-End Transmission-

Since writing for me is often an, oh my goodness I need to get this idea down before I forget it, type endeavor, I often go with what ever name pops in my head at the moment. But just like naming a child, naming a character is important. Their name often portrays a lot about who they are. There are a lot of jokes about Ishmael Horatio Wang, but even this non sequitur moniker says something about who he is. He is telling the story of a captain, hell bend on a quest. Thank goodness it does not end as badly as Captain Ahab. Now not every Ishmael is not going to be the teller of Captain stories but you can bet that Mr. Lowell took great pain in naming our hero.

The same can be said for most characters. Their name effects who they are, what they are like and how they react to certain situation. So when I give character a common name, it effects how the story I write about them forms. Then when I got back and change the name during the editing process, I often find myself rewriting entire sections of the story to match the new name. This can really mess with your head. In one case, I wrote a fantasy and named the main character Jack, just to get the story out. It ended up being rather whimsical because, really, who has ever heard of an epic Fantasy character named Jack. It was not the story that I had intended to write. On top of that, when I tried to change the name to something more typically fantasy, the story no longer fit the new character even after major rewrites. Needless to say that story is in a drawer and probably will stay there forever.

So there you have it, my moment of craziness over character names.

-Michell

Some times we need to get these things out there. Some of it is that it makes us feel better that other people are feeling the same thing.

And You know what? We feel your pain. We are here for you, and we will do what we can to support.

I’m going to an actress friend’s improv show this weekend; invited another friend and said, “Hey, it might be great and we’ll meet some new people!” Because you never know when someone can help you, and vice versa! It’s important to support our friends and their creative efforts as much as we seek it ourselves…

I don’t specifically remember that comment. It could have been a number of my interviews. The ones that involved Short Stories or anthologies specifically were episodes: 70 (Susan MacGregor), 46 (Jaym Gates and Erica Holt), 35 (Sandra Wickham) and 34 (Nancy Kilpatrick). I also believe we may have talked short story writing in episodes: 40 (Jennifer Rahn), 39 (Marie Bilodeau) and 38 (Val Griswold-Ford).

Sorry I can’t give you a more specific answer. I hope this helps and thank you for the good wishes.

-Mike

On a similar note, The first thing I thought of when you started talking about this poor ladies symptoms was, hmmm going to have to write something about that. Evil minds think a like I guess.

Thank you.

That different view of the book made a big difference. I even found a spot where one character changed names mid-story (how the heck did I manage that?). Now, the challenge to you, should you chose to accept it is, tell me which character it was and what was the change?

Just kidding, I know you will find it. You don’t need me challenging you.

But it’s always like this. My favorite example is the Math exam that went out back when I worked for the provincial government that was missing an exponent on one of the questions and therefore had no right answer. When I went back to see how it was missed, 13 different editors had proofed and initialed that page… Or the first edition of Ringworld in which no one noticed Larry Niven had the Earth spinning in the wrong direction…. It’s all just part of the process….

If you have a naked book, she will help you cover it.

Thank you for weighing in.

Good advice, Mike. Hope your writing is going well. And edits. Can’t forget those.

It’s nice to know when you’re appreciated, but reciprocation is always nice.

Good on you! Keep on smiling

Good luck!

I hope Mik Murdoch meets with your expectations when it comes out.

Great job Mik!

I’m glad you like the merit badge. I’m pretty happy with it too.

Keep me posted on how you are doing with them.

The projects I’m currently working on? I actually got hit by a really interesting idea a week ago. It nearly knocked me out of my chair, tbh. lol It’s set in the Star Wars Universe. It’s mostly an exercise on focusing heavily on ‘show and don’t tell’. Also, I have never written in the Science-Fiction genre so it’s good for me in that regards, too.

There’s also another project I’m working on to help raise money to save the oceans. It’s a … um…. well tbh a tentacle porn anthology. O.o Talk about pushing the boundries on this one, eh? lol

Does that answer your question?

Thanks for the great comment, Dan.

Also, did you mean to mention facebook twice. I was just curious.

There has definitely been give and take during the project including editorially. However, we have both taken a hand in the editing and when we disagree, we meet to discuss.

I think the absolute key here is keeping the channels of communication open.

Thanks for the comment.

That’s awesome. I’m so happy for you!

The biggest lesson I’ve learned (up to this point any way) is to ensure that my character talks using language of the right age. In this particular book, he is nine-years-old and, while I try to portray him as smart, he sometimes speaks like too much of an adult. I’ve had to young it down a little.

I’m starting to recognize lazy scenes. Whenever the resolution happens in a single iteration or my scene cuts are too sudden without any supporting information, I know I’m going too fast. I’m still revising this one (the heat has been turned up – a few interesting developments have meant I need to get the manuscript ready that much sooner) so I can’t quite answer your last question yet. I don’t think I will be editing prior to writing new though. I’ve tried that in the past and it has only meant a VERY long, drawn out writing process for me. Better for me to get the words down first, and then edit them.

I think the biggest thing pointed out to me was that I get lazy sometimes. I want to get a piece of the story finished quickly so I rush it too much. I suspected it and, where they have pointed it out, it immediately became obvious.

I haven’t yet come across anything I want to fight over. There was one scene that Robert had some hard questions about, but I answered them and we moved forward. I will definitely have to use your question(s) on Get Published.

This question grew as I wrote it out. Maybe you could answer at the beginning of one of your shows.

Slightly more introspective, neither my reader nor I, the author, for that matter, has the ‘right’ to expose our protagonist, or anyone else for that matter, to a detailed character examination and personality analysis without the character’s ‘permission’, just like in real life. This sounds extremely stupid having just written it, but my characters expose themselves by their words and actions at ‘their’ discretion. After all, I just provide the playing field and the moving pen: the characters are perfectly capable of revealing themselves as they wish.

In particular for those who self publish (for $), finding good editors and good book cover artists/designers are crucial.

Let me know what you think of the site, or if you have questions, fire them my way.

Congratulations on the short story.

Thank you so much for your comment and for giving GalaxyBillies a chance. I knew very well going in that it wouldn’t be everyone’s cup of tea. I expected to get some poor reviews. Where I have a problem is when the review is, as you said, venom-spewing. I always appreciate constructive criticism, but flaming something doesn’t help anyone (well, I suppose it might make the flamer feel better about themselves). Please let me know how far you were able to go and what your thoughts are on the story. I know it has some warts, but I hope to fix most of them when I begin preparing it for publication.

Thank you again,

-Mike

I usually gives 5 minutes to a new podcast : there are so much to listen too ! But so far you have passed the 5 minutes test. (make that 10 at the end of my comment writing, still listening good sign)

I know feedback is a bitch to get. And sometimes it is bad feedback. I realize some great podcasters and writers get bad feedback for petty reasons as : I liked the story but it did not end like I would have liked…

Ask Nathan Lowell, (you know, Parsec award winner and all) how many 1 star ratings he got for Owner’s Share because people didn’t want it to end that way…

Or Abbie Hilton, just because her Cowry Catchers goes ways no one had gone before…

So ratings are very subjective.,, and sometimes written by people who have too much time on their hands and so much amounts of venom they have to spat in a day.

I still can’t say that’s what is happening to your story. I am not there yet. One thing I can promise is give it a fair try and a fair rating.

You are on the right track. Find those little nuggets of time and carve them out for your writing. You will be amazed at how much you get done, especially since you will probably be thinking about the story between writing sessions. You may even find yourself more productive than before because you have had that extra time to mentally work through the story.

Every since I listened to his podcast Galaxy Billies, Mike Plested has been after me to write a review for it. It is not that I didn’t want to write a review, or that I didn’t like the podast or anything like that, the truth is that I hadn’t written a review because I stink at writing reviews. Not only am I not good a writing reviews, I know it and so I procrastinate about it. Well enough procrastinating. I have fired up the 486 Beowulf cluster and there are no excuses any more. Here is my review of Galaxy Billies, WARNING THERE WILL BE SPOILERS

Galaxy Billies by Mike Plested is a wonderful romp through the, well um galaxy with the most unlikely galaxy explorers. The story is told in the style of an old radio drama, and because of that each episode feels new and fresh. The story has a great flow as the group of backwoods folk stumble into and out of trouble each week. What kind of trouble could six folks from the back woods of the Application mountains get into? Well lets just say that before it is all over the two largest intergalatic fleets of war ships and brown postal vans come head to head, in order to get it resolved. Along the way every possible sci/fi trope is is used abused and otherwise burned and pillaged in the name of a great story or cheap laugh.
Mike Plested is nothing if not a professional, and the story telling and audio quality of this production proves that. While I am not a huge fan of modulating one voice for many characters I think Mike pulls this off well. The story telling style is very reminiscent of the original Douglas Adams Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy and this story definitely benefits from that.

Still, you can only do what you can do.

At some point you have to make the decision that you are either willing to let people see what you’ve written or not. It’s a scary thing to do. I know, I’ve been there. I’m always asking myself if a story is good enough. Will people like it? At the end of the day, some will like it and some won’t. Life will go on and I will keep writing, hopefully turning out better quality stuff each time.

The other thing about that is this: if you put a story out for critique or review or simply for people to read and problems are pointed out, then you can always take another kick at it. If readers like it, leave it alone.

Just my two cents.

How long is a piece of string?

Promoting yourself can be pretty tricky. Unless you are one of those people who loves themselves and can’t stand talking about anyone but them, it comes with difficulty. I’m one of those people who prefers to cheer for others over me so it was a challenge when I started too. I still think I’m overly subtle, but that’s really the only way I can do the self-promotion and feel good about it. Maybe that will change and maybe it won’t.

When I first started, I did it in a bit of a sneaky way. If I met someone new and they asked me about myself, I would lead with the fact that I’m a writer. Since almost everyone I’ve ever met has dreamed of writing a book at one time or another, it was a great way to get the conversation going. I still use that tactic to this day (successfully, I think). I also try really hard not to shill myself. That is a hard line to toe.

The bio is interesting. I tend to be fairly self-effacing so when it came to writing the bio, I outlined the information that I thought was important to share and then wrote it in a fun, maybe even goofy way. That has found its way into my Twitter profile too. Bio’s don’t have to be formal or serious. In fact, some of the ones I’ve had the most difficulty with were both of those things.

BTW….I love you podcast and reading your posts! Good luck with all of your writing endeavors and I look forward to reading! (and listening!)