Ok, so the tail end of 2014 kicked my creative butt.
You know how it goes: the bills roll in, the car breaks down, the kids need jail bonds, and you find that 9-5 job turns into 6-8.
But 2015 is a year to punch all that in the face. I'm looking at entering a new decade and by golly I think I'm a big boy now. Big enough to make a schedule that fits my wild and crazy creative exploits nicely alongside my worky-work money-making exploits.
(Work has been really good. My wife, looking over our bank account, asked me recently whether I had started cooking meth in the home office. "No," I said, "I just was really darn productive and got some new clients." Looking back I should have told her I'd become a professional bear wrestler.)
So, 2015. Let's do this.
To start this thing off right, we must look to an inspiring hero to really set the tone of butt-kicking to follow.
[Chiral Mad 2] opens with “Another Man’s Bones” by Mason Ian Bundschuh. The perfect piece to motivate the reader to hungrily devour the remaining 27 stories. The storyline is not only unique, but delivers the creep factor. In doing so, Bundschuh baffles and eludes, until you reach that final well-structured sentence. This essentially is a story of one man’s quest to eliminate the ultimate foe. He is a writer this reviewer recommends you seek out beyond this anthology. What a treat, dear readers!
While I've been neck deep in the heavy rewrites and revisions of my current WIP (work in progress for all you not yet in the know), I've also been throwing my proverbial hat into the ring by submitting short stories all over the place.
1) My short story "The Resurrectionist" won 2nd place in the 2013 Vegas Valley Book Festival Flash Fiction contest. (I'll be reading my winning entry at the VVBF on Saturday Nov 2nd at noon in the small courtyard of the old 5th street schoolhouse in downtown Las Vegas)
2) My short story "Rainmaker" was just picked up by Dark Fuse for their Horror d'oeuvres flash fiction outlet. Fun stuff. Rainmaker was my entry in the Killercon 2013 Creative Fiction contest, judged by the peerless Ellen Datlow and Christopher Rice (a rising star to watch).
Both stories were written on the same day (within a few hours of one another) in two timed contests. The first contest allowed 90 minutes to write, edit and submit, the second only 20 minutes.
Most of you know that I have a super-duper writers group. The Illiterati.
Watch out, better hide your kids, hide your wife.
One of the best things about having a group in this solitary life of a writer is that you roll together. Any triumph for one is a triumph for all. Life is better when you travel as a pack.
In September the Illiterati as a group entered two short story contests in a row: The Killercon 2013 Creative Fiction contest and the 2013 Vegas Valley Book Festival Flash Fiction contest.
We won both.
(Congrats to Matt Czarnowski for his Illiterati-representing Killercon win!)
I credit as much to our own (growing) writing ability as I do to the sense of friendly competition of "outwriting" one another. I admire and enjoy the unique writing voice and style of each member of my group, and to go head-to-head with them is both an honor and a real challenge.
What are you waiting for? Find some like-minded writers and start yourself a writers group. You won't know what you're doing at first, but you'll learn.
Next up in Mason’s Book Picks: Ender’s Game – Orson Scott Card
Another book I was only recently introduced to by my awesome wife (who has great taste in books)
This is the kind of sci-fi I want to read. It's thoughtful, emotionally piercing, and generally amazing for the sense of inexorable doom which hangs over the (incredibly sympathetic) protagonist.
Ender’s Game avoids so many pitfalls of sci-fi by being simply a great story.
You won't find all that sciency-science, nor is it weighted with cartoony characters (such as the dreaded "buxom-amazon-who-wears-revealing-clothes-while-kicking-butt-and-is-essentially-a-masculine-character-with-boobs-because-the-author-doesn't-understand-women") which sometimes rear their heads in sci-fi. (come on, we've all read our share of chauvinist novels.)
It is a masterfully written work. Go buy it peoples. Go buy it.
Ray Bradbury is an unstoppable rebel force of writerly awesome. There is no past tense when referring to Ray Bradbury because he lives forever. (Kind of like Yoda.)
If you've never read Something Wicked This Way Comes, stop what you're doing and go buy this book.
This was one of the first books where I understood for a writer how deep the love of language could go.
I was lucky enough to read it when I was about 12 or 13 (the age of the protagonists in the story). But there's no time like right now to read it for the first time. Go buy it folks.
I read a compulsively. Some of you know what I'm talking about.
At the breakfast table I read the cereal boxes, front
back and sides. When I’m sitting in the doctor’s office or waiting for an
oil change I pick up any old magazine, regardless of whether I care about the
contents. (Sports Illustrated and Redbook come to mind)
And because I share the house with three members of the
female persuasion (four if you count the cat) I have read any number of chick
lit and mommy memoirs (as well as marketing books and children’s picture
books).
I also read a lot of books by choice. But it’s those rare
few books that I will go out of my way to recommend to others.
These are the books that had a powerful impact in some
way or another on my very inner being. Some are books from my formative years,
some I only recently was introduced to. Either way, Mason’s Book Picks will be
a running off-the-top-of-my-head list of those books which influenced me as a
writer and as a person.
They are in no particular order, honestly. I’m shooting
from the hip here.
I only recently discovered this book in my wife’s
collection. I remembered seeing the trailers for the movie back in the day but
never saw it. I’m glad I didn’t, because cracking open this brilliant dystopic
novel sight-unseen was an incredible experience.
The writing captivated me with it’s almost Philip K.
Dick-esque noir terseness. And the battle of ideals and ideas was very
enthralling.
Look out next week or so when I throw another Mason’s
Book Pick at you.
This is not a sports reference. In no way do I follow sports, nor do I endorse the following of sports.
In fact, it was only after I typed March Madness that I recalled its use in the
world of sports. I’m not sure which sport, or sports… but those sport people
use the term for something. (Did I mention I don’t follow sports… at all?)
It was just the month of March. It was certifiably insane.
But lots of good stuff was crammed into that insanity. I
hope I’ll get to share soon.
One thing I can and will talk about is the Fraternity ofFlash being put on by Grand Poobah Misty Dahl. In a
nutshell, she’s crazy like a fox and decided to host her own, invite-only,
flash fiction fest.
And that makes me happy. Not just because I’ll be rubbing
digital elbows with some really fine writers (such as Mercedes M. Yardley, BradC. Hodson, Lisa Morton, John Palisano, Robert Devereaux, Jeff Mariotte, Jason
Reinhardt, and many more) but because I love when people just take the bull by
the horns and instigate something wild like this.
Why is she doing it? She had an idea and didn’t sit around
wondering whether it would garner some huge pay-off or whether it was
super-strategic-according-to-the-latest-marketing-strategy.
She loves writing and she loves writers. And she acted.
Inspired! Hence actually posting something on my jilted blog.
Allow me to introduce you to my other band: Aurea Verba
Eric, Mason, Eli, Matt
See, that's me over there with a pained rock star look on my face. In my opinion, a constipated or wounded pout is the only real face one can make for band photos.
But I digress.
My other band is quite fun to be in. For starters I have too much music in my body to get it all out with just one band. So I need at least two full time bands with several other pick-up gigs thrown in on the side.
It's kind of like writing. I can't just write in one genre, nor am I content with just writing a few stories or novels "and then I'll be done." I'll never be done, I'll always create.
Do thousands upon thousands of people come to our shows? No (unless they are invisible, in which case I am kinda creeped out). But does that mean that somehow it's not worth it?
We do what we love doing because we love doing it--no, we NEED to do it. I can't help being creative, I couldn't stop myself from being creative.
So why would I ever let myself mope and have those useless thoughts of "not being really successful"?
Hot diggety-dawg, I put my pen onto a blank page and a story comes out. I put my fingers onto a contraption made of steel and rosewood and music happens!
That's the fountainhead of it all. I don't need adulation or hordes of fans (though it'd be nice, sometimes), I just need to keep creating.
So I leave you with a music video as I go off and get some writing done. Or maybe I'll go play some guitar...
But if you ever find yourself sitting around waiting for inspiration, here's a little tip: you'll do more waiting than
writing.
Which brings me to the first myth about creativity: Waiting for inspiration to strike.
Waiting for inspiration to strike is a little like waiting for lightning to strike.
Sure it happens--but if you want to make it as a professional writer you can't bank on waiting for it.
Boy, when inspiration strikes, all bets are off. Pen goes to paper and you feel as if you've touched live electric wire. (or fingers go to keyboards, or paintbrush to canvas, or hands to guitar neck... you get the idea)
But what about all the other days when inspiration seems far away?
One trick you hear about is to seek out things that inspire you. Sure, this works sometimes. There's nothing wrong with trying to induce creativity by shaking things up or listening to Sigur Ros or Florence + the Machine. You don't wait in one spot for lightning to strike. You go out and chase storms.
But, there is something deeper than just scouring Youtube for creative videos to spark your imagination (besides, time spent online is time spent NOT writing).
Why not make inspiration a habit?
"What do you mean, Mason? What is this secret of which you speak?"
Ok, so no real secret. Making writing a habit makes inspiration a habit.
As you learn to express yourself more clearly, with less affectation or bad writing habits, the easier it is for any glimmer of inspiration to be seized and nurtured and developed.
You become a clearer conduit for your muse. You learn to fan into flame that little spark, instead of stifling it.
I love my critique group (The infamous Illiterati) because they always tell me when I'm clouding up the waters. And they challenge me to go farther, deeper, and swim in dangerous waters where inspiration lurks like a sea serpent coiling just under the surface.
But let me make one thing clear: You have to be able to write under duress.
Life doesn't slow down. Life doesn't pause or go on vacation for you to write.
You do it in spite of life sometimes.
Anyone who has children under 5 and who's written anything coherent recently can attest to that.
But now let's hear from you.
What things inspire you? Music, videos, blogs, people, thingamabobs?
~mason
So to spark some inspiration here's Florence + the Machine tearing your face off under extreme duress (outdoor festivals, electric instruments and rain = no bueno)
Most of you know that November is National Novel Writing Month. (Can I get a holla from my NaNoWriMo peeps?) The main gist is to provide a kick in the proverbial seat and write a 50k (or more) novel from scratch during the month of November.
Awesome! Anything to get writers to write = wunderbar. It’s the hardest part. I’ve heard professional estimopinions that 90% of people who claim to be writers never finish a novel. Yuck!
So if NaNoWriMo is what it takes, by all means be a Nanite.
But I’m gonna be blunt here. Don’t wait for NaNoWriMo to write.
It’s not cheating to write the rest of the year. I promise. Heck, it’s not cheating to have written 6000 words of your novel from here to November. (Just make sure you hit 50k words written DURING the month to make NaNoFame)
So, enough blogging and twittering about how excited you are for NaNoWriMo, start writing… NOW!
Seriously. Open Word and start. Dude, why are you still reading this blog?
Making music has some interesting similarities to writing fiction.
Particularly: "Where do your ideas come from?"
Honestly it's as if they came straight from the aether without preamble or consideration. You can sense the imminence of it all, the crackle of electricity in the air.
You pick up the guitar or open the notebook. The page is still blank, the notes are still hidden. But they are right there, waiting.
The shiver of purpose and meaning gaining momentum like a pressure from the air around you and suddenly you make something like this.
