And Somewhere Along the Way...

I figured I should offer an update on what's going on over here in the mayhem that is my Writing Corner. Well, I was feeling slumped and distinctly lacking motivational drive to work on the WIP projects that were on the top of the "To Do" list.

It was that "ehhh" sensation, where as a writer or artist, it's best to step away from a project and focus on something else. Or take a break completely, a vacation from effort to rediscover some vigor.

And then my dear friend, the Wielder of Claymores and Hand Grenades, sent me a catalyst of sorts.
Please pay no attention to the "yes, they are still fuchsia" wall color. They provide lovely contrast for all the silly things I slap up on them, so I've decided they can stay. After all these years, I'm honestly not sure how my writer-brain would react to trying to focus in an environment that didn't have this ugly color on the walls.

Black Tourmaline Writer's Tree

At any rate, behold! The lovely Black Tree! And it is lovely. And bloody hell, does the thing work like a charm, too. I was inspired to go rooting around for something else to work on (see what I did there, haha) and have dragged into the spring sunlight a collection of unfinished stories, all set in the same futuristic world: one's 45k strong and about 3/4 of the way complete, two others are roughly 17k each and of uncertain length. Could be a novella collection or series, I'm thinking.

Yay for more twisted aliensmut. Actually, while there exists an entire menagerie of alien races in these stories, the smut content is going to be /mostly/ low-key or off-page I think. The greater focus in these is cultural deviations, social evolution, genetic tampering and wealth of other extrapolated "what-if" inspirations from the cobweb shrouded corners in the dark side of my mind.

So I have been lost in edits, because these writing projects haven't been touched in years and I don't recall much of the plots or characters or where things were supposed to be going except vaguely. Thank you once again, Scrivener, for being my lifesaver, can I just say. Wow. It was the work of maybe an hour to set up three project files, and import and format the existing prose.

This preliminary editing pass is mostly a "clean up and get reacquainted" sort of thing. Heavy revamping may be necessary as well. I'll need to sketch out a plot for the rest of the story arc, I know... the reason it stalled originally was I had no visibility to what the rest of the arc was. Like following a deer path through the woods, only to have it dead-end at a thick wall of brambles and underbrush that's impenetrable. Unless you want to bleed to death from a thousand pokes and scratches.

That can be a formidable deterrent. Much like, "I shall paper-cut you to death!"

Don't know about you but that sounds like a horribly painful way to go. Maybe not Quentin Tarantino material, but then I never was a fan of his. Always been more of a "Boondock Saints" buff, myself. William Dafoe in drag? Yes please.

At any rate, I also discovered a very lovely piece of music that these particular muses have glommed onto with suction cups. Not so strange, I guess, that it's a soothing piece in a eerie kind of way; the mood certainly fits them quite well:





This is Beethoven's Silence, set to a slideshow of the Romanian countryside in autumn. Absolutely gorgeous! I've always had a weak spot for classical arrangements as well as instrumentals, too, so this strikes all kinds of chords with me. And then there's that whole concept of art fueling art. Each project needs fueled in a different way; the energy of certain music won't feed one the same as it will the next. I'm finding that to be more and more the case as I switch gears from one to another and back again.

I've created a Pandora channel titled "Michel's Music" for this collection of projects, in fact. It's all soothing instrumentals, and it is certainly fitting. In that "music soothes the savage beast" way, as I delve into that part of my psyche that is a cold, ruthless killer with a gore fetish and strong penchant for necrophilia... Strangely, that isn't who Michel is. Michel is the one who was bred and trained for a customer with a strong BDSM kink, and then incarcerated for mutilating and killing his master. But he's also the one who soothes the savage beast of his friend, and so...Michel is the music, in a way.

And somewhere along the way, they learn to live and smile. To find joy in simplicity. To live and love, and let it be.
I know I am.