Ah, what a good night's sleep will do for the brain. As I cycled through the Nearly Normal draft today, I was fully prepared to break the "time machine" in the climax... until I realised that the whole story unfolds in the past tense, which means if the "time machine" is destroyed then Norman could never have brought it home with him. So instead of making a wholesale change that would have fallen flat on its face, I stepped back from the brink and left the climax just the way it was. What I did do was beef up the relationship between Norman and his dad and give a stronger sense of their relationship before the stroke... without giving away too much... I hope. Anyway, I've finished the first pass on the revision. I'll sit on it for a day or so then re-read my changes to see if they make sense. Once I'm happy that I've got a solid draft, then I send the revisions to the artistic associates at the Citadel for comments. Plus, I want to have a pretty solid draft to shop around in September.
August 2005 Archives
At the Wordspinner Festival a few months back, Alastair MacLeod was asked by an audience member about his next book. He politely declined to tell her, saying that he never told people about his new ideas. He claimed it was a superstition. I never knew if was being coy or if there was merit to his philosophy... until last night.
Tip to new writers and old writers who don't listen to Alastair MacLeod's sage advice: never, ever, ever tell someone (even your most trusted friend) about a budding idea. Chew on the idea in your own mind. Let it grow and get strong before you even attempt to pitch it to someone else. If the idea hasn't taken root, then it's in danger of dying. I foolishly pitched a budding idea to my wife before it was fully formed. She asked a couple of questions and the idea withered within minutes. Arghhhh!!!!! From now on, I'm keeping my mouth shut and putting everything down on paper. I think I can revive the idea I had, but it's just going to take more work. And no, I'm not telling you what it is.
It's amazing what a little time away from a script will do for perspective and objectivity. Looking over the script I can see all sorts of problems with transitions. Plus, I'm making one element way to confusing and repetitive. In the play, Norman uses a clothes-pin as a remote control that supposedly controls a time machine. Why not just make the clothes-pin the time machine and have it be broken in the climax? Then I've got some real stakes at the end.
I'm going to tackle the changes today and tomorrow and generate a second draft. I might have to abandon the rewrite depending on what happens with the TV project I'm suupposed to develop. If there's a green light then I have to switch tracks and drop pretty well everything for two months.
Not feeling very creative today. Instead of working on my projects I decided to play hookie and read Son of the Mob by Gordon Korman. Published in 2002, its an older book, but it won the 2005 Young Readers Choice Awards in the junior division. The story is about a mobster's son who tries to live the straight and narrow only to find that family and business mix all too often. In trying to do the right thing, he creates more trouble for himself and his family, and ultimately has to settle the score. I liked the book for the most part. I totally felt for Vince Luca as a guy who's caught in the middle, but the story seemed a little coincidental. When you read the book, you'll know what I mean but I decided not to reveal the plot twist for fear of spoiling the story. If you just roll with what the book gives you, it's pretty enjoyable. If you stop to ask questions, you won't like it. Hey, if I can turn off the analytical side of my brain when I read fantasy books or watch sci-fi movies, I can do the same with Son of the Mob.
I had the pleasure of reading Kenneth Oppel's latest y/a novel. The story, geared to older students, follows Matt Cruse and and Kate De Vries as they take to the skies to salvage a ghost ship in search for treasure. I loved the characters and the story was thrilling from start to finish. This is the second in the series and I can see already the signature elements from the shifting moralities of characters, the romantic chemistry, and certain plot elements ('nuff said - I don't want to spoil the book). Great book. Kenneth Oppel soars again. Just what is his fascination with flight? From Sunwing to Silverwing to Firewing to Airborn to Skybreaker. Wouldn't it be ironic if he were afraid of heights?
Last night my wife and I had a lovely dinner with my brother and his girlfriend at our favourite Japanese restauraunt, Furusato. Just as you never forget your first true love, you never forget your first sushi restaurant. I've eaten sushi at other restaurants, but none have compared to the Furusato. Nothing beats a nice piece of red snapper except a Dynamite Roll. My favourite warm dishes are the Salmon Bits Appetizer and Alaskan Black Cod. My mouth is drooling even as I speak.
I had to admit that I have a soft spot for this place because the restaurant opened about 12 years ago when I lived in the Old Strathcona area. I'd eat lunch there almost every day, often coming back for dinner the same day. You might say I was a little obsessed with the food.
The sad thing is that I've noticed that business has slowed down in past months, as the drunk "Brats from the Burbs" turn the Whyte Avenue neighbourhood into a giant wrestling ring. I suspect they'd rather spend their allowances on beer than on good Japanese food.
I can't believe the Fringe Festival is nearly over, and I've barely been on site. Yesterday I had my biggest Fringe day. I saw two plays, ate roti from my new favourite street vendor, saw old friends and participated in the Fringe Forum.
I saw The Tail of the Peacock first, which was a one-person kids' play about a peacock and his tail separating and going off on separate adventures. The story was pretty silly and the direction was cool. There were lots of nice touches with gloves as characters. The other play was another kids' show, Penelope, and it was a three-cast show about a girl who overcomes her fears to defeat an invading alien. It was also silly and fun, using shadow puppets. I think the first show is geared to younger kids (4-8), while the second show is for older kids (7-11). Both are well worth catching.
The forum was about the future of the Fringe Festival. Nothing outrageous was discussed (compared to last years rant by panelists and audience members). Instead, this was a kindler and gentler forum. There were no criticisms of the overexposure of street performers to the near-invisibility of indoor theatre performances, mainly because there's more focus on theatre this year by the festival organisers. I was waiting for the big rant about the indignity of being herded into the star ratings corral (the media's way of reviewing shows is to have a ratings insert so audiences can find the hit shows without reading actual reviews), but there were no media types in the audience, so people knew that the criticisms would fall on deaf ears.
What did surprise me though is how both the Edmonton Fringe director and the Vancouver Fringe director (both panelists) embraced last year's pop culture commercial show, One Man Lord or the Rings, because it made the Fringe more accessible. Miki Stricker (the Edmonton Fringe director) reported that the new volunteers of this year's festival were younger than previous years, and she believed it had everything to do with that show. I've always known that commercial shows will attract audiences and media attention, but I never realised they could spur a spike in volunteerism.
My only observation about this is that I find it ironic that the original concept of the Fringe festival was to give a forum for the marginalized playwrights, performers, and producers to express their artistic visions. After 24 years, however, the festival itself has grown so large and populist that the commercial shows are revered while the original spirit of the festival has become marginalized. But then again, as I eavesdropped on beer tent discussions on what shows to see, I realised that the plays the audiences raved about ranged from the obscure to the commercial. Ultimately, that's the spirit of the Fringe: it's a theatre festival that is all things to all people.
Yesterday, I met with the artistic associate at the Citadel about the two scripts I'd been working on (Forbidden Phoenix and Nearly Normal). He gave the thumbs up to both scripts, saying that Forbidden Phoenix was about 95 per cent ready, and that Nearly Normal is a script ready to have a reading/workshop. That's a huge relief, considering the amount of time I've devoted to working on stage plays this summer. I'll sit on the Nearly Normal comments, which were pretty general, and let them sink in before deciding what to do next. Plus, I'm also waiting for feedback from the other artistic associate. But right now I'm going to launch into the last attack on the Forbidden Phoenix. I have rough versions of all the songs and I just need to polish the dialogue a bit more, then I'm done for this round. Next step is to get together with my composer and beat the songs into shape. But I might take a couple of weeks away from the project to gain some perspective.
I cracked the first song of the piece. Yay! Now I'm cycling through the first act, and I'm going at a good clip. But I know another song is just around the corner and I worry that I'll be stumped again. I just have to remember that all I'm doing is getting the content. My composer can worry about making the lyrics singable. Here we go.
The draft is done and off to the editor for final comments. Words started to swim in front of my eyes, and that was the sign that I had looked at the manuscript far too long. Thanks to my proofreaders, I corrected a lot of typos and missing commas. They also caught some repetition of words and awkward phrasing. I'm eternally grateful to them for their keen eyes. Yay! If my editor signs off on this draft, then I'm done for a few months. Good thing too. I promised I'd have The Forbidden Phoenix sent off to an artistic director by the middle of this week. Vacation? What vacation?
Almost done. Just received proofreading comments from one of my eagle-eyed friends, and I'm probably going to get the notes from the other proofreader today. I'll cycle through the manuscript to clean up the typos, and work in a funny bit that I'd originally cut but now want to put back in. By the end of the weekend, I should have the pentultimate draft which will go to the editor for one last kick, and then it's off to the publisher to make galleys.
The final draft deadline is November, and I'm hoping that the early delivery will give the publisher more time for copy editing, so that there won't be any mistakes (as there were in the Mystery of the Frozen Brains). For any budding writers who are reading this blog, trust me, there is no such thing as a perfect first draft. The draft that I'll be sending off to my editor this weekend will be the tenth draft of the manuscript. It was a lot of work, but I don't begrudge it because once the book is printed I have no chance to fix mistakes. It's all out there for people to judge, and I'd rather put my best work forward.
Just finished reading Luc Besson's Arthur and the Minimoys, the first instalment of a fantasy adventure series. It's a fun read and very visual - no surprise since Luc Besson is a filmmaker (La Femme Nikita, The Fifth Element). I'm looking forward to the second book which is due this fall. I also read the first book of The Olympians series, The Lightning Thief, by Rick Riordan. If you've finished Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, and are itching for a similar story, then I'd recommend this book. Percy Jackson is the hero of the piece, and the parallels in structure to Harry Potter are striking. Instead of wizards, think Greek gods and their illegitimate children. I enjoyed the read, but it did make me wish that J.K. Rowling would hurry up and finish the last Harry Potter book.
I tried to tackle The Forbidden Phoenix yesterday and I self-destructed. I went nowhere with the revisions. My big problem is the opening song. I need to have a good start to the play, and because I don't write lyrics I'm having a terrible time trying to build momentum in the play. Until the opening number is clear and written down I don't feel that I can move to the next scene. Argghh!!! I'm so frustrated right now. I'm going to try to write the lyrics to the opening number today. I know my composer will laugh at the lyrics, but I'll leave him to find the musicality in the lyrics, or change the lyrics so they don't suck so bad. I just need to get the content on paper, so that I can start shaping it.
Right now I'm thinking the theme of the opening number is what people do for the love of their family. I just need to boil down everything I have to say into 3 verses and a chorus. Ughhh. Remind me never to try to write a musical again.
I've procrastinated long enough. It's time to strap the albatross around my neck again and work on The Forbidden Phoenix. Do you know that feeling when you don't feel like working (usually coming on a Wednesday or a Friday)? I have that feeling about this entire play. I don't know what is about the script that makes is so hard for me to approach. There's a lot of support for it and everyone and their dog has an opinion on what the play should be... hmmm. Maybe that's the problem. I have to purge away all the comments and start concentrating on the script itself. Don't worry about what the dramaturge says about too much dialogue. Forget what the director said about marrying the history to the allegory. Punt the composer's questions about accessibility. Just concentrate on what I think will work. Maybe that'll take the stain of this project and give me a fighting chance to make this next revision work for everyone.
This experience is reminding me that a play can be workshopped to death, and I'm feeling like my script is on life support right now. It's very frustrating and I hate the feeling of being adrift. I have to fall in love with the story again. Right now, I feel like I'm in a bad relationship and I'm too scared to break it off. I can't go in to this rewrite with a bad attitude. I have to find something in the script that I really like and expand on it. Maybe that'll give me the momentum to tackle the uglier parts of the script.
Enough griping. Time to work.
Someone get the license plate of the Mac truck that just ran over me. For the last four days I've been poring over my manuscript. I addressed my editor's notes, but I also had to punch up the draft to make sure that everything I wanted to say was said. The hardest part of the job was that I had to be tough on myself on the choices I made. Was there enough description? Was there too much description? Was I being a lazy writer? How much dialogue to narrative was there? Did I create enough tension? And how many times did I use a character's name throughout the manuscript? And on top of all that, I had to catch typos and missing words.
Well, I'm happy to report that I'm done this version of the manuscript. My editor has one more crack at it, but before I send it to her, I'm going to pass the manuscript to a friend to proofread. Actually, I might send it off to two friends. The more eyes the better. I want to make my editor's job easier, and I know that whatever typos I catch now won't show up in the galleys.
Yay! I can celebrate by taking Sunday off. I don't even want to think about what projects I still have to complete. That's for Monday morning.
I was up at 4:30 this morning to cook the Beer-Can Chicken for the Edmonton AM segment. It paid off. The bird was delicious and the studio at CBC now has the distinct smell of barbecue chicken. The segment was pretty funny. They did a good job editing it together. One of the techies tackled the bird at the end of the show and devoured a drumstick. With a strike looming at the CBC I figured the staff needed moral support, so I left the entire chicken for the morning crew.
I finished Eric Walters' Camp X yesterday. It's a cool y/A adventure story set during World War II in Canada. Two brothers suspect a nearby farmhouse is the secret site for spy training.
Spoiler alert: don't read on if you plan on reading Camp X.
Just in case your eye accidentally strays I'm filling this space with some of the other books I've read. I had a blast with Pure Dead Magic by Deb Gliori. I just started reading Strange Heaven by Lynn Coady. I'm also reading about Edmonton's history in Gateway City by Alex Mair. Okay, that should be enough space killer. Now definitely don't read on if you're planning to read Camp X.
The climax essentially puts the boys in a race against time to tell the secret base commanders that Nazi spies are going to try to assassinate someone at the base. The climax of my second book runs along similar lines - my heroes have to tell the police about the real Graffiti Ghoul. I'd been worried that the climax might seem wimpy, because kids are looking for an authority figure, so I ramped up the chase, and downplayed the involvement of the authorities. When I read Camp X and saw how Eric Walters handled the same situation I felt better about my own climax. I know it's obvious to say this, but reading other writers' works can really help your own writing. So read!
I finished the polish (3rd draft) of Nearly Normal. Not a lot of work. I trimmed away a lot of repetition and redundant lines (my greatest failing is to repeat myself). I'm sure there will still be some fat to cut away in the script. The big change was the ending. I think I've finally figured out the climax. It's a real punch to the heart as Norman tries to get his dad (who's recovering from a stroke) to do his rehab exercise. There's not much to the denouement right now. After the note I got from my editor on The Mystery of the Graffiti Ghoul, I've been thinking about denouements for my other projects. I'm really not sure what needs to be said in the wrap up in this case. And I think any attempt in the play to wrap things up would seem too much like "and the moral of the story is...". I'll do some more thinking before I send the script off, but it's looking way better. Good timing too. I have to put my mind to the book, Forbidden Phoenix, and a TV series. Then my life gets really busy in September. Oh boy!
I just received the second edit of The Mystery of the Graffiti Ghoul, and boy am I pumped. The editor is really happy with the revisions I made to the climax. She still thinks the denouement is too short, but other than a few questions and a bunch of typos, it looks like the manuscript is in pretty good shape. I'm going to cycle through the editor's notes and address them all this week. Then I'll proofread the manuscript to catch any last stray typos. I'm also probably going to send the draft off to a friend who's very good at spotting typos. When he gives me the green light, I'll send off the draft to my editor for final comments, and then it should be good to go! Wow! I'm bouncing off the walls right now. Yay!
I taped the barbecue segment for the CBC Radio morning show, and it will air Friday, August 12 between 8:00 am and 8:30 am. I felt bad about the segment because the chicken takes about an hour and a half to cook, and the host, Ron Wilson, couldn't stay to taste the bird. So I offered to cook another bird and drop it off on Friday for Ron to try on air. The producer went for the idea, so I'm going to be cooking the recipe one more time this summer. Check out the segment on Friday. The station is CBC 740 AM.
I rented the DVD of British hit series, The Office. Ricky Gervais is hilarious and totally identifiable in that way that makes you squirm with recognition. I loved the first season, and I think the second season is just as good, but it's a little darker. As Gervais' character becomes second banana at the office, we see his desperation emerge. Oh boy, it's funny, but it's also pathetic. What a great series.
I tried a little experiment yesterday. I read a new book in a series, but not the first book. I wanted to see if a later novel in a series would work for someone who knew nothing of the previous characters. The book I picked was Roy Mac Gregor's The Screech Owls' Northern Adventure, which is a part of the Screech Owls series. I noticed that the character descriptions focussed more on "new" characters in the series as opposed to the existing ones. The regular characters were still pretty clear, defined mostly through action, so even though I didn't know their whole back story, I got a sense of their personalities. The story worked well, and I don't think I needed to know what happened before to understand this book. It helps that this series seems to be one adventure after another, as opposed to J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series which is a saga told in parts. All this is fodder for thought as I start to put my brain to my third book. I've got to make sure there's enough information for a first-timer to appreciate the story, but I can't get so bogged down in catering to a new reader that the constant readers of the series become irritated with a re-hash of information they already know. Writing a series is trickier than I thought. I'm going to have to proceed carefully as I plot out the third book. By the way, I think I've got a seed for the fourth book too. It has to do with ghosts, spit, and a grandmother. 'nuff said.
Ron Wilson, host of CBC Radio's Edmonton AM, will be dropping by the house tomorrow to tape a segment about backyard barbecues. I'm planning to cook a Beer Can Chicken, which is my favourite barbecue recipe. I was thinking about a Caroline Pulled Pork, but sticking a pork butt on the grill is just not as fun as sticking a whole chicken on a can of Kokanee. I'm not sure when the segment will air, but at the very least I get a chance to eat my favourite dish again.
I just finished my second draft of Nearly Normal (I tend to write 3 drafts of a story before I'm ready to send it out). I'm pretty happy with the character of Norman, who is now half-Irish and half-Chinese. He's got a lot more going for him than I originally envisioned; in fact, he might make a good protagonist for a new kids' book. I'll have to think about the notion of adapting the stage play into a book.
The plot seems to hang together very well, and a lot of the character voices have really come to life. My only concern now is specific scene work and concerns about repetition, clarity, and transitions. I'm going to move on to another project this week, so that I gain some objectivity. Probably some time next week, I'll read the script again and all the flaws will become apparent right away. That's when I'll do a final polish and then send the script to the Citadel for consideration. This project has been a joy to work on, mainly because it's new and exciting. I wish I could say the same for The Forbidden Phoenix, which is starting to feel more like an albatross. I'll find fresh legs to tackle the polish off that play, but for now I'll bask in the glory of completing a decent second draft of Nearly Normal. One more draft and the play will be ready to show, and then the real work begins.
As Premier Klein and his Government push for a "third way", I wonder about the value of two-tiered health care in Canada. I've long believed that everyone should have equal access to health care regardless of their social status or the size of their pocketbooks. However, I do get cranky when I have to wait over an hour to see a doctor. Maybe in this "get-it-now" society we can no longer wait for services, and that's why the two-tiered access seems appealing to people.
That said, however, I'd like to point out that we'd be sailing on a ship of fools if we believed the island called private health care has the patient's best interest at heart. No, businesses run because they can make a profit. If there's a profit to be made from making people healthy, the private clinics will operate well and no one will ever complain about two-tiered health care. But business is about making money. If you were a health care professional and you were given a choice between working insane hours with little compensation in a public system, or working regular hours, picking the clients you want to see, and getting paid handsomely, which option would you choose? If you pick the second one, then I suspect you're a rare breed among people.
What bothers me is that the Klein Government terrorizes Albertans into thinking that our current system is a sinking ship and that the "third way" is the life saver. And this is the same Government that promised that electricity de-regulation would save Albertans money. This is the same Government that claimed vehemently that we must wipe out our Province's debt, yet now is trying to sell us on the idea that there is good debt (like infrastructure) and bad debt (like health care).
I always thought a democratic government was elected by the people and was for the people. Apparently, in Alberta, that notion is naive and old-fashioned. The new democracy seems to be a government that is elected by the people and is for some of the people. Is there a "third way" for the politicians we elect?
