Strangely, when I mentioned bird flu on here the other day, my journal got linked to on several bird flu blog-watching sites, which amuses me deeply. Let’s see if it works again!

Papillon is at 72,000 words. I think the current part is very strong dramatically, but it has almost no jokes. I’ve found that one of the hardest things to do as a writer, after one has mastered crafting compelling plots and complex characters, of course, is maintaining tone. This is especially difficult over the course of an entire novel. Tone, you see, is a product of many things: my precise mood when sitting down to write, my caffeine level, whatever music may be playing nearby, the weather, etc. It is less frequently a product of intention. “Papillon” is particularly difficult in regards to tone. I want it to be fundamentally serious, if absurd, but not funny-absurd, but sprinkled with many hilarious jokes that amuse and inspire laughter but don’t detract from the impact of the drama. This tone is a knife edge!

Some good examples are the television shows “Deadwood” and “The Wire”. Each features uncompromising verisimilitude in acting, direction, and dialogue; the quality of those elements makes for wrenching, highly effective drama. Yet each show is frequently side-splittingly hilarious. It is a mark of incredible skill that they can have a foot in comedy and drama without falling into the respective pit-traps of farce or maudlinism. The two elements complement each other exceedingly well. Comedy relieves the tension of drama, and drama keeps the characters relevant and interesting. Leavening comedy with drama means not letting your jokes get the better of your characters, cannibalizing them for laughs - see the past ten years of “The Simpsons.”

(”Farscape,” that sweetest of shows, is not a good example of the balance I’m talking about; it falls into farce and camp, and leaps the fence again, with the greatest aplomb, and it always works. As far as I know, it is unique in this respect. The works of Joss Whedon are a better example.)

Why is this approach so effective? Because it most resembles life, methinks. Life is alternately difficult and joyous. We laugh and cry; works that evoke both reactions fire all our emotional cylinders. I keep going to television shows - something like “Heroes” leans too far to the drama camp, and, when watching it, the absurdity of so many straight lines in a row, with no one cracking a joke, simply strikes you as unrealistic. This quickly devolves to tedium (an unfortunate victim of lowest common denominator scripting). Purely comical works, though, become amusing nothings; enjoyable whilst consuming them, but forgotten within days or hours.

“The Office” strikes the sublime balance of which I speak; a comedy that doesn’t forget its characters.

The works of Sinclair Lewis often do this. What else? Glancing at my bookshelf: Eco, Philip Jose Farmer, Heinlein, Terry Pratchett (sometimes), George MacDonald Fraser, Balzac, Roald Dahl, Steinbeck.

I’m not saying that this is essential to producing great works. Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Melville, Hemingway are not known for their ability to make jokes. I am saying that great works can be produced this way.

What say you, dear reader?

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Papillon is at 67,500 words - right at quota! It’s been so long since I could say that. On Friday, I’ll break 70,00. That Herodotus quote really did the trick.

I’m reading “The Great Mortality”, by John Kelly, about the Black Death epidemic of the 14th century. It’s incredible. The devastation wreaked by the plague is hard to imagine; twenty-five million dead in Europe alone, and another fifty million in China. I don’t really have any way to describe it.

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It’s been three days! Oh, no!

Papillon is at 65,000 words. I’m about a thousand behind. Last weekend was crappy for writing, and it looks like tomorrow I’ll have some extra school botheration that may slow me down. I should at least make quota, though I won’t close the gap any.
65,000! Wow! I’ve got the rest of the novel plotted out. I even have three more chapter titles for you.

VI. Justice
VII. Arabia in Perfumed Splendor
VIII. The Reign of Vermin

And then there will be two more chapters, and then the end!
I came across this quote of Herodotus the other day:
“Some men give up their designs when they have almost reached the goal; While others, on the contrary, obtain a victory by exerting, at the last moment, more vigorous efforts than ever before.”
And I thought, damn, that’s just what happened with my last novel. And I realized that I was slacking on my current novel, and resolved to exert more vigorous efforts than ever before!

I plan on expanding the chapter “Wondrous Light and Color” by at least 5,000 more words. Then I can’t imagine writing “Reign of Vermin” and the final chapters in less than 40,000, which means that my novel might come out at around 120,000, which is 20,000 more than I originally intended. I intend on eliminating the easy and stupid jokes on the rewrite, so that should trim out 15,000 easily.

Enough about that! What else is going on? Well, I’m thinking of becoming a fan of They Might Be Giants. Opinions?

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If you click the link to “Publications” on the right, it’ll take you to a “complete” list of my published works! Except for the ones I have forgotten or that have vanished. Many are available online, so you can read them right now!

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Today saw the creation of an excoriating monologue. Who was the object of this monologue, you ask? God. He gets a stern comeuppance! Presumably He recovers.

Tomorrow: pirates! And the return of two fun characters, including the always colorful Captain Septimus Petit.

My first impulse was to hyphenate “always colorful”. Why? “Always” is an adverb. Since when do we hyphenate adverbs and adjectives? The same impulse gives us “well-known” instead of “well known” or “well-liked” or any of these other abominations, become acceptable by “merit” of usage. Bah. Bah. Prescriptivists unite!

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Slow but sure. 57,100 words. I had to skip over a portion because I don’t yet have the books I need. It’s weird. I’ve never done that before. I always write novels linearly, starting with chapter one and finishing with chapter (whatever). I never skip around. But this time I didn’t have a choice. Material on cathedral symbology is hard to come by on the internet, and it’ll be ten days before my books arrive in the mail. Sigh. By then, Papillon will be in Egypt or something, far away from any cathedrals. And I’ll have to rewind my brain.

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I have five chapter titles so far. There will be perhaps eight or nine in all. What do you think?

I. Papillon
II. The Grand Whore
III. Chivalry
IV. Rat Kings
V. Wondrous Light and Color

I like ‘em.

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Yes. After writing this damn novel for six weeks or more, I’ve realized I’ve been spelling the title wrong. The French word is “Papillon,” not “Papillion”. Now let us never speak of this again.

This weekend was miserable for writing. Saturday we were traveling and Sunday I suffered in the grip of a cataclysmic hangover. Yes, cataclysmic. My world was ending.

So today I called in sick and wrote 3,000 words in one sitting, bringing me up to 52,000. According to quota, I ought to be at 54,000. No matter! I’ll catch up - tomorrow!

In the meantime, I’ve finally finished reading “The Wind-up Bird Chronicle,” by Haruki Murakami. Frustrated. Confused. Then today I saw that a friend had put this in his gmail profile: “Murakami: empty boxes, blowjobs, spaghetti, empty people, ambivalence, baseball, david lynch”. I agree completely. Some parts of the novel were incredible. Some were obscure to the point of nonsense. Much of the novel takes place in a squishy dreamlike state where actions and spatial relations have no meaning. It is five metric tons of information, and not an ounce of comprehension.

Now reading: “The Hunchback of Notre Dame.” While writing “Papillon”, I kept staring at my bookshelf, thinking, “I wish I had more fiction set in medieval Paris,” my eyes skipping over this volume each time, never realizing that it fit exactly. Then my mother emailed me: “Why don’t you read… ?”

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Papillion: 48,000!

I bet you want to talk about something else now.
Flash fiction, then!
I think my initial problem with “flash fiction” was the nomenclature. It gave me the idea of writing stories in an impromptu fashion, with no preparation and no polishing. Why would you do that? Why would we have markets specifically for that?
(Of course, I later identified this as a misconception.)
I was fine with simply writing very short stories, though I preferred to call them “short-shorts”. This also makes one think of Daisy Dukes, which are sexy and fashionable, as well as the timeless pop song regarding the wearing of short-shorts, and the participants in this activity. More importantly, it gives the impression that so-called “flash” pieces are just very short stories, given the same thought and meticulousness as any other work, regardless of their length.
More troubling, though, was the existence of “flash authors”. You sometimes encounter them on the Internet. They are difficult to recognize in real life. I wondered, what sort of author would work solely on stories under a thousand words? What kind of madman limits his artistic growth so?
Answer: I don’t know, but I don’t really think of it that much.
Now I have come to value “flash fiction,” though I still prefer my term of “short-shorts”. “Flash fiction,” or simply “flash,” as it’s known on the streets, is edifying as a writing exercise. Furthermore, story ideas too gimmicky or half-baked to work as a long piece can be quite successful in five-minute form. The brevity of “flash” is also very convenient to a modern audience with the attention span of a rabid African white-toothed shrew. Every Day Fiction knows this, and succeeds accordingly. And amazingly.
All this is to say that I can’t wait to start posting my weekly short-shorts on the website. Katie McCullough is putting together some grand art for them. You’ll love them.
But let’s not call them “flash”.

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Today I summoned the above-mentioned powers and plowed through my quota. After a thousand-word shortfall yesterday, I had a bit of doing before me! And I did it!

So now it’s at 46,500 words. 48,000 tomorrow. 51,000 on Saturday. Wow!

Today I wrote two sentences of which I am very proud:

“Her bony hips were as inviting as the pincers of a giant crab.”

“Rats surfaced and dove among the corpses like fish playing in the surf.”

Today’s installment also features an appearance by the Wandering Jew.

In other news, many of my Talented Friends are endeavoring to write a story every day for the next two weeks. What an undertaking! I wish I could join, and would, if not for this novel. But encouragement is due them. Join your plaudits with mine!

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Papillion hit 43,500 today. I’ll be past 50,000 by the end of the week - “halfway” is what we call that!

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I encourage you to go here and vote for “Philosopher Quinn”, by me! We can’t let me not win!

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“Homunculus” is a word I can never spell right on the first try.

“Pseudopod” is the plural of “pseudopod”. Who knew?

(Edit: Unless you use the longer form of “pseudopodium”; then you can have “pseudopodia”.)

To give you an idea of what sort of novel I’m writing, I wrote this sentence in my notes today:
“Adjust homunculus timeline to allow for dragon slaying.”

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Talented Friend Erin Kinch has sold her piece “The Dragon Thief” to Static Movement; it’s online now! This zine, you may recall, is renowned for its excellent taste.

Papillion’s at 37,500 words; I have a three-day weekend, so I don’t see why it couldn’t hit 90k by Monday!
Just kidding. I’m shooting for 42,000.

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Work on the novel continues apace - etc. Up to 36,000 words, which means I’m back on schedule. Like a champ!

Papillion has become squire to the great Sir Figaro, and they’ve gone to the annual tournament in the Bois D’Ouest. There he meets an old enemy and participates in a general melee, winning much honor for Volumnia, his lady love.

I’ve actually written the chapter after this scene, where Figaro and Papillion fight the dragon that’s been terrorizing France. After I finished that passage, I decided to insert the tournament, to give Papillion a glimpse of the finer side of chivalric life, before plunging him into a holocaust of horror. Again.

The dragon lairs near the alpine city of Channecy, which the astute French geographer may note does not exist. My book may therefore draw some criticisms for inaccuracy. I would also submit that the book contains a dragon.

In other news, Talented Friend Erin Kinch has gained acceptance at the august journal “A Thousand Faces” for her piece, “Bridge Club,” just like I knew she would. It’s a solid piece and perfect for the market, which is renowned for its exceptional taste.

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Stephanie Scarborough’s “Visions of Hummis-cide” is up at Bewildering Stories! It’s worth the three minutes it’d take you to read it!

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Papillion: 34,000 words. That means I’m only 500 behind. Oh, yes!

I wish I had something more exciting to say. But my head is tired.

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I only had two classes today, and wrote all afternoon, with a concentration forged of hardened nickel-iron-coated diamonds in the hellfires of Hell! I made over 2,700 words, bringing me up to a scant 1,000 behind, and a total of 32,000! That’ll teach you to bet against the Jensotron, world!

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“Papillion” is 2,500 words behind quota! Thanks to the aforementioned botheration and a weekend road trip, I have some serious catching up to do. What’s that? You say it can’t be done? I say this only makes me work harder! There’s a bit of dramatic tension in it now. Can he come from behind? Will the odds overwhelm him? Can he catch up? That’s right. I just fell behind on purpose to make this more exciting for you, the spectator. You’re welcome.

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