themagzstuff-blog - Tumblr blog

themagzstuff-blog · 9 years

Text

Eureka

So as some you may be aware, I am a writer and aspiring novelist. I have written an 86 000 word manuscript however upon review and the advice of the literary agent I mentioned in last week's post, I am in the process of redrafting it again. And it was just a matter of trim-trim-trim the fat until Tuesday morning last week, when BAM: epiphany.

And by epiphany, I mean one of those inspired, inexplicable and utterly awesome moments in a creative process where the stars align, where a nugget of 'Hey, that'd work' turns into a whole goldfield of 'I could do this, and then that could happen and then this would work heaps better and the whole thing would make so more sense'.

Yup, I had one of those. I think I'll call it a gold rush, because even though not everything that comes from one of these sessions is golden, the feeling that comes with a genuine gold rush, excitement, relief, disbelief, joy, is akin to what a prospector might experience when finally, after years mucking around in the mud, a shiny yellow rock emerges from the river bed. And the urge to scream 'Eureka' is almost always irrepressible, though I tend to express my 'Eureka' moment in a little jig, several fist pumps and a grin that'd rival a kid (or adult) getting their own pet dragon.

So I had a gold rush on Tuesday morning at about 6:23AM. I stripped my whiteboards with a sock and window cleaner and went to work getting everything I could out of my head. And what was I left with? A complete rewrite. The essence of the story remains the same, the characters are the same, but every thing is clearer, better, faster. Originally, my YA novel was the first in a trilogy. Not anymore. I've tightened the plot into a single narrative, added entire as yet unwritten sections, I've carved out chapters and sped up the action so it kicks off from the first chapter and doesn't slow down until, well, never. Instead of trim-trim-trim, I now have cut-cut-write-write-write-cut-move-cut-write-write-write-cut-move-move-move-write-write-write-write-write and so on. So much work. But you know what?

It'll be awesome.

#writer #upandcoming #aspiring novelist #first novel #rewrite #editing #creative writing #author

1 note · View note

themagzstuff-blog · 9 years

Photo

23K notes · View notes

themagzstuff-blog · 9 years

Photo

It’s #nationalhandwritingday!! These handwriting examples in this 1901 Gregg’s Shorthand Dictionary are very difficult to read - definitely a lost art! [Stein Z56 G832 1901] #uiowa #specialcollections #libraries #shorthand #handwriting #penmanship #20thcentury

331 notes · View notes

themagzstuff-blog · 9 years

Text

“Lock up your libraries if you like; but there is no gate, no lock, no bolt that you can set upon the freedom of my mind.” — Virginia Woolf, who was born today in 1882.

1K notes · View notes

themagzstuff-blog · 9 years

Photo

M_oxo

17K notes · View notes

themagzstuff-blog · 9 years

Link

summer poem up on Toe Good, with a recording of me trying not to be an incorrigible page poet, and these so-lovely words from heyteebs:

"Poetry filtered through Theonia’s industrious, brave, and sensitive intellect is a constellation, a relief map of feeling, an aching lyric wonder.”

oh wow oh geez, this just rules. poem below:

///////

WHEN YOU’RE TRANS IN THE BROOKLYN SUMMERTIME

it’s hot out already, your shorts just keep getting shorter, and your hair is finally long enough to pull into a top knot. Lately, people’s looking at you lasts just a little bit longer.

A man on the street wants you to know you woulda been a magnificent woman if you’d just kept your original attributes. You blow him a kiss and say, too bad.

When you’re trans in the Brooklyn summertime, you and everyone you know arrive late to the long expanse of Riis beach each weekend and cram yourselves into the leftmost corner, where you finally don’t have to think about anything but the aesthetics of what to wear swimming. You’re all of you uncovered to the open air, and there’s no need to look too closely as the light divides behind the bathhouse ruins because everyone else is as beautiful and uncertain as you are.

When you’re trans in the Brooklyn summertime, your roommate introduces you to a total babe who lives three blocks away, and you hang out like all the time for the three weeks before they move back to California because shit is unlivable here. Really, it’s not just the rent: one time they spotted cops driving undercover in an ice cream truck, and you get it; how’re they supposed to cope with knowing they have no recourse even against the ice cream guy?

The thing about this city where you were born and live is that everybody seems to leave it, but in the span of everything, the very fact of your sadness means something good has happened and exists throughout, even invisibly, like when astronomers decide a constellation is extinct, that they won’t look for it any longer, the stars that make up the fox, the bee, the telescope or printing press don’t just stop being.

When you’re trans in the Brooklyn summertime, you can return to this by holding on to the fireworks they gave you as they left, called butterfly and flowers, since you can already see their sparks, though they remain unlit: first crackling with electric purpose, then absorbed into everything else in the moment of their darkening.

12 notes · View notes

themagzstuff-blog · 9 years

Photo

You know what doesn’t f**k around?

Australian children’s books on animals

331K notes · View notes

themagzstuff-blog · 9 years

Text

An Email

This week I emailed someone important. Someone who has the power to kickstart my career as a novelist, and I mean a paid novelist. This week I emailed a literary agent I spoke with last year. No, I'm not signed but yes, last year I was all about that submission. My previous conversation with this particular agent ended with him encouraging me to try harder while asking to be kept in the loop about my progress. I heard him motivating me at the time, telling me not to give up and that I had something worth working on, but to be honest it was buried beneath a pallet load of disappointment.

The 2 months following this phone call was a rejection whirly-wind. Another rejection, after a year of rejections, well, any writer knows rejection is part of the job but seriously after a while it truly starts to suck. Couple that with a personal review of the manuscript I'd be sending out and the realization that it was, in fact, absolutely crap. I mean craptastic. The level of amateur and unpolished that I'd spent a degree and my career as a writer determined never ever submit to a blog, let alone publishers or literary agents, was catastrophic. Career stunting. The mistakes were mind blowingly obvious and painful to read. And the worst part was, I could have prevented this shamozle. I was too close to the project for too long and broke one of my biggest rules: take a break. A writer must put down a manuscript, especially a sizable one, for at least a couple of months before commencing the next draft . Otherwise you lose perspective and when you lose perspective, you can't see the shit from the shiners. And not seeing the shit from the shiners is bad. Very very bad.

So creatively, the end of 2014 was a horrible hamburger of humiliation slapped between two buns of rejection related depression. I proceeded to feel sorry for myself until a much needed holiday reset my inner monologue. I decided to start 2015 with refreshing my contact with the literary world via this agent who, beyond the call of duty, had taken the time to discuss my manuscript with me for a full half hour. Not every agent would put in this time for an unsigned writer. In fact, none of the others had. Some hadn't even formally rejected me, just left me floating in the 'maybe they'll call' limbo until so long passed I forgot I even submitted to them.

But how to refresh this connection? Yay for the internet. I sent him an email to thank him for his help and to let him know I was looking into all the issues we discussed, hoping for nothing more than an acknowledgement in return. And that night, whammo: a brief but awesome email back that was just as encouraging and just as interested as last time we spoke.

Win for Maggie.

Now I've got to get this draft done. Like yesterday.

#writer #upandcoming #literary #aspiring novelist #publishing #literary agent #going to get there

2 notes · View notes

themagzstuff-blog · 9 years

Photo