Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Building a World

My writing philosophy is very structure and I follow the Tolkien model of fantasy world building. Instead of merely writing a story and then building the world around it, I build my world with its history first and then write the story in this world. i feel that this give the world a larger field, and makes it feel more authentic.

Of course this model has its drawbacks as well. The biggest frustration is if you change one thing it effects so much. It effects the history, it effects the story, and it effects the whole world. You change something as small as a name and the ripple effect is huge and quite frankly difficult to keep continuity.

But these changes are worth it because I am excited that I have created an expansive beautiful world that I hope my readers will get lost in.

Any thoughts?

My next post will be on my first major writing slump.

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

It's been a while!

Wow exactly a month since my last post. I am sorry that it has been so long. I told you last time that I would right about fantasy world building but I will postpone that until next post. Today I want to talk about who writers should write for.

As I write I often find I do not like myself very much. My writing is fairly dark and serious and I consider myself to be a very fun loving upbeat person. How could I write things that are so dark.

Along this thought comes some shame in my weaker moments. I feel shame that my parents will not like my adult books. I feel shame that I am not using my talent to further my career or my faith. I wonder sometimes why I write, what is the purpose.

But more than that I wonder who I write for.

Am I writing to get published? I would like to get published but I am not writing to be published.

Am I writing because I have this story and these characters in my head? Do I owe it to these characters and this story to write? This I think is my primary motivation, but is that good enough?

Should I write my story even if it offends my loved ones? I am, but I do not feel good about it.

Am I an artist? Do I compromise my art to assuage my conscious? How does that apply to editorial notes that I receive when I try to get my work published?

These have been my thoughts lately...what do you think?