lemm.ee

3 points

1 year ago

Hello there!

I’m at a place of “I want to write, but I can’t figure out what I want to write”. I recently came to the end of a project that I’d been working on for a number of years, and while I feel like I’m done with that story (after about 1.3 million words, not intended for publication), I just can’t figure out where to go next. I haven’t quite landed on an idea I can get excited about.

I’m pretty sure I don’t want to be published. Nothing kills the joy of writing for me more than “okay, but is it marketable enough to sell?” No shade on anyone who wants to be published! It’s just not for me.

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J.B. Pinkle@beehaw.orgOP

3 points

1 year ago

(after about 1.3 million words, not intended for publication)

Sheesh. I’m at 106k words and that’s 10x more than any single thing I’ve ever written before. 1.3 million sounds impossible - what a journey writing that must have been!

Nothing kills the joy of writing for me more than “okay, but is it marketable enough to sell?” No shade on anyone who wants to be published! It’s just not for me.

I can get that. In my case, I am going to need a second career as I age, and personal circumstances limit the sorts of things I can consider. Fortunately, this is something I can consider, something I am really enjoying, and something I think I can learn to be good at.

If you are willing to share, what’s the scope and general description of your huge work?

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3 points

1 year ago

The huge project was basically a big, sprawling sci-fi/fantasy adventure. Magic, aliens, transformation themes. I just started writing one day and kept going. The 1.3 million words was over five or six years, so it’s mostly just that I was sticking with one story rather than hopping between different projects. It was definitely a journey, and I really enjoyed working on it. There’s something really liberating about just writing whatever I want and not really worrying about writing for anybody but myself. But I just reached a point where I felt like I had nothing more to add to it.

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J.B. Pinkle@beehaw.orgOP

3 points

1 year ago

That does sound pretty awesome. Writing a blended sci-fi/fantasy story is on my list of things I want to do, but I don’t think I’m ready for that yet.

The worldbuilding for something that size must have been immense, I feel like that must have been the most fun part in a way.

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3 points

1 year ago

A sci-fi/fantasy blend is less complicated than it seems, if it is something you want to give a try in future. Mine basically started out very Star Wars-esque, before it took on a life of its own and I played up the magical elements more. I find that I don’t enjoy world-building for its own sake, so I tend to incorporate it into a story as I write. The results end up pretty fluid, but disorganised, which is interesting.

What kind of thing do you write?

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J.B. Pinkle@beehaw.orgOP

2 points

1 year ago

I’m writing what I think of as “classic fantasy” - though whether others would find that term applicable I do not know.

No dragons, no Tolkien-esque races, but a typical Europe-ish setting, say 18th-ish century without gunpowder, and a fairly hard magic system which is both powerful and self-limiting, with a story of pursuing justice while being pursued by those who would deny it. The theme has ended up being very heavy on friendship and loyalty. It’s not a cozy, but it’s very much not grimdark, either.

I’m a little bit worried that I don’t provide enough possibility of death to any of the main characters via the story as written, but I’m so close to the end that I’m not going to change anything unless I still feel this way during revision.

I find that I don’t enjoy world-building for its own sake, so I tend to incorporate it into a story as I write.

I do this as well, but I take somewhat copious notes regarding the significant details as I create them. It’s too early to tell whether this is going to generate a result I’m happy with or not. 🙂

I was thinking about one of your opening comments before:

I just can’t figure out where to go next. I haven’t quite landed on an idea I can get excited about.

As kind of weird as it is for me to feel this way, I’ve been having random ideas lately that might be a good fit for where you are, depending on if you feel you are done with the entire world or not.

I have found myself daydreaming about doing short stories involving some of the secondary characters and the lives they had/have before they got swept up in the events of my story, or a slightly different idea would be to do short stories that may involve new characters but showcase a particular culture from the world, or an interesting situation to be solved in an interesting way with magic, or etc. For me, I feel like that’s a fairly foolish daydream for the point where I am at this time. But for you, with all that body of work, and looking for something to do - maybe a good fit?

Edit:

A sci-fi/fantasy blend is less complicated than it seems, if it is something you want to give a try in future.

My worry there is that I’m not sure I can learn what I need to in order to write credible sci-fi while also learning to write. But I’ve been a majority-fantasy reader for my entire life, from a very early age. I feel like I’ve got a built in comfort zone on the fantasy side that is allowing me to focus more on learning to write than learning to write fantasy.

additional edits for minor corrections and clarity

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2 points

1 year ago

No dragons, no Tolkien-esque races, but a typical Europe-ish setting, say 18th-ish century without gunpowder, and a fairly hard magic system which is both powerful and self-limiting, with a story of pursuing justice while being pursued by those who would deny it. The theme has ended up being very heavy on friendship and loyalty. It’s not a cozy, but it’s very much not grimdark, either.

This sounds really cool, actually! I think the “medieval” fantasy has been such a staple for so long that an 18th century vibe is quite refreshing. And nothing wrong with heading for the middle ground between cosy and grimdark.

I’m not sure how much you’d need to worry about threatening your characters with death. I kind of think the whole Game of Thrones “anybody can die at any time” thing is a bit overdone now, and it risks alienating readers too. I’ve dropped a few series because once all my favourite characters had been brutally killed off, I just didn’t care enough about the handful still left alive that I was willing to keep paying for books, you know?

As kind of weird as it is for me to feel this way, I’ve been having random ideas lately that might be a good fit for where you are, depending on if you feel you are done with the entire world or not.

I’m definitely done with the world. Like, I love it, and I might go back to it one day, but after writing so much about it, I’m really ready to try something new and different. I’m feeling drawn to some xenofiction, maybe, I just haven’t hit on the idea that really makes me go “yes, that one!” yet. I actually find short stories really challenging, because I tend to write by going really deep into a single character’s POV, so if I care enough about them to write about them, then I want to write a lot. So… I just need to find that character+world combination that I feel attached to enough to spend time on, if you know what I mean?

My worry there is that I’m not sure I can learn what I need to in order to write credible sci-fi while also learning to write. But I’ve been a majority-fantasy reader for my entire life, from a very early age. I feel like I’ve got a built in comfort zone on the fantasy side that is allowing me to focus more on learning to write than learning to write fantasy.

That makes sense, yeah! Working with a new genre is challenging, especially if it’s not one you’ve read a lot. But a sci-fi/fantasy blend is more forgiving in that respect than hard sci-fi, since the magical elements allows you to get away with fuzzier science.

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