It's Been Touch and Go with my Adviser

My adviser and I haven't been meeting as regularly as I would like. Partly because of illness. Hopefully, we'll be able to hook up this Friday. In the meantime, I've completed work on the initial draft of my thesis. It's 102 pages in length and now has a working title. There are a total of twelve stories in all.

I've put the stories in an order that makes sense to me. The shorter flash pieces have been put at the end of the longer stories as an anchor to the others, as was suggested by my adviser.

One of the stories in my thesis has been published by Bewildering Stories. Another is forthcoming.

Hopefully, I won't have that much to do with re-writing or editing (because I'm doing that now). I'm looking forward to finally finishing this project and moving on to writing stories at my leisure.

I currently have two stories out being considered by other publications, and incubating others. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

Jury Duty was Interesting

Well, Jury Duty was interesting--as usual. I was able to come up with a few ideas for future stories. Actually, since I've been going to jury duty for over thirty years, I sat down with myself and started reminiscing about all of my jury duty experiences. Since they're all cumulative, I think I can come up with a bunch of stories that will keep me busy writing for months.

I still find it interesting that I know of people who have never been summoned for duty, but I get called every two years like clockwork.

Anyway, I've been working diligently away on my thesis. I'm meeting with my adviser tomorrow for a sit-down. I'll find out then if I'm on the right track with my writing. I currently have eleven completed stories finished (both short and flash) and two assignments he gave me the last time we met.

I rewrote one of my published stories and then took that same story and gave my narrator a background. It could be considered a prequel.

In the meantime, I've decided to use a couple of characters I've already created as the connecting thread to my story collection. If my adviser is not keen to the idea, I may have to go back to square one if I can't effectively defend my decision to use them in that way.

I'll let you know.

Jury Duty or a Smorgasbord of Ideas

Today, for the umpteenth time in over thirty years (that's once every two years for three decades), I will be performing my civic duty.

I'm going to use this most recent experience as a practice ground for getting ideas for stories.

Lots to Write, Much to do

I just finished working on my adviser's latest assignment: a second rewrite of my "Bully Factor" story. But this time, I had to give more detail about the narrator. I emailed it to him yesterday. I feel comfortable with what I wrote, but I think I could do more. I tried to give the reader more insight into the narrator's personality.

What I did for the rewrite was give some background about the narrator that fit the overall story without changing the focus of it. It's still a story about the school bully pushing around a group of nerdy kids, but now I've briefly explained how the narrator fits in with these kids and kept it to within 750 words.

Since my thesis is a collection of short stories, and my adviser wants me to experiment with my writing, I think I'm going to tell the story again, but this time focus on my narrator. The bully story will still be told. Only this time, I'm going to tell it from the mind of the narrator. I intend to make him more subjective in his narration and less objective.

My adviser has also asked me to work up a theme that will link all of my stories together so that they seem more cohesive and less like a bunch of stories thrown together. I have an idea of how I might accomplish that.

More on that later.

Met with My Adviser : now the hard part begins

Well, I finally met with my adviser for the first time this semester. He had a lot to say and a lot to get me started thinking about.

One of the first things he did before we met was give me a writing assignment. Since my area of interest is in flash fiction, he asked me to rewrite the last short story I published and turn it into a flash fiction story.

During the hour and a half in his office, we talked a good deal about the focus of my thesis project. I do need a theme or focus. It can't be just a bunch of stories gathered together. I understand that. We discussed some of the stories I already turned in. One has been scratched totally as not being appropriate enough. I would need to do some serious re-writing to make it fit. I'll put that on the back burner for a future project.

Another story I'm working on has no ending. I'm having problems coming up with one. As soon as I do, I'll turn it in to him.

Two of the stories I submitted to him have been accepted by Bewildering Stories for publication in future issues. He's only aware of one of them and we discussed it. He had some issues with it, but it just goes to show you how arbitrary writing is and how one publication may not accept something but another will.

In the meantime, I have to rewrite yet again my last published story. Now it's got to be not only flash, but from the personal point of view of my narrator. In other words, I now have to convey why he is who he is.

Doing independent study is not like sitting in a classroom, but it's more demanding because I now have to discipline myself to write and to meet deadlines in a slightly unstructured format.

Wow! I Can't Believe its beenTwo Weeks

It's been quite a while since my last post. In that time, I've submitted a total of five short stories to my faculty adviser. (I've already passed the minimum page requirement.) I've met with him once and am scheduled to meet with him again this coming Friday. We haven't set a definite time yet. He's supposed to get back to me with the specifics.

I've even had another story accepted by Bewildering Stories. What make this one so special is it's one of the stories I sent to my adviser for my thesis project. I told him that one of the stories he's reading was accepted for publication, but I won't tell him which one. I want to get his feedback on the story without him knowing which one it is.

I'm working on two more stories that I would like to get to him before Friday so that we'll have something substantial to discuss.

Working on this thesis project has taken a lot of time. But there is one positive motivating factor. The story that got accepted should definitely have no problem becoming part of the thesis. I can include any story I'm working on as long as it has not been previously published. The story that got accepted was not previously published and will probably not be published before my thesis is complete. I'm guessing, from past experience, that it will take six to eight months before Bewildering Stories publishes it.

In plan to continue working on my thesis and submitting stories I think might stand a chance of getting published.

In the meantime, not only am I plugging away at writing, I'm still reading J. R. Ward and listening to J. D. Robb. I have to get back to Gena Showalter.

One of the things I've been practicing is writing snazzy opening sentences. I've discovered in my writing that if I'm not comfortable with the first sentence or first few sentences, my stories fall flat. This seems to be true of my non-fiction writing as well.

Ive also discovered that having an ending helps. I'm working on a story for my thesis where I have a vague idea for an ending; my story has changed so drastically since I started writing it, that I'm going to need a completely new ending. Unfortunately, this is one of those cases where the story is writing itself, but the ending is eluding me.

Sometimes it helps if you start with an ending and build a story around it. This particular story started with a snazzy opening sentence and has turned into an endless adventure.

I think I'm going to have to use my felt sense for this one.

I Turned in My Third Story

Well, I finished working on the draft of that third story I was going to submit when I submitted first two. I got an email from my adviser letting me know he got the two. Now I've got to wait to see if he got the latest one.

I said before that I held back on it because I needed to add more to it. I finally ended up with a 33-page short story. I think (if my adviser lets it stand) I can break it up into two to four parts. I've never written anything in my life that was this many pages. Once I got started, I just couldn't stop. But I believe I now have a story with a beginning, middle, and end that work and that make sense. The ten pages I originally had seem so incomplete now.

I never realized how much time I'd be putting into independent study. Between work, writing, and life, I'm REALLY busy. Whew! I don't see how some writers are able to knock out stories, novels, or whatever, boom, boom, boom. Like that. Since June, I've produced three complete drafts (I'm working on two more.) And that's over a period of two months.

I can definitely understand how some writers stop everything and seclude themselves from the world so they can devote themselves to their craft. If I didn't have to work for a living, I'd consider it myself.