Hi, I'm Luddy and I have writer's disease

Dude...

You sound like you will be a fantastic addition to the workshops! I've been slack myself of late, but there's a groundswell of decent characters appearing here and there who are providing that oft-necessary kick up the chufty. You are one of them.

The workshop structure is pretty straightforward, and it sounds like you've got it in a nutshell. Basically, review 5 and you can submit one.

The Chuck workshop is usually for stories in response to, or experimenting with, the suggestions in Chuck's monthly essays - which as a paid up member I'm sure you can read. There's 15 months of those suckers to get through!

The self-assignment workshop is for everything else. Whatever story/poem/book chapter you might want to share.

The man to talk to if you want advice/direction/general all-round inspiration is Vigorous Puppy.

Get reviewing and submit something. I'd love to read what you have to offer...

Oh, and welcome aboard.

Thanks for the help and the hearty welcome, Riddlegimp. Anyone who calls me "Dude" has instantly claimed a place in my heart. Yeah, I'm that easy.

I'm in the process of printing out the 15 months of Chuck's narrative wisdom. Looking forward to the reading and being read around here.

Hey welcome and stuff.

Yo!

(i'm working on the Minimalism thing)

hey mang...

what exactly is a "Luddy Dunn" anyways? is that some irish horseshit from yesterday ?

if it's your real name ... my bad

[QUOTE=karbunkle]what exactly is a "Luddy Dunn" anyways? is that some irish horseshit from yesterday ?

if it's your real name ... my bad[/QUOTE]

Heh. No not my real name. Life if hard enough without giving your kid a name that incites strangers to picture Irish horseshit. Or big raging red boils, eh karbunkle?

But this isn't Life, this is Fiction.

Luddy is a character in something I'm working on. You had precisely the response I wanted. Horshit by any other name...just wouldn't do it.

Do you have hypergraphia? Have you seen that book the Midnight Disease?

[QUOTE=Luddy Dunn]Or big raging red boils, eh karbunkle?
[/QUOTE]
those are disgusting !

Welcome to town. Sounds like you'll fit in nicely around here, liven things up in the workshop. You've got my curiosity piqued about your books. I'm dying for a title.

[QUOTE=levinsontodd]Do you have hypergraphia? Have you seen that book the Midnight Disease?[/QUOTE]

What was your first clue?

I go through mild bouts of it, usually when my brain is gearing up to commit to the year's work it takes to churn out a novel. When I don't or can't write for a while, I come down with asthma symptoms. Yeah. Blackmail myself back to work: get typing or suffocate.

Alice Flaherty's [I]Midnight Disease[/I] is one of the best books for writers about writing ever put to print. One hell of a book in its own right. Science as literature; Literature as science. Amazingly written, wonderfully comforting. Your non-writer friends are correct; writers are, in fact, not quite right in the head--the closer to genius a writer gets, the more out of balance his brain chemisty. A specific form of epliepsy figures again and again in the lives of many who we consider the greatest writers we've known. Depressions. Addictions. All part of being gifted/cursed with a creative brain.

If you are at all interested in how you physically create creative writing, check it out.

[QUOTE=karbunkle]those are disgusting ![/QUOTE]

Agreed. But what's in a name? You don't come across as all [I]that[/I] disgusting. Thanks for the hello.

You are in Cincinnati? Where in Cincinnati? I'm kind of in Cincinnati, too.

[QUOTE=Rents]I'm dying for a title.[/QUOTE]

Life support has been sent. Be careful what you ask for. I'm happy to have found this place of cooperative insanity. Thanks again to everyone for the warm welcome.

We can't have you running around the place naked now, can we Luddy?

Here's an avatar for you.

Now put it on before you catch your death of cold...

[IMG]http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Valley/1394/luddyG.gif[/IMG]

Welcome aboard Luddy Dunn, like saying you screenname aloud, rolls off the tongue very easily and comically. Enjoy the one month to one year tenure you signed up for and dig in and flip through the newbie tips for reviewing if you like, but from the sound of it I don't you'll be needing to.

And Lo, she saw that she was naked and she was ashamed...but more by the fact she could not figure out how copy Riddlegimp's generous gift of an avatar. This is the one I use everywhere else on my computer, so this is the one you get. Just dyed my hair red...so yep, it works.

Thank you for your concern about my cyber-health.

Howdy back at you, UbikRex. And trust me, I need all the newbie tips I can get my hands on.

Hey Luddy, welcome aboard.

Do you teach? Where? What? Whom?

Newbie tip: Read through various reviews of stories, or at least skim them, before starting to review. Generally people will be likely to review your work with greater devotion if they know that you are a dedicated reviewer yourself. And in the workshop discussion forums there are some excellent threads on reviewing.

And one more tip: Since you are a novelist, be aware that, unfortunately, the longer the submission is, the less people will consider reviewing it. But people might disagree with me on this so don't let this hinder any submission.

Newbie tip: Consider filling out your writer's profile.

[QUOTE=Luddy Dunn]And Lo, she saw that she was naked and she was ashamed...but more by the fact she could not figure out how copy Riddlegimp's generous gift of an avatar. This is the one I use everywhere else on my computer, so this is the one you get. Just dyed my hair red...so yep, it works.

Thank you for your concern about my cyber-health.[/QUOTE]
to copy simply right click and then click on "save image/picture as"

Hey, Luddy. Welcome to the Cult !

Honest reviews don't really need structure. Just be honest and give the reviews you'd prefer to receive. The Tip threads are helpful and useful, especially to brainstorm how to help. Especially for beginners. But, what it boils down to is this: every writer reviews in a different way. When I started reviewing, I was lost and confused and just plain trying to help writers. But I wasn't a writer then. And every month, now that I am a writer, now that I've been writing for a year, my writing improves, and my reviews become more helpful. The Tip threads were invaluable to me. But, you seem to have read and reviewed work by many of your students. This is no different. Simply a beautiful way to add another voice to the shops. I'm glad youre here.

As for the essays, what started my writing brain was that first one, that essay on Authority. My favorite essay--I think--was the On-the-Body. My favorite part of that essay was using it as a transitional device. Really, as Chuck once told me in the Q&A section one month long ago, everything on the page is a possible transition device. Whether your taking the reader from one part of the story to the next via a physical description--

Say youre referring to the plot in a third person narrative, something about place and time, and then describe the hands of a character off to one corner: youre immediately turning the reader's attention to that part of the story, to that character, and then can commence with that character's involvement. Many times (I've seen), dialogue is used for this very reason. But using a physical description more easily turns the reader to that character and they learn something personal about that character. Doesn’t mean I still won’t use dialogue in this way; it simply means that I will use other ways including dialogue.

I very seldom use all of Chuck's essays. For instance, Submerging the "I" is not always the best start for a story. Burroughs' [i]Junky[/i], Clevenger's [i]handbook[/i]. In those two off-the-head instances, the story didnt particularly need to bring the reader in before establishing that the story is about the character. Like Chuck said, use the techniques that work for your story, for your writing--they are simple offers.

One of the most helpful essays [for my writing] was the one on Thought Verbs. Particularly the part about "unpacking" the thought. As an established writer, you won't get as much use out of it as I did, but I will tell you, I got much out of it, and within a few days, my writing improved dramatically.

There are some very useful points to the essays. There are also some great pointers to pull from other Cultists as well. Rod, for instance, showed me to use less of the standard words. “That”, for instance. My work was always tattered with “that”s. Ive cut them down; theyre annoying in abundance.

We mostly practice in the Chuck Side—technique applications and trying new things. For instance, linear story telling.

The Self Side is used for more advanced work. Most people stay to one side. Some of us straddle that fence as often as time allows. What we have here are tools. I’m here to use those tools, when they can help me.

So, again, welcome to the Cult.

Oh, and read Chuck’s books. I love to read them, but I don’t have a desire to personally write the way he does. (So I know that I’ll never copy him. But hell, he even said that when he started, he mimicked King.) However, I laugh while reading him, and generally enjoy every part of them. And to think that he almost never got published…

kabol

[QUOTE=JKabol]One of the most helpful essays [for my writing] was the one on Thought Verbs. Particularly the part about "unpacking" the thought. As an established writer, you won't get as much use out of it as I did, but I will tell you, I got much out of it, and within a few days, my writing improved dramatically.
[/QUOTE]

Um, this "established" writer got a lot out of the Thought Verbs essay. Going cerebral is a weakness in my writing, a pattern I've been trying to break in myself for years. I do searches for certain "thinking about it" and "name that emotion" type words before sending in drafts. It's a hard demon to exorcise when my characters tend to be imprisoned in their heads because their creator tends toward the intellectual analysis of what an emotion means rather than simply experiencing it. The prospect of working with a different kind of story is, in part, a chance to force myself to see exits in some of the language roundabouts I get stuck in.

I am over reliant on the “technically correct but not really necessary thingies” such as "that" and "it's" too. Part of the problem there lies in my incorrect assumption that the copyeditor's complaint is always correct. Their job is to be as anal and prim and strict as possible with the language issues--simply to make sure that the writer is aware of an apparent flub. But I always keel over at the first glimpse of red on manuscript.

What I am getting here at The Cult is not only a chance to experiment with new techniques, but also the astute editorial input that just does not exist in publishing any more. Editors read manuscripts and submit them to the sales department. If the sales department thinks the book will sell, the book will get published. Regardless of quality. Dan Brown, I’m looking at you. The days of developmental work with a devoted champion of your writing are gone. The very, very lucky find themselves with agents who have editorial talents, and those agents will perform the cultivation work that used to be the province and the privilege of editing. No one involved in the current system likes it. Editors and agents and most other folks are in publishing because they love books. They want to get books they love to other readers who will love them. But the big six houses are all owned by conglomerates now. Bottom lines rule every decision. The sales force decides who goes to print based on what is selling at the moment. It takes nine months minimum to get a book into the stores. Who can say what will be selling by then?

I was just reading the new Newsletter from vigorous puppy, and he lays out the problematic relationship between wanting to write and wanting to publish straight, pure, and clean. An excellent essay if you haven’t yet seen it.

Wow, way to wander off topic. Sorry. Just wanted to say that published means nothing in terms of talent or growth or potential. I have a lot more to learn. This is a good place to learn a lot.

Thank you, Kabol for your as always generous help and advice

[QUOTE=Luddy Dunn]Editors read manuscripts and submit them to the sales department. If the sales department thinks the book will sell, the book will get published. Regardless of quality. Dan Brown, I’m looking at you.[/QUOTE]

My woman and I laughed about this for a good long minute...

Welcome to our enlightened community. Didn't you say in the other thread that you work in a bookshop? Does it sell your books?

Hello again, fellow member of the not-so-secret society of [I]Die, DaVinci Code, Die! [/I]

First rule of fiction: get a day job. I'm the corporate sales rep at our neighborhood Borders. They've been very supportive of the cause. But then I work my butt off for them. So mutually beneficial synergy type stuff at work.

is that luddy as in putty, or is it luddy as in fuckin ludes, man?

and, is that dunn as in stick a fork in me, or dunn as in frank herbert?

just checking.

Stick a fork in the putty, and you've got it.

Love the quote in your signature. What is that from?

[QUOTE=Luddy Dunn]First rule of fiction: get a day job.[/QUOTE]

no truer words were ever spoken. welcome aboard luddy.