Today went quite well. It started slow because I went to bed late last night and so got up late. I got some kerfuffle done -- mainly packaging my pain-in-the-neck city taxes. (Everything else is done, and the refunds are already in my bank account.)
And I had an incredibly fruitful brainstorming session this afternoon....
Today's Progress: Started in on "Riding Dark Whisper," about 1200 words. This is the story idea I generated as an example when I wrote last night's blog post; Title: Dark Whisper, Subject: First Riding Lesson. While it does involve a first riding lesson by the end, the story is actually about overcoming fear of horses. Also about doing a good job at things. The heroine draws horses and really wants to be an artist. She's just moved to a new house, and there is a riding academy back behind the new subdivision where she lives.
This afternoon I beat out a plot for a long novelette -- about the same length as The Ride To Save King -- and I'm suddenly very excited about it. I know the genreal sweep of all four acts, and I have chapter breakdowns for the first two. I'm not sure I'll get this written in one streak, though. I'll probably write about half of it and jump to something else for a while and come back. Stories like this work that way for me.
"Dark Whisper" btw, is the name of her idealized imaginary horse, and maybe there is a horse that fits the bill at the academy. I'm not sure that name is good for the title though. I'll have to think on whether I need to completely reframe the title.
Eating, Watching, Reading: Made "Shrimp Roll-Ups" today while watching Humphrey Bogart in In A Lonely Place (Columbia, 1950, with Gloria Grahame). A later Bogie flick, and one of his great performances. It was also a great noir potboiler -- a temperamental screenwriter who may or may not be capable of murder, and the woman who falls for him and gives him an alibi, only to wonder if maybe she has put herself in danger. (Funny how real, classic noir was very often a "women's picture" or "woman in jeopardy" type story, more than a hard-boiled detective story.)
In the meantime, I've put off watching any more versions of The Glass Key until I finish the book. The movies are very much like each other, but they change just enough of the book to make the book confusing. Hammett writes in "objective" voice here, character motives are completely opaque -- you literally don't know what anybody is thinking -- and you have to pay attention to when and how things happen.
See you in the funny papers.
Daring to live life as a full time writer, with or without success.
2 comments:
Do you do much genre reading when you are writing in a particular genre?
Anyway, if you do, and if you haven't read the novel "In a Lonely Place" I recommend it. I found it in the Mystery Bookstore here in L.A., read it and thought "Damn." Hadn't seen the movie previously, but made a point of seeing it as soon as I could.
"The Blackbirder," by the same author (Dorothy B. Hughes), is another noir stunner.
I tend to read "counter programming" but since I only write noir as short fiction, it's always a fine time to read it.
(Like I said, I'm reading The Glass Key right now.)
There are a few Dorothy B. Hughes books available for Kindle, but not In A Lonely Place. I'll have to watch for that at the library. Thanks for the tip!
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