Digest: Frost Penny

This week, Dear Writer takes inspiration from coins, goddesses and Robert Frost

MONDAY: The Inspiration

"I have never started a poem yet whose end I knew. Writing a poem is discovering."
—Robert Frost

Sometimes, the scariest thing is knowing you’re going to do something, but having no idea how. For those of us who like to plan and know where we’re going, this week is going to be about getting comfortable with not knowing. It requires that we trust ourselves, our capabilities and our resilience - our ability to deal when things don’t work out the way we’d planned.

Writer, today, tell yourself that you trust in your capability and your resilience, and then open up that work in progress and just write.

TUESDAY: The Fat Orange Cat

When I was first did Nano, I did it with a group of people I’m still friends with. Every night, we’d gather, and write together. That was the Nano that produced my first book, Time Off for Good Behavior.

One day, I didn't know what to write, and someone from the group was talking about her fat orange cat—that’s all I remember about the cat, he was fat and he was orange—and I just randomly put it in the book, a fat orange cat named Toby. When my editor saw the book, she was like, “What is this cat doing here suddenly?” We removed the cat, but I kept the scene, a scene I might not have written if it wasn’t for the cat.

Fat Orange Cat days are the days I give you something random to put into your story, just to get you going.

So, today’s Fat Orange Cat: A coin. It can be a rare coin, or a common penny. Maybe your character thinks pennies are useless; maybe it relates to something or someone else that character thinks is useless. Maybe it’s a rare coin, or a challenge coin. A magic coin? Maybe it’s bitcoin. Whatever. Work a coin into your WIP.

WEDNESDAY: The Trope

Mother, Maiden and Crone.

I’ve been reading Neil Gaiman’s The Sandman for my podcast, Endless, and in one of the early issues, there was a lot of play with the triple goddess, the three furies, the graces. Called by a lot of names—all of which are better than “crone”—these three women carry the wisdom and knowledge that comes from looking at life from three angles; the young, the mid-life and the… let’s call it… experienced.

I’ve always enjoyed the three goddesses, and had some fun working with these three stages of life in Dogs and Goddesses, which I wrote with Jennifer Crusie and Anne Stuart. I like the idea of looking at the world from multiple perspectives, which makes this archetype fun because it has a great deal of versatility.

And while this trope is highly feminine-coded, because wisdom is often coded feminine, that doesn’t mean you can’t do this with masculine-of-center or non-binary characters. What if you did a gender spectrum set of furies, one masculine-of-center, one non-binary, and one feminine-of-center?

Lots of potential in this one.

THURSDAY: The Q&A

Thursday is Q&A day, but since I just announced it and you haven’t had a chance to send me any questions, I’m going to answer the most common question I get about writing.

How do I start?

This newsletter is really designed to get us started. Because it’s not just about the first line of the whole thing… it was the best of times, it was the worst of times… but about starting every time. You start by trusting in yourself. You start by using a random prompt or idea as something you’re going to incorporate. You start by opening your work in progress on a regular schedule and sitting with it, even if you don’t write anything.

That energy required to start is honestly the hardest part of writing. And that’s what this newsletter is designed to help you do.

FRIDAY: The Practical

One thing that a lot of people don’t realize is that reality shows often have constructed narrative baked right in. I mean, “18 people, 1 Survivor!” speaks right to the mutually exclusive conflict; everyone wants the same thing, only one person can have it. Conflict. And conflict is the starter seed packet of narrative.

I’m watching a reality show right now called “Clarkson’s Farm.” I never watched “Top Gear,” but Ian has, which is why he received the recommendation from Amazon to watch it. The first thing Ian did was warn me that Jeremy Clarkson is a complete ass, and… yeah. Except that he’s brilliantly built up the first internal conflict-driven reality TV show, which I find to be, pardon my language, fucking brilliant. Jeremy is a guy who wants to farm his land himself, but his own arrogance and ignorance constantly trip him up.

There’s an argument to be made whether Jeremy really is as arrogant and dumb as he pretends to be. Unlike most other reality stars who get caught out by the camera being assholes while pretending to be good people, Jeremy gets caught being good while pretending, I think, to be an asshole. That’s how he builds in the internal conflict; he indulges his worst inclinations while at the same time, trying really hard to take on and succeed at the challenge he’s set himself to.

Aside from that, it’s classic comfort viewing. I’m happier whenever I turn it on, and I’ve watched it a few times now.