Geekchic OOTD: Looking for a Mind at Work

April somehow conspired to be a great month for my Hamilton interests. This month marks one year since I wrote this emotional and somehow coherent review of my experience of Hamilton at the Public in February 2015, and the Hamiltome is finally out in the world! (Deliver my book to meeee quickly, BN!)

And last but not least, one of my favorite geek ladies, Jordan of Jordandené, is offering a Hamilton-themed shirt (or tank) for her April Shirt of the Month. It features a quote from the song "The Schuyler Sisters," which is the show's introduction to the eponymous sisters - amazing women of the Revolution.

So in honor of all things Hamilton musical, I am making my first Outfit of the Day post, featuring Jordan's "Looking for a Mind at Work" shirt. (Stick around to the end for a surpriiiiiise~!)

A photo posted by jordandené (@jordandenenyc) on Apr 8, 2016 at 2:39pm PDT

A little background:

I'm an unabashed fan of Jordan's simple-chic, hand-lettered geeky shirt designs, and I love the Shirt of the Month feature because it means getting a new design on a monthly basis. So when Jordan reached out to me for Hamilton quotes for the April shirt, I didn't hesitate to, frankly, bombard her with quotes. Anyone who has listened to the musical can sympathize; it is brimming with quotable lines.

But I ultimately pushed for something from the Schuyler Sisters because I love these resilient, brilliant women and thought they ought to be represented on more Hamilton merch. I couldn't be happier that Jordan went with the quote "Looking for a mind at work!"

The Schuyler Sisters celebrate Women's Equality Day! #HamiltonBway proudly supports Equal Rights Amendment! #ERAnow pic.twitter.com/rU5kwQEQXt

— Hamilton (@HamiltonMusical) August 26, 2015

Full disclosure, Jordan sent me an early preview of the shirt for helping, and I was so excited about it that I resolved to do an outfit post for fun. And then once I started, I felt like I had to do 3 different outfits - you know, one for each of the sisters. :)

Note: The shirt I'm wearing in these pictures is an XS. I normally order T-Shirts in S for a looser fit. In the tanks, I usually order in XS because the S tends to run a bit big on me.


ANGELICA - I know her dress isn't really pink, but it's a warm and vibrant color. Angelica is a lady, but she's independent and strong too, so I thought this feminine floral skirt paired with bold lips and the sassier cat-eye frames would represent that well.

Outfit details: SHIRT (Jordandene) // SKIRT (Forever 21 N/A; Modcloth-similar) // SHOES (Eileen Fisher) // SUNGLASSES (HotTopic) // NECKLACE (Forever 21 N/A) // LIP COLOR (Bite Beauty custom coral; similar in 'pickled ginger')


ELIZA - Eliza's color palette is soft blues and greens, and her personality is more subdued than Angelica's. Hers is a quiet, honest strength. So I went with a sweeter look.

Outfit details: SHIRT (Jordandene) // SHORTS (Dear Creatures N/A ; asos- similar) // CARDIGAN (Target- similar) // SHOES (Forever 21- similar) // FAUX LACE COLLAR (vintage) // LIP COLOR (Bite Beauty custom nude; similar in 'meringue')


& PEGGY - The youngest Schuyler sister has become something of a fan favorite as perhaps the sassiest sister (and if you read about her, you'll find she was badass too - like saved her family by lying through her teeth to Redcoats & scaring them off). So I stuck with her yellow color palette and gave her my most youthful and work-work outfit.

Outfit details: SHIRT: (Jordandene) // SKIRT: (Forever 21-similar) // TIGHTS (Blackmilk) // SHOES (Nike N/A) // NECKLACE (Forever 21- similar) // BRACELET (BombDotComGeekery - similar) // SUNGLASSES (Ray Ban) // LIP COLOR (ColorPop in 'Beeper')


And as a gift to my wonderful internet friends for putting up with my endless Hamilton obsession, Jordan has given me a discount code to share with you!

You can get 25% off the entire Jordandené site, including the Hamilton shirt with my code workwork. The code is good through May 31st, but remember, the Hamilton Schuyler Sisters shirt will only be available until the end of April!

Already have the Hamilton shirt? No worries because there are other great options - like my other favorite, the Matt the Radar Technician/Kylo Ren tank.

HAPPY SHOPPING! (And special thanks to Jordan Ellis!) Huzzah!


Q4U: Which of these outfits was your favorite? What Jordandene goods are you getting?

New Year / New Look

Happy Wednesday! I hope everyone had a marvelous weekend. I did because I got President's Day off, which meant 3 day weekend for reading, writing, and general lazing about. Mostly, reading and lazing happened.

BUT something else happened to. In fact, some of you may have already noticed that things look a little different here...

No, I didn't get a new look and go Dark Side.

After a couple of years (has it been that long, really?!) of birds on a wire, A NUDGE has finally gotten a blog makeover!

Farewell, sweet birdies!

I've been wanting to update the look for a while (though we did really love those birds), but I've not had the time or energy to find and implement something we both liked. Neither of us are designers or coders, so we're often limited to what we can find and google.

Enter the talented, generous, and wonderful Caroline Richmond! She writes and photographs already, but lucky for us, she recently delved into web design and is pretty flipping good at it! My internet addiction totally paid off when I happened to see her post offering free blog designs go up, and it was first come first serve. I had been thinking about changing the blog look again, so the timing could not have been more perfect.

All 3 designs were so cute it was hard to choose, but we settled on her Le Bold Design. I'm a fan of the clean, minimal blog look, but we're also all about the whimsy here. So I wanted some cute elements and/or bright colors. So Le Bold was perfect.

Caroline's "Le Bold" design mock-up.

Caroline was so supportive and cooperative in helping us get things looking just right - from pointing us to color palettes (this was a time-suck, let me tell you) to tweaking text for us to customizing our Page banners and sidebar social media buttons. AND she worked on and implemented the design over the long weekend while she was sick! (Caroline, I hope you're resting and much better now!)

So thanks to her hard work and to my figuring out how to make some simple elements/buttons myself, A NUDGE is debuting its new look today! Looking fresh and new, yes?

I encourage you to poke around the other pages, as I've made some updates to content there and in the sidebar (and also so my little flags get some attention, haha).

Check out Caroline's Designs Pinterest board and her blog to see more of her work.

THANK YOU, Caroline! We are so happy with our blog makeover! You are The Best, or as my sister and I like to say in German, die beste! :)


Q4U: What other talents do you have OR what skill/hobby have you been meaning to pick up?

A Cooperative Reading Venture

As you may know, Krispy and I read a lot of books.  As you may also know, I am masochistic.  And as you may know again, Krispy and I read the same books if they're good/we think it's well-suited to the other's taste.

This why, through one thing and another, I ended up reading Fury of the Phoenix by Cindy Pon without having read the first book, Silver Phoenix.  Krispy read Silver Phoenix a couple of years ago and had moderate feelings toward it (which I think became lukewarmer with the passage of time), so I didn't read it and just had Krispy summarize everything.  She was interested in the sequel but when our library didn't pick it up right away, she forgot about it.

Then, recently, what with all the Stormdancer brouhaha about research and cultural appropriation hitting the 'net, Krispy and I have been talking about diversity in YA and cultural (mis)representation and appropriation, particularly of Asian-based fantasy--reminding us of Silver Phoenix and hey, did our library ever get the sequel? (Note: Not that the research stuff has anything to do with Silver Phoenix. It just got us thinking about Asian-inspired YA fantasy.)

Then Krispy came across a review of Fury of the Phoenix that describes how the Chinese-based characters cross the ocean to what the blogger called generic!Whitelandia since the country is so colorless--and yet despite the apparent time period, the (Caucasian-based) women of this western land enjoy more equality, empowerment, rights, and sexual freedom than anywhere in the real world today.

Naturally this piqued our curiosity anew.  Krispy wanted to read Fury since she was curious as to what happened, but was a bit reluctant to pick it up because she's got a ton of other books on her plate and reading Fury seemed like an exercise in pointless masochism.

Which latter is just my style!

Krispy and I hate this cover, btw.
There is nothing Asian about it, from the girl to her costume to the dagger.

I told Krispy that since she read the first book and told me everything, I'd return the favor by reading the second book and if I didn't think it was worth her time reading, I'd tell her everything.  Which I did.  The very next day.  Because if I put it off I might not do it and if I took longer than a day to read it, I feared might hemorrhage something.  Fortunately, the book wasn't that bad, but uhhh it was problematic.

Let's just say that the plot was very slow for one storyline (the first half of the book is essentially 8+ weeks of sailing with nothing happening except a random pirate attack and random a magic monster attack in an unsuccessful attempt to make things exciting) and got slower and slower in the other storyline (which is humanizing backstory on the villain from the first book).  The two storylines don't really mesh or intertwine, and in the end they're jammed together in a conclusion that doesn't entirely make sense.  And generic!Whitelandia was everything I'd dreaded and more.  Also, there was a very disturbing lolwtfbbq plot point with regards to the fact that the backstoried villain is a eunuch.

But see!  Together, Krispy and I got through the Kingdom of Xia duology together!  By acting as a buffer and gauging each other's taste in books, we managed to find a happy medium that satisfied our mutual curiosity with minimum effort.  Schneizeleffort extended to book reading, baby!

Have you had a cooperative reading effort before?

P.S. Schneizeleffort always wins the day.

P.P.S. We're planning a post on the concerns raised by Stormdancer and its worldbuilding and research. So we will link up to all the relevant posts in that later post. However, if you're dreadfully curious about the brouhaha mentioned above, here are a few links to fill you in.

• Part 3 of our friend Wistfully Linda's Ponderings on YA Asian Fantasies: Green-Eyed Asian Love Interest (this post got Krispy started thinking cultural appropriation & world building)

• Kayla + Cyna's scathing review of Stormdancer, which addresses its world-building flaws among other things. (Our true inkling that something might be troubling with this book. Also Warning for strong language.)

• Karen Healey's & others' reactions to: Jay Kristoff on Japan as steampunk cultural touchstone

Collaborative Books

I was digging through a pile of old books recently and rediscovered this old book by Mercedes Lackey (acclaimed author of the adult fantasy Valdemar series which I used to be crazy about) and Piers Anthony (best known for his pun-laden Xanth series, also fantasy) called If I Pay Thee Not in Gold.

Is it just me or does the heroine
look decidedly stumpy?

Ignore the misleading Goodreads blurb, which is the same as the one on the back of the book--the publishers were trying to capitalize on Piers Anthony's humorous/light fantasy renown.  The book itself is serious in tone, and the plot goes nine kinds of WTF in the end.  It starts off with conjuration magic and the Queen trying to murder the heroine, and by midway through descends into a morass of travel and the heroine and her war-party get attacked by giant crabs and anemones and by the end there's gender-shifting and threesomes and--yeah, no.

Why did the book become such a mess?  (Not that it was super great to begin with, mind you.)  I finally read the author's note in the back and apparently Piers Anthony never met Mercedes Lackey--he had the idea for this book and pitched it to the higher-ups, who gave it to Mercedes Lackey to write.  After she was done, the book went back to Piers Anthony who did the final editing.  He had a very good analogy too:

I did a complete job of copy-editing and spot revisions and additions, exactly as I do for my own drafts, polishing the novel to my satisfaction and expanding it by ten thousand words.  Those who are conversant with Misty's writing and mine will see aspects of both here, just as both of our ideas are represented.  Thus I did the top and bottom of it, the summary and the revision.  Picture a sandwich: I'm the two slices of bread.  Most of the nourishment is in the center, but without the bread it wouldn't exist. (397)

And yeah, I totally see it now.  I'm pretty sure that the latter half of the book was his addition since it really has very little setup or tie-ins to the first half.  Add in the plot holes and continuity errors and it becomes obvious where text and plot were added.

This led me to thinking about collaborative writing, since that's what Krispy and I have done in the past and are currently doing (or would be doing if someone would finish her section already, hint hint wink wink poke poke nudge nudge).  In the case of the aforementioned book, the authors never met and never discussed anything, and ultimately never even spoke to each other.

Whereas with Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, the authors worked very closely with each other.  Wikipedia has a very good section about the authorship of the novel (though there may be a couple of spoilers in there, so be warned!) wherein both authors say that things started out kind of separate but by the end everything merged into one big beautiful indistinguishable whole.

And indeed, at first I was easily able to tell which author probably wrote which bit.  But as I read further and further into what is a masterpiece of fiction (really, Good Omens is fantastic), I stopped noticing the differences in style--perhaps because the differences no longer existed.

For this novel, the authors worked together on everything from plot development to the acutal business of writing and editing, and it shows.  The novel comes together as a cohesive and delightful whole, unlike poor sordid WTF-laden If I Pay Thee Not in Gold.



On the other hand, there are cases where having two authors works in the book's favor.  First-person (or third-person) narration from two different narrators, for instance, means that differences in style, tone, and diction work well.  The contemporary YA novel Armageddon Summer by Bruce Coville and Jane Yolen is a great example of first-person perspective from two characters.  I reviewed it last year here and talk a bit about the two authors = two narrators = advantageous thing.

Book was so-so but
the cover is still awesome.

Havemercy by Jaida Jones and Danielle Bennett is an adult fantasy with four different first-person perspectives.  The voices of each POV are each distinct and unique and the characters were a pleasure even if the actual plot was lackluster because, really, it hardly existed.  

I wish I could cite a webpage or a book note here, but I can't seem to find a source right now (I'll edit later if I find it), so take it with a grain of salt when I say: I'm pretty sure that each author took on two characters, and they collaborated very closely as they wrote.  Once again, the character interactions show a cohesive, believable wholeness.

A not-very-good-but-still-interesting example of collaborative writing is Tiger Burning Bright by (wait for it) Marion Zimmer Bradley, Andre Norton, and Mercedes Lackey.  When I got my hands on this book years ago I was so super beyond excited because omg three such awesome fantasy authors collaborating on one fantasy book! 


The book design is cool because that red cover lifts up and
inside is a full color plate of all three main POV characters in their
roleplaying costumes distinctive garb.

It was okay.  It's told from three distinct third-person POVs: the Dowager Queen, the Queen, and the Princess, who have to respectively diguise themselves as an acolyte, a merchant, and a gypsy.  I'm pretty sure that Mercedes Lackey wrote the Princess perspective.  I'm less sure that Andre Norton wrote the Dowager Queen and Marion Zimmer Bradley wrote the Queen.  I've read less of their books than Mercedes Lackey's so am less familiar with their styles.

I know absolutely nothing of how the authors collaborated on this novel.  The plot is kind of a mess, especially as the Queen's section hares off on its own political intrigue and worldbuilding that's almost completely separate from the other two POVs.  The Queen's section was also the most different in terms of tone and style, and often felt like reading a separate book; the other two characters' sections meshed better, but were still oddly isolated from each other in terms of plot.

Overall, the book was disappointing since I was expecting a shining masterpiece and what I received was something lackluster; the story comes across as a some kind of role-playing game that never quite got the editing it needed to smooth it out.  Which may be why this book is lesser known despite three huge fantasy authors' names plastered all over it.

On the other hand, there's Lisa and Laura Roecker's The Liar Society.  In this novel, there's only one first-person perspective (I think--it's been a while since I read it) and it's impossible to tell where one author begins and another ends, in terms of writing and ideas.  It's a seamless perfect whole, without any weird gaps, jumps or bumps in the narration, tone, style, diction, you name it.  The authors worked closely together and it shows because it doesn't show.

I'd blather on here about how Krispy and I write together but we've done that in the past, so I'm schneizelefforting this one in Krispy's honor and telling you to just take a gander at our collaboration tag. 

In our current endeavor, we've gone for the Different Character Perspectives approach.  Krispy in fact tried to write a section from "my" character's POV and found it rather difficult, so switched back to "her" character and the words flowed again.  Right, Krispy?  FLOWING, right?  That's what they're doing now, flowing like a fountain from the top of a mountain?

Anyway, collaboration has its pros and cons.  What are your thoughts and experiences concerning collaboration both in your own writing and books you've read?  If a colony of pirate penguins and a single ninja narwhal got into a fight, who would win?

WIP Wednesday: Beginning on the Right Foot

Welcome to the conclusion of our 3 truths and a lie miniseries! Alz here to give you the breakdown. Let's see how you did!

If you guessed #2 as a lie, you are correct. I've never been camping, actually, though Krispy can attest to the fact that I do have a fondness for chasing birds and startling innocent flocks of pigeons and sparrows and crows into flight. I have never chased a single turkey, much less a flock of them, but I am foolhardy enough to possibly do so depending on how much caffeine I've had beforehand.

Now for explanations of my truths:

1. TRUE - Reading 100+ pages an hour: I'm a crazy word monster, but I usually only manage this transcendental state of super reading when it's either a very good book or a very fast-reading one. For instance, I finished Catherine Fisher's Sapphique and Suzanne Collins' Mockingjay each in a four-hour-straight read-through. But depending on my mood, available time, and how engrossing a book is, I'm more likely to take my time reading in chunks here and there. (Incidentally, you can find me on Goodreads if you're interested.)

3. TRUE - Cotton candy and french fries: All right, all you nay-sayers out there, listen up! If you like sweet potato fries, having cotton candy (the regular pink kind that's not flavored and is just spun sugar) and french fries (not seasoned fries) is a bit similar--it's a combo of salty and sweet, and if you've had salty-sweet desserts or snacks before, you know how good they can be. Try sprinkling a bit of sugar on your fries next time and you'll get an idea of what it's like. Go on, try it!

4. TRUE - First short story involved an evil black child-killing zombie-making unicorn: What can I say? I was a twisted child. I think I was maybe 10 when I wrote that story. I'm not sure. I've still got it around somewher to remind me how far I've come and also how I've remained the same.


Moving on, let us talk about beginnings. No matter where you start writing, you're writing a beginning, even if it's the ending. Wow, that sounded existential. I'm so impressed with myself that I totally forgot where I was going with that thought.

Ah, there we go! I wanted to talk about beginnings, whether you begin writing for the day, or begin a story, or begin a chapter, or begin a paragraph. Get it into gear, get into the proper mindset, get into the groove. Once you've caught the rhythm and the story, you're ready to verbally rumble!

In our current co-author effort, Krispy and I are not quite rumbling, but we're getting there. I'd say we're revving the word-engine and warming it up, and had some false starts in the meantime. Krispy's currently on take #1.5 with her section while I'm on #3.0.

Tone was what tripped me up, see. In my first attempt, the tone was very la-dee-dah with the airy prose traipsing along on tippy-toes. Much too peachy-keen, I decided, and wrote a second scene where the character had a craptastic rainy morning complete with leaky roof, no hot water, and hardly any food and all of it moldy. Much too dreary, I decided, and wrote a third scene in which the guy has an okay morning, no hot water but scrounges an edible breakfast.

Et voila! Walking the middle ground between the two extremes produced the desired results: An average sort of morning which becomes all the more remarkable when standing in contrast to extraordinary events.

Do your beginning scenes go through many different incarnations? Do they come out near-perfect on the first try, or do they only necessitate a bit of tweaking? Do you discard them entirely if unsatisfactory, or do you rework and rewrite until eventually they're brand-spanking new?

July is Summer-like

That being said, I am a happy camper. Yes, it is hot and I do hate sweltering, but it also means not having to wear jackets, eating icy desserts (which I love), swimming, and general chillaxing (yes, I do use this word in every day speech). After June Gloom, sunny sunny July is long-overdue.

With the return of SoCal sun, our dear friend Luce returned from her year abroad. She is the friend we wrote A Story of Very Questionable Origin for, and we were finally able to put the book in her hands (literally!) last, last Saturday. She was delighted and informed me Tuesday that she had begun reading it.

Tonight, she informed Alz that she had finished the book in which nothing really happens, and I believe the quote was "nothing happening has never been so glorious." I am thrilled; Alz was thrilled; and really, nothing happens in the story except for a very long, very crazy dinner party.

Anyway, perhaps best of all is that she also told Alz that she couldn't tell our writing apart later in the novel (structure in the beginning has something to do with this telling-apart business). Yay! Being able to blend two writing styles seamlessly is, of course, important in the collaborative process. So this was good to hear, especially from Luce since she's been reading our writing since days of yore (or some might call it high school).

I intend to interrogate her ruthlessly tomorrow when I see her for lunch. Perhaps more on her experience and what that means for Alz and me as a dynamic duo at a later date. Maybe after this weekend since I am insanely going to Disneyland in predicted-to-be 100 degree weather and then hosting a birthday party for small children on Sunday. Fantastic!

I do love the summer. Peace out.

Cookie Completion

Let this post stand as a testament to determination, literacy, contrivances, plot devices, randomness, creampuffs, and above all else, unmitigated genius—for last night, on the 27th of May of the year 2009, Krispy and I completed our first long term collaboration.

The Christmas Cookie is complete. It is baked. It is fragrant and delicious. There are further cosmetic plans for it currently underway, but the text itself stands alone as a monumental effort some six months in the making.

Final word count is ~105,000 words. It can be done. 80,000 is average novel length. We can do it. We did it. We are amazing. Yes, I am stroking our egos madly, but mostly I am impressed that we pulled so much off in such a short time span.

Collaboration works! It really, really does. I think that I'd been attempting to write this solo, it would have petered off any number of times, and gone in fits and starts, and eventually it would have trailed off while I moved on to something else and only came back a year later to work on another couple of pages before prancing off again. But the creative madness that ensued in playing page ping-pong with someone else served as sufficient motivational force to keep us writing on a regular basis, I think.

This is probably the most writing I've ever gotten out of Krispy on such a consistently regular day-to-day basis. Thank you, Krispy, and congratulations. KEEP IT UP. ♥♥♥

Momentum

Personally, I find that collaboration helps a great deal with regards to actually producing writing. I work better when there's a deadline, and I also work better when there's a little judicious prodding going on in the background. While we have not set a deadline for ourselves, Krispy and I sufficiently prod each other every day for our daily dose of delicious cookieness. Partnership! Tasty indeed.

This is the longest collaboration we've ever done. F'realz. I mean, technically speaking, I suppose that our neglected Penny Drabble is the longest as in we worked on it over a longer period of time (months—maybe even a couple of years?) but really, this Holiday Cookie trumps all both in terms of length and intensity of production. We've written far more of our Holiday Cookie than of our Penny Drabble, and within a much shorter span of time, practically all at once. One or the other of us has been cookie-ing practically every day as we roll out the wordage dough between us and stamp it over and over again with our own character-shaped cutters. That was a bizarre metaphor and I don't care.

I daresay that I'm particularly happy with this cookie because it means that Krispy has been writing a lot more than she normally does and I'm a greedy bastard who will take all that I can get and if getting more necessitates incessant nagging, then nag I shall! Krispy understands this because she reciprocates in kind. Thankfully we've got our momentum going good and strong and the cookie is ever mounting in size, and the nagging is at a minimum for the both of us. We blasted through the latter half of December and have not plugged through January so much as frolicked, and with determination and high spirits I'm sure we will be just as frolicsome going into February.

We are familiar enough with each other's characters to write them pretty well, we know what we're doing or at least appear to know what we're doing, and if ever there are doubts or uncertainties, there's this marvelous feat of technology known as instant messaging that facilitates consultation. We're going strong. We cannot be stopped. We are invincible! We're a two-person army, are Krispy and I. We're like the Spartans only instead of 300 of us it's just 2. Three hundred might seem like a more dramatic number, but really, what if only two held off the Persian army? How's your drama then, eh? Eh? Silly, you say, too silly? Not as far as Greek mythology goes. What was I talking about again?

Ah yes.

Are we getting anywhere?

Yep.

Slowly?

Maybe.

Entertainingly?

I think so.

With a minimum of bloodshed?

Well, now that I think about it, I do believe there has been no bloodshed at all. So far. Although this is, of course, subject to change as whim and passing fancy dictate. Which is basically how this entire cookie is proceeding, although we do have a vague plan for the future to which we shall adhere: The setting is a dinner party and a dear friend of ours has graciously provided us with a simply superb menu, and so there will be, in the very near future, without qualm or question, food.

And lots of it.

Cookies and Collaboration

Long has it been since Krispy and I have paid attention to our sorely neglected co-novel baby. We are bad, bad parents.

However, we have been collaborating on a Holiday Cookie these past couple of weeks, and it's going quite well if I do say so myself. We've collaborated before on a sack of pennies as well as numerous other bits and bobs, cookies and crumbs, and cracktastic alternate universe high school melodramas. (Just kidding about that last—that was with another friend, although still containing Krispy's characters.)

But in our defense (as though something were attacking us besides our parental consciences), some of our co-novel characters appear in this Holiday Cookie, and by some, I mean one, and that one is a member of our novel's supporting cast. (Incidentally, this same character also appears in Krispy's Nanowrimo story, playing a slightly bigger role than in our novel.) So what if our current cookie endeavor is a multiple-world-crossover of questionable alternate universality? At least we're getting to know someone a little better, and see how he reacts under pressure and behaves in general. Chronologically speaking, this takes place a good many years decades centuries after the events in our co-novel and while I suppose that a few hundred years might make a difference in one's character and personality, I'm going to ignore that thought right now.

Collaboration this time is a wee bit different than how we wrote (and should still be writing, if only Krispy would freakin' write the next drabble) our Penny Drabble, wherein we took turns writing a section at a time, taking things in random directions to see where the other would run with it. For our Holiday Cookie, we've been writing different scenes simultaneously (and said scenes are more or less happening around the same time), consulting each other as necessary for information concerning settings, character whereabouts and interactions, etc.

Perhaps by the time we actually finish planning and plotting our novel, we will have smoothed out a few of the kinks, ironed some of the wrinkles, and sandpapered away the most awkward bumps of figuring out how to actually write it. I have the feeling (take no bets, please, for my feelings are as fleeting as they are fickle) that our novel will require a combination of both Penny Drabbles and Holiday Cookie techniques along with inventing some brand spanking new co-authorial anything-goes literary kung fu.

We will be co-author kung fu masters by the time we're through. Masters.

Pros of Collaboration 2: The Sequel Post

As Krispy noted previously, we have slowed down a bit. I too place the blame on midterms and the tantalizing approach of Spring Break, though a recent negative reason for the lack of productivity is my potentially ill computer (not virus-ill but hard-drive-making-disturbing-hacksaw-noises-ill) because, as noted previously, we do 98.5% of our plotting via instant messaging and I've had limited internet access these past couple of days.

However, a slowdown in our mad headlong rush towards our novel is not necessarily a bad thing. It provides time to look back over what we've planned and spot plot-holes and inconsistencies. Also, since we have gotten around to some more substantial world-creation, building things from the ground up, and now we have time to explore what we've created and work out some of the finer kinks and details. We get to add to and refine our cast of characters, work on the little details that will show their personalities and motivations, and give them their little quirks and mannerisms that will hopefully make them unique and noteworthy instead of being cardboard cutouts. For this, they need to have backgrounds and reasons for doing things, which are of course not at all mutually exclusive.

Like angst. I abuse the term generally and broadly, but we decided that one character needed a better reason to stick around than the vague one we'd started out with, and so want of reason led to want of angst, and want of angst led to suffering. Things were going just too easy, you know, and we can't have that. (This is frequently how it works when I'm writing solo: I'll decide that things are going just too jolly well for said characters, so it's time to complicate matters and beat them up and add a judicious touch of betrayal, maybe a sprinkle of angst, a dash of guilt or shame, suffering and self-recrimination. Character development calls for a complicated recipe unique to every character, after all.)


Krispy, I believe, is far too disparaging of herself in the previous post. She's a great one for those little details that make our characters into people, and for keeping things reasonably realistic. Like, you know, I'm all for great plot twists and drama-llamas galore and maaaad ideas, and I know that sometimes I get a little too excited (particularly when the sugar-and-caffeine-highs hit late at night) and start blurting out random crazy things, and Krispy is like my combination psych and muse, able to sift through this barrage of semi-lucid images and semi-idiotic plot devices and pan the gold from the gravel. (Not that there's a lot of gold, or even gold every time. Would that there were.) And from these raw nuggets of inspiration and even from these coarser granules of stupidity, she's able to dredge further ideas that are usually great and sometimes brilliant. Pulling a diamond from a pile of pebbles? That's my Krispy.

Our general plan so far has been to just plow through the general story and get that basic outline finished, after which we'll go back and flesh out further and revise and edit and eviscerate and adjust and add all our bells and whistles, our stripes and spots, our fangs and claws, our laser-vision and fireballs, and generally polish it up just fine and dandy, spruce and dashing, and then get down to the actual business of writing it out. We're constantly editing and revising as we go along, too, going back and adding key scenes and inserting new characters. And our antagonists do need quite a bit of rounding out, some spit and elbow grease, polish and varnish and lacquer until they're shining examples of—you know what? I don’t even remember the metaphor I was going for right there. Oh well.

Like Krispy, I have no frelling idea how we're going to go about the writing. I suppose one way to do it would be to split up points of view and scenes and split the characters between us, in which case the difference of voice could be used to an advantage, though that does seem rather limiting as I think there are characters and scenes we'd both like to write. Or we could actually write it together a piece at a time, sending bits back and forth, which seems terribly cumbersome and like it would take forever and a day. Or we could do as we've done in the past and simply write segments and take up where the other leaves off. Or we could do a combination of these things, or work out something new. No idea at this point.

(Krispy, by the way, exaggerates my huge vocabulary, because I'm pretty sure I don't use hugely impressive-sounding and gobbledygookish words in my normal writing. I only toss around words like "defamiliarization" , "dystrophic", and "thalassocracy" in analytic papers in a vain attempt to sound all smartful. And because my professors said to remember them because they were cocktail-party words with which to impress slightly drunken people. And then tell Krispy these big huge words I learned, from which she receives her false impression.)

I fear matching my writing to Krispy's marvelous voice for beauty. Seriously, there are times when she writes and what comes out is as much poetry as prose, be it drama or dialogue. Because, see, when I say "beauty" I don't mean just pretty images, but, like, beautiful prose. Not purple prose, not melodrama, but just quite frankly beautiful writing.

I guess we'll just have to do our best to live up to each other's legacy, Krisp.

Pros of Collaboration

I really need to stop using the blog for procrastination.

Recently, on the novel plotting front, things have slowed down quite a bit. I blame this mostly on midterms and the teasingly close whiff of Spring Break floating on the air, but I think it is also because we're getting into the nitty gritty of plot and character. We've gotten into the mechanics of the world and the logistics of the organizations involved, which is fun and also very frustrating at times.

This leads me to the pros of collaboration. It's great having Alz to bounce ideas around with and to discuss issues. I tend to take an idea and run with it, thinking I'll figure things out along the way, but this style is perhaps too free-form. It certainly explains how I get writer-blocked so often (I mean, Real Life aside) and also why I have issues finishing stories. My idea tends to be too general or too vague, and then I have to spend a lot of time pondering things. I ponder a lot, let me tell you. It's possibly a reason why I take long showers.


Having a partner changes that because when I don't have an answer, she might, and if neither of us has any idea, we can try to figure it out together. It's kind of the same concept as ranting to your BFF about your woes and asking for their advice.

Alz also writes things out and has been keeping a nice outline/note-sheet for us. This is the most I've ever known about anything I've attempted to write--it's kind of insane--and the most organized. Again, this may explain why I'm such an erratic writer and fickle poetry flirt. I'm aware of this tendency of mine, but I know that having Alz around will keep me disciplined.

I'm not sure what exactly I bring to the table other than general randomness and enthusiasm, but Alz seems to think I'm at least somewhat useful. The point here being that collaboration works when partners complement and support each other and they get things done. I feel that is certainly happening for us as we flesh out events, characters/relationships, and motivations. We're beginning to complicate things too with a few new players, but I think we still need to show the antagonists a bit more love. We also need to make sure certain characters who need to be sympathetic actually are.

The question that looms in the future though is for when we start writing. How are we going to go about with the actual writing, and how are we going to blend our voices? I think the latter will be less difficult than it sounds since I think I'm not a bad mimic (I'm not sure if I should be proud of this or not, but I kind of am?) and I've written a little with Alz before. The issue is that we've only written fun, comical, and completely not serious things together, which is much easier for voice-blending, but we write somewhat differently when we're "serious." At the very least, Alz tends to show more of that giant vocabulary of hers and big words that I may or may not understand appear, and my skills in mimicry don't cover vocabulary like that.

But we'll deal with all that when we reach that bridge.