Balls and Walnuts
more than you ever wanted to know
Category Archives: Writer’s Life
Jolly good show
I’m all written out, folks. I reread the last 4000 words of my WiP, edited that part, and then wrote another 5100+ words. Even on my best days of the Brakan Correspondent trilogy (Nest, etc.), I don’t think I ever managed more than 4000 in one day, and I’m sure my average (on a day when I was able to write at all) was closer to 2000.
What does it mean? Does my muse live for writing humorous romance? And please don’t call it “lad lit” or “gick lit” or whatever. *Shiver* what godawful terms.
Anyway.
Just reread the sex scene. I had doubts about it, and I guess I still do, since I’ve never tried to write a sex scene from a female pov. Also, I can well remember how certain writers completely muck up that opposite-sex-pov thing. Guess I’ll have to wait until my gal readers give me feedback on this scene.
I laughed more rereading it than I did writing it. Surely that has to be a good sign. No . . . while I writing it, I was too distracted by the fact I was turning myself on. I do that quite well, but then, I’ve had years of experience.
D.
End logic
Of all the books you have read, what are your favorite endings?
I’ve been thinking about endings ever since Tam wrote about it (scroll down to June 29, but along the way, don’t miss yesterday’s post on method, or the July 1st post on discipline). Tam’s bottom line:
Main storyline’s finished? Major support threads dealt with? Fine, you bastard, you’re OVER!!
Leave it to Tam to end her books with a bloody ax 😉 Anyway, I began wondering whether I could find any common themes among books I consider well-written. In the examples which follow, I’ll try to avoid spoilers, but I ain’t making any promises. I’m hoping you’ll think of your favorite endings and share some ideas with me in the comments. I’m especially interested in you mass devourers of romance. When all of the novels end in an HEA, what constitutes a good ending versus a bad ending?
On to the examples.
Note way cool nude-in-nude-in-nude effect
Well, not really by Walnut, but you wouldn’t believe how tough it is to change the author stamp.
Erin and I met when we guest-blogged together at Demented Michelle’s place. The Demented One will be joining us shortly. What struck me most about Erin, since I’m a typical shallow guy who thinks with his testicles, is how cute she is, and how incredibly willing she is to bare her skin on her blog. We’re a lot alike in that regard, except her skin is worth looking at and mine is all covered up with hair.
Without further ado, here’s the lovely Erin O’Brien:
Greetings Hoffmanians. My name is Erin O’Brien and I am a writer in Cleveland, Ohio.
Was that not a nice, simple, polite introduction (nude picture not withstanding)?
It always amazes me how people introduce themselves and present themselves on the Internet, particularly in the blogosphere. Take our humble host, for instance. Although I have never met the good doctor, I know that he has a proclivity for earthy oral experiences. Now, I find nothing wrong with this. In fact, I find it refreshing in our increasingly sanitized, deodorized and hairless world. But can you imagine approaching someone at a cocktail party, someone you have never met and saying, “I love the smell. If I’m getting freshly washed goods, I feel cheated,” of the feminine … er … experience?
Granted, it seems the vast majority of bloggers go under anonymous names or titles. (Note at this juncture this does not include me or Dr. Hoffman.)
I, on the other hand, pride myself in taking the higher moral ground. Instead of announcing the status of my pubic area, I merely referred to the controversy surrounding how hirsute a woman should be. The resulting post, which was more or less a take-the-day-off filler post, garnered a flurry of commentary.
People love to talk about this stuff online. Look how much traffic the same topic stirred up here. Enough about shaved genitalia. Now onto me.
BUY my novel, Harvey & Eck!
READ the funniest thing I ever wrote.
MARVEL over the fact that I watched a bunch of people masturbate and got paid for it.
VISIT WITH OBSESSION The Erin O’Brien Owner’s Manual for Human Beings.
This is the light and the truth. This is the sound of falling water.
Erin O’Brien
www.erinobrien.us
erin-obrien.blogspot.com/
The importance of thorough research
Today, I bought the July issue of Cosmo. For research purposes, not for the
62 SEX MOVES
Guys Share Tons of Totally Original and Mind-Blowing Tips.
Not at all. And good thing, too, because those Totally Original tips included such Mind-Blowing suggestions as, “After climax, a guy’s head can feel overheated and tingly. If you gently pull his hair and massage his scalp, it will quickly relax him.”
I’ll save the What I Learned From Cosmo post for my Thursday Thirteen. For now, I have a question to ask. Why do we in America get this:
while the Brits get this:
Compare the covers. In the Land of Pat Robertson, we get GORGEOUS EYE LOOKS. In England, they get SEXIEST EVER NAKED CENTREFOLDS. Why can’t I get nude Cosmo at my grocery store? I’d even let them spell it CENTREFOLD.
Did you know Cosmo published me? It’s true. Reese Witherspoon was the cover girl. I wanted to talk about the Middle-Aged Balding Jewish Male Sexual Response, but they were only interested in hearing me pontificate on sore throats. They were all hung up about me being an ENT doc — but dammit, I’m an expert in other things, too! I felt so cheap . . . particularly since they bought me off with a complimentary issue.
I have a pretty good idea who writes this stuff. That obsession with swallowing? Guys write those articles. But this 62 SEX MOVES story, I dunno. There’s a guy’s name attached to every move, but what guy calls his dick “my member”? And, “Watching a woman do yoga is the hottest foreplay you could have without touching each other.” Whaaaa?
There’s horrendous advice in this issue. In their Sexy vs. Skanky feature, they list “Sharing clothes with your friends” under Sexy, “Sharing guys with your friends” as Skanky. Not! And they’re telling women not to drink eight glasses of water a day. This is madness! “Eight to ten glasses of non-caffeinated, non-alcoholic beverages,” that’s what I tell everyone.
I think they need me on staff as their resident ear, nose, and throat doc, sniffer-out of bogus things attributed to guys (but really written by women), and test subject for all of their latest sex tips. I think I have a great deal to contribute, and besides, they already know my work.
D.
For love
This is challah, love in bread form. One of these days I’ll learn how to take a decent digital photo.
Karen appreciated my challah, but my little heathen, a focaccia fanatic, gave my challah the thumbs-down. That’s okay — it just means he doesn’t love his dad. (KIDDING, Jake, KIDDING!)
Today’s Smart Bitches Day post will focus on the following question:
What do your characters do to show their love?ÂÂ
Because, you know something? Protestations of an eternal bond are like, feh. Just feh. Screw the words, I want to see actions.
Like rabbits. In my head.
The trouble with writing guy-chick lit, or gick lit, is that my two characters are getting it on in my brain way ahead of schedule. On the page, they haven’t so much as kissed, but in my head they’re spending hours on oral. (Remember how it was when you were a virgin and you could make foreplay and oral sex last all night?) And I got this great idea about suspect advice derived from the pages of Cosmo, an over-anxious first-timer, carbonated beverages, and a certain candy.
Stop it, you two. Just stop it. I’m not ready to write that scene yet.
As Jim would say, comical hijinks ensue.
I’ll simply have to write faster.
D.
Lips of wax, pimento eyes
Walnut’s note: this is my first stab at random flickr blogging. We’ll see whether folks like this sort of thing or not.
I blame the fight.
“You’re never here on Thursdays,” Carver said, trotting out Contestant Number One for World’s Worst Excuse.
“Will you wipe her off your face?” I screamed, tears flying. I tried to slap him but he caught my wrists and pulled me close.
I could have head-butted him then. It would have saved me a lot of grief.
“It didn’t mean anything, Annie.” World’s Worst Excuse, Contestant Number Two. “I’ll forget about it if you will.” Contestant disqualified for lameness.
“It’s because she’s thin, isn’t it?”
He kissed me on the cheek, catching a tear on his tongue.
“Gee,” he said. “Licorice.”
Why do fools fall in love?
What amazes me the most about Groundhog Day is that I love it as much as I do, even though Andie MacDowell and Bill Murray are light-years away from my ideal vision of romantic leads. Goes to show what a kickass script can do for a film. More on Groundhog Day in a moment.
As you folks know from yesterday’s post, my muse has decided she wants to write a romance. Or a romantica. Or an erotica. The muse doesn’t get out a lot, hasn’t read much from any of those genres, doesn’t care about the distinctions between them. But she has a story to tell and damn it she’s going to tell it. From past experience, I know better than to get in her way, but I also know she needs proper nutrition. Hence this evening’s post.
If it’s romance the muse is writing, my protags ought to fall in love, right? But, but, but . . . why?
Why do people fall in love?
Who wants to read the first 3500 words . . .
of my ‘romantica’ story, Sloppy Firsts?
Already I see a problem. 3500 words, and no one has gotten laid. I’m thinking I don’t understand this genre, which isn’t surprising, since I’ve never read this genre.
This is Miss Kate’s idea, by the way. She’s the one who encouraged this. She and my muse, whom I gave permission to write about anything today, and what does she do? 3500 words. Damn. For me, that’s a pretty fine day’s work.
If you’re at all interested, let me know. Especially if you WRITE this stuff yourself. Email me (azureus at harborside dot com.) If I’m way off base, I’d like to know before I invest much more time in this project.
On the other hand, I haven’t had this much fun with writing in months.
D.
Agent behaving badly
Just checked my hit counter and . . . sucky Sunday! I should be whoring my little loins off with a Technorati-laden post, but I don’t have the heart for it today. Instead, I would like to follow Beard’s lead and talk about the latest Barbara Bauer brouhaha.