Chapter Three is done but for some reason got pretty screwed up! A five paragraph description of my little blue truck just mysteriously disappeared! I'll put it in later! I'll have to rewrite and re remember it because this is my first draft right here, unedited and just hot off the press! Writing a long story is an interesting challenge. Shakespeare took 2 lovers from 2 families and killed them both off, end of story, then he filled in the blanks with a bunch of detail. In a way it is no different from painting, what to put in and what to leave out. So far I am comfortable with the telling. It is somewhat true and I can't yet be caught up in a lie; however, the fiction of it all will very soon begin. Truth can be a very dull story.
No, it is not the story of a former girlfriend, although I do have contact with 2 girls I knew in the early years of college and use them as a foil. They are both successful artists and one has a husband who is dieing of cancer. They are in Europe somewhere and yes, because medical care is so expensive here.
Like all good stories it will be about greed and corporate manipulation. Half of Japan will end up on the beaches from Oregon through Washington and upwards to British Colombia. Some will sink but lots will wash ashore and it is said to be radioactive. There just has to be a story there, I know.
A difficult part in telling any story is "character development". It can require a ton of research and note taking causing the writer to be always aware of who is talking and what would be appropriate for him to say? I am solving that problem by just being myself with only tiny lies and manipulations.
Actually all of the characters in this book will be people I know or knew in my youth so it will be easy for me to imagine what they would say or how they would react. I won't need to take notes, just dredge up memories from childhood, hearsay and newspaper accounts. So we will have a famous writer, a successful artist and a movie star! and, of course, someone will die! The rest will come from newspapers. You never have to go far to find a story. Nuclear reactors are leaking near Chicago and in California. Our local scrapyard has installed a radiation detector at their front entry and there are metal thieves all across this country. Someone is bound to steal something they don't really want!
The trick is not to write the whole story in one paragraph and attempt to make it interesting and curious along the way. The chapters are purposefully short because this is the blog world and we have other things to do and, admittedly because I write 800 words or so and have no bloody idea of where I am going! It gives me something to do between paintings while I am waiting for the paint to dry.
I am retired! Chapter Three is HERE!
No, it is not the story of a former girlfriend, although I do have contact with 2 girls I knew in the early years of college and use them as a foil. They are both successful artists and one has a husband who is dieing of cancer. They are in Europe somewhere and yes, because medical care is so expensive here.
Like all good stories it will be about greed and corporate manipulation. Half of Japan will end up on the beaches from Oregon through Washington and upwards to British Colombia. Some will sink but lots will wash ashore and it is said to be radioactive. There just has to be a story there, I know.
A difficult part in telling any story is "character development". It can require a ton of research and note taking causing the writer to be always aware of who is talking and what would be appropriate for him to say? I am solving that problem by just being myself with only tiny lies and manipulations.
Actually all of the characters in this book will be people I know or knew in my youth so it will be easy for me to imagine what they would say or how they would react. I won't need to take notes, just dredge up memories from childhood, hearsay and newspaper accounts. So we will have a famous writer, a successful artist and a movie star! and, of course, someone will die! The rest will come from newspapers. You never have to go far to find a story. Nuclear reactors are leaking near Chicago and in California. Our local scrapyard has installed a radiation detector at their front entry and there are metal thieves all across this country. Someone is bound to steal something they don't really want!
The trick is not to write the whole story in one paragraph and attempt to make it interesting and curious along the way. The chapters are purposefully short because this is the blog world and we have other things to do and, admittedly because I write 800 words or so and have no bloody idea of where I am going! It gives me something to do between paintings while I am waiting for the paint to dry.
I am retired! Chapter Three is HERE!
3 comments:
Jer, I'm loving your story really. I hope the person who dies is fictional though. I just get the skeevies using anyone real, like karma or something. And no one spins a tale as you do! As to the radioactive debris on the west coast? Oh dear God. What are we doing to ourselves?
Sherry, that is an excellent and sensitive point! I'll keep the people I know alive! and the radioactive stuff? I think that will be at the core of this story.
A story about what we are doing to ourselves. Thanks for the encouraging words and advise! Jerry
Very cool Jerry :-) I'm studying Photoshop tomorrow at home, send me a note and we can have a chat. oxox
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