Thursday, July 17, 2014

Manuscript Origins

Last year, I went to the Gay Rom Lit conference in Atlanta. I wasn't there as an author, because I didn't register in time. But I had an airplane ticket I had to use, and one of my publishers, MLR Press, needed some help with a big event they were sponsoring.

So I flew up to Atlanta for a couple of days. I hung out with fans and talked about books, I went to the parties at night and had fun, and I wrote.
The first night, I was standing in the buffet line behind this great-looking older guy who just oozed sexuality. I was stunned into near-silence, which is pretty unusual for me, and we talked for just a moment or two about the crowd.
Later I realized that he was an actual porn star who was there to promote a line of books he was editing. I admit, I got a little obsessed with him, and he started my imagination going.
There was a Starbucks about a ten-minute walk from the hotel, and the next morning I trekked over there with my trusty netbook. I opened a new document and started to write.
Usually the most I can get out of a writing session is about two hours, before my inspiration starts to flag and I begin to remember all the things I have to accomplish that day. But that morning in Atlanta, I had to reason to hurry back to the hotel, and I kept writing and writing.
I felt almost like Jack Kerouac with his endless roll of paper, typing away at On the Road. That’s what obsession feels like, when the words just pour out through your fingertips, with no idea where the story is going. It was a very different experience for me; while I often start hearing a character’s voice in my head, I also begin with an idea of what kind of book I’m writing, and where it’s going.
Will it be a romance? A mystery? A piece of erotica, or a non-fiction article?
With Freddie Venus and Newt Camilleri, I was just eavesdropping on their situation. But once they got together I had no idea what they were going to do or what kind of story they were in.
Between that day and the next, I ended up with about fifty pages. I had no idea where it was going, but it started with a retired porn star living in isolation in southern France, and the overweight, middle-aged fan-boy/writer who gets obsessed with him.

When I got home, I had to go back to manuscripts that had deadlines attached to them, and besides, I had no idea what to do with Freddie and Newt. It was only over the next few months that I realized I’d set these guys up in the territory where my bodyguard heroes, Aidan and Liam, live. So their story, which begins as a romance, was going to have to turn into a case for the Have Body, Will Guard team.

Sunday, July 13, 2014

New computer

So about a week ago, my faithful netbook died. It had given me a blue screen of death at least once before, but recovered, but when I sat down at Starbucks one morning to write, it just wouldn't load Windows. It had lived a long and productive life, though, being used almost every day of the year for writing.

I went looking for a replacement and settled on an 11" HP Pavilion laptop with Windows 8 and Office 2013. I figured that would be small enough to carry around easily, and since we're getting Office 2013 at school I could get a head start on learning to use it.

Big mistake. I'm not sure where my problems came from -- was it the hardware? The software? A combination of both? It was very difficult to right-click on a Word document, which was a big pain in the neck for me, as I right-click all the time, to add words to the dictionary, correct spelling, and update the table of contents, among other things.

I think that was a hardware issue. The touchpad just wasn't responsive.

Second problem was in saving files. I am in the habit of saving all the time -- I hit control-S every few paragraphs, or at least every page. The Pavilion was SO SLOW in saving that the screen would display Microsoft Word Not Responding, and I'd have to wait and wait in order to continue to type. Not good when you're relying on inspiration!

It also seemed like there were many more steps involved to the simplest actions. I couldn't just hit "Save as" and have the dialog box pop up. Had to jump through several hoops for that. Couldn't shut down very quickly, either, though I did figure out a work-around for that.

In the end, I just couldn't tolerate the computer, so I sent it back and got an Acer with Windows 7, and put the copy of Office 2010 I already own on it. It's like a miracle -- everything works again, just like I want it to! Let's hope this computer lasts for as long as the netbook.