The Sunday Circle is the weekly check-in where I ask the creative-types who follow this blog to weigh in about their goals, inspirations, and challenges for the coming week. The logic behind it can be found here. Want to be involved? It’s easy – just answer three questions in the comments or on your own blog (with a link in the comments here, so that everyone can find them).
After that, throw some thoughts around about other people’s projects, ask questions if you’re so inclined. Be supportive above all.
Then show up again next Sunday when the circle updates next, letting us know how you did on your weekly project and what you’ve got coming down the pipe in the coming week (if you’d like to part of the circle, without subscribing to the rest of the blog, you can sign-up for reminders via email here).
MY CHECK-IN
What am I working on this week?
The coming week will not involve a lot of writing, mostly because I’ll be doing a library talk in Logan Library on Tuesday night and a workshop at QWC on Thursday night, which means the sole day where my writing time isn’t replaced by seminar/workshop prep is Friday.
Rather than look at this as an irritation, I figure it’s a good opportunity to put some energy into putting together some long term plans, doing necessary admin that I’ve been ignoring, and generally clearing the decks so I can hit the ground running when time clears up.
What’s inspiring me this week?
I’ve been re-reading Todd Henry’s Die Empty this week, and just like the Accidental Creative before it there has been this moment where the processes he’s talking about suddenly shift into focus and my opinion goes from well, this is okay, I guess to holy shit, this is awesome.
If the Accidental Creative is all about delivering processes that allow for long-term planning and focus, Die Empty is the day-to-day planning component with some serious high-level planning thrown in for good measure.
What part of my project an I avoiding?
I need to sit down and do some serious prep work for the first Business of Books seminar, which will follow a different format to the notes I have from last year, and therefore needs some adaptation. I also need to sit down with a few contracts and actually read them, before they get signed.
I’ve ended up taking a short, unscheduled break from writing newsletters over the last fourteen days. Regular GenrePunk Ninja transmissions will resume
Like many of you, I have good weeks and bad weeks on the writing front. This week has been rocky, and if
Welcome to GenrePunk Ninja supplemental, where I occasionally post foundational essays written before I launched the GenrePunk Ninja newsletter, especially if they’re
13 Responses
Peter: Sounds like you’ve already gotten ahead of the game in terms of adapting to a less than ideal writing week, so bravo for that! Sometimes the head game is 90% of the battle, it seems…
What am I working on this week?: Continuing the extended outline for the new fantasy novel project, which so far has been clipping along really well, despite an ever-uncertain napping schedule. I think some of the project parring-down I did earlier last month has really helped focus the creative thinking on this project, and it seems to be evolving nicely without a huge amount of head-banging-against-wall, which is always nice for a change. So onward with that! And perhaps, if I there’s time and energy for it, an out-loud read of the edited short story to put back in the words I thought I could cut but really can’t without losing something. That’s a stretch-goal though.
What’s inspiring me this week?: Just finished Waiting for the Barbarians by J.M. Coetzee and started The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro. Sparked by someone’s comment either last week or a few weeks ago, I’ve been paying more attention to the way in which extended travel is depicted (or summarized elegantly). Waiting for the Barbarians of course has my head spinning about the nature of oppression, and the complexities of the benign/adjacent oppressor’s capability of understanding the true impact of even their own subtle oppression on the oppressed. The narrator is a sad, pitiful man, yet through his eyes the scenario is as fascinating as it is odd, and it’s really got me thinking and stewing, which is never a bad thing.
What part of my project am I avoiding?: Not much, actually, which is rare for me. I guess in general I’m utilizing my avoidance techniques to avoid putting too much pressure or self-pity on myself with regards to the amount of time available to work. I’m actually genuinely excited about the current novel project, which I’m realizing now has been a rare feeling in past months (maybe even a past year or so). I’m letting myself wallow in the enjoyment of it for now. There will be plenty of nuts to crack on this project later. 🙂
Huzzah on not much in the avoidance arena and for having stretch goals. I like that term applied to words. Never thought to do it.
Part of my attempt to not over-goal myself during the week (and then feel like a miserable failure for not doing *everything* on my to-do list!). It helps a bit! ^_^
I’ll be interested to hear your thoughts on what you notice about travel sequences!
It’s a fascinating slice out of some of these stories! I’ve only just started looking into it, but one thing I noticed with Waiting for the Barbarians was the physicality of travel. It’s not just distance covered or time travelled or descriptions of landscape, it’s dwindling supplies, aches and blisters from walking miles, dehydration and an acute awareness of the physical challenges to travel (in this case: sand, freezing winds, cracking salt-flat terrain, and undrinkable sources of water). Through those details, I really felt like I was trudging along with them, getting sick and exhausted and hungry, and when they see their destination in the distance, there’s that momentary thrill of relief, and then the sinking realization that the journey is only half over, and now they have to turn around and go back. But it somehow captured the sense of increased speed on the way home, too–that somehow, although it’s just as far, knowing that you’re heading back towards home and comfort does make the time pass a bit faster. Coetzee’s very simple and straight forward in his writing, too, so the whole journey maybe lasts a dozen pages or so at most, but certainly longer than “they rode day and night for six days and ended up at the mountains.” Travel-scenes have been an interesting thing to focus on, and I’m looking forward to seeing how it is similar or different in the fantasy/journey novel I’m also reading! ^_^
Adapting is easier than starting from scratch (and also makes the whole “later” thing arise). Sounds like you have plans to get around your work. May you get some lightbulbs of your own as you do the presentations (even if it’s “oh, that for that story”).
Yes, have come back up for air post the retreat. It was intense (not warm and fuzzy in the least) and I hit the ground sprinting for a massive uni assignment as I simultaneously came down with a massive head cold (Distinction was the mark back yesterday). The aftermath of the retreat is ongoing and awesome but intense which has had me thrown around routine wise. I kinda wrote off April and May due to this.
I have set up all my notebooks with page numbers and intend to expand this into the threading you blogged about awhile ago Peter. Hoping it will help the current helter skelter state of words.
What am I working on this week? Uni. Again. Final assignment due in 8 days, and it’s another massive monstrosity where we have to allocate the words to the hydra (aka 3 parter). In there I also hope to get words down, anywhere on any story.
What’s inspiring me this week? Really looking forward to Cheese, er, I mean Write Club this week. My partner in crime (Jodi) has been interstate caring for family. A chance it may not happen but just knowing it’s on the horizon again is inspiring me.
What am I avoiding? Uni. So over it and am actually now investigating the options of “downgrading” from a Masters to a Graduate Diploma. So much illness and shifts in attitude and the way I think make me at an even less than zero level of motivation.
All the best for your uni choices & assignments (also yay for cheese).
Always tough when making decisions about what you can manage at any given time, but sounds like you’re taking your time to make those decisions and weighing the options. Personal sanity and health is worth a lot! Hang in there, and good luck with this final assignment. Eight days, and it’ll be over at least! 🙂
My Sunday Circle is here. I’m pretty pumped to get back into the swing of things – I’ve been swamped between my internship and family stuff, so it’s gonna be great to actually be writing again.
That unapologetic-ness about Fargo! Yes – and also I think a real affection for its characters?
Yeah, I agree! It really commits to the strangeness and the quirks (both harmless and very harmful) of the town and townsfolk and embraces them.
What am I working on this week?
1. Getting through the bulk of the illustrations for the current big illustration project.
2. Finishing the layout for a picture book proposal.
3. Doing a horrible first draft of my prospectus documentation for uni.
4. First draft of the time-travel murder short story.
What’s inspiring me?
1. C.S.E.Cooney’s Bone Swans, particularly “How the Milkmaid Made a Bargain with the Crooked One”. She captures perfectly little worlds I more than half know from too much reading, and while horrible things happen there are also accidental bickering found families, and good endings too, and “Milkmaid” could have been written for me.
2. Endeavour, the prequel series to Morse, set in the ’60s, which I didn’t want to like, because I’d been enjoying Lewis so much. But it turns out to have so much I love, particularly stoic competency and a central relationship of friendship/mentoring.
3. I just watched John Wick, and I have thoughts about it, particularly focussed on the almost complete absence of any identifying signage. It could almost take place in a mafia afterlife, and embody some inverted, subverted religious iconography. The design of it felt like Dark City or Night Watch.
4. Lists. I made a list of every question I had about the time-travel murder story, and then I made a list of ten possible answers to each, and I think I have solved the most pressing problems in it.
What am I avoiding?
1. US tax forms.
2. Reading several books I need to read.
3. Moving a bookcase across the living room.
Looooove lists! Sounds like the question angle came up with some great material for moving forward on that project! ^_^ Bone Swans sounds fantastic…may have to add that to my reading list. Wonder if my local library has it…
And US tax forms? BLECH. You have my deepest, sincerest sympathies. >.< Only thing I can say to that is: at least once it's done, it's done, and out of your hair for the year!