell? Why do I have such a hard time reaching it?
What do I enjoy in stories? How can I hang onto that joy?
And sometimes, when I am feeling very low and can see only the flatlined sales and the magazine rejections:
What am I doing wrong?
I published that first little collection in 2013, when my entire life was falling apart. I'd had a nervous breakdown, I was a situational mute, I couldn't keep down food most days. I was seriously figuring out the logistics of living out of my car, because I was going to lose my home.
I put together this collection of flash fiction about robots and bodies and survival. I did it out of spite more than anything. To spit in the eye of the people and the world that were trying to eradicate me. I barely remember the process, because it all happened in a kind of fugue state. I taught myself everything from scratch in a couple months: how to finish, properly finish, stories fast and right; how to design covers, albeit rubbish ones; how to layout ebooks in four different formats across three different programs; how to run shop software off my site.
Five years on, and it feels like I have learned nothing. That my ignorance of storytelling and publishing both are so profound, I could never hope to rise above them.
And I have known this date was coming up, and I have expected it to cause unwelcome emotions. After all, I know to expect a drop every time I publish something, just from the adrenaline letdown; a reminder of my cumulative publications seemed likely to cause more of the same. And I'm hormonal and overworked right now, so my resistance is low. It's just that the emotions aren't coming from the direction I expected.
I expected the distress to be about how much I have or have not published in five years. It is not a lot! I am not well pleased by this, it's true. Especially when I very much need to transform myself into the sort of person who writes and publishes such a goddamn deluge of fiction, I can afford to live on that alone and stop killing myself in restaurants. Not producing fast enough is, like, my top anxiety gremlin.
Mostly, though, I was struck by the continued depth of my ignorance. Whatever I have learned about the practice of writing, from dozens of classes and articles and events and podcasts and mentorship, it does not seem to have made a dent. Writing still frequently feels like a mystery.
How do I get myself to write? Faster? More? Smarter?
Why do some stories finish in an instant? Why do some have endings that evaporate as I search for them?
How does plot work? Structure? Pacing? What are the reliable mechanics of story?
Why do some stories that seem to rush, burning, straight from my heart turn tepid and saggy when I try to revise them? Why do I need to tell some stories yet cannot make them work for anyone else?
How can I surprise readers when so much seems to have been said and done already? How can I surprise myself? Why is surprise necessary?
Where is the market for the stories I want to tell? Why do I have such a hard time reaching it?
What do I enjoy in stories? How can I hang onto that joy?
And sometimes, when I am feeling very low and can see only the flatlined sales and the magazine rejections:
What am I doing wrong?
I published that first little collection in 2013, when my entire life was falling apart. I'd had a nervous breakdown, I was a situational mute, I couldn't keep down food most days. I was seriously figuring out the logistics of living out of my car, because I was going to lose my home.
I put together this collection of flash fiction about robots and bodies and survival. I did it out of spite more than anything. To spit in the eye of the people and the world that were trying to eradicate me. I barely remember the process, because it all happened in a kind of fugue state. I taught myself everything from scratch in a couple months: how to finish, properly finish, stories fast and right; how to design covers, albeit rubbish ones; how to layout ebooks in four different formats across three different programs; how to run shop software off my site.
Five years on, and it feels like I have learned nothing. That my ignorance of storytelling and publishing both are so profound, I could never hope to rise above them.
