Writing Exercise

So this semester I've started a selfish class in addition to my other ones, creative writing fiction, and today's exercise was very interesting. We were supposed to use only dialogue and character expression to convey a scene between two characters bearing a dead horse (haha), and here's my try (sorry, can't put in tabs):

"Now what are we doing to do?"
"You take the front legs and I'll take the back ones."
"It's too hard, Amis, the head is in the way."
"Try harder."
"There's no grip for leverage."
Amis sighed, short but full of long-suffering. "All right, we can change positions, Lymus."
They grunted with effort, each try as unsuccessful as the last.
"It's too heavy," Lymus whined, doubled over.
Amis panted as he looked around the clearing, "If we have rope and a long stick we can carry him easier."
"That sounds good."
"But we'll also have to keep a watch on him, in case the farmers and their dogs come back. How about you look for the rope and the stick first, and I'll whistle at you if anyone comes by the road?"
Lymus grumbled and drew little circles in the dirt with the tip of his boots, but went.

Maybe I'll look for a book of writing exercises. I had scoffed at them before, thinking that my time as a starting writer would be to just write write write, but it's fun to write something whimsical and naughty.

Layout

Mapping out the lay of the city (the positions of the castle, the shrine, the castle park, the sacred woods) made continued work on ch4 easier, even though I haven't completely planned out how everything will look. I also drew Van's rooms and his study, as they're other scenes in the first part of DS. It's pretty hard to plan room layout as how Van would arrange things. Fanelia seems to be pretty sparse on details and more about functionality, and I'm not exactly aquainted with bachelorpads, lol.

Long sentences are hard to write:
That made Hitomi uneasy about past rumors and what Van had told his staff of her intruded stay in Fanelia, and she tried to keep her head high and to not think about what this man might have heard of her as she followed his broad back through the crowd.

Progress Update 5

Slightly disorientated from late hour and wine and reading about food (I've been salivating over an essay on choucroute garnie à l'Alsacienne) tonight; sorry for rambling:

I haven't tried any storytelling on paper yet, but did do a good amount of brainstorming during commutes. I'm now having trouble remembering all the details ; ; The act of compiling all my notes into Google Notebook seems a daunting task. I'm horribly lazy and naturally procrastinates, so I really must take care to keep going and do a little bit each day--and I thought that continuing to post my progress here will keep me on task, so thank you to you lovely girls who keep me motivated and speak sense into me.

I rewrote the beginning of ch4 but there wasn't really any outstanding sentences. Maybe when we get to the festival.

Behind Deadline

I've been very bad this month and haven't written any real substance for DS. As I shifted through ch4 and broke away the outdated parts and separated scenes for future chapters, I realized ch4 now only has 2 paragraphs.

Oops. Oh well, too late to regret publishing my supposed buffer chapter. I better stop further tinkering with the plot and write something again.

Maybe I should try writing instead of typing, as a change to spice things up a little. I seem to brainstorm better on paper. Perhaps it's the physical act of putting words down. Drawing links between different characters, asking side qusetions that develop into long answers, filling out emotions of the scene--these all seem to be easier in active process. I wonder if it will do the same with storytelling?

Posted Ch3

I'm back from vacation~

This week I've been reading The Plot Thickens and A Dash of Style, and realized some errors and made some more character and plot adjustments. I wrote down lots of notes for new layers, and tonight as I got off my flight I decided I've delayed long enough in posting ch3. So it and its drawing are now up.

Oh, I had promised a Van picture to celebrate my freedom--this picture makes me smile:

Progress Update 4

Sorry that I've been neglecting the blog this week. Please don't think that I've forgotten about you or about the project.

Perhaps an explanation of what's been going on is in order: I've been very busy with work as I'm in my last days getting ready to leave--work continues to pile on while I train my replacements, prepare as much neat packages as I can make for them, and finish the things unreasonable for them to inherit. The saddest thing is--I've been taking on extra work, because I know when I leave, it's difficult for anyone else to do it. So even with my departure a week away, many days are uphill battles, and when I come home I'd either do mindless things or go to bed.

But the DS project still continues. I've planned out much of the additional plot, and I'm really excited about it, because it delves into a lot of Escaflowne backstory that I love to think and write about.

It's just that this week, I'd open my working DS document, take one look at the white page with its blinking cursor, and close it back up. I'm not sure why it's so hard to keep staring at that page, to force myself to type something--anything.

Just...so very tired, I guess. But everything will come to an end Friday, and we'll celebrate with another exciting Van picture.