Today was a good day for my Clarion withdrawal symptoms. This afternoon I went to a crit session with some former Clarion grads and got my fix of both coffee and “ditto.” It was nice to get back into the mode of reading and critting stories, even if it was only two for the whole week instead of seventeen. I’m hoping that being in the group will help motivate me to write new stories and to get my Clarion stories revised. Then this evening I got to go to a mini-reunion with a few of my classmates over dinner, so …
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Clarion Wrap-up
Final word count:
Week 1 (exercises on setting, character, and plot) : 2,000 words
Week 2 story: 1,900 words
Week 3 story: 2,700 words
Week 4 story: 5,000 words
Week 5 story: 3,500 words
Week 6 story: 5,700 words
Total: 20,800 words
I was far from being the most prolific writer of our group, but over 20k words in six weeks is not too shabby :)
Having been through the workshop, what advice can I give to future students?
* Bring ideas with you to the workshop, but don’t feel obligated to use them. I …
Week 5. Ellen Datlow gave us an editor’s perspective, including: information about markets, the importance of the first read (you can only read a story for the first time once), and insights into working with an editor on revisions. Ellen was great both for her perspective on writing and for being a wonderfully fun person to hang out with. Writing-wise, this week was a particularly stressful week for me, I didn’t get the idea for what I wanted to write until mid-week (which wasn’t entirely unusual for me), AND the idea was pretty complicated so it took me a couple …
Where did weeks 3 and 4 go? Time is accelerating at an alarming rate and I have no idea where it is going. I’m already dreading leaving, I’ll miss being with everyone so much (I hate it when I start missing people before they’re gone, it’s a bad habit of mine, but the end of the six weeks is rushing ever closer so I can’t help it).
Week 3 – Ian MacLeod was great. The poor man was both sick and jetlagged when we met him on Sunday, but he perked up as the week went on. He reinforced for …
Well, two weekends have come and gone without a single post from me, which shows how busy they are keeping us here :)
Paul Park’s week flew by. Instead of writing a full story for him to critique, we did a setting sketch, a character sketch, and a plot outline. He would read some of the sketches to us in class and we talked about them. It was lovely to deconstruct a story into these elements and really focus in on what does and doesn’t work. The other nice thing about the exercises is it got us into the habit …
We met Paul Park yesterday, and I’m very excited about this week. We already had homework! His writing is a very different style from mine, so I’m hoping to learn from his strengths (but I suspect that this week will be challenging for me, because Paul is wonderful with setting, and it’s one of my weakest points).
I’m going to try to update my journal on the weekends, but already I get the sense that we will be very busy, so I may not keep up on my flist, and I won’t answer my comments (though I will read them).
Well, I’m here. I’ve met almost all the other students, mostly unpacked, and now have my computer up and running. And tomorrow, the craziness begins…
Bleh. I woke up this morning with the urinary tract infection, and had to spend a good chunk of my day at the University health clinic :( I hate it when you go into the doctor knowing exactly what you need (antibiotics) and and then it takes three hours of mostly just sitting around for them to come to the conclusion that you need antibiotics. Add another half an hour waiting at the pharmacy, and that was my day today. Not exactly my idea of a good time. Of course, it could’ve been worse, it could’ve happened tomorrow morning.
Okay, …
Four days. Last night when I was trying (unsuccessfully) to get to sleep, I found myself composing text for one of my story ideas, and got up and typed out a few hundred words. This was promising on a couple of levels: first, it’s been awhile since text spontaneously appeared in my brain; second, my wrists appeared none the worse for wear after the half hour or so of typing I did.
My “things to pack” pile grows steadily larger. The luxury of being able to throw whatever I want into my car almost guarantees that I will bring twice …
For some reason, I’ve been craving doughnuts lately, so this morning I went to Krispy Kreme and got a cup of coffee and not one but *two* doughnuts. Sigh. I actually feel worst about the coffee, I’m supposed to be laying off caffeine (!!) because apparently it isn’t good for my wrist problem. My wrists have actually been better lately, though, so maybe I’ve reached the point where coffee is okay.
I’m now officially giving up on my goal of getting all my trunkies out the door before the workshop. Looking over them, I think I’ll be better off retiring …
