good questions

[truepenny]

witchqueen is asking, What's your story?.

arcaedia wants to know how you bribe yourself to write.

My story, I realize as I think about it, is about two damaged people learning to trust each other--and learning that they are worthy of trust themselves. Which can play itself out in any number of arenas, including but not limited to the romantic, and is a surefire source of my favorite flavors of angst. This dynamic is one of the things I like about Swordspoint, and I know it's why I find the end of Busman's Honeymoon so intensely moving.

It also sums up what I write novels about with fair accuracy.

My bribery techniques are multitudinous. LJ is definitely one. When I'm in a game-playing phase, a round of mahjongg or a level of Diablo II or a game of Arachnid solitaire. Reading something fun. Watching an episode of Man from UNCLE (drat you, matociquala!). I tend to work, when I'm working well, in a steady pattern of write, take a break, write, take a break. My rewards can thus never be anything I can't put down easily if the next sentence trips the motion detectors in my head.

When I'm not working well, nothing works. I am as unmotivatable as a pissed-off mule.

But really the most effective motivational technique is one I'm not responsible for. The plain truth of the matter is that I tell myself stories to keep from going insane with boredom. The fact that I can write them down and get paid for them is really just a delightful bonus. Even on days when I'm not writing and can't write and can't imagine being able to write a sentence that isn't pure drivelling shit ever again, the story-telling machine is still cranking. Sometimes writing is fun; sometimes it isn't. But it's always better than the alternative.

And speaking of which, Part 3 of this thing that's maybe a novel clocks in at 5,658 words. I'm now stuck at the beginning of Part 4.

Comments

[oracne.livejournal.com]

My story, I realize as I think about it, is about two damaged people learning to trust each other--and learning that they are worthy of trust themselves.

And what a nummy story that is.

Not that I would have any opinions on the matter... [ahem]

Sometimes writing is fun; sometimes it isn't. But it's always better than the alternative.

ALWAYS.

If I had some contrary opinion, this reply would be more interesting, but I don't. Well, except that I think Free Cell is better than Arachnid Solitaire. But only because I suck at Arachnid Solitaire.

[stakebait.livejournal.com]

What a great story. And I adore Swordspoint.

Busman's Honeymoon doesn't quite get me like Gaudy Night does, though -- in this and even more so in the short story that took place post-children, Peter's sudden transformation to masculine landed country gentry (his "reverting to type") when he had been so thoroughly identified with the city, the feminine, the nervous, the socially suspect, the theoretical, the protean, and everything in opposition to it hit me as almost a betrayal. Or a bait and switch on Harriet, although she didn't think so. I successfully struggled to deal with the unfairness of my expectations and let Peter revert to his roots in peace, but the effect of that struggle is to distance me from the narrative somewhat.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

I agree with you completely about "Talboys." It's fun, but it's also a decided retreat from what Gaudy Night and Busman's Honeymoon accomplished.

But the end of BH, to me, is the ultimate failure of all Peter's facades, including the masculine landed country gentry he's been counterfeiting so beautifully throughout the novel. He finally trusts Harriet enough to let her see the damage done him.

[stakebait.livejournal.com]

That makes a lot of sense. I'll have to reread with that in mind. Not exactly a hardship, that. :)

Mer

counterfeiting

[inkylj.livejournal.com]

I agree with you completely about "Talboys." It's fun, but it's also a decided retreat from what Gaudy Night and Busman's Honeymoon accomplished.

Well, sure, but that's how life works -- you can't go walking around all the time with your skin peeled back and your heart exposed for anyone to prod at. So you rip yourself open, do the emotional surgery, and close things back up again; maybe next time it's a little easier to open up when there is adjustment that has to be made.

I also take issue with the idea that Lord Peter is faking being a idle nobleman or a country gentleman: these are both clearly things he actually is, and just because they're not what he is "deep down" doesn't mean that they're not part of him. Probably moreso than he realizes; the books are as full of him unconsciously acting the roles as consciously.

Re: counterfeiting

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

Not a retreat from what Peter accomplishes. A retreat from what Sayers accomplishes.

"Counterfeiting" was a bad verb choice. I meant something more subtle, but now can't articulate it. *sigh*

[rysmiel.livejournal.com]

I don't bribe myself to write; to some extent, writing is how I bribe myself to bear with the day job.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

That was true for me when I was taking classes and the two summers I had the very boring clerical job. But the natural perversity of all things meant that as soon as I could write full-time, it stopped being a reward for good behavior and became something that needed a reward system of its own.