Skip to content

Love, Simeon Posts

Working on the Craft: Evil

Published by Simeon on May 18, 2020

This cute little exercise aims to describe the scene of a murder from the perspective of the murderer. The goal is to have him get away, feel no remorse, and try to make him sympathetic to the reader. I don’t know if I succeeded in that last part, but it was creepy how easy it was to get into the pettiness of the character. Oh well, something to work on in therapy, I guess. For now, enjoy my murder scene ^_^

I walked into the commander’s office. He sat at his desk, hands directing the overlaying holos like a concert pianist. But there was no artistry in what he did. His back was straight even when nobody was around. His posture rigid, even when sitting. A military officer through and through, all hard edges and lack of imagination.

He looked up at me now, annoyed. The commander lived in a system of fixed rank-based value, and I – a lowly civilian – did not rank high. That I served a Magister directly was of no consequence. Here was an officer of the king’s army. In his mind, I was so far below him, that I wasn’t even on the same chart.

“What is it, advisor?” he asked gruffly. No names. Never names with the commander. You were your rank, if you had one, your profession otherwise. “I am incredibly busy, and I don’t recall seeing you on the schedule. In fact…” He looked at a chrono display on the left side of the desk’s surface. “I have no meetings scheduled at all for the afternoon.”

I could see his mind already composing the stern admonition he was going to give his assistant – a wormy ensign I had only passing compassion for. Letting the obnoxious Magisterial advisor walk unimpeded on his station was compromise enough, as far as the commander was concerned. But coming into his quarters unscheduled? Blasphemy.

“What is so funny?” His harsh voice interrupted my thoughts, and I fixed him with my most placating smile. I knew it would piss him off further.

“I apologize for coming unannounced,” I said, and sat in the chair in front of the desk, feeling a shiver of delight pass through me at his outrage. He hadn’t offered me a seat. “I fear this could not wait.”

“Advisor, may I remind you that you are on this station purely as a sign of my respect for your… superiors?” The commander’s stiff posture was now bristling. “You have a free run of the public areas here, as per your request, and that is as far as my generosity goes.”

“I am, of course, eternally grateful,” I responded, not trying to hide from my tone of voice just how eternally grateful I wasn’t. “Alas, I have found myself… dissatisfied with this arrangement.”

The sleet-gray eyes widened. “Dissatisfied? I am under no obligation to satisfy you, advisor.”

“See? It is this attitude.” I was keeping my cool now, though I could hardly contain how smug I felt. “When I arrived here, it was to observe the workings of the station for my lord Magister. He is interested in overthrowing the King, you understand, and it is outposts like this one that will serve him best.”

The commander stood still, stunned by my conversational candidness.

“Treachery,” he whispered.

“I wasn’t to do anything, of course. His plans are nowhere near completion.” I kept talking, as if the man before me wasn’t just about ready to jump across the desk, and strangle me. “But I just… I find you so unlikable, commander. So extremely unlikable.”

“You dare speak this way to me, in my own quarters.” He almost seemed to need to state the circumstances out loud, so he could believe them. Lack of imagination, as previously mentioned. “I only have to call out, and there will be a squad of soldiers here to arrest you.”

“You reckon? How would they hear you?”

“My assistant…”

“…is not at his post, I am afraid. And with him not around, who even knows you are at your office? It is, after all, way past your office hours.” He looked at his chrono, confused. “These desks are embarrassingly easy to hack and disconnect from the network,” I offered. I hadn’t thought his eyes had more bulge in them. I was delighted to be proven wrong. Any moment now, I thought. Time for the coup de grace. “Does anybody actually know where you are at this very moment, commander? Did you let your wife know you’d be working late? Poor thing must be so worried.”

He darted for the weapon under the desk. He was fast.

I was faster. My stunner bolt threw him back in his chair, paralyzed but still conscious. His eyes traced me as I rose from the chair, gun in hand, and walked around the desk, fiddling with the controls.

“I just want you to know, commander, that this is not part of a plan.” I spoke mildly now, fully engrossed in my villainous role. “Sure, you would have likely been removed once things were in motion. But this?” I looked at the now lethal energy weapon in my hand. Then I looked back at his mute face. “This is sheer pettiness. Because I genuinely, sincerely…” I put the gun to his temple. “…do not like you.”

The beam passed through his head, cauterizing each entry point as it evaporated his brain. His face remained frozen in its dumb expression of fear, eyes turned sideways, toward the gun that was no longer there. I wiped the weapon with a piece of cloth, then arranged his fingers around it.

There would be an investigation. It would find nothing. And most of the base hated the commander, so they wouldn’t look too deep, unless forced. By which point, I would likely be very far away from here.

I started whistling as the door closed behind me.

When Your Writing is Just Absolute Shit

Published by Simeon on May 15, 2020

I have been semi-hard at work on the second draft of my fantasy novel for the past many moons. It’s a chonker, clocking at about 200,000 words (which is definitely where you want to be with a debut novel, but that’s a different stress point). This draft has yielded a lot of new material, rearrangements, as well as the realization that a side character is completely unnecessary, and should be excised in the next round of edits.

However, I want to talk about sucking. More specifically about me sucking. I do that, sometimes.

Somewhere around the beginning of the last quarter of the story, I realized that events needed to take a detour, for the purposes of tension building, try/fail cycling, and the like. Whether that detour has been successful, or even necessary, I won’t know until I get to the point where the book feels tight enough to do a speed-read. But the point is — I wrote a whole lot of new material.

Then I came back to the point where the story merged with the already existing chapters, and realized that said point also needed a complete rewrite. Characters were now in different places, their relationships changed, new information had come to light, and so forth. So I rewrote the chapter. I had some cool character beats. I felt great about it, and let it marinate for a day, before coming back to quick-edit it, and add it to the whole.

Boy, was it awful! The beats still felt cool, the story still went the way I felt it needed to. But the writing. Oh my god, the word choices, the sentence structure! It was tres tres garbage. I patched what I could, left the rest for a future re-read.

Stay with me. There is a point to this, I promise.

See, even as I was establishing my incompetence, lack of talent, and utter unworthiness to exist as anything but a cautionary tale of the hubris of thinking you can be creative when you obviously can’t… I knew that I couldn’t trust that feeling. Quarantine is tough. Anxiety. Depression. Getting on your loved ones’ nerves, and them trampling all over yours. For every moment of manic productivity, there has to be one of hopeless self-flagellation. Or rather, there doesn’t have to be one. But in my personal experience there usually is.

The point (as promised) of my sad exhibitionist ramblings is — it doesn’t matter.

I might actually, objectively, suck. I might be brilliant, but depressed. Likely, I’m somewhere in the middle, with most of humanity. But I know what I want, and what I want, is to keep writing. I believe that the only way for me to do this, is to accept that there will be moments where insecurity (or, hey — objectivity!) will get the better of me. Where even my best effort will seem like a vomit sundae. And that those moments don’t truly define what I can accomplish, how far I can go.

Accepting the feeling of suck, and moving past it. Writing even when it really seems like all you write is despicable trash. It’s the only way forward I can conceive of, if I want to come out on the other side of it.

Reading Update 05/13/20 – Barrayar

Published by Simeon on May 13, 2020

Today’s post will be a short one. An actual “update” if you will.

As previously mentioned, I decided to use the audiobook medium as a means of re-“reading” books. There is a lot of stuff I’ve wanted to get back to for the longest time, but couldn’t, because there was always something new to read. So, adding audiobooks to my “non-reading” time has been a game changer!

After finishing Dune, I went to Lois McMaster Bujold’s Vorkossigan Saga, which I have been aching to come back to. I am going through them in order of internal chronology, and since I read Shards of Honor last year ago, I started listening to Barrayar. It is absolutely fantastic, just as I remembered it from my teens! Bujold’s writing is effortlessly engrossing, in a way that fills me with dark envy.

Sidebar: I am taking a stance against male narrators pitching their voice high when reading female-coded dialogue. Come on, dudes, it just makes the characters sound scared all the time!

Working on the Craft: Loving

Published by Simeon on May 11, 2020

The title says it all. The exercise asks that you write a short scene about someone you love. It challenges you to both make a conscious choice about the type of love you will be focusing on, and the means by which you do it. It is easy to become sappy, or to fall into stock phrases. I found it very exciting, however, because to me love is always in the details, whatever kind of love we talk about. So, here is my exhibitionist little scene about my boyfriend ^_^

He looks down at his notes, and I fall in love with him all over again.

He doesn’t lean, even though you’d think he would. He has this grace that tall, slim people sometimes have, a swan-like curve of the neck, where he just encompasses the notebook below him, rather than bending to read it. A pen is moving between his long fingers, sometimes touching his lips in an unconscious sign of thoughtfulness. You could draw a line from the feet of his crossed legs, running all the way up to that pen. It would be a bold line – a single fluid movement with no sharp angles, yet it would still look like a lightning.

The laptop is open on the desk in front of him, and it’s all gibberish to me. High mathematics are for people with better brains than mine. But to him it’s a language, and he is fluent in it. The code of the universe, and he can crack it. That is what stops me at the open door – a realization that strikes every time I see him work. His mind can encompass something so profoundly complex, that I have no choice but to be in awe of him. More so, for knowing how little of his ego is involved in the equation.

He works with quiet intensity. Not the dramatic movie style “10 seconds until detonation” type of intensity, but rather the deeply human drive to know and understand. To discover. I know the face I will see if I call out to him. Thin. Elegant. Beautiful. And deeply annoyed at me. His eyes will do the slow blink as he takes a moment to stop himself from snapping. I love him for that as well. He is in his zone, and I would be a distraction. Sometimes I draw his attention regardless. But not now. He is an explorer, and I’d rather just watch him explore.

Often, that is all I need.

He rolls the chair away from the desk, gets up, and walks to the mobile whiteboard by the wall. His movements carry an effortless grace. He is a dancer, even if his dance happens inside his mind. It has nothing to do with the music in his AirPods. When he traces the marker on the board, you can see the artistry. His movements are always broad, because even his confusion is underlined by confidence in his ability to comprehend. To solve.

His back is straight as he works, and he never hunches, although – again – you would expect him to. Tall people, especially tall people who stare at screens or boards all day, so often do. But in his office, in his natural habitat, he has made his world to fit his stature. He doesn’t hunch, because he never has to. There is beauty in this.

He notices me, standing by the door, and I act like I haven’t been there a while, but am just now passing by. He smiles.

There is beauty in this as well.

Magic as a Storytelling Tool

Published by Simeon on May 8, 2020

As someone who deeply loves magic, be it in fantasy, or Science Fiction, I have always been excited by different systems and the ways in which they are integrated within the story. Brandon Sanderson — a huge inspiration on various axes — has an entire theory about how magic should be used. I greatly recommend reading his First Law article, which sets down a strong correlation between magic systems and plotting. The entire thing is worth the time, but the law itself reads:

An author’s ability to solve conflict with magic is DIRECTLY PROPORTIONAL to how well the reader understands said magic.

On the surface of it, this makes a ton of sense — the less explicable your supernatural forces are, the more unsatisfying it is when they resolve a problem. Gandalf can wave his hands and divert storms. He can win willpower battles against gods and ancient spirits. But do we understand what the parameters and limitations of his magic are? We do not. Would we like it if, after three books of toil and strife, he shows up and just solves all problems? We would not. We are barely ok with the Gandalf Ex Machina already present in the trilogy!

But magic is not binary. Sure, prophecies, totemic and symbolic powers, and destiny are lazy ways to solve a problem. But they are certainly awesome at creating one. A world can be governed by laws far different from the reality we inhabit, and its heroes can still fight against those different laws. Magic doesn’t need to be systematically defined, in order to be part of a satisfying story. It just can’t solve that story’s main problems.

However, I think those two ways of approaching supernatural powers aren’t mutually exclusive. “Soft” magic can be your inciting incident. It can fully govern the world of your story and create all its problems. “Hard” magic can save the day. Because it is bound by rules and limitations which the reader understands, it is perceived as just another skill in the characters’ toolbox, and as such, it does not break the ability of the story to put them through the grinder.

Of course, this is all relative. Rules exist to be broken. Your story can be about the inevitability of failure in the face of overwhelming powers. Or it can be about a godlike being and their awesome abilities that we understand fully, but which no one can stand against. Or your “soft” magic can be a higher form of a hard system that you have just not revealed to the reader yet.

Still, to break a rule, you have to understand it. And I believe that Sanderson’s First Law is a unique attempt at discovering how the tropes of speculative fiction actually apply to literary structures. Magic is a great tool we have. But unless you are writing a role-playing system, or do not care about structure in your story, you have to use that tool in a way that enhances your work, rather than breaks it.

Reading Update 05/06/20 – Audiobook Developments, and Brandon Sanderson Book Porn

Published by Simeon on May 6, 2020

Listening to Books, and How It Can Go Wrong

My adventures with audiobooks continue. After the awesome experience with John Scalzi’s Redshirts, I decided to try Catherynne Valente’s Space Opera next.

The result was horrific.

Don’t get me wrong. The book is adorable. But my body was not ready for a slow-reading Brit doing accents and dialects. My body was particularly unprepared for an entire chapter in the voice of a southern diner waitress. I think I will have to stay away from works that include dialects and “funny voices”. For my own sanity, you understand.

Next, I started Dune, because Denis Villeneuve’s movie is OBVIOUSLY going to be the greatest work of science fiction ever made. And also because I have been meaning to reread it for years. So far, it is going splendidly, and the production is really impressive, with multiple voice actors and even some background music.

As an aside, it seems that audiobooks might be a solution to a problem. Since they have the dubious honor of occupying my “at night, while playing video-games” time, I think they can help me with getting back to works I’ve already read. A solution to the constant struggle of feeling like re-reading is a waste of time when there are so many new books to experience. Vorkossigan Saga, here I come!

Mistborn Goodness

In unrelated news, I wanted to brag about finally completing my set of Mistborn collector hardcovers. Guest featuring, the newest Dragonsteel HC — Warbreaker. Now all that’s left is Elantris, once I have the resources for it, and whatever Brandon Sanderson decides to tempt me with in the future.

The quality of binding of these editions is absurd, and the artwork galleries are stunning. And for fans of Sanderson’s Cosmere, it should be criminal that the books contain charts with information on Scadrial’s magic systems not actually in the stories themselves…

All in all, if one is about that collector’s life, these editions are a must. Of course, if you are a normal human with normal human priorities, there is no justification for spending the amount each of them costs. (Not a criticism to Brandon, his agreement with Tor does not allow him to sell them for less. And frankly — the quality justifies it). But if you are like me, I cannot recommend them enough.

Working on the Craft: Ways of Seeing

Published by Simeon on May 4, 2020

Back to the 3 A.M. Epiphany, and an exercise titled “Ways of Seeing”, in which a first person POV is used to describe an idiosyncratic viewpoint as the narrator observes a traumatic event that does not concern them directly. The goal is to focus on the idiosyncrasies. I am only about 60% sure that I achieved this, but I tried to turn it on its head a bit. Hopefully, someone can tell me if I got it right.

I step inside the bar, the interior revealing all its secrets to me in an instant. The subdued atmosphere of shadowed corners, belying the barrage of sound they are designed to withstand. The twists and turns, made for people to be pressed against walls, almost, but not quite out of sight. The strobe lights above – hibernating now, to awake and rage later.

But in the early afternoon hours, the place is almost entirely empty. A bored bartender picks at his nose, confident in his invisibility at this time, hours before the place could make its first claim to crowding. Two girls sit at the tall stools on the other end of the bar, sipping at something that’s just the right color of pale red to be considered “basic”. A barback is roaming around in the shadows leading to the inner sanctums of the place, probably setting up for whatever events they have on work nights.

I have been here before. Not in this particular bar, but in a hundred like it. You could say I collect them. I am part of their scene, and – for reasons about to be apparent – also not. I get to observe them from afar, and then merge seamlessly with what they offer.

Which is, let’s be fair, often not a lot.

In a few hours, the first tendrils of the night will start creeping in, and there will be music, growing louder and louder as the place fills up. Groups of threes and fours, and the occasional hopeful single person. Not the couples, of course. Those come later, if they show up at all. Predominantly young men, predominantly attractive in the traditional sense, or failing that – bedecked in the flashiest possible regalia of their pageantry.

This place is made for them. The ones who want to see and be seen, by anybody, by any means necessary. The ones who dare to be desired. The bar abhors weakness. It doesn’t even feed on it, but simply rejects it. You don’t have to have a decent self-esteem to be here, but you sure as all hell must be able to simulate it.

The bartender sees me, gives me a disinterested nod, pretends to be cleaning a glass. Inwardly, I smirk. Sure, honey. As if you don’t pour most of this garbage in plastic cups. But I play along, and sit on another stool nearby. If he is here now, then he is the early shift. Could be the one, we’ll see.

Provided his girls leave earlier, or stay after.

The barback comes into the front, and my eyes pass through him, making the barest of cliff notes. Places like this have their own hierarchy of players. This guy is just that tiny bit too short, has just those few extra pounds, and just enough of them coalesce on his bearded cheeks, that he could never hope to make it behind the bar. Not for him, the shirtless look that gets the tips from men and women alike. Not for him, the perks.

People like that grin and bear it, because that’s what they have available to them.

As I reach for a drink I don’t remember ordering, it occurs to me – seemingly out of the blue – that there are other options available to people like that.

There is a gunshot. A scream. Another scream. Another gunshot. And a few more. The sound of glasses breaking.

A light goes dark.

The barback stares at the gun in his hand, eyes wide and wild. As if he can’t believe it’s his hand, with a gun in it. His gaze moves, as if dragged against its will, to the two bodies on the floor, splayed in a tangle of toppled stools, and beyond them – the empty, glass-shard covered space behind the bar, where a more traditionally attractive young man stood only a moment ago, but doesn’t anymore. Heavy breathing going faster and faster, the barback moves to look over the edge, and sees the bartender on the floor by the minifridge, a broken glass by his head. His eyes stare at the dark ceiling, but see nothing.

He would see me, if he weren’t dead. The barback never even knew I was there. They don’t unless I want them to. He just walks around the violated place now, in a daze, gun still in his hand. He holds it so tight, that it must be burning him. He doesn’t seem to understand what has happened any more than his victims did. Even though he must have planned this. I can only imagine he is in shock.

So, when I alight behind him, and put a gentle hand on his shoulder. When he whirls around, only to see what they all see when I want to reveal myself to them. He doesn’t even scream. From a certain angle, this is the most poetic way for things to end for him. It makes a cruel sort of sense. Harm received for harm caused. A life pays for life. Who cares if I wasn’t owed that life?

I am gone before the first sirens sound. The next bar awaits.

Clarion West Online Classes – A Personal Retrospective

Published by Simeon on May 1, 2020

In the past month, the Clarion West Writers Workshop offered a number of online classes through their website. I only managed to sign up for one class from the first round, but I was lucky (read – manic) enough to attend more from the second. The experience was absolutely fantastic on several levels, and the ability to directly interact with professional writers was like being plugged into an outlet, and having my battery charged.

The subject matter of the classes varied wildly, from the use of psychological responses and types of interactions in character building, to the relationship between worldbuilding, character, and story. The structure itself was very different from class to class. Some were webinars, with Powerpoint presentations and room for questions. Others were more lecture-based, with participation, exercises, and the like.

Some takeaways:

1. I need interaction with other writers, be it published, or aspiring ones. It is becoming more and more apparent to me that on a sheer motivation level, I require contact with others who are doing or trying to do what I do. This is making me evaluate the potential to find a writing group, even though I am instinctively suspicious of such things. But it really seems like something that will boost both my motivation, and output.

2. I seem to – and this one is hard to phrase tastefully – actually, uhm, know a lot. Not in the sense of “these classes were useless”, in fact the absolute opposite. I took something unique and helpful from each and every one. But more than a few of these things were rephrasing or offering a unique perspective on information I already had.

Which, to be fair, makes sense. I have listened to hundreds of hours of podcasts, and read a massive number of books on the business and craft of writing. With each passing class, I realized that invariably the most helpful aspect was the direct exchange of ideas, and the practical exercises.

There is always more to learn, and I am likely not even done with the beginning of the process. But it does seem that at this point I actually have a surprising amount of raw information inside my head. Which means that further “learning” for me will have a lot more to do with practice and personal exploration, than simply absorbing information.

Fuck… Oh well.

3. Most importantly, I am realizing that this is truly what I want to be doing with my life. Every class, every sit down with a bunch of other faces, all of us staring awkwardly at each other and the person speaking, has been another crystal clear resonance with the awareness that THIS is who I am. Who I need to be, and what I need to become.

I don’t think any practical benefit I could list (and there were specific ones, to be sure, from each class) will measure up to this simple realization, or rather its reinforcement. Quarantine has been hard on all of us, and I have had my unproductive moments, just like everyone else has. However, after these past two weeks, I feel energized and motivated. And not simply to overcome anxiety, depression, and the uncertainty everyone is dealing with, but to know that even when I fail to do it, my path remains unaltered.

I am no less a writer just because I haven’t been published yet, or because I might have unproductive, uninspired, or flat out blocked streaks. I am more of a writer, knowing that after each of those streaks, I will be back at it, writing. Because I can’t imagine not doing it.

P.S. As for the picture of Jaime protecting my work area as the majestic panther god that he is – you are welcome.

Reading Update 04/29/20 – Doing Aural For Virgins

Published by Simeon on April 29, 2020

During quarantine, my daily routine has been fairly fixed. Mornings are for writing, editing, and blogging. Afternoons are for reading or other work. Evenings are for movie/tv time with the boyfriend. And late evenings are for videogames and podcasts after he goes to bed.

But with that said, I ran out of episodes on the podcasts I follow, and it struck me that I could attempt — cue dramatic drum effect — an audiobook! I have always been resistant to the idea, but the reality of the fact is, I had no rational reason for that resistance. So I went and downloaded something I thought might be a good gateway, and a book I hadn’t read: John Scalzi’s Redshirts, narrated by Will Wheaton.

Well, about halfway in, I have to say I am loving it! I do get characters confused here and there, and the “[name] said” tags are profoundly visible in this format. It has, if not limitations, then certainly a learning curve, but I had no trouble maintaining attention, and I couldn’t stop listening. Of course, it does help that the actual book is really good. I will definitely not be “switching” to audio from now on, but as an addition to my reading, it is certainly not nearly as awful as I expected.

As an aside, this project features TWO people that have been given the “KHAAAAAAN!” approach — both Will Wheaton in The Big Bang Theory, and Scalzi himself, in early seasons of Writing Excuses, where he was, for a time, Brandon Sanderson’s “nemesis”.

As for the title of this post… I know. I’m sorry. I will see myself out.

Working on the Craft: Picture Prompt

Published by Simeon on April 27, 2020

This week’s exercise is a little different. Last Friday, I participated in an online course from Clarion West, titled Writing While Blocked, with Eileen Gunn. Part of the exercise was to write for 5 minutes a stream of consciousness, based on a picture. It is something a lot of people do, but I never had, and I quite enjoyed it. I am adding the picture, so you can judge for yourself how well it fits with your idea of it (if at all).

He walks, the smell of rust his only companion, even as the Mood tries to force his attention on it. It hovers above him, like tied to a string, always blocking the light, although – what light is there in the rust corridors? Corroded metal and anger have made the sunlight flinch and recoil. It is too pure for the filth of this place, too innocent for its anger.

He walks, the wind blowing torn shreds of story around him, as if it too wants to add entropy to this place that is already devoid of order or meaning. Whose story was this? Did they care for it? Did they fight the wind as it tore it from their hand, their desk, their drawer? Did they curse it as it snatched the story and tore it apart with malice?

He walks, and he wonders at the stale air, at the nonsense of it, at the wind that should make it fresh, and the Mood’s fuzzy pollen-covered wings that should make it fragrant. He wonders, most of all, at himself, and why he does not wonder. He is angry, but he does not wonder why, or at whom. Is he angry at himself, for this walk that never ends? Is he angry at the Mood? Is the Mood his own anger, or his sense of wonder, taken flight and warped by the rust of this place, but the absence of light, or by the cruel wind that takes stories from people and tears them apart?

He walks, and the walk has no end, but he does not care, for his anger sustains him, as it sustains the walk itself. Was there a beginning? Was there rust when he started?