Preconceptions

Via: Daily Prompt – Label

Image: Pixabay

Are writer’s quick to judge? If writers habitually sit around in public places, siphoning characters out of their neighbors, are their inspirations founded on preconceptions programmed into their outlook of society? I mean, sure, they add onto what they see but would it be correct to say that their imagination is still founded on stereotypes that they are prepossessed to notice?

WRITING CHRONICLES #11: Character Independence

Via: Daily Prompt – Abstract & Pattern

Image: Pixabay, CC

I recently came to learn that most of my fellow writers pick characters off real life. They sit around in coffee shops and roadside bistros, watching their neighbors and making up stories about them. This practice is, apparently, more common than when you watch TV on mute and try to feed dialogues to the people on the screen. Mind blowing, right? I always wondered how writers felt so comfortable tapping away at the keyboard in coffee shops. Turns out, they are really just describing their surroundings. Not a bad writing tip, I thought. Should speed up the process of character creation some.

My characters come completely out of my head – just as my stories come to me when a real life situation strikes me as though it didn’t pan out the way they should have. So I try to “fix” things, albeit in fiction, where my muddled heroes and heroines stumble around until they learn “the right way” of living. I’m a big fan of justice, and when justice is not to be found in the real world, I make up worlds of my own. I’m really a very balanced person.

The problem is if my characters come right out of my head, how do I allow them to become independent of who I am? When I already know the way I want my characters to behave at the end (to serve the moral I wish to convey), how do I let their journey become independent of mine? Also, it would be a terrible bore if every character turned out to be an extension of me. 

Just Add Salt

Via: Daily Prompt – Nuance

There’s a loaded word. I always felt that nuances exist on the precipice of stereotypes. You take the expectations cultural dogmas have conditioned in you and add a little something-something. Voila! You have nuanced characters for your stories. Personally, I use the following template to guide me when creating my characters. This should help a few writers.

 

Image: Someone on Tumblr

 

WRITING CHRONICLES #09: Five

Via: Daily Prompt – Arid

Image: Alexandra Koch, Pixabay

Some five years ago, an interview with a college consultant motivated me to start blogging. A brief meeting with him informed me of the budding world of independent publication when he questioned me why I’m letting a delay in studying creative writing keep me from becoming a novelist. He showed me his friend’s WordPress blog and how this friend had set up an enterprise for himself online, already with a few novels published beyond the traditional channel. This consultant had practically chastised me for not taking the initiative on my own and I am so grateful to him. I don’t remember his name or his friend’s blog site, and I wasn’t yet convinced about self-publishing a “book”, but I was ready to start focusing on building a career as a novelist.

So I opened this blog on February 25, 2012, with the hope that having a live audience would shame me into finally finish writing a full novel. In the end, I did sort of self-publish a novel on this site with serialized posts of the chapters. And even though procrastination ensued now and again, and for long periods at a stretch, I so appreciate the habit working on this blog instilled in me. I started the blog with the objective “It’s a site to make sure I write” and it made sure I wrote.

The career path I was on, tough I enjoyed, did not harbor an everlasting appeal for me. Life seemed barren, my dreams left to dry without nourishment. Now? I live, I thrive.

Image: Vinegar and Brown Paper

INSTRUMENTAL LOVE (04 min read)

Via: Daily Prompt – Seriousness

Image: Zaireen Lupa

I’ve been using my laptop since January 2011. Upon becoming a corporate lady, it was the first piece of machinery I had bought by saving up paycheck by paycheck. I had put in almost a year’s wait while searching for the ideal laptop and, once I found it, for it to receive its tech reviews. I had a friend bring it in from Singapore and it has been my companion these six years.

Oh, Dell Studio XPS 1647, how I love you!

It hasn’t been the smoothest of relationships. Immediately, it started showing speed adjustment issues. If I would even turn on Google Chrome while running my media player, it would throttle for a few seconds. Of course, I was not tech-savvy or laptop-savvy enough at the time to get what was happening. I would hear the sound break, get stuck, and panic until it went away. I looked it up online but not knowing what keywords to search for, I didn’t find any solution. I comforted myself that it was just a temporary break in time so it should be fine. It wasn’t. 

WRITING CHRONICLES #03: Soiled Hands

 

Image: Saiko Weiss, Flickr

When getting into the process of writing a book, I think all of us worry at some point what if we are throwing pebbles into a bottomless abyss. This is not taking into account that about 80% of the people in our lives thinks we are crazy to pursue such an endeavor. What matters is that we are brave enough to chase after our dreams. We believe in our potentials as writers and therefore guard the manuscripts stingily. Not allowing anyone to read them even for the purpose of receiving feedback until “they are ready”. Only showing the finished works to a handful of very trusted friends, hopefully, true enough not to evade giving their honest opinions but kind enough to word their criticisms constructively.

 

But if we really wish to be published, at some point, we must send out copies of our manuscripts to strangers. These maybe professional beta readers, an agent to gain representation or even directly the publishers themselves. They’re now out there, available for abuse, ridicule and rejection. But we take the bold steps because we loved working on them, and which parent has not wanted to show off their baby’s accomplishments at some point? We hope that someone will see the value of our effort, believe that we are the next best thing to happen to the publishing industry. A publisher will kiss their lucky star that they got a hold of our manuscripts before someone else picked them up. We are prepared to weather what J.K. Rowling went through – even if our work does not become a billion dollar global franchise.

But what if our work is the next best-seller and someone wants to pilfer it? No, we are not so naïve that we did not ever consider the possibility. Yet, we take a chance on fate because with fear, we can never get ahead. Our work deserves to be read and therefore we test our luck. However, sometimes luck does not favor us. I was reminded of this when I read a post by a fellow blogger earlier this weekend. Jarring, the experience was – to be shown again that integrity is one of the rarest commodities in any industry.

For those of you who have been following my blog already know that after years of dabbling I only recently took up writing full-time. While preoccupation with my career was the primary reason, another reason was wondering if I would manage to get my manuscript ever picked up. I am sitting in Bangladesh writing fiction based on American characters for primarily a Western audience – what are the possibilities of finding representation and a publisher willing to take the hassle of working with me, right? And I harbor all of those hang-ups on how easy it would be for someone to steal my work once I send out my manuscripts overseas or for people to swindle me out of a worthy contract since it would be so challenging for me to take it to court. This aside from the apparent 30% withdrawal income tax I would have to pay the US government for being a foreign payee! But I somehow managed to convince myself that no, God willing, I will only find decent people down the road and I will get published and people will love my romance novels…

Then I read this blog and all those fears just came back. Because I know what it feels like to have my work stolen, to see someone else’s name on the cover of my writing. Soon after I finished my Bachelor’s, I was invited by the Head of Economics Department at my university to discuss the possibility of working on a research article for a global forum. I was one of the top students of my cohort, a Summa Cum Laude in fact, and all of my professors at one point or another had approached me to consider joining the faculty once my MBA was also completed, and if I do become a faculty member, to join their respective department. I imagined the meeting with my Economics professor would be of similar nature.

When I got to his office, however, he had a more concrete proposal. He asked if I wanted to collaborate on a research paper with one of his university alumni, a prominent businessman, who will be visiting Switzerland to share a paper at an international development conference. My professor told me, whether I wish to pursue collegiate teaching or receive a good scholarship for further studies, having research articles published in international journals would add unparalleled value to my resume. I jumped at the opportunity. For months I read up literature, hit public records on trade and commerce in Bangladesh, looked up potential industries that may become the next frontier for foreign direct investments in our labor intensive country, wrote and polished the paper. I e-mailed the draft to my professor and he was effusive with his praise for my effort, forwarding the work to his friend for review while keeping me in CC. I didn’t hear anything for over a month and asked my professor if his friend did not like it. My professor apologized for his lack of attention to the matter and then reached out to his friend. Only to find out the paper had already been delivered and the friend had not had enough time to give a feedback before he traveled to Switzerland and back.

My professor then broke me the news that his friend had also delivered the paper under his sole authorship and it was on its way to being published by the forum as such. As I sat there in his office, my professor could not meet my gaze while he apologized, telling me he had never expected his friend would stoop to such poaching. All I could ask was if his friend made changes to the paper, adding his own materials. No, he had not. So it was not a collaboration because I worked on the paper all on my own; he just corresponded its content to the audience? My professor was in an awkward position and reluctantly informed me his rich powerful businessman friend wished to compensate me for “a job well done”, as though I was working on hire. My professor advised me to take the compensation since contesting it in court in Bangladesh against the director of a chamber of commerce no less would be futile.

Naïve as I was, I wanted to contest it still. My professor gave me the address to reach him and offered to go with me but I could tell his heart wasn’t in it so I released him from the obligation. I did take a friend with me though when I went to visit Big Businessman. My friend was already working as a researcher with the local branch of an internationally renowned development agency and maybe I had hoped his presence would shame the Big Businessman into ensuring my name gets on the paper before it is actually in print. But thieves are without shame, aren’t they? I was given an envelope full of cash and that too without apology. He completely avoided acknowledging what he had done, his smile jaunty throughout the time we stayed in his office. Everyone loved my paper at the conference. Isn’t it great that I could put together such a contribution to our nation’s economics in such a short time?

I was so young and it took every cell in my body to hold back the tears as I came to the realization that I can never win against such a callous individual. Beside me, my friend’s head hung low instead of the Big Businessman seating across the giant executive desk that had done its job in making me feel dwarfed. My friend felt more shame at the actions of his fellow mankind than the perpetrator. We had been served tea and biscuits but I don’t remember taking anything. Eventually, I said a polite goodbye and the man showed us out very cordially all the way to the gate of the building. Maybe he was afraid we would create a scene once outside his office. My friend hailed a cab, we got in, and only then did I cry. It was such a violation. I remember blabbering that no one else should ever have to suffer it. A bit dramatic it seems now but I think that was one of the few times in my life I cried in front of anyone outside my immediate family.

We went back to my home, where my friend gave me the envelope. He had picked it up for me, figuring I should get something out of the ordeal. It was such a vile sight, I told him to give it away to charity. Then I showed him the e-mail containing the attachment of the article, as though I still needed to validate that it was my work. It was only then that I realized that the draft I sent was without any citations of the facts and figures I incorporated, and everyone knows a research paper without source information is worth zilch. Does it make the last laugh mine? No. It doesn’t matter that the article was published without the bibliography section. I will never be able to publically claim the paper as mine. Months later, when the paper was published online, I downloaded it with his name as a reminder to never be that naïve again. I have actually gone online almost every year since to see if the article is still up there, as though Big Businessman would miraculously grow a conscience and have it removed. I went back today, in fact, as I typed this post, wondering if I should just hyperlink it here and reveal that person as the farce he is. It makes me mad but I curb it.

But the fact of the matter is that we are still putty to fate. At least, so it appears according to the blog I just read. When I write now, I am subconsciously aware and fearful that the past might repeat itself. Still, I write, whether I make a cent or not, with the possibility of having my work stolen again, only with the vague hope that I will work with people of integrity. Though I would not know how I would handle having another one of my works stolen and published under some other person’s name. I guess we can only cross that bridge if and when we get to it. God forbid.

Image used is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International

WRITING CHRONICLES #02: Strange Feelings

Image Source: Wikimedia Commons

At 4:58 am on the morning of January 07, 2017, I posted the final chapter of my first ever full-length novel on this blog site. So cometh the end of a 05-year journey. The project was riddled with disruptions – one gap nearly 3.5 years long – during which time I hit a block so massive, I began to believe that even my endeavor to commit to writing under the surveillance of an audience had failed. Thankfully, a trip overseas to the country where I originally acquired my writing voice jostled me out of this funk. And so today, I am truly the author of a finished novel.

This is a big moment for me for the obvious reasons. It is for anyone who manages to produce a whole book. I’m sure there are thousands of us out there who have been bitten by the bug a few times in our lifetime where we vigorously plot and create mind-blowing characters but when it comes down to typing out the actual manuscript, don’t get past a few chapters. At least, not in the first few attempts anyway. It has happened to me so often in the past 15 or so years that I finally resorted to posting the chapters of I’ll Be True online on a weekly basis to shame myself into reaching the finish line – a reminder that everyone was watching and so quitting was no longer an option. Still, it took me 04 years 10 months to write 26 chapters. I allowed myself to be led astray. But the point is that I kept at it and so have proved myself capable of writing an entire work of fiction. 75,460 words! That should deserve a pat on the back. Right?

It’s strange that I’m not floating on the rosy high of accomplishment – I had expected to be. I mean, after being forever preoccupied with my career, I gave it all up to turn to working full time on my dream of becoming a best-selling author. So having finally passed level 01 of my goal should give me some kind of buzz, right? Nope. Nada. I just wrote the last chapter, edited it, put it up on the site and went to bed. I read a book written by someone else for a while and that made me feel more moved than what I had just done. And when I fell asleep, it wasn’t even in relief. I was just tired from working late into the morning. And now, I’m thinking if the thrills haven’t kicked in even with 38 hours gone by, maybe it isn’t shock that has me sedate.

Perhaps I ran out of adrenaline since it took so long to complete. Perhaps it’s because I published it chapter-by-chapter on my own damn blog that it does not possess the glory for me that comes with being “a published author”. Perhaps since this novel was always meant to be my practice run and that I did not write it with a sale in mind that I don’t really feel like I made a mark. Perhaps it doesn’t count. But I really want it to.

Which reminds me, now that I’m done writing I’ll Be True, I should get started working on the manuscript I WILL sell. Time to grill the fat…

So it’s a new year: Bah! Humbug!

(Also there will be changes to the site in 2017)

Picking up from the title, did I reference that exclamation to the wrong holiday? I don’t think so. I love Christmas. Having spent the greater part of my preteen and adolescence amongst colorful baubles and fairy lights in red, green and white all through December, accentuated by the great American television bonanza surrounding the spirit of giving, Oh Christmas Tree and Santa Claus, it’s hard not to pick up on the excitement. Although the same decorations and entertainments stayed up until New Year Day, I have never actually been lured in by New Year’s Eve revelry. So what is all this hype about?