The OFFICIAL Unofficial Achewood Message Board
Trivial Pursuits => Arts & Entertainment => Topic started by: littlefallsmets on October 25, 2007, 05:17:26 am
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As I have mentioned, I finally started an attempt at a full novel.
I'm around 50 pages into the first draft... which is amazing to me, actually.
It's kind of about mourning the spent potential of the American experiment, it's kind of about time travel, it's kind of about not knowing how to let go of your grief, it's kind of about John Lennon, it's kind of about my three main male role models... my dad the put-upon factory worker, my cousin who was murdered at the age of nineteen and my uncle who slipped into schizophrenia in his early twenties and lives mostly like a spirit. The father, the son and the holy ghost.
It's kind of about all the things we lost and gained between Altamont and 9-11.
Basically, I have batting around a lot of titles.
It started out as:
"Just Like Starting Over" but no one liked it.
"The Things We Tell Ourselves At Night" is evocative but too wordy.
"The Faith of My Father" is perfect but misleading, as that sounds like a religious self-help book.
"The Dream is Over" works but is really really obvious.
Any of those titlles really ring true?
Any other suggestions?
I'm far enough along where having at least the first draft of a title would help a dude.
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wwwwweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeoooooooooooooooooo ooooooowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwssssssssssssss sssssshhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhxxxxxxxxxxxx xx...Little feedback for ya.
Sorry, couldn't resist.
Well, without having read it, I'd have to say I vote for "The Things We Tell Ourselves At Night." I'm a sucker for those evocative titles, man. But I guess it'll come down to what you want in the end.
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based on which one I would pick up based on the title if I saw it on a shelf... probably The Faith of my Father.
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Well, without having read it, I'd have to say I vote for "The Things We Tell Ourselves At Night." I'm a sucker for those evocative titles, man. But I guess it'll come down to what you want in the end.
He's made it abundantly clear he doesn't want it in the end.
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I have to be straight up honest with you, if I saw those names on the shelf I'd assume the book was a complete wank-fest and would thus miss out on what (from your summary) sounds like an interesting read. I like the faith angle since it can play on personal, symbolic and national levels (faith in the country/faith of the country) but agree that "Faith of my Father" doesn't sound so great.
If the time travel is prominent and sciencey I'd call it 'The American Experiment' but I fear that would marginalize the bits more related to your personal history.
I would also think a title isn't that important that you should fuss too much over it, find a line of dialogue in the book you like and just use that.
Any chance of us getting some proof-reading action in?
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Don't forget to try this! It's maybe not actually useful but it's fun.
http://www.lulu.com/titlescorer/index.php (http://www.lulu.com/titlescorer/index.php)
What's wrong with "Just like starting over"?
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What's wrong with "Just like starting over"?
Isn't that a cheesy George Harrison song?
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from what ive learned about writing, the title is the last thing you write. By that point that choice is obvious.
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Well, John McCain has a recent book called Faith of My Fathers, so that's out.
I agree that none of the titles really do it for me--I suggest picking short line or phrase from the book.
How about Father, Son, American Ghost.
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from what ive learned about writing, the title is the last thing you write. By that point that choice is obvious.
I only wish that were true. Lucky people that you heard that from, I guess.
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if you're looking for a Lennon-y title, how about "Nobody Told Me"?
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Hmmm. You guys and ladies have been helpful on this one, I seriously apprecilate it. I think my best course of action would be to keep "The Things We Tell Ourselves At Night" as the working title and then hope that something more dead-on pops up somewhere near the end.
As I get closer to the end of the first draft, I may well ask proof-reading of some of y'all. I would definitely apprecilate that as well (I once heard Popeye say "apprecilate" instead of "appreciate" and it just stuck with me) but it'd be kinda premature when I'm not even a quarter of the way into the beast, yet, y'know?
Right now, my only proofreaders are my dad and... the best prose writer I've ever real-world met, my good friend from high school Amanda who I mooned over for years and have finally been able to recoup a normal friendship with now that I have basically found my lifemate in my Adrian.
It says volumes about me, I suppose, that I could only re-coup my friendship with a girl I once had a Major Thing for when in a very committed relationship.
I suppose it says volumes about Los Angeles that I have been working around the entertainment industry for four years and the best prose writer I have ever met is from upstate New York and is working in a children's clothing store in San Francisco and has never been professionally published at the age of twenty-nine.
"The Things We Tell Ourselves At Night" is... of course... a variation on the Lennon song where he asks McCartney how he can sleep at night.
"(Just Like) Starting Over" was a Lennon solo song, too.
"Life Begins At Forty" is another Lennon solo song but that's just so cliche and it doesn't sound like science-fiction at all.
Sounds like something that my mom would buy at Starbucks by the Tuesday with Morrie guy.
That's basically my goal, here.
I want something that applies to what I'm writing without sounding like something you'd buy in Starbucks.
Y'all are helping, though, and I do apprecilate it. Any more ideas, I'm open to them.
You are rad ladies and dudes.
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has never been professionally published at the age of twenty-nine.
You say this like this is a tragically ripe old age.
Ah, youth.
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After the Explosion, Before the Collapse
(sorry, I have 9-11 themed titles stuck in my head)
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No no no, that's not how I meant it.
What I meant is that she has basically never even tried yet.
She's the most naturally gifted writer, of any kind, I've ever met in my life... she can do what so many have to take ten drafts to do, just automatically typing, and she basically hasn't even tried anything full-effort.
There is a difference between "still fighting the fight" at twenty-nine and "ah, still haven't even fully tried yet" at twenty-nine.
Y'know? Does that make more sense?
EDIT:
Oh, also, I've considered just ripping off Neil Young and calling it "After The Gold Rush" even though Neil Young isn't a character.
He's just one of the two people quoted in the introductory page. Him and James Joyce.
"History is a nightmare I'm trying to wake up from." - James Joyce
"Hey hey, hi hi. Rock and roll will never die." - Neil Young.
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No no no, that's not how I meant it.
What I meant is that she has basically never even tried yet.
She's the most naturally gifted writer, of any kind, I've ever met in my life... she can do what so many have to take ten drafts to do, just automatically typing, and she basically hasn't even tried anything full-effort.
There is a difference between "still fighting the fight" at twenty-nine and "ah, still haven't even fully tried yet" at twenty-nine.
Y'know? Does that make more sense?
Still, she's twenty-nine.
Writing is not Olympic figure skating - you don't have to do it young or else never get a chance. And maybe there's something to be said for life experience.
I am sure that someone out there has a website that lists all the writers that didn't even start till they were way old, like forty or whatever. I will look this up later when I am trying to avoid work.
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Well, just so you know, I don't apply this standard selgiraffely. I basically considered myself a failure for not being a professional fiction writer at the age of twenty-three.
If I have high expectations of others, I have impossible expectations of myself.
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But LFM, those aren't even good expectations. There's nothing that annoys me more than a 20 year old novelist. Go out and learn something about life before presuming you know enough to make something up about it, you know?
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I once got in an argument with a guy saying the Tuesdays With Morrie guy is good. He is not. It is just sympathetic bullshit.
Sorry, just had to get that out.
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Even though Tuesdays with Morrie could have been written by a chimpanzee, doesn't mean it can't touch people. Just because something is tripe doesn't mean it can't have an effect.
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A chimpanzee can touch people. Figuratively and literally. Especially literally. When they are killing you.
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I think that they usually just throw shit instead.
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Oh, my standards are slowly normalizing, womb@.
The most important thing in my life in Los Angeles, the piece of information that has made my time in Hollywood vitally useful to me, no matter what else I do in this life, no matter where else I go is that...
If you're rich and/or famous too young, no matter how good the one or two creative endeavours you had in you to get you there... that's where you'll peak. That's where you'll stop. That's where you'll start either doing the same thing over and over and over again or else burn out completely.
The moment you become rich and/or famous is the moment where you stop creatively growing in all the ways that matter, okay?
Because suddenly you're not a normal person anymore, you're not a real person anymore, you live outside of all the things that make the other 5,999,000 of us tick and function and laugh and cry and dream.
You're cut off from all those things. All you've got to say about the Real Human Experience is whatever you built up in your system before you graduated into godhood. Even if you're still a good person, even if you try hard not to be, you're suddenly isolated from the really real world and you have to be... or else you'd be beset upon by beggars until your death.
So if you're 23 and you're suddenly a Star... you won't have lived much real life and you'll probably only have one or two fresh ideas about the real world of living.
After that, you'll either have to write variations on those stories over and over again or... write about being rich and famous and really only have useful things to say to the million or less gods and monsters that walk the Earth amoungst us.
And you know what?
Most of those people aren't looking for outside advice anymore.
So you probably won't sell anymore tickets or books or CDs or whatever creating for those people.
This is what Hollywood'll teach you pretty quickly. And I am thankful for that.
The longer that I thrash and struggle and languish and go mad, the more I'll be building up actual things to say and write about, in case I ever win that fuckin' lottery, literally or figuratively.
But with my friend, all that I'm saying is...
She's such a good writer and she hasn't even TRIED to like... send some poems to a journal or even anything like that. She won't even play her music out in public, despite being a brilliant lyric writer, a beautiful singer, a decent tunewriter and a decent guitarist.
I'm not saying you have to be a success by that point but...
There's something unnerving about not even trying, especially when it's not like... oh, y'know... she's also great at something else that she loves and that's been her vocation for thus far for whatever. She's an amazing writer and a really good singer and those are the only things she's good at that she also enjoys.
I dunno.
It's one thing where, like, my girlfriend for example. She's a brilliant costumer but she hates the business that comes along with costuming, the industry and the backstabbing and all that... so she's a teacher, which she's also very good at and enjoys doing more.
Or my brother who's a brilliant guitarist but he's also a brilliant laboratory scientist and... being a laboratory scientist doesn't involve the kind of travel that he hates so... that's what he does.
These are fine things. These are reasonable choices.
But I, for one, know that the only thing I've ever been good at is making up crazy shit and putting it into words. This is pretty much all I know how to do.
And I've been trying to figure out how to make my living doing it for a good five years now.
I dunno.
I'm rambling now.
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"FREE LESBIAN BUKAKKEE CELEBRITY SEX 9/11 INSIDE JOB PRINCESS DIANA"
All leading the reader into a story about princess diana in a lesbian love affair with Barbara Bush while they plan 9/11... for free.
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"Normal Men and Magic Bullets"?
"What Happens While You're Making Other Plans"?
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If it's a sci-fi book, I recommend the title "Tron Javolta"
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"Normal Men and Magic Bullets"?
"What Happens While You're Making Other Plans"?
Um, I think these are getting worse.
"After the Gold Rush" is a good title. The only thing is that I was sure it must have been used too many times before, but there's only one fiction book on Amazon by that title right now, and it's a mystery and doesn't look like a serious publisher, so I don't think that guy gets dibs on it.
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Here's the thing:
I really like "The Things We Tell Ourselves At Night" actually.
It really sorta encapsulates the idea. It's just... again... my major training as a writer is as a screenwriter and, secondarily, as a journalist. It goes against everything you learn in those writing disciplines, they're both all about the brevity thing.
Two word titles, at the most. Gotta fit on the marquee, all that.
What it all comes down to is that...
The perfect title for this story is already taken by something far too famous than to duplicate.
"The Once-and-Future King".
So I think part of it is just... writing enough where I can get past the idea that some other asshole took my title a long long time ago. That and the whole brevity thing.
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I really like "The Things We Tell Ourselves At Night" actually.
Ooo, the Lulu titlescorer really hates that one. More than anything else I've ever tried. I don't know why, but maybe it is the length.
Could you use The Once And Future (Someothernoun)?
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Maybe I oughta parse through the lyrics to Pink Floyd's "Wish You Were Here"...
There's a lot of that idea to this story.
did they get you to trade
your heroes for ghosts
hot ashes for trees
hot earth for the cool breeze
would you exchange
a walk-on part in the war
for a lead role in the cage?
That sorta thing. Hm.
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Jesus Christ, you have spent too much time here. Stop thinking everything has to conform to screenplayability.
It sounds like you're calling it "The Things We Tell Ourselves At Night," and that's a fine thing. If you think it's too long, lose the first word. That's about it.
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Oh, don't worry too much, Limmo.
I've been hacking into Chapter 8 while I've been chatting here in the other window.
This overthinking is helping, not hurting, I assure you.
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How about Father, Son, American Ghost.
Seconded.
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Oh, don't worry too much, Limmo.
I'm not worried about it, I've got my own novel to think about for November. Nanowrimo!
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I would say go with the one you like.
or, Once and Future King. That is a cool title. You could be all "Invisible Man" with it.
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It sounds like you're calling it "The Things We Tell Ourselves At Night," and that's a fine thing. If you think it's too long, lose the first word. That's about it.
Let's trim it down more.... "We tell ourselves at night."
Or do the same to Pink Floyd: "Heroes for Ghosts."
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Just call it "Night." Elie Wiesel can go suck a dick.
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Funny, I'm watching the World Series and I was JUST thinking to myself:
"James Taylor can go suck a dick."
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On "Father, Son, American Ghost" and marquee possibilities:
I just did an Amazon search on "American Ghosts" and was shocked to see it apparently hasn't been used. If you want two-word snappiness, there you go.
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On "Father, Son, American Ghost" and marquee possibilities:
I just did an Amazon search on "American Ghosts" and was shocked to see it apparently hasn't been used. If you want two-word snappiness, there you go.
I can only hope that Amazon asked, "did you mean 'American Gods'?"
Can you maybe work Oprah's name into your book title? Because that woman can move some literature.
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How about "The Pet Goat"?
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Three Blind Mice.
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The Cat Who Liked Baseball
Not really, geeze.
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"Hey hey, hi hi. Rock and roll will never die." - Neil Young.
It's Hey hey, my my.
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I like American Ghosts.
I'd like once and Future King if there was some Elvis in there.
I also like Normal Men and Magic Bullets, or maybe just Magic Bullets. I think if you are doing a sci fi novel a certain level of cheese is totally acceptable.
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I'm going to derail this thread for a brief rant.
LFM, why are you in the movie business if you're a writer when the movie business has no respect for writers? The last couple weeks, I kept seeing ads for a new movie based on a Dennis Lehane book, part of a well known series, that never mention his name, not once. And then the last couple of days I starting hearing an ad for a movie: "Sleuth, by Kenneth Branagh, adapted by Harold Pinter." How can they use 'by' when that person didn't write it, and how can they just make the original writer totally vanish and give credit to two other people entirely? I had to go read a review to find out for sure that this really was a remake of the Anthony Shaffer play/movie and not just another thing with the same title.
OK, sorry, carry on.
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Mostly?
Because my strongest talents as a writer are at writing dialogue and at writing comedy.
I'd be a humour columnist for a newspaper except that I couldn't go through the ten years of being a normal journalist to get there.
I'd be a playwrite except that... hm... I don't know... live performance is too plastic and varying from night to night. Drives me nuts. At the end of the day, I sort of need one finished product from whatever it is that I wrote, be it a book or a television show or a movie or a comic book or whatever. Something about my disposition, I think.
I'd be a cartoonist except that I'm not much of a visual artist.
I'd be a dirtier version of Weird Al Yankovic except that I can't play any instruments and only sing passingly well.
And when I was in college and realized that I didn't want to be a journalist, the TV-Film department was in the same school of Syracuse University so it seemed like a good idea at the time, you know.
And maybe it's because I'm a writer with self-esteem issues and so the no-respect thing fits my mentality?
I dunno.
"American Ghosts" "American Ghost" "Heroes for Ghosts" "Hot Ashes for Dreams" "Hot Earth for the Cool Breeze" "The Ghosts of America" "Ghosts of the Revolution" "American Tune"... I like this line of thinking but I just fear that it's too on the nose... or is on-the-noseness less of a sin in prose?
"The Report on Project Turtledove" I sort of like... evokes early Vonnegut short-stories, refers to the machine that was used to bridge the gap between alternate Earths, named after one of the masters of parallel universe fiction, Harry Turtledove... but too inside?
And then there are all the names of Neil Young albums that all would sort of work:
"On The Beach" "Living with War" "Harvest"...
Hm.
"Things We Tell Ourselves At Night" does work slightly better without the "The", though, definitely. Thanks to whoever suggested that.
"Things We Tell Ourselves At Night" with the Vonnegutian subtitle "...or... The Faith of My Father" is definitely what I'll continue to use as a working title.
But there is that part of me that loves the brevity thing.
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And maybe it's because I'm a writer with self-esteem issues and so the no-respect thing fits my mentality?
That's a good answer.
Isn't there a movie out right now called something like "Things we lost in the fire"? Someone didn't think that was too long.
I still like my idea of "Heroes for Ghosts." I wish that just once I could think of a title for something of my own that I liked that much, dammit.
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That's a good answer.
Isn't there a movie out right now called something like "Things we lost in the fire"? Someone didn't think that was too long.
The Unbearable Lightness of Being
The Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag
The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber
Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe
And to Think That I Saw it on Mulberry Street
Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil
There are a lot of long titles out there. If Hollywood balks, they'll just trim it down like they did with "Fried Green Tomatoes".
Oh!
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep = Bladerunner
So yeah.
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as of today, the name of my band is "The Loudhailer." I already regret this.
they rejected my suggestion of "Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo"
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"Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo"
This may just be a personal peeve but there seems to much... deliberately calculated quirkiness is the best I can call it, in music today. It's like everyone's looking at Zappa saying 'I want some of that, look how much I don't care that my band name is actually akward to say and our songs are the lyrical equivalent of a toddler with pixie sticks.'
Buffalo9 would be ok though.
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oh, see, I love that shit. so much. I wasn't serious about naming the band that, though. My favorite band names are usually one word.
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"Blue Harvest" would be a great name for a band. Or "Harvest Blue".
Or just Harvest, I suppose.
Like I say, if I ever got a band off the ground, I'd call it Screaming Viking so...
Yeah. Yeah.
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oh, see, I love that shit. so much. I wasn't serious about naming the band that, though. My favorite band names are usually one word.
I liked it up to the point that I just got totally sick of it and just want people to make straight up, honest music. I am turning into Nice Pete is what I am saying I guess.
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I liked it up to the point that I just got totally sick of it and just want people to make straight up, honest music. I am turning into Nice Pete is what I am saying I guess.
Wait, are you saying that Zappa isn't straight up, honest music?
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Zappa was about as honest as they get.
I don't like more self aware quirky stuff.
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Zappa was about as honest as they get.
I don't like more self aware quirky stuff.
OK then.
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Sorry LFM - this is a huge pet peeve of mine: in proper English it's playwright, not playwrite. Wright comes from the archaic English for crafts person or builder. A Playwright crafts the entire world of a play, not just the lines of text spoken. There are important distinctions between something being wrought and something being written that I am keenly aware of when working on a script. I only have Canadian dictionaries and the Oxford on hand, but neither list "playwrite" as a word at all, and everywhere I look on line corrects the spelling to "playwright."
A close second is my hatred of the use of "a lot" as one word instead of the proper two. LFM doesn't do this, but some of you do, and it drives me crazy. Please stop. You don't write "agallon" or "adozen" or "abunch" so please stop writing "alot" - it's not a word.
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This only goes to show how little I've actually considered writing plays.
I don't even know how to spell what I'd be if I did that.
But I learned how to spell "a lot" early and how to spell it often. My dad's a grammar stickler type.
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"How Near or How Far"...?
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"Sex Funeral" would be a great name for your book.
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"Sex Funeral" would be a great name for your book.
Ha! I'm thinking goth erotica. Can'd
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Isn't "goth erotica" one of those contradictions in terms...
Like "jumbo shrimp" or "the Bush Administration's military intelligence" or something?
Call me old-fashioned but ain't nothin' sexy about a zombie or a vampire or a werewolf.
Just gimmie a healthy adult lady in not a lot of clothes, you know?
Bonus points for bein' tall, for having swarthy skin or freckles, for havin' dark hair, for havin' eyes that are somewhere between brown and blue, for not overshavin' her downstairs, for havin' a full bosom and et cetera.
Why do we have to complicate it with people play actin' that they're dark elves? It's so hot already, the lady in not-many-clothes.
I... I wasn't made for now, that's all there is to it. I was either made for the early nineteen-seventies or for five years in the future. I just have to accept this. I wasn't built for a time that is attracted to Paris Hilton, this is just a fact.
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This is all true Lil' but the best people to write genre erotica are those who aren't into it, that way they can stay objective and not get caught up in things. It's your future calling. Will you... will you answer the call?
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Isn't erotica all ABOUT getting caught up in things, though?
Or... I guess I just don't understand erotica.
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I was trying to buy romance novels for my mother tonight (it is a family Christmas Tradition that my dad and I buy her a bunch of them, at least a few lame), and I was really kind of surprised by how many paranormal romances there were. I mean, sure, as a subgenre I can get it, but... does every second book these days have a vampire or a demon in it? This is worse than Highlanders!
(Also, for some reason the bookstore stocked "Mature Manga" next to the romance novels. This led to an extremely strange conversation with my father, as you might expect. "Hey, Amanda, what're you looking at? ... Is that guy supposed to have a tail?" "Uh, I think so? It's Japanese. And, uh, I'm not actually interested in buying it." "Oh.")
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My update for y'all on this subject:
I've kept plugging away at this thing. I'm about 62,000 words in... or 142 pages in the format I'm writing in now... or 18 chapters in now. My rough early outlines said that I was going to end up with 45 chapters if it went as I'd planned at the beginning so... like...
I guess I'm 40% of the way in. So much farther than I ever thought I'd get. The plot points that I considered to originally be the middle of the book, plotwise, looks like I'll start getting to them in the 21st chapter and so... like... yeah. Yeah.
I'm on pace so far and... while there will be, of course, a whole lot of work to do after the first draft and all of that... so far for a first draft, I'm pretty happy. I'm saying the things, telling the story that I've wanted to tell so far.
I just wanted to thank y'all again for the encouragement at the start.
Without it, I might not've had the balls to start. Thank you, thank you.
Also: wombat? My girlfriend likes "heroes for ghosts" too and so she makes the rules, that's the working title now. Your idea has helped me a great deal.
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Good for you, LFM. And glad to have been of service.
In related news, I am now reading a book about writing fiction called "Telling lies for fun and profit" by Lawrence Block. So far it's not very useful but I couldn't pass up the title. (It looks like it gets more useful later - so far it's a bunch of chapters about work habits and persistence which are not really problems that I have. It's highly recommended by Sue Grafton who's very successful in my genre so I figure I should keep on reading.)
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So, LFM, are we gonna be able to read some drafts? I'd really like to take a look at what you've got. When you're ready, of course.
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Most likely, yes. Probably once I have a full rough draft and have been able to take one polishing pass at it, I will be comfortable enough to share it with some of the people here. Of course... if its taken me two months to get 40% of the way into my original plan for the story... I'm a long way off from there.
Interestingly, as I look over what I've done so far and what goals I have left to accomplish, I... once I get the characters to the situation that marks the three-quarters-in mark of my first outline... I kind of don't know how long that last quarter of the book, after that point, could actually be. Could be just two or three ten-page chapters from there.
The first quarter was all set-up for the characters while they were in NYC, the middle half is supposed to be a journey west with three or four definite stops along the way (the characters are now between their first and second stops on that journey) and the last quarter was to be what happens after they get to what they thought was their goal.
So. Like. Maybe the third "act"... the final quarter of the plot might be significantly shorter in terms of pages/words/chapters. I dunno.
If I can get another nine or so chapters into the story by the end of the year, about 60% of the original plan, maybe I'll have a better sense of the endgame by then, y'know.
It's all so interesting. It's so unlike a screenplay where you can bang out a first draft in three weeks that's all that you're up to.
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Sue Grafton
Tangent: Sue Grafton is a native of Louisville. Last time Mrs. West and I went to the funky little furniture consignment store we frequent, they were selling a custom made office set (desk, credenza and so on) of Sue Grafton's.
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I'd really like to read it too, once you are ready of course.
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With two more chapters... "Letters from the Earth" and "Shoeless Joe"... written as first draft, I have 22 chapters written from an original plan of 44 chapters and can say that by some measure I am halfway done with the first draft.
Good Lord, what a thought. Somehow actually halfway there and yet... really? Only halfway there?
I'm sure Bon Jovi could write a song on this topic.
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I'm still writing the first draft but I now have...
Forty chapters written, though three of those aren't typed in, yet.
And I got four more chapters to go.
Pretty much, this thing is either a saleable science-fiction novel or evidence toward my committal.
I'm still calling it "heroes for ghosts" so far and, man, it has become larger in size and in scope than I could ever imagined.
Once I have a polished first draft, I will still definitely look to some of y'all for advice/input when I get to that point, if you are still up for it.
It is turning out a little more paranoid than I thought it would?
But, also, so much more hopeful.
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Once you've gotten it all typed, give yourself a deadline to make the official first draft. I'm finding the hardest thing I ever do is declare something to be ready for feedback -- if I don't have a deadline, I'll keep it forever and completely lose perspective.
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No one can title your novel but you.
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I'd title it "Watching the Wheels" and your Joyce quote is slightly wrong.
It should be: History, Stephen said, is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake.
From Ulysses. Oh, and today is Bloomsday.
So how about that?
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It's all over but the typing, now, the first draft anyway.
I've spent so much time on the road lately that in notebooks was the only way to finish it.
I honestly like "heroes for ghosts" best right now, not because it is someone else's idea but because... it is the heart of the idea, after all.
Did my parents' generation trade their efforts toward a better tomorrow away to raise their children instead, my poor generation of selgiraffe distracted ghosts? Would we be better off with a shattered America that admitted what it was than the playing-card-castle mockery of wholeness that we're living with?
Which is worse, a war in the streets in front of us that can be won and moved on from or an unwinnable war both ten thousand miles away and inside our hearts, everyday, for the entire forseeable future?
Where did this trade happen, inglorious roles in a revolution for comfortable chairs on a blimpride to the end of Western Civilization?
Did it happen with the assassination of a handful of symbols of hope, one after another, or with the slow degradation of ideals and beliefs traded away for cars that don't break down and slots in the good pre-schools?
Did it happen when they killed John and Martin and Malcolm and Bobby and John again... or did it happen with the glacial advantage of a hundred million mortgage payments coming up due every month for thirty years?
How did we get so far past the point of no return?
It is a fitting title for an exploration of such ideas, really.
At least, you know, for now.
When the thing is Actually Actually Done, I might have some entirely other goddamned wild hair up my ass.
But its a motherfuck*ng great working title.
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Is it a thing to acknowledge song authors (http://www.numavox.com/home.htm) when you derive a title in an unrelated medium from their work? I'm not busting your chops, by the way - just wondering.