I’m working on a project right now that is stretching my brain and moving me into territories both unfamiliar and daunting. I am trying (note the word “Trying”) to write a Science Fiction Comedy.

I love comedy writing whether it is Terry Pratchett’s “Discworld” series (yes, I know it is parody. It’s still funny), or Douglas Adams ‘Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’ or even Robert Asprin’s “Myth Inc.” series. Comedy writing is some of my favorite to read. It is also the reason I chose the title that I did for my blog.

But, darn it, it is a LOT harder to write than I thought. I’m about 5,000 words into the project so far. I’ve got detailed character sketches, most of the plot and some of the setting. I started writing and tried to come off with humor. The next thing I know, one of my characters is faced with a serious situation and I don’t feel much like laughing.

What gives?

So, I tried again. Once again, the writing started out light-hearted but quickly moved towards something more serious. I took a break a tried to reason out why this kept happening.

Then I realized, I made the characters too real. They all thought they were alive and were acting in ways that I thought of as normal. What I need to do is keep them real, but make there reality totally different from my own.

If you’re wondering what I mean, picture Cletus the yokel from Simpsons. He collects roadkill for food. Not because he has to, but because that’s the way he was brought up. It’s normal to him. Or how about Homer (also Simpsons). He and the rest of the family don’t think twice about his strangling of Bart. Again, normal behavior.

That’s what is missing from the character sketches I did. I have a clear idea of who the characters are, but I haven’t given them their normal yet. Their normal needs to be considerably different from what I think is normal and correct.

If I can successfully do that, I might be able to get the humor flowing again.

Humor doesn’t need to be about talking funny or slapstick. It can also be about characters acting in ways that make you say WTF? Now that I’ve come to this revelation I can move on with the project. Hopefully it is a revelation and not me fooling myself.

The results of this change of mindset will reveal itself shortly.

Personal Update

NaNoWriMo is over for another year and I am happy to say I hit my 50,000 words. I now have another book in my “Mik Murdoch” series (which I’ll be editing in the new year). Now that NaNo is over, I’m going to spend some time entering a few contests.

The first contest I’m going to enter is a flash fiction contest at Absolute Xpress (http://absolute-x-press.com/flash-fiction-challenge/). I’m also going to enter “Mik Murdoch, Boy Superhero” in a YA Novel contest that I’ve heard about (I’ve got to do some more investigation on that one).

I’ve also got the writing project (mentioned above) to work on. I’m going to be recording the first, teaser episode for that in the next couple weeks. I will put it into my “Get Published” feed. I’ve also got two episodes of “Get Published” to record and produce for December.

It’s going to be busy.

Tags: absolute xpress, blog, discworld, douglas adams, Get Published, hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy, humor, irreverent muse, Michell Plested, myth inc., podcast, robert asprin, science fiction, science fiction comedy, terry pratchett, writing humor

All I can say is “Whoops!”

With everything that’s been going on I almost forgot my weekly post.

“What’s been going on?” you ask.

Well, for one, I’m going on two weeks of vacation starting Saturday. That in itself isn’t what is distracting me. It’s all the OTHER things I’m trying to get out of the way before I go.

For example, I had Episode 8 of ‘Get Published’ to finish and get into the feed. Then I had a promo to write, record and mix. AND the podcast was nominated for a Parsec Award which means I needed to mix a 10-minute sample episode for the judges. And I’ve still got to record Episode 9 (I’m not expecting to have good Internet Connectivity while I’m gone). That’s not even taking into account the regular stuff I need to do around the house, the time spent with my family and so on.

All I can say is busy, busy, busy.

I guess that can serve as this week’s lesson: whatever you have on the go, don’t lose sight of the important stuff. For me, this blog is important. Granted, my family still ranks higher, but I made the commitment long ago to have a new post out every Wednesday and it is important to me that I do so.

So, my apologies for getting this out late and when it did get out, not having a lot of interest to talk about. I’ll try to do better next week. You know, when I’m on holidays .

Personal Update

As mentioned above, I posted Episode 8 of ‘Get Published’. I encourage you to listen as I was lucky enough to interview Phil Rossi. He’s an interesting (and talented) guy.

I also created a promo for the show. I had a lot of fun writing and recording the episode and I would love to hear what you think about it. Please don’t hesitate to have a listen and send your comments my way.

I finished my sample episode and sent it off to the Parsec Submissions committee. Now I sit back and wait. While I am very honored to have been nominated, my competitive streak tells me that darn it, I want to win! We’ll see how it goes.

I’m (hopefully) a couple weeks away from finding out if the publisher has accepted my YA Novel submission. Fortunately, holidays will keep me distracted while decisions are made.

The biggest news I have is concerning Episode 9 of ‘Get Published’. I’m creating a “special” episode to air while I am gone (July 5th). It will feature my first ever recorded fiction, in this case, as short story I wrote a few years ago prior to my first novel. It was created as a study of the world I was creating. Nervous to put it out doesn’t even begin to cover it, but I’m also looking forward to sharing it.

Please, please, please (yes, I am begging) have a listen when it drops and let me know what you think. Negative feedback I can handle. No feedback is harder.

Tags: blog, fiction, holiday, irreverent muse, Michell Plested, short story