It's time for another blog chain entry. This time Abi started things off with a lovely set of questions.
1. What writing related things have you done in the past?
Well besides doing lots and lots of writing - like enough to fill notebooks and journals dating all the way back to second grade - the other writing related thing I've done is read. I've read a lot, and I continue to read a lot.
I suppose another writing related thing I've done is acting. Oddly enough the bug bit me in eighth grade when as part of a Christmas pageant at my school I was cast as Brenda Star. I was literally a star... like the kind that wears a gigantic cardboard star on her head with a whole cut in the middle of it for her face to stick through. A star so big that I had to walk through the door that led onto the stage sideways. My one line: "I'm Brenda Star ace reporter and I'll get to the bottom of this." What I learned from acting that I can now apply to my writing wasn't humiliation (although obviously I did learn that), but how to think about a character's motivations.
Of course, after graduating with a BFA in theatre I realized what I really wanted to do was direct. And so on to film school in California. It was in taking apart and examining the structure of a screenplay that I started to figure out how to tell a long form story and keep things moving. Also in writing my own screenplays I was really able to work on how to show the story through action instead of telling.
2. What WIPs are you working on now?
I'm working on an Urban Fantasy that I am aiming to finish the first draft of by the end of February at the latest.
3. Do you have anything brewing for the future?
Not really. After I finish my WIP I will let it sit for a month of so, and during that time might work on rewriting some old short stories I've had lying around for awhile. Then I'll rewrite my WIP and prepare to send it out into the big bad world. Beyond that I haven't a clue except I know that I will be writing.
4. Are you setting any writing goals or resolutions for 2009?
It's not really a 2009 goal, but rather one I started towards the end of 2008. I was trying to write 1000 words a day and came up short pretty consistently. This was, as you might imagine, rather discouraging. I switched to a goal of 500 words a day and have found that on most days I can not only reach this, but often surpass it. A double win.
That's it from me. If you want to read the post before mine you can find it at Mary Lindsey's Weblog and as usual Archetype Writing is the post after mine.
