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#ScribesAndMakers Mar 1: What are your goals for the month?
Ah geez, man. Write more words? Get closer to finishing in some appreciable way? Let's go with that.
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 2: Are you inspired by nature? Please explain.
Yes, absolutely. I live in a very green city, so the green is always present: the soil, the colours, the glorious rain.
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 3: Are you more productive during long stretches of free time, or when you have to squeeze creativity into your busy life?
Definitely long stretches. Right now, I need to *produce* words, and I'm having trouble making the time, and I'm having trouble getting into a groove. It's been hard.
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 4: My Creative Work is an essential part of who I am -- true or false?
Oh yeah! I'm a writing/literature prof. Creative work is shot through almost everything I do.
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 5: If you have family living with you, what do they think about your creative work?
My wife reads my stuff sometimes. She's really happy I have a creative outlet. I'm a more pleasant person to be around when I'm writing. My kids are not ready for what I write!
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 6: Tell us about a book you go back and read over and over.
I reread books that I teach, so:
- Neuromancer
- Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde
- End of East
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 7: Many authors write the book they couldn't find. What does your work offer that you couldn't find elsewhere?
At the time I wrote it, there wasn't a really considered critique of STAR WARS in the form of a narrative, but then THE ACOLYTE both premiered and then was cancelled, so my book is still viable, but there's definitely some shared territory.
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 8: What is the nicest thing anyone has said about your work?
I showed all my work--all of it!--to my writing buddy, and at the next meeting, she said, "I've just been reading Orion's stuff all week..." I don't think it gets better than that.
Close second: my dissertation supervisor once said, "Orion's not capable of a misreading." He was talking to someone else in front of me, and I was like: What really!?
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 9: What would your best creative life look like, keeping it realistic?
I transition to a creative writing instructor--because I love teaching, and I don't want to stop--which gives me enough money and free time to write my work but also get it published, which generates enough income that I can go part-time on the teaching, and then I'm a writer who teaches.
#ScribesAndMakers Day 10: What's your preferred format for reading (hardcopy, e-book, audio)? Is it the same for publishing?
Ebook, definitely. Carrying around chunks of dead tree isn't appealing, although I do think books are superior technology (never runs out of batteries, the only compatibility issues are whether you read that language, highly portable). For publishing, whatever people want, man.
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 11: Is travelling/vacation good for your creativity?
Sure. It's good for all kinds of thing. Specifically? Not especially.
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 12: Do you play games? If so, do they influence your creativity?
I'm a lifetime D&D player, and I find I have to push away a lot of those ingrained rhythms in order to write stories. If I'm not careful, I start arranging my narratives around "encounters" and using D&D's schools of magic and stuff like that. It's a problem.
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 14: Dialogue, everything from hello to goodbye or stick to essentials?
It depends on the scene, the characters, the "vibe," etc. Generally, though, I do like to include all the awkwardness and pauses and staring out the window. I like to hear the sound of cutlery clinking on plates, wind whipping rain against the window, people clearing their throats. That's all part of the scene.
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 15: How's your goal going? Is there anything you would like help with?
Come to my house and watch my kids so I can finish this draft.
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 18. What would your best creative life look like if you stretch beyond realistic, but still keep it plausible?
I make enough off writing to do it full time (although I still teach maybe one or two courses per year, because that's just fun). I have licensing deals going where I stay somewhat hands-off but maintain creative control and good relationships with the creators. I go to cons and read passages to fans, take questions, do the whole "author" thing.
That'd be nice.
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 19: At what age did you start creating?
I remember trying to make stories and pictures as a little kid, then again with writing in my teens and twenties, but it wasn't really until I was 39 that I came up with a viable idea for a story and wrote it and thought, "Huh. This is actually good..." and it's been like that ever since.
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 20: Do you like graffiti? Do you have an example? Yes.
Many many years ago, a girl I went to high school with and who'd just moved from another country saw a wall of graffiti and said, "Look at the calligraphy!"
I think of that EVERY TIME I see graffiti.
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 22: A book you love by an indie author.
Elliot Kay's GRAND THEFT SORCERY is really good. He writes SFF with some smut on the side, although this one has relatively little actual sex in it, and it's just solid writing. The pacing is great. The characters really live. And he presents a white man as a lead who's genuinely sympathetic as someone with low privilege. The whole thing just works.
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 23: How do you feel about puns?
No thank you.
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 26. Ask the expert: if you're a specialist in something, would you answer questions for writers/artists regarding your specialty?
Sure, why wouldn't I?
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 27. Were you ever discouraged by great art of someone else?
I watch a lot of bad TV and think, "I can do better!" And I write. I read a lot of good books and think, "I can do this!" And I write.
I read Catherynne M. Valente, and think, "Holy shit! I cannot do that!" And I do not write.
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 28. What would your best creative life look like if not bound by reality?
A room by myself with a window overlooking nature, a really comfy chair, and a computer. Forever.
(Obviously, I take breaks to do other things and see my family and stuff.)
(And being super famous and beloved would be great.)
#ScribesAndMakers Mar 29. What is your proudest or best moment with your creative endeavor this month?
I started actually writing again. And I found that it's not actually *hard*. I've been lazily ignoring my draft for a long time, but when I bring up the files and just look at a scene, I'm immediately back into problem-solving mode: how does this fit into the flow? what are the character beats? etc?
@orionkidder which is the most fun to teach? Is it the same as the one you most enjoy reading?
@saposcat You're right. It's really not the same! I think END OF EAST was the most rewarding to teach because it's about something students can relate to personally: dealing with immigrant families. Even if they're immigrants themselves, they got right into it. Student engagement is where the fun's at.
@orionkidder there's a certain line of thought where if the person teaching is into the material, that enthusiasm might carry over to the students, but I don't know that it's necessarily true. It seems like it's more important for the students to find the material relatable, or in line with their interests.
@saposcat Absolutely true, I think, and it's possible for a teacher to *love* a book so much (or a poem or whatever) that they can't teach it any more. I learned early that I can't teach Leonard Cohen because I just want my students to love it, and that's not teaching.
@orionkidder which Leonard Cohen have you tried to teach? I've listened to quite a bit of his music, but the only book I've read is Beautiful Losers.
@saposcat I tried to teach a couple of his songs a looooong time ago--"Closing Time" and one other, can't recall which--and it wasn't a good idea. I have no critical distance with him. :)
@orionkidder yeah, I can definitely see where that could happen.
@orionkidder I think we have an upcoming question about a song lyric, so maybe that will be an opportunity to get into it. Not the same as teaching it, obviously, but maybe more enjoyable than trying to teach it.
@saposcat Looking forward to it.
@orionkidder I love them all. It's completely dependent on what I'm doing. There's a format to suit every option! Walking or driving? Audio, of course. Eating? Ebook; I need my hand free. Bed, airplane? Ereader; lightweight, no light needed. Everywhere else? Paper.
@orionkidder it's such a solid narrative structure! For the context of gaming, if not for novels... 
I recently ran a short campaign in a system called Flabbergasted that was structured more like a TV show, and I found it really interesting. I think I had an easier time planning plotlines with it, since I'm not a very experienced GM and had only written up one-shots before.
@jojoinabox It's really interesting to think about how these structures are and are not suited to specific media. For example, MURDERBOT is a series of novellas. They feel very movie-like in that way. Comics and TV are also very similar to each other. When I write shorts, I tend to intuitively make them about one (American) comic-book long. It's worth being conscious of these things so that we can use them to our advantage.
@orionkidder for sure! It's a really useful thing to get your head around.
I've actually been thinking about the strengths and weaknesses of different media types to discuss on my blog, and there's so much to explore! Length, structure, purpose, stylistic conventions...
@orionkidder those extra details, the sounds and all, can really pull you in and make you feel like you're there.
@saposcat That's the hope! In any case, I can't *not* hear and feel it all when I imagine it, so into the text it goes.
@orionkidder That’s similar to how I see it. Life isn’t all fast-paced acts that move us on to the next thing quickly. Reality is a series of meanders with an occasional weir. Dialogue can bring that to the page by having the mundanities included.
@johnyNocash Okay, this is really interesting. I was thinking yesterday about how *trained* we all are to film/television-style storytelling where seconds = hundreds of thousands of dollars, where time is limited, etc.
Novels don't have to work that way. There's a negligible added cost to a couple of hundred words. We don't, in fact, have to "open on action," etc. Those are all rhythms born of the needs of a literal different *medium* of storytelling. They're optional in novels.
@orionkidder Yes, definitely. The story I’ve most recently finished I wrote to be as deliberately slow-paced as I could. The plot of the story is that nothing happens, but in that nothingness so much happens. Whether I’ve been successful remains to be seen…
@johnyNocash Yeah, I hear ya. The gap between "could work" and "did work" is ~large~.
@orionkidder I wish I could, my friend. I believe you're clear across the continent from me, and my kid-watching skills are basically gone¹. But I would give it a try for an afternoon, if it weren't so impractical to get there.²
1. Before I left home for college, I was a pretty good babysitter, having siblings ranging from 5-12 years younger than myself. But that was over 3 decades ago, and... yeah, I'd need *a lot* of retraining.
2. I do at least have a passport...
@kagan Make sure that passport's up to date. The border's really close, and who the hell knows when they'll outlaw any and all queerness.
Stay safe.
@orionkidder Thank you for your concern. (Honestly, no shade or sarcasm.) I just verified that it's good for the next 4 years (although people who DGAF about the law might not GAF about that expiration date either, but what can I do about that?).
I figure I've got a few more months before they go full-Nazi, "round up all the queers and put 'em in death camps!", and my plan (aka "Project GTFO") is to move to Dublin before that happens. (Cf. that cover letter thing.)
Staying as safe as I can.
@orionkidder you and @AlexCorby should do a swap. You watch his kids and teach his classes for a while, then vice versa.
@orionkidder I called, but you were out.
@johnyNocash Dammit! I see one movie...
@orionkidder did you finish the viable story?
@saposcat Oh hell yes! It's a novella now, and I have plans for a second one. I can't wait to get back to it.
@orionkidder is the second a sequel or related to the first, or its own thing? Any publication plans?
@saposcat I am working on a standalone novel and I have a novella in the can as well as plans for a sequel to the novella.
"Plans" to publish makes it sound like I have a choice in the matter. I have sent the novella out to several places and got a whole lot of "not a good fit," but by then, I'd moved onto the novel, and life got busy, so I haven't been sending out anything at all.
@orionkidder oh, okay. Wasn't sure if you were going the trad route or considering self-publishing.
@saposcat I've considered self-pub, but I haven't looked into it for real. I DO NOT want to contribute to Amazon's whole monopoly thing, and past that, I don't know where to start.
@orionkidder I'm likely going with Draft2Digital. It's an aggregator that lets you choose which platforms to sell through. They do take a higher percentage than I think you'd lose if you submitted to each site individually, but from what I've heard from others it's worth it. Might be worth looking at it you do decide to self-publish.
As expert on composition and comics, or as general nerd? Or about teaching?
Would you agree having your expertise and handle published on a special page on our website https://write.as/scribesandmakers/? Thank you!
@gahlearner Depends on what you want from me. Depends on how busy I am. I'm also a full-time prof who signed up for way too many projects this year!
I went to your general interest post and looked what you listed there. But if you are too busy, no worries.
For now what we want, is make a list with people who have expertise/experience in something, that doesn't need to be academic, and who are willing to share this expertise. There will be categories like writing, comics, gardening, whatever, I have to look through the many entries first. The list goes to our website, and people then can pm someone and ask questions.
@orionkidder sigh... I second that...