A Quick Gulp of Air

Whew! Well, to say this year has been busy is an understatement! Fortunately, all the free time I can wrangle has been going towards my writing time instead of blogging, but I’ve got a free minute, so I’ll give you a quick update.

First, it’s always great to know that there are people out there who appreciate what I’ve written. Ours is a quiet sort of entertainment, where we create a world that exists in between ourselves and our readers, a bridge of sorts. And through the magic of the internets, we get the opportunity to cross over the bridge and see how our words have effected others, such as in this glowing example of a reader, well, listener in this case, responding to Our Drunken Tjeng. This happens to be the story I’m most proud to have written too, so I like his taste in stories.

Secondly, another ArmadilloCon has come and gone. Honestly, I was still a little wiped out from last year’s con, so I limited my participation to being an instructor in the writer’s workshop and doing a joint reading. The workshop was fun. Meek little me sat in the back row, cracking hushed jokes and hoping not to get called on. Hello, high school all over again! Kidding. Well, sort of. I did set a goal to say at least two things during the panel, and ended up saying three–how intelligible my comments were, well, that’s debatable, but I spoke up and that’s what matters.

I was more at ease when we broke out into smaller groups and had some great critique sessions. I was really impressed by the quality of the manuscripts there, and also in the quality of critiques that the other students gave. There was one manuscript I really wanted to pick up for Drabblecast, but alas, it was too long for us (and maybe too good for us, but hey, that’s what reprint markets are for!)

I also had a great time at our reading for Daily Science Fiction Year One anthology. I read along with K. G. Jewel, Cat Rambo, and a couple others. Nice to be in the company of such delightfully twisted minds. I have three stories in the collection, but opted to read Wrath of the Porcelain Gods because what Sunday afternoon con panel doesn’t need a little interstellar potty humor to help the mood?

Anyway, wish I had time to post a picture or two, but hopefully words will do for now!

My Secret to Creating Well-Rounded Characters

I’ve got creating characters down to a science. Literally! Well, the science of astrology anyway… and you too can know my secret, but first you must suffer through what’s new in Nicky Draydenland!

First and most importantly, after ten years of wanting one, I am now the proud owner of a sitar! It’s even more awesome than I could have imagined. I have now masted the traditional Indian ragas Mary Had a Little Lamb, Old MacDonald, and Over the Rainbow…okay, so obviously I need some instruction on how to play this thing. Maybe that will  be a possibility one day, but for now I’ve got my hands full with other creative endeavors.

I put out another ebook collection of short stories, this one entitled The Wide, Wide World of Weird. I gave it this title because people kept commenting on my other ebooks that the stories were “weird” like that was a bad thing! Little did they know that “weird” is just about the best compliment you can give me. So in the name of truth in advertising, I put it all out there right on the cover, and beyond the cover, you’ll find 12 strange stories definitely deserving of the title.

Story a Day in May was a big bust. I got two days into it and decided that I just couldn’t perform like I wanted, so I dropped it. Instead, I’m concentrating on my novel revision which has gone almost halfway through my critique group. They’ve been extremely helpful in helping me to develop and focus the story and I’ve really fallen in love with the characters.

Which brings me to the main topic of this entry: creating well-rounded characters! My favorite part of the character development process happens during the second draft, in which I pull out my handy dandy The New Astrology: A Unique Synthesis of the World’s Two Great Astrological Systems: The Chinese and Western a special little cheat that my old writing coach Richard introduced me to. It contains insightful descriptions of all of the Chinese zodiac signs, plus all of the Western ones, then goes one step further and combines them for a total of 144 unique combinations…combinations that make great well-rounded characters with little to no effort!

I always do this process after the first draft so that I at least have an idea of what the characters are like. Then I look through the lists of character traits for both the Chinese and Western zodiacs and find the ones that closely match each main character. I pick the best from each astrology system, find where they intersect, and viola! Each entry gives me several pages of material, including a generous list of character strengths, weaknesses, and quirks right there on the page. It also goes into detail about what professions suit the character, which signs they’re romantically compatible with, and what their family life is like.

I pick and choose from these little gems to backfill my story, and with a few carefully placed details, the characters come to life and jump off the page.  So that’s my big characterization secret. If I were to have only one book in my reference library, this one would definitely be it!

Story a Day in May!

It’s that time again…Story a Day in May. Time to face the challenge that crippled me emotionally and creatively for the better part of last year. It’ll warp my brain. It’ll make me have insanely twisted thoughts. It will turn me into a sniveling shell of a person who babbles incoherent nonsense…so pretty much my normal life as a writer, except I hope to have the beginnings of at least a few salvageable stories by the end of the month. Yes, it’s wicked hard, harder than even NaNoWriMo in my opinion. But it’s worth another shot, right? I think this year I’m more prepared to go down that winding, weird, dark rabbit hole that is hyper-creativity…and if I’m not, my muse is more than willing to give me a good shove. So who else is in?