Month: February 2011

I love descriptions, but like everything in life, too much description gets to slow down your reading, and as a reader, as well as a writer gets annoying. I just finish reading The Marching Season by Daniel Silva. This is the second book on his Michael Osbourne Series. This book had the same problem I found with the first one, it takes forever to get to the action, after you get to the action the book is incredible. The problem is not research, the book has plenty of research. I like to get into the story, tell me the info, but help me get sooner into the adventure I am going to embark, and in the case of the two books on the series takes a long time. I was hoping, because this was the second book, this was going to be different, but wasn’t.
Aside of that, of if you enjoy extensive descriptions, is a great book, especially after you get in the middle of the story, and the story begins to move.
I know first hand, how hard is sometime to let the story goes, I am living it right now, as I am working on my next book. I will love to spend days telling you about the character, Hannah, but after a lot of consideration I took the same route I took on the previous book, let me bring you a little into the story, and later on I will tell you more.
Mr. Silva, gives you all the detail and more, he shows how much research the book had. The problem, with this is the risk you take, the risk of loosing the reader. Giving long descriptions is an art, I am an adventurer writer, I want you to embark in the journey, I want you to discover more as we move along, and I will provide you with the information you need in order to enjoy the journey, but I try to avoid spend pages of pages describing something that will be cool to know in 100 more pages, I am a believer as a reader, and therefore as a writer that the faster you get my heart in the story, the more I want to know, give me the details, but capture my heart first. This book, works the other way around, gives you all the data, and later on capture your heart, but in general unless you are aware that it will capture your heart later on, most likely you will run before.

When I was a teenager, I had a great Plan A, a Plan A that I was in love with. I was convinced that I was crazy, and I should have a Plan B. So I did went out and get a Plan B, and then a Master for the Plan B, and life went on.
It was Will Smith that said “There’s no reason to have a Plan B because it distracts you from Plan A.”
I had fun playing with my Plan B, I learn about computers, software, sales, deals, good ones and bad ones. I learn a lot, but in the process of getting good on my Plan B, I leave my Plan A apart, I forgot about Plan A, I put it in the back burner and stop paying attention.
The good news is that I found the crumbles I left to my other me to find this Plan A, and the better news was that I found it. So I begin looking for more clues on that Plan A, and I begin working hard on that Plan, and in the process I re-discover the Writer inside! The more I found and remember about Plan A, the more resentful I got about Plan B, not because was a bad one, but because wasn’t Plan A. I decided to follow Will Smith advice, and forgot about Plan B, and focus on my Plan A.
I begin tracking my daily word count per day, I did 17,931K words this January and finish my first (for the public eyes) novel. Even better, I am planning the next one, and will begin drafting on February first.
Being a Writer is one of those jobs that are hard, ungrateful and everyone think they can do. I quit on this job sometime ago, because was so ungrateful and I was afraid. I follow Plan B, succeed in other jobs, while I dreamed that someday I will be back to be a writer. I was living the Plan B, instead of killing myself in the Plan A.
Did you remember your Plan A? Are you living your Plan A or you settle for Plan B?
I regret only few things in my life, leaving Plan A behind is one of those. My plan here is to write, talk about writing, show my writings, and share the experience of bringing back my Plan A to live.