R. Garrett Wilson

Note: This is geared for MS Word, but there might be similar tools in other word processors

For those of you who don’t know, I write a lot of SciFi, some fantasy, and a little general fiction.  In SciFi especially, there are a lot of weird names (just to name a few, I have a place in one story called the Falls of Aqwu-la, a species in a novel called Chimree, and a family in another novel called Drayr).  I’ve been having problems keeping the spellings of my characters and places straight.  The spell check never catches anything because it marks the proper names all the time.  I don’t like using Ignore All, because by chapter 20 I might not remember if the name had come up with a different spelling before or not.  I also don’t like adding words to my main dictionary because then the names are there for everything.

I don’t know how many of you use Word or already know how to do this, but I just learned how to create custom dictionaries for Word.  This is different from just using Ignore All or adding words to your standard dictionary.  I can create a different dictionary for each story, and then just select the proper dictionary when I start writing and/or editing, or deselect them all when working on something different.

I am in the process of creating a dictionary each for my different series: Chimree Republic, Passages of Consequence, Plague World, Armies of Atheious, etc.  I have already found this to be a wonderful tool, and I hope you will too.  For information on how to accomplish this, check out the following sites:

• How to add a custom dictionary in Word by Microsoft Support
• Create and Edit a Custom Dictionary in MS Word 2007 by infopackets

“Writing is not necessarily something to be ashamed of, but do it in private and wash your hands afterwards.” — Robert Heinlein, science fiction writer

Pennsylvania State University’s newsletter, LIVE, ran an article today about writing and health titled Writing your way to better health.  Apparently, writing is a good habit after all, even if you should do it in private and wash your hands afterward.  It basically says this: if you write about past trauma, you will be healthier for it.

The reason I brought this up is because there was a link to a blog of writing prompts (you probably know that I believe in story starters and writing prompts).  These aren’t like mine – the story is secondary.  The focus of Your Write to Health  is on your mental health.  Check it out.

I wanted to write something really special for my Eleventy-First post, something on the order of how I don’t like half of you half as much as you deserve, but I have had neither the wit nor the time to put together something like that.  Actually, I’ve been in a bad place lately. 

A lot of my inspiration comes from dreams.  Not your typical dreams, mind you.  I don’t do much in the normal fashion.  I’m not just a lucid dreamer (someone who is aware that they are dreaming while they are dreaming); I’m the Freddy Krueger of my own dreams – more on this in a minute.  I, however, haven’t been dreaming lately. 

My lack of dreams is something I blame on school.  Classes where I have to read a lot of technical material (I’m a graduate student studying Software Engineering) seem to have a negative impact on the amount of dreaming I do.  For the last two semesters, I haven’t dreamt but maybe one dream that I could remember, and it wasn’t lucid.  However, I dreamt last night.

I can’t quite do what they do in the movie Inception, but I’m pretty close to doing the stuff you see in Nightmare on Elm Street.  It’s not the same every night, but my level of control increases the longer the dream lasts.  I can add monsters at will, introduce plagues that can infect everyone, change the scenery to just about anything, and put danger everywhere.  I can also do nice things, like replay good scenes from my life or fix bad ones, go to places I’ve only seen in pictures of movies, or come up with solutions to my problems or the world’s. 

I start out wherever my subconscious puts me as I’m a Dream-Induced Lucid Dreamer – everything starts as a normal dream, and then I become aware it’s a dream and start to take over.  I don’t have enough control to make an entire city or to have thousands of people like Inception, but five to fifteen is pretty doable.  It seems that when I add too many people or monsters, some of the people or monsters just disappear, and I don’t even notice until I’m reflecting on the dream after I wake up.

This most recent dream, I was on a road trip with my son.  We were on some bizarre route from the New England area to the South, and we were pulling into a restaurant in the mountains.  I was trying to order a burger I had seen on a billboard (which was really a $6 burger from a Carl’s Jr. commercial I just saw) plus some yellow, green, and black bananas (my son is picky about his bananas – some days he wants yellow, rare days he eats green, and some days he likes black).  My alarm woke me up before I really got rolling, but I had started to take control of the dream. 

Since one source of my creativity is my dreams, it was wonderful to see that inspiration and imagination back in my life.  I still don’t have time to write much as I’m a fulltime worker, student, commuter, husband, and father, but I’ll take any reminder of who I was before I started this school program.

Sorry I’ve been away for so long.  The disadvantage of toddler, working, commuting, and a class with way tooooooo much reading of not-very-fun technical books. 

Anyhow, I saw a post from Janet Sumner Johnson about a pitch contest with Victoria Marini over at Chanelle’s Beyond Words.  I told my friend, C. Michael Fontes about it, who entered and then encouraged me to enter.  So, if I got all my links right, you should be able to figure out the history of how this post came to be.

If you want to get in on this, you need to get over to Beyond Words before the end of today.

A little over five years ago, I experienced an incident that kind of defines how people from other states view Californians.  My house was fairly new, and I don’t remember if we had a security system yet.  I had just arrived home, my wife was running a few minutes late, and my sister was going to arrive anytime for a visit.  I sat down on my couch and had just turned on the television when I heard three loud, pounding noises from the upstairs – noises like someone who didn’t belong, madly running away when the homeowner arrives.

I slouched and thought, “Oh, no!”  Actually, I’m sure an expletive came to mind in place of “no.”  You see, I don’t own a gun, and at that time I didn’t even have pepper spray.  In fact, the only two items I own that could be used as weapons, a hunting knife and a baseball bat, were both upstairs.

Within a few seconds, about the time I expected someone to barrel down the stairs or leap out a window, the whole house started shaking.  “Whew,” what a relief, it was “only an earthquake.” 

Within a minute, while I was still shaking off the jitters from suspecting an intruder, both my wife and sister arrived.  Neither of them felt the quake while driving, which was apparently common.

So, why could this only happen in CA?

• I am liberal enough to not believe in owning fatal weapons
• Realizing it was “only an earthquake” was relieving – relaxing even
• Most people who were driving couldn’t tell a quake from their own driving behavior

And if you are wondering, the three loud bangs were a structural feature.  My house was new and built to settle.  The early, unfelt waves of the earthquake had accelerated the setting process.

So, have you had any experiences that highlight the stereotypes of your region?

Today I get to see a group of people, as a group, for the first time in over a year.  They are the Fresno Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers, and they are having their 100th meeting.  I could tell you so much about all of them but I want this post to come in under 75,000 words, so I will describe my first meeting with all its impressions, a meeting about two years ago.

My first day there is one I will never forget.  We were all crowded around a few tables pushed together at Denny’s – almost like dinner and a movie, well, story.  Either the air conditioner had stopped working, the collective bodies had overpowered the cooling effect of the AC, or I was nervous.  We spent the meeting critiquing previously submitted works.  I was the only one not prepared to critique both pieces. 

There were six people who made an impression that first meeting:

Elle was the first.  She was thin, but not the fragile thin – no, there was nothing fragile about her.  She had an in-your-face personality – very friendly and outspoken to the point of being a little scary.  And you could tell that she had a passion for what she wrote; that passion oozed out of her.

Toff was the second.  He was the person I had said “Hi” to first, but I didn’t get to actually talk to him until Elle gave me a chance.  Toff was the only person I had talked to (email) prior to the meeting, and he wasn’t what I expected.  I don’t think anyone could expect him, even if warned.  He was a great guy, he loved writing (both his own writing and other people’s writing), and the intellectual level of his conversations did not seem to be matched by the outward physical persona he presents (I wish I could have said that in a way that doesn’t seem insulting, because it isn’t meant that way – you will know what I mean if you are lucky enough to meet him).

Earl was the next one I met.  I’m not sure why I had a nightmare later that week where he was yelling at me, “Your writing is so immature!”  He was kind – not just naturally kind (which he is), but he also takes time to think about what he says before he opens his mouth.  I wish I knew more people like him.

Roh and Mellie were the next two.  I didn’t really meet them before the meeting, but observed them throughout the meeting.

Mellie was centered in the table and the conversation.  It wasn’t that she had to dominate, but she didn’t want to miss out on anything.  The group was important to her, the remarks were valuable.  She soaked up what she could and responded whenever she had something to contribute.

Roh was odd.  She had just traveled several hundred miles in three of the four previous nights, staying up until the not-so-early hours of the morning, to go see various Nine Inch Nails concerts.  Someone had said something about vampires, and they were apparently talking about her writing and not her (which is how I took it at first).  She didn’t open her mouth unless directly spoken to, and even then, she seemed unsure.  I couldn’t tell if she wrote and I wondered why she was there.

The last person to make an impression was Ian.  He came in late, announced his presence with a huge “Raaah,” and left 15 minutes later.  I asked Elle about him and she simply said, “That’s Ean,” as if that explained everything.

I knew there were others there; almost all of them had introduced themselves (in a blur).  I had to leave the group early, so I didn’t get to talk to anyone after the meeting.  I didn’t get a chance to know the people at the other end of the tables.  Those first impressions were almost right, the exception was Roh.  Roh has a beautiful way of writing; she is the blending of a poet and novelist.  She belongs to the group.

I can tell you more about that first meeting now in reflection than I could when I got home.  My wife asked me, “How were they?” to which I replied, “I have never seen so many nerdy and geeky people in one place.  I loved it.”  When my wife asked if I was going to go back, I explained that I had to – I had to pay back Toff for picking up my tab after I forgot to pay <blush in embarrassment>.

I miss them so much, and it is hard to stay in my seat now knowing that I will see them and all the other friends I made in the group within a few hours.

I stumbled across a blog today (actually, just one entry) and I absolutely loved it. Thought I would share:

http://whitepaintedwoman.wordpress.com/2010/03/07/the-write-stuff/

Three sure ways for a movie to make money right now: remake, sequel, and based off a popular book or comic.  There have been some standout movies and series based off novels.  Books give movies a built in audience.

So, why does this matter?  Because the business practices in the movie industry need to stop just paying attention to what is happening in the book industry and jump in.  There is an opportunity here.  With several books going directly to eBook, without the publishing houses and agents, movie executives could directly contact authors using a new business model.  How can this work out?  Here is a rough (and perhaps impractical) brain storm idea…

Optioning of eBooks instead of scripts – but payment is in marketing instead of cash:

A movie studio creates a small team (partly consisting of people in the book industry) to work with new authors.  This team is given a budget (let’s say $4Mil a year).  With the budget, they (the production studio) will try to attach themselves with original books by new authors (let’s say 100 new books a year).  Instead of offering the writer any money directly, they will make a contract for marketing.  They will spend that money ($40,000 – I know this is probably high side, but the better a book does, the better then movie generally does) in a specific time span (say six months) marketing a book (they could have prepackaged marketing plans by genre).

At some point (say 30 months after the marketing ends) they will decide if they want to make a movie out of the book or not.  The contract will define how much the author gets paid based on book sales (under 200,000 books, amount A; 200,000 to 999,999, amount B; 1,000,000 to 4,999,999, percent of movie C; 5,000,000 or more, percent of movie D).  If the studio doesn’t buy the movie rights then, the authors get their rights back in full.  Even if the production studio only green lights a few contacts a year, they will probably still do well.

Summary of Plan:

• Production studio creates team to read and option books
• Book options are for marketing expenses/packages, not to pay authors directly
• Movie industry chooses which books to turn into movies after a defined period of time
• The cost of the movie rights are defined in the contract (by sales of the novel)

Advantages:

There are advantages for both the author and the movie execs.  The author becomes known – their book reaches the masses and they have the potential to make some money off of it.  Since the movie industry has no interest in the book royalties, the author will get to keep all of those.  The movie industry can lock in rates for acquiring movie rights for less than normal.  The upfront expenses for the movie agency are really small time for the potential reward, but upfront money for advertising is hard to come by for authors.  Once an author is famous, they won’t need to make this kind of deal again (although there is nothing stopping them), but it helps them get a foot in the door.  The movie industry gets much needed new material.

And here is the great part: this will help the smaller publishing houses and book agents.  The movie industry doesn’t really have the infrastructure to know what will make both a great book and a great movie – they only know what will make a great movie, but they need the books to succeed as novels first for this business model to work.  So that small team I was talking about would consist of movie experts combined with agents, editors, and/or publishing houses that they contract with.  The agents, editors, and publishers know the material that works as novels as well as some of the better methods for advertising.  The team members wouldn’t get royalties, but probably something more like regular salary combined with bonuses for when certain books/movies reach financial milestones.

So that’s a rough model for just one new business model in the entertainment industry.  Any thoughts?  I would love to hear what other author’s think of this plan, or any ideas they have.

NOTE: If any studio takes this seriously, I would love to work on it.

I think everyone knows what that title means: Drive Failure, the F’n Drive Bombed Out – everything is gone.  This is a courtesy reminder to all you writers out there, learned from a very recent, painful, deflating experience, back up your drives often.

I made a backup on February 17^th.  I thought I also made a backup in April, but I can’t seem to find that one.  Luckily, since I haven’t worked on any of my novels since then, I have lost nothing there, but it still hurts to lose anything. 

What I did lose:

• my KeePass database (no big deal as there is only one password I don’t remember off the top of my head)
• ideas for my blog that I hadn’t yet posted (no big deal)
• four novel ideas that I had documented (slightly painful, but not the end of the world)
• some story starters and writing exercises that I was going to use on my blog (I don’t have time to come up with some new ones, so my two monthly posts will probably go on hold until August – when I have a short vacation from school)
• a finished frame for a future anthology (this hurts, a lot)
• all of my homework from this semester and most from last semester (this hurts, a lot)
• a short story I had just started writing and was about a third of the way through (since this story felt better than anything I had ever written before, and I’m not sure I could repeat it – this is devastating)

What hurts the most is that I debated printing out my short story just a few hours before the Drive Failure.  Could have, should have, would have, but didn’t.

So, please, learn from my experience and back up everything you value.

The following is a set of writing exercises involving touch/feeling.

Do these activities, and then write about how each of them felt for four minutes.  Compare it to nature.  Use strong verbs and metaphors.  Repeat the activity as necessary during 4 minutes to keep the flow of ideas coming.

• Lay you arm down on the table, from your elbow to the tip of your finger, with your palm down.  Using one finger from your other hand, lightly caress your arm from your elbow down to the tip of your middle finger. 
• Grab a hair or two from just behind your right ear and pull slowly and firmly
• Take a breath as deep as you can.  Repeat 2 more times without breaks between.
• Clap your hands together as hard as you can.

For the final 4 minutes: Analyze the descriptions to come up with the most powerful images and words.  Find the shortest way to get the general feeling across.  Create a list for future reference.  List where each these descriptions would be useful in writing.