lrcutter

I need to remind myself, from time to time, just how much walking is a part of my process.

There have been novels when I’ve gone for regular walks, because it was only during those walks that I could plot out the next scene/chapter/point what have you.

The ideas for this novel have been coming along pretty regularly, so much so that it’s only now that I need the reminder that, when the ideas start to slow down, I need to go for a walk.

Though I’d been poking at the novel all morning and for part of the afternoon on Monday, I still didn’t have a clue about what the next scene was. So I finally took myself for a walk.

By the time I hit the second block, I knew what the first scene was.

By the end of the walk, I knew what the rest of the backstory was, in very general terms. (This novel is told in the same style as Paper Mage, in that there’s a front story that’s happening in current time, as well as a backstory, that’s happening in the past, that’s the character’s time at Raven’s Hall.)

Today, after my walk, I figured out in general where the front story is going as well.

I know that other writers have this process, that creative thought comes with movement. I just wish I’d remembered it sooner, in this case, about a week ago, that this is a great tool to bring out when I’m puzzling things out.

Maybe next novel, eh?

scalzifeed

http://whatever.scalzi.com/2012/05/29/redshirts-contest-winners-reviews-and-so-on-and-such/

http://whatever.scalzi.com/?p=18728

To quickly catch up on a number of things relating to Redshirts:

1. Congratulations to Troy Zimmerman, the winner of the Redshirts fan art contest, with the very amusing picture you see above (click on it for a larger view). Closely behind Troy was Desiree Kern in second place, followed by Natalie Metzger, Nathaniel Payne and Elizabeth Porter. Troy wins $250, Desiree $100, Natalie $50, and every one of the finalists gets an ARC of Redshirts. Thanks again to everyone who entered, and who voted.

2. We also have two more ARC winners, from the contest I ran to celebrate the return of my missing computer (and other stuff). The times chosen for the giveaway were 2:39pm (and Val was the first entrant for that particular time) and 7:19pm (alsohuey, at 7:20pm, was the closest to that time). So congratulations to the two of them! Now all they have to do is e-mail me their mailing addresses from the same e-mail address they used to post their comments, and we’ll be all set.

3. I have two reviews to highlight at the moment, one from this morning and the other from a few days ago. This morning’s is from Wired’s GeekDad, and it’s positive:

It’s a brilliantly funny book with an unexpected amount of emotional heft, and I liked it an awful lot.

w00t! From a couple of days ago, there’s this also this one from io9.com, which is also positive (it contains very mild spoilers, which it notes, for which I am grateful):

Scalzi takes some of his trademark smart, quippy characters and puts them into a Trekkian reality in which they’re forced to make sense of their existence. It’s one part Rosenkrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, one part “Below Decks,” and one part geeky nitpicking about the bad science in science fiction television. With a dash of Cabin in the Woods.

w00t again!

Lest anyone think the reviews have been uniformly positive, floating out there at the moment is a negative review from Kirkus Reviews, of which the best it can say of the book is that it is “vaguely amusing in a sophomoric sort of way.” Yes, well. Can’t win them all. I’m not linking to the review because, among other things, it contains a massive spoiler. I will note that I do see a correlation between the reviews that don’t like the book and a willingness to spoil the book without warning the reader of the review. I’m not entirely sure what the correlation indicates, but I do find it interesting.

4. Neither a review nor a contest, but something that makes me happy nonetheless, this ad for Redshirts, which is running in the New Yorker magazine this week. The color version of the ad is in the digital version; there’s a black and white version for the print edition. Either way: Hey, my book’s being advertised in the New Yorker. I can’t complain about that.

5. Finally, I hope you’ve all by now listened to Jonathan Coulton’s new song “Redshirt,” which I commissioned from him as the theme song to Redshirts. I’ll also say that if you linked into the Tor.com discussion of the song and noticed the video of my ukulele cover of the song, you should keep watching the video after the song is done. Why? Let’s just say there’s a Marvel superhero movie-like bit at the end. More I will not say.