{"id":916,"date":"2013-09-09T13:00:06","date_gmt":"2013-09-09T17:00:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cuppapulp.com\/?p=916"},"modified":"2014-02-08T00:12:39","modified_gmt":"2014-02-08T05:12:39","slug":"part-4-advice-on-first-drafts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cuppapulp.com\/writers\/2013\/09\/09\/part-4-advice-on-first-drafts\/","title":{"rendered":"Writing News and Part 4 of Advice on First Drafts"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Cuppa<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Writing News<\/h1>\n

September 5, 2013–Best writer’s inspiration this month comes from a video. \u00a0Poet Neil Hilborn offered “OCD”<\/span><\/a><\/span> as a finalist in the 2013 Rustbelt Poetry Slam, delivering a punch-to-the-gut love story that is also a wrenching portrait of human psychological illness. Do that in 1000 words or less, and you have created living art.<\/p>\n

Congratulations to local author Max Ellendale for Glyph’s<\/em> appearance on Amazon’s Erotic Horror bestseller list<\/span><\/a><\/span>!<\/p>\n

Last but not least, Team Cuppa Pulp is looking for some bada** writers and generous souls to support us in the 8th Annual NY Writers Coalition Write-a-Thon, benefitting writing programs for the underprivileged. You can read Donna’s plea here<\/span><\/a><\/span>. Join us by registering or donating at our FirstGiving page for the Writers Coalition<\/span><\/a><\/span>.\u00a0Writers reach out to sponsors and show up to write from 10-6 on September 21! If we have enough team members, we will have two groups, one at Cuppa Pulp and one in NYC at the General Society of Mechanics and Tradesmen Library, \u00a020 West 44th St., NYC, NY. Thank you in advance for supporting the NYWC through Team Cuppa Pulp!<\/p>\n

Writing Advice: First Drafts, Part 4<\/h1>\n

Be Unstoppable<\/h1>\n

Donna Lee Miele<\/em><\/p>\n

Max Ellendale is no stranger to finishing difficult projects. She holds a graduate degree in mental health counseling, completed her MFA in 2013, and has written short stories since the age of 12. The second book in the Glyph<\/i> series was recently published, and the third is well-underway. But she almost abandoned Glyph<\/i> in the first year of her MFA program.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the time, most people were not clued in to the booming sci-fi\/fantasy genre. I felt like an outcast. What I was writing wasn\u2019t good enough, because it wasn\u2019t memoir or literary fiction. It dampened my spirit. \u2018What are you writing that for? That has no value.\u2019 I butchered Glyph<\/i> and changed it to attempt to meet the needs of others, breaking Kurt Vonnegut\u2019s rule of writing fiction: \u2018Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

The turning point came when, against all her own expectations, Max mastered a \u201cworthwhile\u201d writing assignment: a literary memoir. \u201cI struggled the entire semester because of my \u2018sci-fi\/fantasy handicap,\u2019\u201d she says. \u201c[And] I tore a nonfiction piece from somewhere inside me. During our final reading, I made people laugh, and sad at the same time. The look on my teacher’s face, and the pat on the back she gave me when I finished, said to me, \u2018You can do this, you can write.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

With the confidence gained from this small success, Max went back to writing what she really enjoyed. She learned to listen critically to critics. A literary critique of genre fiction \u201cis like going to a podiatrist for a dental consult,\u201d she says, \u201cthough the flipside is also true. You might learn about metaphor and symbolism from a poet, or you might get some political insight from a blogger. Take what feels right and leave the rest.\u201d<\/p>\n

Max also found an audience through online networking. Industry wisdom counsels against putting your drafts on your own website or blog, if your goal is publication in a literary journal or press. Many publishers want work that has never been published before, in any format. But Max had already submitted to numerous agents without success, and felt that it was time to try communicating with readers another way.<\/p>\n

\u201cI posted a few tidbits on my blog that started to get some attention. My now-editor read chapters 1 and 2 and contacted me via Facebook. She urged me to submit to the small press that she works for, which publishes in my genre. I was able to find value in my work.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Authors\u2019 Extra Mojo<\/em>:<\/b><\/p>\n

So does Max celebrate upon finishing a first draft? \u201cI celebrate by moving on to the next project,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

For most writers, the \u201cnext project\u201d is revision.<\/p>\n

James King does not celebrate either. \u201cI get started as quickly as possible on the second draft,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Emmy Laybourne takes a time out\u2014sort of. \u201cWhen I get to the end of a first draft, I type \u2018The End,\u2019 and then I lie down on the floor and go to sleep! That\u2019s happened twice, now. I get to take a nap, in the middle of the day.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stephen King recommends stepping away from a piece completely, for longer than one afternoon. \u201cMy advice to you is that you take a couple of days off\u2014go fishing, go kayaking, do a jigsaw puzzle\u2014and then work on something else. Something shorter, preferably\u2026 you\u2019re not ready to go back to the old project until you\u2019ve gotten so involved in a new one (or re-involved in your day-to-day life) that you\u2019ve almost forgotten the unreal estate that took up three hours of every morning or afternoon for a period of three or five or seven months.\u201d<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re not a strict outliner, you\u2019ll know you\u2019re done with a first draft when \u201cyou feel you\u2019ve done what you set out to do, or you\u2019ve come as close as you are capable,\u201d says Joanna Clapps Herman. \u201cBy the time I\u2019ve gone down my initial \u2018grocery list\u2019 and said what I have to say about each item I have a rough first draft, and I know more or less what work is ahead of me to write this piece fully.\u201d<\/p>\n

Joanna, who has experienced the full spectrum of the writing process many times, understands that when you finish your first draft, you are really just beginning. Now is the time to call on craft\u2014\u201cAll the stuff that everyone works so hard to learn, and that is so well outlined in so many how-to books,\u201d Joanna says. Your work has found its voice, but that is intermediary, at best, to a complete book. You must enflesh your story\u2019s bones. You\u2019re about to start all over again.<\/p>\n

Coming Next Time: Part 5, Begin Again<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

References:\u00a0<\/em><\/h4>\n

Except where noted below, quoted material from James King (Bill Warrington’s Last Chance,\u00a0<\/em>New York: Viking, 2010), Emmy Laybourne (Monument 14<\/em>: Sky on Fire<\/em>, New York: Feiwel and Friends, 2013), Max Ellendale (Glyph<\/em>, Breathless Press, 2012), and Joanna Clapps Herman (The Anarchist Bastard: Growing Up Italian in America<\/em>, Albany: State University of New York Press, 2011)\u00a0are from personal interviews and emails with the author, March-June, 2012.<\/p>\n

Quoted material from Lauren Groff (Arcadia<\/em>, New York: Voice, 2012)\u00a0is from the author\u2019s transcript of Ms. Groff\u2019s seminar at the New York Writer\u2019s Institute, State University of New York at Albany, March 27, 2012.\u00a0\u201cLauren Groff on Writing and Arcadia\u201d<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

Stephen King,\u00a0On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, <\/em>New York, Simon & Schuster, 2010, pages 211-212.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0\u00a0Writing News September 5, 2013–Best writer’s inspiration this month comes from a video. \u00a0Poet Neil Hilborn offered “OCD” as a finalist in the 2013 Rustbelt Poetry Slam, delivering a punch-to-the-gut love story that is also a wrenching portrait of human psychological illness. Do that in 1000 words or less, and you have created living art. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,10,12,5,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-916","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-author-news","category-cuppa-blog","category-homepage-firstfeature","category-writers-resources","category-news-events"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cuppapulp.com\/writers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/916","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cuppapulp.com\/writers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cuppapulp.com\/writers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cuppapulp.com\/writers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cuppapulp.com\/writers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=916"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/www.cuppapulp.com\/writers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/916\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1045,"href":"https:\/\/www.cuppapulp.com\/writers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/916\/revisions\/1045"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cuppapulp.com\/writers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=916"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cuppapulp.com\/writers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=916"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cuppapulp.com\/writers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=916"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}