Words and Music (or, Countdown to NaNoWriMo)

Here in the Eastern United States we're now down to under nine hours until 2011's National Novel Writing Month starts. I plan to get at least my first 500 words in tonight after midnight rolls around.

While I'm writing, I'll likely be listening to music. Just last night, I was chatting with a friend and critique partner of Twitter (@digitalinkwell) about what type of music we like to listen to while writing. Both of us like listening to instrumental music, particularly film scores.

Here's a list of ten CDs I like listening to while writing, seven soundtracks, one classical album, one jazz album, and Mogwai (which Wikipedia calls a "post-rock" band). All of these are available to legally stream using Spotify, as well, which is convenient for if you want to try hearing something new. The links below go to the Spotify pages for these CDs.

1. Tron: Legacy soundtrack (music by Daft Punk)
2. Spirited Away soundtrack (Joe Hisaishi)
3. Princess Mononoke Symponic Suite (Joe Hisaishi)
4. Passion - Music for The Last Temptation of Christ (Peter Gabriel)
5. Hardcore Will Never Die, But You Will (Mogwai)
6. The Dead Zone soundtrack (Michael Kamen)
7. Defiance soundtrack (James Newton Howard)
8. Vasily Kalinnikov Symphonies #1 & 2 (performance by National Symphony Orchestra of the Ukraine)
9. Dead Again soundtrack (Patrick Doyle)
10. 13th House (McCoy Tyner)

What's going to be on your playlist as you write in November?

Sunday Links: October 30th, 2011 Edition

I've been mentioning NaNoWriMo during each of these Sunday Link posts in October, now the time is almost at hand. I still have a bit of work I'd like to get done as prep work, but I have a reasonably good feeling about where I stand. Hopefully a week from today I'll still be feeling optimistic. Anyone who wants to be a writing buddy on the site and hasn't found me there yet can add me as a buddy via my NaNo site profile.

In addition to the good news I got earlier this week about my story being accepted as one of the winners for the October Kazka Press Flash Fiction contest I also heard today that my story "My Name is Imago Montoya..." finished in 8th place in the second Platform-Building Writers' Campaign challenge. Woo-hoo! Thanks to Saba from Of Thoughts and Words, Margo Kelly, and Janice Seagraves from Janice's Home for donating the prizes which I won and to Rachael Harrie and all the others who volunteered to coordinate the challenge.

Now for this week's links!

Dissecting the Short Story: "The Gap" by Mikal Trimm

Welcome to the new installment of my Dissecting the Short Story series where every other Friday I look at a recently-published short story from a major genre fiction publication.

Story:
"The Gap" by Mikal Trimm
Published in:
December 2011 Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine
Approximate Length:
2500 words
Presentation:
Third Person, Chronological
Summary [WARNING: Spoilers Included!]:

Winning Prompt and Upcoming Publication

Two quick news items. First, congratulations to David Powers King, whose prompt I've selected. If you didn't see the prompt, it is:

"A child finds a candlestick in the gutter on her way home from school."

Thanks, also, to scribblingpencil who also suggested a prompt. I liked the photo, but it didn't stir any immediate story ideas in me.

The story based on David's prompt will be published on Friday November 4th. I'll then be issuing a new call for prompts on Saturday November 5th, so if you want to participate in that round, start thinking about what you might want to prompt me with!

The second news item (also relating to prompted flash fictions, come to think of it) is that I've been informed that I am one of the winners of the October Kazka Press flash fiction contest. I'm very excited about this. It's my first publication in over a year and also the first of my "new" stories which has been accepted.

The Kazka Press story should be posted November 1st, I'll make sure to point everyone towards it when it's live.

The timing of this couldn't be better. As I mentioned to a friend on Twitter earlier today, I'd been getting to the point recently where I was really having to work hard at taking my own advice to "reject rejection" and not let writing frustrate me. Having this piece of good news (along with a small, but nice, personal comment on a rejection from a market I really hope to sell something to one day) has helped my mood immeasurably. A great boost going into this last pre-NaNoWriMo weekend.

One final note, I will be posting the Dissecting the Short Story article for this week tomorrow, but it may be on the late side.

I hope all of my readers are having good writing weeks. See you tomorrow at the Dissection!

Dissecting the Short Story Preview & October/November Goals

Every other Wednesday I announce the story for this week's "Dissecting the Short Story" entry, to be published on Friday. This week, I'll be looking at "The Gap" by Mikal Trimm from the December, 2011 issue of Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine. If you have a copy of that magazine and would like to "read along" with me, now would be the time!

Like in the previous entries from the "Dissecting the Short Story" series, I'll be looking at this story to see what techniques the writer used and decisions they made to help make the story effective. The ultimate goal is to use this information as a way of better understanding how professionally-published short stories are written.

7 Things to Do When You Feel Like You're Losing Your Mind

We've all been there, right? That feeling that you're just about to go absolutely bonkers and that if one more thing goes even vaguely not-just-right, you're going straight over the edge?

OK, but going over the edge isn't exactly a good life strategy. With NaNoWriMo coming up, a lot of writers are going to be dealing with some extra stress from the presence of that deadline. But other writers are dealing with deadlines of one kind or another all the time, be they from agents, editors, contests, or what have you.

And it's not just writers who deal with this feeling. There are a lot of holidays coming up, and while those provide many great experiences and memories for many people, they are also a great source of stress and agitation for many people.

So here's a list of 7 things to do when you feel like you're losing your mind:

1. Breathe. Oxygen is what drives our bodies and our brains. Also, for some people, focused breathing exercises can be a source of relaxation. If you're feeling panicked, one of the best short-term things you can do is be aware of your breathing.


2. Don't make rash decisions. For a writer, this could mean not pressing the button to delete some work that you've gotten frustrated with. For someone else, it could mean not sending out a hotly-worded email telling everyone not to bother showing up for Thanksgiving. Conceivably there could be good reasons to do either of those two things, but make sure you've slept on it, and don't act in the heat of the moment.


3. Talk to someone about it. For writers this can be very easy -- there are lots of places to vent about your frustration with writing, from Twitter to blogs to forums like the Absolute Write Water Cooler. For general like issues, though, this can be hard, especially if part of your stress comes from interpersonal issues in the first place. But letting it all stew inside of you can be a path to greater stress levels. Try to find someone who's a good "sounding-board" who won't be emotionally involved. They may end up giving you a bit of a reality check -- there may be things you're doing which are increasing your own stress -- but sometimes that's what we need to hear.


4. Take a break and do something "guaranteed" to be fun. This is a good thing for when you're feeling "stuck" in some way and are having trouble making progress. So, if you've been staring at the screen for a long time and haven't gotten much accomplished, it may mean you need to take a break. Sometimes the best thing to do is to set the situation aside for a few hours and do something which you'll almost certainly enjoy -- watch a favorite movie, go to a favorite restaurant, do some type of exercise you really get pleasure from. When you come back -- and you need to make sure that you plan to come back to what you need to get done -- you may find that your perspective has changed and, if nothing else, your mood should be better.


5. Take care of your body. This is not the time to be skipping meals, drinking to excess, or going without sleep. When you're under a lot of stress, you need your body and mind to be as sharp as possible.


6. Make sure you're doing the most important things first. If your stress is being driven in part by feeling overwhelmed by the number of demands on your time, make sure that you are prioritizing effectively. There are lots of different ways of looking at this, but one is to divide tasks up into "Urgent and Important" (which means they are both time-sensitive and of value to you), "Non-Urgent and Important" (so there is little or no time pressure, but it's of value), "Urgent but Non-Important", and "Non-Urgent and Non-Important." An example for each of these could be:
   
   • "Urgent and Important" - Submitting an entry to a contest before its deadline.
   • "Non-Urgent and Important" - Finishing a final draft of a short story before submitting it to a magazine with open submissions.
   • "Urgent but Non-Important" - Incoming messages on Instant Messenger or similar tools. ("Non-Important" here can depend somewhat on context. If this is an important professional message or an important person in your support network, such messages may not go here. If it's someone pinging you "just to chat" while you're deep in trying to get your main character out of the jam you put him in, then it probably belongs here and maybe this would be a good time to turn off the IM software.)
   • "Non-Urgent and Non-Important" - Watching an episode of a TV show you don't really have any interest in just because it's on. (And it's OK to have leisure time, even when -- sometimes especially when -- you're stressed, but there may be better choices for that leisure time than something left on the TV "just because.")
     
   
   Remember that the "Important" piece of that depends on your goals and values, not mine or anyone else's. So the examples above definitely shouldn't be taken as a statement of what should or shouldn't be "Important" to you or anyone else.


7. Remember that you are not your writing. So even if you're feeling like your writing is a complete wreck, that does not make YOU a complete wreck. Everybody has a multitude of roles which they play in their life. If it's your writing (or some other specific part of your life) which is driving your feelings of stress, work to remember that you have value in many other aspects of your life as well.

I hope that one or more of these tips are helpful to you in dealing with stress either as part of your writing life or simply life in general. What do you find helps you when you're feeling stressed?

Sunday Links: October 23, 2011 Edition

With just over a week remaining until NaNoWriMo kicks off, I finally got some decent planning time in yesterday. Nowhere near as much as I probably should have, but enough that I felt good about what I had accomplished. I've got the main very-high-level story arc nicely laid out and the main character's family tree about 40% complete. I want to get to the point where I have a reasonably-detailed outline done by the end of next Sunday. By the way, if you are looking for an online tool to make a family tree, Family Echo seems to work really well.

Normally I wait until the very bottom of these links posts to tout anything of my own, but I do want to draw attention to my new "Call & Response" Flash Fiction series. The basic idea here is that readers can propose prompts for me to write a flash fiction based on. The prompts can be anything at all: a picture, a song, a concept, whatever. I'll pick my favorite prompt, write a story based on it, publish it on the blog AND send a $5 Amazon gift card to the person who provided the chosen prompt. This seems like it could be a lot of fun for all of us.

And, yes, along with counting down the days to NaNoWriMo, I'm still counting down the days until I can replace phone with one of Sprint's new iPhones. Playing with the one my wife bought has definitely convinced me that this is a good choice for me.

Now for this week's links!