Creative Writing

Flash Fiction Completed; Initiate Summer Novel Outline

/ Justin Turpen / Leave a comment

While I am still working on editing and revising Adrift with the feedback from my writing group, I didn’t want to stop creating something new so I decided to write a piece of flash fiction. 500 words later I have a completed my first piece of flash fiction – working title Death of a Wizard (I’m not in love with this title).

I think one of the greatest benefits of writing shorter pieces of writing is the sense of accomplishment. I’ve spent years trying to write one novel and then the next, never really getting to that finish line with any of them. Now that I’ve got two short stories and a flash fiction under my belt I feel like less of an imposter – something I’ve heard many writers struggle with.

Additionally I think there are many lessons to be learned from writing shorter fiction that can be applied to longer forms. Characterization, fore-shadowing, descriptions, and etc. all need to be so precise to keep the word count low. You’ve got to milk every sentence for what it’s worth.

Moving forward I’ve got two projects that I’m going to juggle. In addition to editing and revising Adrift I’ve started the outline for a novel I plan to start writing some time in the summer. I want to give myself plenty of time to plan out and consider the story before I start writing. Which leads me to a few questions for you writers out there.

What works for you in your planning for a novel? What has helped you finish?

Thanks for reading!

Adrift 2nd Draft Completed! What’s next?

/ Justin Turpen / Leave a comment

Wordcount: 15k

Man it feels good to finish off a draft! I am far more pleased with this ending and am excited for my writing group to get their hands on it. I’ll do one round of edits before they see it – I mostly look for grammar, clarity, and word choice.

Assessing the manuscript as it is now, I don’t think I’ll need to write another draft. I can uplift it through a round of revision based on the feedback I get from my writing group. After, I’m going to send it off to some beta readers. I’ve not had many people outside my writing group weigh in on my recent projects so it’ll be good to get impressions from readers who aren’t writers and who have fresh eyes.

A note on receiving feedback. My approach is always to let the reviewer have an open mic. Let them tell me their impressions, their issues, and their suggestions before weighing in. It can be difficult not to interject, explain, or defend what I’ve written – and I’m not perfect at it – but I think it is vital to get an uninfluenced take from the reader as is possible.

What am I going to do while my alpha (my writing group) and beta readers are reading my story? Well starting my next project of course! I’m hoping to produce a short story, I’ve settled on a structure I want to use and have some ideas on what I want to do with it. No working name, no details yet, but definitely more to come on the short story in the future.

A huge thank you to all of you who’ve been keeping up with me on these projects. It helps keep me motivated knowing that you’re interested in the work I’m doing. Writing is a solitary pursuit but the product is to be shared, to be enjoyed and discussed by a community. Thank you all for being a part of it.

Are you a writer? How do you approach feedback on your works?

Thanks for reading!

Adrift Update #1

/ Justin Turpen / Leave a comment

Second Draft Word Count: 3199

My favorite part of writing this second draft is having the opportunity to expand and polish the world my characters live in. The simple way of putting it is that I get to retreat into my mind and try to describe the imaginary world I’ve made for myself. It’s so much fun.

I plan to include a few more characters. A father and a sister.

In the first draft I felt that the protagonist, Sara Emoc, needed a stronger reason for following through on her role in the plot. She had originally been motivated by “just wanting to do the right thing”. It didn’t match up with the stakes of the story. I plan to combine her motivation of wanting to do the right thing with also wanting to honor her Father.

I also felt that the first draft lacked conflict at certain times. The conflict that Sara faced in the first draft was mostly exterior and I wanted to give her more to chew on emotionally. Especially in the earlier part of the story – enter the Sister. The late parts of the story are a bit of whirlwind. I’m eager to rewrite them and expand on the climax and ending.

A crazy idea I’ve been playing with would also change the story drastically. I’m considering adding a second protagonist whose story would run parallel to Sara’s and intersect somewhere in the rising action. This would be a major change. I’ve gone back and forth on wanting to include it in this second draft. The main consequence would be doubling the word count. This would take me out of qualification for the competition I was planning to join. Choices.

That’s it for this first update. If you have any suggestions for what you’d like to know about, feel free to chime in on the comments.

Thanks for reading.