TWO FISTED HOMEOPAPE December/12 - Revisiting My 10 Writing Tips
Advocating for library socialism in all things - let me borrow your dinglehoppers.
♫ I applied for a rescue dog,
But if I get you dog,
You're rescuing me ♫
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2022 -- bounce.
Library Socialism.
I’d never come across this term before, but I instantly knew I believed in it. I think I saw it a few weeks ago in the nothing here newsletter [genius place of ideas, links, and social restoration that it is]. We don’t need to buy and own everything, and people will be hugely advantaged if they had more opportunity to just go somewhere to borrow the thing they needed and use it for a week and then return it.
When I think of the fact libraries exist - a whole building full of as many books as you can imagine, in every genre, format, style, type, size, and smell, well, it just fills my heart. You only have to consider *why* libraries exist to understand how important education is to a community. Think of how many people have access to stories and different voices and pictures and knowledge and joy that might not otherwise be able to afford it. Think of how many people can just duck in and discover a wealth of information about gardening and then leave without having to spend a cent.
I know, as a writer I should want people to buy my work, sure, but if every library bought a copy of my latest hardcover, I’d be insanely happy, and financially better off. Side Fact: if you ask your local library for a copy of any of my comics, they will go out and buy one for their shelves. That’s a fact. So doing that today - requesting a copy of, let’s say, SPEED REPUBLIC, means the library will source one through whatever library purchasing channels they use, and I’ll get one more sale, and you can then read the comic for free - how awesome is that?!
Anyway, back to the hallowed grounds - libraries are amazing, and the idea that it’s a shared place of knowledge is genius. Also: don’t start in on the internet existing and replacing books. It’s just not going to quite happen the way anyone imagines it. I love the internet, I understand that a YouTube recipe video is probably more effective than a page in a dusty tome, but I also know that flipping through a whole recipe book of Italian sausage recipes is quicker than watching 4 hours of videos to find the thing you want to make. I actually believe the two can go hand in hand - plus, libraries offer free internet, so that’s double points for the whispering walls of your local.
Another plus for libraries - if you have kids, you can sample eleventy million picture books for free. I don’t know how many weekend mornings I would spend in the library, building a stack of picture books to take home and read over the coming fortnight, while also putting some back on the shelf because minor inspection showed me the book was not for us. I found some of our favourite creators that way [shout out to Tohby Riddle and ESCAPE FROM CITY ZOO] and I didn’t have to spend a cent [until I went out and bought our own copy of ESCAPE FROM CITY ZOO]. One of the very few parenting tips I have is to take your kids to a library.
Hell, I remember growing up poor and having visits to the library be a cool weekend adventure. My home town might have been a walking graveyard of bogans and violent druggos, but the library was a 31st Century affair [to my 5yo eyes]. I would wander the kids’ lit section and just gorge my eyes, and always find something to read.
So, back to library socialism - it’s the idea that libraries for many things should exist. To wit, there should be a Tool Library in every local area. I don’t need to buy and own an angle grinder when I use one, maybe, one a year. I should borrow one for that day and that job, then return it. If it were borrowed once a week, that might be 52 angle grinders not bought and stored away, but instead 1 bought, looked after, and shared.
I often think that the idea of the real man’s garage having one of every tool was some kind of genius marketing hack half a century ago to make men buy more tools - especially when they are often referred to as toys - and I cannot fathom spending $200 on some of these things that you will only need a few times over the course of years. My lawnmower, sure, I use it every fortnight in summer. A pop rivet gun, umm, been a while between drinks on the use of one of those.
I actually just found a Tool Library in my local area - it’s $22 a year, but that’s cheaper than buying by a long shot, and cheaper than renting certain tools, and it’s the kind of initiative that if you use it then they can prove there’s need for them in the community and then they can seek more funding. How cool!
So, library socialism. For books, for tools, what else? Kitchen gear - who needs a pressure cooker in their cupboard 365 days a year, or a frozen yoghurt maker? Kids’ party and play stuff - inflatable water play, catering gear, etc.
Library socialism. In all aspects of life. I’m all for it.
Addendum: I long wanted to be a librarian, and do hope before I stop productively working and moving that I spend some time in a public library to give back to the community.
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Writing is excavation.
This old saw has been pushed by many a master of the form. What they don’t tell you is, some days you might only move a few grains of sand. Or a strong breeze will blow more stuff in to cover your artefact and this will set you back.
This week I was tapping away at a script. It is actually a rewrite of an old thing, a tweak, a polish. So I’m in this script, with the comic/art next to me, and just working out what I can refine. Some mornings, it’s cruisy, nothing needs to change; some mornings, I have to think through a decent chunk of change, but it comes smoothly; and one morning I was just stumped. I tried to work my way around and through this scene and it just wasn’t happening. So I kept trying, and distracting myself with other jobs around it [email, newsletter, etc]. But I ended my morning office session nowhere closer to wrapping the scene. All I had were notes about what was wrong, and maybe what a fix might be, but no way of knowing how to make those fixes actually happen.
But that’s writing. Not every office session yields the same results. The trick is to have the mental game to know this might be a month long excavation, and at the end you will have unearthed something, and so you just turn up each day with a pick and a brush and a good sunhat, and you get about the business of getting this thing out.
There’s a lot of faith involved in writing, and this week I had to have faith maybe the next morning’s Ryan would have better luck. Thankfully, he did, and now I think I have something quite good -and definitely better - than what I previously had. Huzzah.
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Noirvember.
I finished, and survived, writing one noir story title and intro for every day of the month of Noirvember. I really like a lot of these, and I love a certain few.
You can check them all out at these links:
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Romance or Sci Fi - halp!
Okay, I need help: which genre should I choose?
Next year, I will teach a genre unit where we showcase short stories and poems and students will analyse and then write their own.
The world is my oyster, and I think I have it narrowed down to either Romance or Sci Fi - but I can’t pick one. I need your help?
Which one should I go with - and can you give me one story and one poem to go with it?
Sci fi seems the obvious choice for me - so deep in my wheelhouse, and a million stories. Haven’t looked for poems yet. But I know I can deeply do this genre, and everything within it, and it will be fun [so maybe I am leaning this way]. But --
Then there’s Romance - it has brilliant poetry [gotta do some John Donne, The Sun Rising] and the thought of students twisting romance tropes into their own creative response fills me with joy.
Help?! :] - I’ve posted this to the Substack Chat - if you have the app, I think you can click here!
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PERHAPS YOU'D CARE TO SAMPLE
My link/article reading is somewhat down. I’m not scrolling any platforms, I’m rewiring my brain. I’m checking more news - but nothing I need to link here. So I guess I’m also seeing less links to share here, I’ll consider that moving forward.
Though I did dig this one out of my Pocket archive - anyone remember using Pocket to save articles to read later?
Michael Chabon’s Advice to Young Writers - spoilers: it’s to put your phones away. It’s also great advice!
The brilliant Dan Hill [sub to his newsletter here] also shared this interview with Rian Johnson, which I need to read [slap it into Pocket, I say] and I dug his interview on the Smartless podcast, too.
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GRIST FOR THE MILL
Black Diggers - a play - What a brilliant and beautiful piece of writing. A plethora of Indigenous interviews and research was conducted to inform this fractured play about the experience of Indigenous soldiers in WWI. There are some really heartbreaking moments in this thing and a whole lot of information I’d wager many people did not know about.
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Be one of the good guys, because there's way too many of the bad.
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Who is Ryan K Lindsay?
I’m an award-winning Australian comic writer. I’ve been published by Black Mask, Dark Horse, ComixTribe, IDW, Mad Cave, Heavy Metal, Vertigo, and a few more. Kickstarter has been a home for many short comics. I often get to collaborate with great mates, and this brings me joy.
I write about balancing this creative game alongside a full teaching load [currently College English] and a lovely family load and the forever melting brain that is modern man. I think about a lot of stuff, I still don’t know if it’s the right stuff. ymmv.
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POST CREDITS SEQUENCE
Writing Rules. I love ‘em. Could eat them up daily. They aren’t always perfect, they aren’t always for me, but they are always worth thinking about.
About 4 years ago, I came up with 10 of my own. I thought it might be interesting to go through them again and see what I think about them. As always, forever and ever, YMMV!
Here's the old post, and I'll intersperse with "personal thoughts" along the way.
THE RKL 10 WRITING RULES-ish - Old Poste
I'm getting the feeling people don't like Writing Rules, they don't want a rigid structure of how it works to get worlds out of your brain, and they certainly didn't warm to those laid down by Jonathan Franzen, but I'll admit, I find them fascinating. A word I choose carefully.
"I actually want to put together a collection of every writing rules list I can find. See what I can sift out of the collective hive mind."
I want to know what the masters think we should hold in our highest esteem, I want to know it from my peers, and nascent writers, and plenty of others. I want to look into everyone's head and see what roads they follow. I won't necessarily follow those rules, or even care about them, but the process of having them to read absolutely fascinates me. It'll tell me more about the person's mindset and style than it will about any universal truth of writing.
I dig books about writing, I dig blogs and podcasts and tweets about writing. I use them like I'm building up a pantry, but when I write I'm just cooking. I might have everything stockpiled, but I'll only take out what I need for a specific recipe when the time comes. You dig?
"I absolutely cannot think without an analogy involved, can I? I'm like a mule with a spinning wheel... :["
But, in the spirit, I wanted to attempt to carve out my own ten tips, just suggestions, just from me, and then I could see what I thought rose to the top, so here goes:
"How arrogant to think anyone would care. But I think, at its heart, all writing is a form of arrogance to some degree."
The RKL Top 10 Writing Rules Tips
1 - Your story must be about stuff. And that stuff isn't just a list of the things that happen, it's why those things will matter to the reader, the truths beneath it all, the theme. Your writing will be amateur until you have something of meaning to say.
"This is a tricky one, because we don't often set out with a theme at first and then start writing. Though I know some writers who absolutely do have an area or an idea on which they wish to say something, and then they craft a story around it. I don't quite work that way, but this rule is mostly something to consider because you know the inverse - when you've written something and it's completely hollow. Maybe this shouldn't be #1 - and maybe it should be more about reflecting on your work and finding the truth you've laid down. Hrmm."
2 - Write so 1000 people will absolutely love you, not so 100,000 will think you're kinda alright.
"This I stand by. Don't chase fads. Don't water yourself down. Writing is an act of bleeding on the page, don't try to bleach out the stains."
3 - Write about whatever gets you excited to sit down and write.
"You know this is true whenever you try the inverse."
4 - Set small writing goals. 500 words/2 script pages a day. Then blast through them, sometimes.
"Set goals. Sometimes meet them. Perfect compromise."
5 - Have only one tab open while you're writing.
"Don't do what Donny Don't Does. I stand by this rule, I wish I could do it more often. Hyperfocus."
6 - Think on paper.
"I proselytise this in every classroom I occupy. The brain just works better this way."
7 - Are all your default lead characters straight white dudes? Why?
"One of those rules that's also to remind myself."
8 - Write whatever you want. Any genre, any length, any format. You might not find a paying home for it, but you'll be true to yourself.
"Is this too similar to #2 and #3? Am I padding to hit 10 tips? Maybe on all counts. But it's about form. Don't lock yourself into being only a poet, nothing else. Remember: even Dickens wrote a weird ghost story."
9 - Be inspired by your heroes, but don't ape them. Let them fuel you with the courage to be yourself.
"Find those authors and those books and fill a room in them. Then spend time in that room."
10 - Recharge your brain so it has more to write about. Read comics, watch movies, study the world, live life.
"This, when done well, should cycle you back to #1 - have something to say. Your writing will have something to say when you have something to say, and you'll always want to say something about the things on which you are passionate. Find things in your life that stir up those muddy waters within."
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These points are very clearly by me, for me, and just for me. If you find them interesting, I'm glad. If they help you sharpen your own Top 10, fantastic. If your 10 are the polar opposite of mine, fill your boots, I bet we can still be mates.
I write about stuff like this all the time in my newsletter, statistically, there's a chance one of you will like it, so here's the link - ryanklindsay.substack.com
"I like stuff like this because it allows certain ideas and thoughts to be brought up to the front of my brain for a minute. It's like any cool information, it's not that we don't already have it in our head, it's that we don't access it a lot. I know tiger sharks fight in the womb and eat their sibling before birth, but I don't think about it often, so when I do it fills my brain with wonder about nature, and ideas about characters, and I'm all the better for having the idea brought to the top of the brain soup for a minute so I can dine on it momentarily."