What I Didn’t Say to Oksana Was

  • by jendeal with things in the proper fashion
  • I have a good relationship with the Fahey family
  • pastel-hued ketchup packets
  • I would probably take my bra off as well
  • which necessitated three visits from the police

Tune in next time part 483      Click Here for Earlier Installments

What I didn’t say to Oksana was “well they certainly aren’t *good* ninjas” although I was sorely tempted. Instead I feigned Jason’s infamous curiosity and boyish wonder and said, “Really? Then what are they?” Being a General of the Mountain Garrisons, it behooved me to deal with things in the proper fashion, especially when those things were a potential invasion army.

“Why they’re yetis, of course,” Oksana trilled. “I have a good relationship with the Fahey family, and they’ve taught me how to train the yeti in the ways of the shadow warrior. It’s coming along quite well, as you can see for yourself.”

I myself have a good relationship with the Faheys, and they’d never mentioned ninjas in my presence. I was gaining all sorts of new insights today.

Before I could press Oksana for more information, Tatiana and John strode into the cavern. Tatiana’s abdomen was bulging with the child or children we had conceived on the crystal throne of Mingus Mint. John was wearing a ski outfit that looked like it was made from pastel-hued ketchup packets.

“I’m here representing Viscount Arlo of Svenborgia,” John announced.

“And I’m representing the Crystal Clown,” said Tatiana. “She’s even more pregnant than I am and couldn’t travel.” She winked at me. “You missed your chance, Jason. But you’re about to be an uncle several times over.”

“You’re a tough woman to brave these mountains in your condition,” said Oksana. “If I were you, I would stay at home with my shoes off and my feet up. I would probably take my bra off as well. Respect.”

Tatiana dipped her chin.

As more auction participants made their way into the chamber, I tried to keep track of them all. It reminded me of the Homecoming party during my senior year at the Academy, an event which necessitated three visits from the police, two from Interpol, and one from the International Siblinghood of Street Performers, who were there on a recruiting mission.

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Embiggening

Son of Music Novel (Book 3 of our Music Series), is a chonk. A whopper. A massive tome. And we’re currently making it bigger. The enhugening is happening on the micro scale, the macro scale, and everywhere in between. On the smaller end of the spectrum are the missing words we’ve since found and inserted in their proper places (thanks beta readers!). Next along, size-wise, are the places where our readers asked for clarification or additional detail. A sentence or two, maybe a paragraph. Nothing scary on its own, but it starts to add up. Largest of all will be the new scenes. Yes, even as big as this puppy is, our beta readers felt there were a few story beats that needed a little more attention. Kent already tackled one of them, adding two pages to an existing scene, and blending the edges expertly. The other two will be entirely new scenes, and as such they’ll need stubs before they’re written. Which means that Jen will need to write the stubs, which she’ll get to as soon as she tackles a few more of the medium-size changes.

What goes up must come down. Even word counts. Our next step will be to roll up our sleeves and start the sometimes messy process of editing. We’re just fattening the manuscript up so we can make a good meal of it.

 

Oksana Smirked

  • by Kentlooks like he smells bad
  • very superstitious
  • two inches deep
  • called it my initiation ritual
  • I had an active fantasy life

Tune in next time part 482      Click Here for Earlier Installments

Oksana smirked. “Hoping to gain an edge during the auction? Looking for inside info? None of that! I know all about you, Jason. I did a thorough background before sending any invitations. Yours said, ‘He looks like he smells bad but most of the time it’s not an issue.’ So, there’s no way you can surprise me.”

“Surprise!” came a familiar, lisping voice from the cavern entrance. He beat-boxed for a second and then chanted, “My name is Jason and I am fashionably early for the auction.”

Dammit! Jason would probably be more convincing as himself than I was.

“What now?” Oksana crowed. “Two Jasons? My background check didn’t say anything about there being two Jasons!”

“He’s my twin brother,” I lisped. “He likes to pretend he’s me. Can’t blame him.”

Oksana looked from me to Jason and back. “Why should I believe you’re the real one?”

“Because I was here first?” I tried.

“We Colloquillians are deeply suspicious people by nature,” she said. “And we’re also very superstitious about punctuality. Since you were, in fact, more fashionable in your earliness, I’m inclined to believe you.”

“But I have the invitation right here!” the real Jason complained.

“Easily forged,” Oksana said with a flip of her hand. “You will be held in the lower chambers until after the auction, when I will decide what to do with you.” Several of the yeti statues unfroze and chivvied Jason out of the cavern. “He’ll be fine,” she said to me, sotto voce. “The lower chamber floods sometimes, but right now the water is only two inches deep. When I arrived here that was where I lived, by choice. I called it my initiation ritual, and it truly was because it earned me the respect of these majestic creatures. They are not as they appear, you know.” Her voice dropped to a harsh whisper. “They’re not really ninjas!”

I nodded knowingly, but inside I just wished I had an active fantasy life like hers.

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I Tried to Banish All Memories of Roxie

  • by jenflexed, wet and warm
  • “Stick knives in dead people.”
  • in real time
  • so violently that his bones clattered
  • It’s a confounded nuisance

Tune in next time part 481      Click Here for Earlier Installments

I tried to banish all memories of Roxie under my desk, muscles flexed, wet and warm mouth poised just so… but it was, literally, quite hard. Luckily the names Roxie and Oksana sound quite similar, so I just repeated my last mumbled utterance, only with one important edit.

“What was that, Oksie?”

“I didn’t say anything,” she said, eyes narrowed. She circled me, scrutinizing, comparing me to the photos of Jason on her phone.

I lisped, “Stick knives in dead people.” That was a Colloquialism I had picked up from my former lover. It meant something like “I want to jump your bones in real time.”

Oksana cocked one of her thick black eyebrows. Meanwhile, Jim startled so violently that his bones clattered. He tried to cover his reaction with another drug-induced bird call.

“I’ve heard you were bold, Jason,” Oksana said. “But I had no idea just how bold. Unfortunately for you, I’m not at all interested in stabbing corpses.” Her eyes flicked to Jim and back. “At least not with you.”

“It’s a confounded nuisance having Jim for a brother,” I said, trying to sound disappointed. “But if you like him so much, why are you selling him?”

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Writing Cave Progress Report

Update on the Music Series: After completing the read-through for the whole trilogy, we made a few tiny little adjustments to Book One. We then collated all the input from our critique group and beta readers for Book Three, and all the stuff we wanted to take action on has been transferred into the live Scrivener project. It was a few dozen items, mostly pretty small. We say it was a few dozen because Jen has been knocking things off the list at a truly impressive pace. Meanwhile, Kent dug in on a couple of the not-so-small issues and has made great progress on them. Fewer items getting checked off the list, but a comparable degree of progress.

We did discuss working on Book Two after we got Book One tidied up. Because, you know, they go in order that way. Here’s the thing. Book Two is the one we wrote third. Thus, it hasn’t had as much time to rest, and we haven’t had a chance to circulate it for feedback. Therefore, we’re still doing this series inside-out.

“I Really Have To Object”

  • by Kentshaped like natural birds
  • tight-pressed against her bosom
  • vibrating sensuously
  • party where I met Jim
  • take out his penis at his desk

Tune in next time part 480      Click Here for Earlier Installments

“I really have to object,” I huffed. Oksana narrowed her eyes, so I rolled mine. Of course I was going to acquiesce, but just as Jason would I needed to drag things out a bit. For dramatic effect.

As I hiked up my coat and the vest with the silver buttons so she could inspect my lower back, I was a little nervous. The scars at the base of my spine were shaped like natural birds, and I hoped she’d decide they passed. After a minute she harrumphed, so I straightened up and turned to face her. She still had her phone out, tight-pressed against her bosom. Her expression was unreadable. Just as she seemed about to speak, she got a call. Her phone’s buzzing distracted her, leaving her vibrating sensuously along with it.

“Aren’t you going to answer that?” I wisecracked. Her quivering little smile reminded me of the party where I met Jim‘s longest-term girlfriend, Roxie. Roxie stood out in my memory, because she became my stalker and targeted me for carnal ambush from time to time. A man tends to remember a woman who liked to take out his penis at his desk, which she’d been hiding underneath. (Underneath the desk, obviously.)

“What was that, Roxie?” I muttered.

Oksana and Jim each shot me a sharp look.

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“When Does This Damn Auction Start?”

  • by jenlocated at the base of your spine
  • enough face cream
  • Sorry honey!
  • a language that literally no one
  • a picture of you in the folder

Tune in next time part 479      Click Here for Earlier Installments

“When does this damn auction start?” I bellowed, striding into the cavern. “Don’t tell me I missed it!” I tried to act as cocky and entitled as the diplomats and spymasters my mother tended to hang out with. My wooden climbing boots gave me a stilted, clattering gait.

My brashness startled Oksana’s yeti minions. Their ninja training took over, and startled ninjas always freeze and attempt to camouflage themselves. I was suddenly surrounded by a forest of frozen yeti statues.

“Jason!” cried Jim in faux-surprise. “You bastard!” And then he made another bird call, this one decidedly less Himalayan.

Oksana straightened her spine and approached me. “You’re not late at all. In fact you’re early. I have to double check your identity, of course. I’m sure you understand. I have a picture of you in the folder of auction material on my phone, which I will now pull out of my cleavage.” She did so. While she compared me to the photo of my twin on her phone, she muttered to herself in Colloquillian, a language that literally no one outside of Colloquillia knew. Except for me. I had a Colloquillian lover years ago, who taught me the basics, after making me promise never to use my knowledge for espionage. That was a promise I now had to break. Sorry honey!

What Oksana was muttering wasn’t very enlightening, though. Something along the lines of “with enough face cream I guess literally anyone can stay youthful.”

I kept my mouth shut while she perused me, so that she wouldn’t see the golden tattoos on my tongue. My brother and I tended to copy each other’s distinguishing features, but as far as I knew, Jason didn’t have those. At least not yet.

“Now Jason, in order to confirm that it is you and not your twin, I need to see the crescent-shaped scar located at the base of your spine.” She smiled without showing her teeth. “I’m sure you understand.”

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You Gotta Love What You Do

It’s surprisingly common to find remarks from writers to the effect of, “if you don’t hate what you’re writing, then it must not be any good.” In a world awash with bad advice for writers, this stands out as perhaps some of the worst. (Especially if what you’re writing is a novel.)

Writing a novel is a commitment. It will probably take years. The writing itself will likely take many months, and then there are revisions. A novel-in-progress is often likened to a child, which is a fair analogy. If it’s more like an irritating roommate, maybe things aren’t going to work out. The idea that throughout such an undertaking you should expect to feel powerful negative emotions about the thing you’re creating… no.

You do need a certain critical distance. Saying you love the work doesn’t mean you don’t want to see it improve. That’s what the revisions are for. Allow it to be flawed, and don’t hate it for its imperfections. Circle back and put in better words.

So, why would anyone say such a thing? Why would they want you to hate your work? They don’t want that. What’s really going on there is that the writing process is often frustrating. Especially if your goals are ambitious, it’s likely that the early drafts will not really work, and it’ll be hard not to feel discouraged about that. Many novices expect the perfect flowering of their thoughts to just land on the page. That’s not typical. A common mistake is trying to combine the modes for initial creation and fine-tuning, which puts you into a very stressful bind of not being able to please the internal editor.

If you find yourself genuinely hating what you’re working on, lay it aside. Put it in time-out and give yourself a break from it. Maybe it’s not what you should be trying to write. Maybe just move on. But maybe giving yourself some space will help you see its strengths and weaknesses objectively, in which case you might feel inspired about it again.

Another thing to reflect on is your process. If you’ve always been a pantser, and you seem to spend a lot of time resenting your works in progress, there could be a connection there. Try giving yourself a rough outline, or imposing some other light framework, and see how it feels. (Full disclosure: Rune Skelley has a highly developed and structured process. That’s what most of these blog posts are about. But, we’re all different, so what works for us might not be the answer for you. If you’ve used a detailed process and you’re still having trouble? Maybe what you need to do is write without a net sometimes, take a break from planning.)

The final point to make about this “hate your own work” ethos is that it’s probably often borne of isolation. Writing is generally seen as a solitary occupation, but Rune Skelley is here to tell you it doesn’t have to be that way. Working with a co-author inoculates you from the creeping doubt that can afflict someone toiling alone. If you don’t have an actual writing partner, form a good partnership with some beta readers, or participate in a critique group. A network gives you support as a human being, and (hopefully) constructive input about the issues in the work.

“It’s Time to Get You Presentable”

  • by Kentwear that light blue sports jacket with your cream-colored trousers
  • conceal her nudity from strangers
  • her temperamental, boundaryless sidekick
  • has a urologist on call
  • opens the umbrella, but that’s not going to work

Tune in next time part 478      Click Here for Earlier Installments

“It’s time to get you presentable,” Oksana said. “We’re giving you a sort of dissipated restauranteur look, so you’ll wear that light blue sports jacket with your cream-colored trousers. Why are you still on the floor? Get up! Oh.” She paused and unlocked his restraints, producing a key from an impossible pocket in the taut white fur jumpsuit she had chosen as a way to conceal her nudity from strangers. “Now, hurry up and get dressed.”

Jim made his odd, keening bird call again as he donned the garments Oksana accepted from her temperamental, boundaryless sidekick yeti. It’s costume was quite obviously too tight, especially in certain key zones. “I hope he has a urologist on call,” I muttered.

Everyone froze. Dammit, I thought, I know how much my voice resonates in caverns and tunnels! I stayed still as Oksana used hand gestures to direct her furry minions in their search. I was doomed to be found. My stillness was like a man with an umbrella who steps into an avalanche, then opens the umbrella, but that’s not going to work. I had only seconds to come up with a plan, with both my life and my brother’s hanging in the balance.

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The Himalayan Snowcock is Not an Especially Terrifying Bird

  • by jensoiling his opponent’s pants
  • telling you she loves you
  • none of the children believed their father
  • and a haggis
  • touch the marks on my arms

Tune in next time part 477      Click Here for Earlier Installments

The Himalayan Snowcock is not an especially terrifying bird. Due to traumatic events in his childhood, though, my nemesis John feared them so violently that hearing their call would often lead to him soiling his opponent’s pants in addition to his own. It was nearly as frightening as my mother telling you she loves you, which my siblings and I all dread. She only says that when she wants something from you, and the things she wants are always terrible. In my family, none of the children believed their father when he told them that their mother was a misunderstood, kindhearted soul. We all knew she was as ruthless as a wolf that ate both a haggis and a haggis maker.

As I took a moment to touch the marks on my arms left by my mother’s tattoo artist when I was just a boy, I hoped that neither she nor John would appear at this auction.

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