#it sinks every time i see its a literary agent

[rains-inky-mind]

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Dear...

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[brave-clarice]

“Clarice” Liveblog: Episode 2

Again, some extremely unfashionably late hot takes.

(Special thanks to @kathrynethegreat and @special-agent-pendragon​ for encouraging another liveblog!)

Clarice is working out! And eating junk food! I love it.

and cleaning her gun!

hey, Ardelia is drinking what I’m going to assume is her grandmother’s “smart people tea”.

Krendler disciplining Clarice already is infuriating but appropriate.

“I lost control.” Oh no, I don’t like that. Don’t make Clarice unstable. Her mental and emotional state never had anything to do with her failing career.

getting weird mixed signals from Ardelia. Last week, she obviously didn’t want Clarice to lie/stick to the script Krendler gave her, but now she’s telling Clarice she messed up by not doing so...?

“I better know you if you’re calling this early.” Amen, Ardelia.

I’m in love: this cinematography is straight out of the film (when she’s flying to WV with Crawford)!

“When’s the last time you went back to Appalachia?” “It’s been years.” What??? It has NOT been years--Clarice was JUST in West Virginia last week as well as in Silence, and she arguably attended college there as well. (UVA is at least nestled in the mountains, and you don’t have to drive far outside the Albemarle Valley to hit Appalachia proper.) After all the details about her character they’ve been nailing, they miss this glaring error? 

I like the tiny details she’s noticing (like the guy biting his nails). Not only because she’s an investigator, but because it’s reminiscent of Hannibal’s influence (imo).

Clarice Is Short: The Saga continues

still not getting any creepy vibes off Krendler. He’s going to be much less effective as an antagonist if he isn’t lewd as well as a dick.

I really don’t care for the way the opening “credits” fade out from the death’s-head moth to Clarice’s face. There are MANY animals that represent her, or parts of her, in the books--lions, lambs, horses, and of course birds--so this choice feels empty and lazy to me.

also lazy: having a fellow agent straight-up tell her in episode 2 “you shouldn’t be in the Bureau.” Maybe in two or three years, after some further “Death Angel”-type incidents, I could see this blatant rudeness, but not yet.

“Reesey”? Thanks, I hate it.

this flashback must be of Clarice’s little brother. That answers one question I had last week. That said...Clarice’s brother doesn’t play the same role in her story that Mischa does in Hannibal’s--but this sure feels like a Mischa-esque flashback.

good: they’re finally getting to the source of Clarice’s actual trauma!

bad: this is NOT how Clarice found out about her father. In fact, that whole incident is laid out in detail in the novels, and there’s nothing overly literary/un-cinematic about it, so this feels unnecessary. “The police are here! Something happened to Daddy!” No, bad! Show, don’t tell!

she would’ve known better than to introduce herself to that kid as “Clarice Starling, FBI,” come on now.

were they regularly able to wire tap hair clips in 1993? 

actually, nothing in this show looks very 90s to me so far. I’m sad about it.

so in eighteen months, Ruth Martin has gone from a junior Senator to the Attorney freakin’ General, and now she might run for governor?? At least let her get settled in one position of power first, why don’t you!

yet more Buffalo Bill flashbacks...alas.

are they trying to make this guy another surrogate Hannibal character? He’s commenting on Clarice’s accent and the dryness of her skin, asking about who she “left behind”...it all feels very Hannibal. (I know he’s a Charismatic Cult Leader trope, too--but when played off of Clarice...)

“Ew.” “I hate this guy.” I laughed.

I understand that Clarice probably feels conflicted re: her siblings in the book, but I’m really not digging the flashbacks of this Tim Burton character her brother.

@ the writers: Clarice already has the lamb backstory/symbolism, too. We don’t need this Little Brother stuff.

*shrieking* Mrs. Starling! At the sink washing the blood out of his hat!!! 

...aaand they had to ruin it with the brother’s painfully bad dialogue. Will still be good for gif-making, though.

are we supposed to interpret all these flashbacks as Clarice being incapable of controlling her emotions/state of mind? She keeps losing herself in memories and emerging all doe-eyed and panicky. I don’t like it.

not to be a broken record but...Clarice should be TOUGH. Again, Ardelia only saw her cry once in seven years. But she’s more worked up in this scene than Jodie was in Memphis!

when Mr. Cult Leader shouts “Agent Starling! Agent Starling!” he sounds exactly like Hannibal calling her back to his cell in the asylum. That has to be intentional. 

damn, wish that I could look as good five minutes after I’ve been crying as Clarice does.

I LOVE that Ardelia gets to be the crucial behind-the-scenes book-smart partner to Clarice’s action heroine.

AG Martin’s just playing politics by turning a blind eye to the crooked sheriff. But when her own daughter was just kidnapped and almost killed, she looks like a real hypocrite.

gosh, Rebecca Breeds is great. I already hope she gets nominated for an Emmy.

so Krendler is...doing the right thing???

Clarice’s father was definitely not a sheriff. I hope she’s just exaggerating for dramatic effect. (Maybe this will be clarified later.)

she couldn’t just sit with a manipulative guy without getting emotional, but she’s cool as a cucumber while telling an extended story about her father? HmmMM.

sometimes her mannerisms and facial expressions are so much like Jodie’s that it’s uncanny, like here when she leans forward to confront the Cult Leader.

“She did it.” Damn straight!

another great callback to Silence. this show’s camera crew knows its stuff!

“He’s concerned I have some residual trauma from Bill.” I. Hate. This. Subplot--and all its OOC implications.

“Catherine was close to her father, too.” Ooh, a nice allusion to the novel! Clarice makes note of their “common wound,” the loss of a father, when she’s in Catherine’s apartment in Silence.

she is just SO pretty.

little Clarice looks a LOT like Rebecca Breeds. I hope we see some more of her. 

The Good:

the continuing visual nods to the Silence film via cinematography

Mama Starling!!!

Clarice’s “The World Will Not Be This Way Within the Reach of my Arm” attitude, refusing to leave without helping the victims.

Ardelia Mapp coming in clutch! 

Clarice being, generally, a badass

and using psychological tricks/mind games to pin the antagonist...that’s the woman who disarmed a monster with just a few words.

Rebecca Breed’s acting has been phenomenal so far.

I like Clarice’s haircut a lot better when worn down (though it’s not very practical for fieldwork, so we probably won’t see it much).

The Bad:

the continuing Buffalo Bill-related Trauma Subplot. Ugh.

all the flashbacks to Clarice’s brother (and the not-so-subtle suggestion that her brother is, symbolically, another lamb).

will the real Paul Krendler please come forward? this guy is so TAME.

the other agents’ hostility towards Clarice needs to be toned down slightly so that it can escalate. Otherwise, where’s the tension?

is this actually 1993? I’m not feeling it. Shouldn’t it have a little of that Season 1/2 X-Files aesthetic? Please give me more than once-an-episode references to pagers and fax machines!

that glaring Appalachia continuity error...it’s still bugging me.

I missed the overt Hannibal references, even though they’re not necessary to any part of this episode. A lady can dream!

Overall, I really liked this one despite my various issues with it. It started shakily but built to a great finish. The emphasis across both episodes on Clarice being in the FBI not just to “get out, get anywhere,” but out of a genuine desire to help victims has been wonderful. I just hope they don’t swerve too far into the “too traumatized and emotionally compromised to function” lane. It would be a disservice to Clarice’s character and to her journey (and would smack too much of “Hannibal really did prey on her weak mind/brainwash her”.

Things I’d still like to see: More of her personality. Her hobbies and interests. That she’s cleaning her gun is great! Now let’s see “Poison Oakley” practicing her sharpshooting skills. Or car shopping. Or clothes shopping to show off her “developing taste.” (Ardelia can come!) I’ll take literally anything. Give us more of Clarice’s sense of humor as well. She had some subtle funny moments in the pilot, and it’s nice to see Rebecca smile for a change.

And Krendler? Smear that man in grease! I appreciated a happy ending even though Clarice’s career is, as we know, already in a downward spiral--the last thing we want is for every episode to be a slog, especially when a good chunk of the audience hasn’t read the book and doesn’t know Clarice is doomed to fail in the Bureau.

However... Krendler’s not a “redemption arc” kind of character. Or even a “run-of-the-mill sexist asshole” character. This is a man who spent seven years systematically sabotaging a young woman’s career because a) he was jealous that she solved the Gumb case before him, and b) she wouldn’t fuck him. He was a Justice Department official working fist-in-glove with a serial child molester who was planning some of the heinous vigilante justice imaginable. THAT’S why his very gruesome end at Hannibal’s hands felt deserved--even Clarice thought so! In short, he needs to get nasty.

Anyway, thanks for coming to another long-overdue TedTalk. Fingers crossed that the next one will be more timely (aiming for Sunday night)! 

[lemonjoonah]

Let the Villain Win (M)

Word Count: 5K Rating: M Genre: Thriller, Drama, Author AU Warnings:  Smut scene (Oral m. and f. receiving, Fingering), Yandere Namjoon, Stalking, Drugging, Kidnapping Pairings:  Namjoon x Reader, Mention of Seokjin x Reader 

Summary: Kim Namjoon, famous author and your childhood friend has been keeping a secret from you. His new book treads on such dark themes that he’s finding it difficult to write. Excited by the prospect of a sinister plot you offer him a piece of advice, “Let the villain win…” 

...

You look to the building pile of manuscripts on your desk, curling your lip over the prospect of reading them. You’re sure that some of them will be good, a couple of them might hold your attention, but none of them are the story that you truly want to read, the one that you are waiting for, the one that was due three days ago...

“I’m going to kill him.” You mutter to yourself while taking a sip of tea. Kim Namjoon, one of the finest thriller authors ever to be published, and your best friend since childhood. You have the privilege to represent him as his literary agent, but that comes with its setbacks. Namjoon never seems to take you seriously when you set a deadline. Even now he’s off gallivanting somewhere, refusing to answer his calls or texts until he returns from his ‘creative space’.

You look over to his house across the street for the hundredth time since his departure. Every time you had glanced over the windows remained dark, but now your patience has finally been rewarded with a glow emanating from his curtains. You set down your mug haphazardly and check your phone. Your anger grows when you see that he failed to notify you of his return.   

Forgoing your jacket, you dash across the gap between your dwellings the rain pelting you as you cross the narrow street. You stomp up to his porch, and pound on door as if the wooden barricade is at fault for his actions. “Open the door Kim Namjoon, I know you’re in there!”

You hear his voice call through the door. “I don’t know, my agent taught me not to open to door for any crazed fans.”

“Namjoon, please?” You try to appeal to his softer side. “It’s raining and I don’t have my spare key.”

“I’m coming, I’m coming.” He chuckles as he unlocks the bolt for you to enter. “I’ve only been home twenty minutes. I’m impressed, you must’ve been watching out for me.”  A bright glowing smile greets your look of frustration.

Now being his childhood friend isn’t the only obstacle you’ve encountered in your professional relationship. In addition to his talent as a writer, he is also blessed with devilish good looks. Dark eyes that pierce your heart every time he looks to you, warmly toned skin that calls to your fingers, and lips so full that a simple smirk often drowns the fabric between your legs.

Shaking off those thoughts you try to focus on the your anger towards him,“Where the hell were you?”

“So vulgar,” he chastises you. “I missed you too.” He pulls you into a hug despite your damp clothes, and rubs his cheek against your wet hair.

“Two weeks, two weeks with no contact!” You pull away from from his arms.

“Sorry,” he scratches the back of his head and looks down.“Thanks for covering for me with the publisher.”

“Namjoon it’s not just about the sample, I was worried about you. You’ve never been gone that long before.”

He steps back from the entrance making room for you to come in before closing the door behind you. “I know, I’ve just been having some writers block.” He lowers his head in shame.

“It’s not like that hasn’t happened before, in fact I’ve come to expect it, but usually you’re only gone for a few days! I just wish you would have let me know that you were okay.”

“This time it’s different. The ideas are there I’m just afraid to write them. I wanted to call you but...” He pauses, his fingers trailing around his mouth, as if it might soften the effects of his words.  “I think you’re the reason I can’t write it.”

Your face falls at the thought of being the hitch in his creativity, spurring a further explanation from him. “No please don’t take it like that, it’s just... this story, it’s not like my others. I feel like I’ll be subjecting you to the darkest part of my mind, I don’t want to put you through that.” There’s an exhaustion behind his eyes that you’ve never seen before, after a such a long absence you expected him to be well rested but it looks as if he didn’t sleep a wink.

“I’m not afraid of that big brain of yours,” you lean up to him rubbing his hair playfully. “I’ll take whatever you have to give me.”

“You’re willing to read it? No matter how dark or immoral it gets?”

“Namjoon we’ve been friends for over 15 years now. It’ll take a lot more than a book to scare me away.”  If you’re being honest with yourself you always thought Namjoon would be the one to leave you behind. You don’t have many clients and there are agents with far better connections than yourself, but even after his first bestseller he refused to sign with anyone else. Stating that no one could support him as well as you.

He nods still looking at the floor. “I’m sorry, I should have talked to you about it before running off like that.” A wicked grin suddenly flashes across his face. “I can’t say that I mind seeing how much you missed me though.”  

You scoff, at how quickly he can go from such a vulnerable state to one that completely wrecks you. “I said I was worried not that I miss you!” You tease back with a angry tone. “I have a life beyond you...”

“Pfft, no you don’t.”

“Yes I do! For your information I went on a date last week.” That seems to shut him down in an instant.

“Wait, with who?!”

“Seokjin.”

“Kim Seokjin? The cocky asshole from Smeraldo’s Books marketing team? I thought you said you wouldn’t date people you work with.”

“Confidence is not cockiness! And I don’t work with him directly so there’s no conflict of interest.”

Namjoon clicks his tongue and rolls his eyes, making his distaste known to you. These conversations never go over well with him, he always finds something to criticize about any guys you are seeing, planting a seed of doubt in your mind.  He manages to find that perfect flaw that you’ll fixate on until you ended the relationship. Even now you find yourself starting to question Jin’s vanity.

“And stop changing the subject, I’m the one who had the right to be upset here not you!” Namjoon smiles at you sheepishly, slumping his shoulders in surender. With a sigh you too throw up the white flag.  “Get some sleep okay? It’s getting late, we’ll talk tomorrow. ”

...

The next day you work from home. Diving into the pile of drafts from the comfort of your own bed. This also gives you the chance to keep an eye on the door across the street. Namjoon hasn’t left the house all day. By the time evening rolls around you begin to worry, considering that he had just come back from a two week absence there is no way he has any proper food in the house. You send him a text already knowing the answer.

...Have you eaten?...

...No...

...Jajangmyeon?...

...You know me too well, could you bringing it to my place?...

...Sure, I’ll see you in a few...

When you knock on the door Namjoon calls out instead of answering.

“It’s open.”

You step inside but there’s no sign of him.

“Sorry.” He comes into view with only a towel and water dripping off his frame. “I just realized when you messaged that I hadn't showered.”

“Namjoon, clothes, please!”

“Right...” He gives you a wide dimpled smile while he tousles his damp hair.

Fuck he will be the death of you and your career, you conclude as you sink into his couch. He knows the risks his knows the liabilities but sometime you think he intentionally tries to draw you towards him. From your seat your try to distract yourself by examining his walls looking to spot any new additions to his vast collection.

Namjoons home matches his personality perfectly, from the endearing art figures on his shelves to the brass telescope stationed by the window.  Showcasing his affinity for charmingly cute items but also his sophistication and scholarly pursuits.    

When he finally joins you, he sits down beside you and digs into his noodles. He anxiously starts to discuss the progress of his work. The worry still seems to hover over him regarding you reading the piece. “It’s not like my usual stuff, most of it will be told from the point of view of the villain. He’ll go unnamed for most of the story to have his final reveal at the end.”

“Oh that’s dark, I like it. You can really have fun with this character, there’s no need for you to hold back or try to make the readers like him.”

Namjoon nods in agreement, “It feels more honest too. The character doesn’t feel the need to hide behind a veil, the passions and desires are right out there in the open for readers to see.”

“You always write the hero, I’m excited to see you portray the villain.” As much hope as you give him there is still doubt on his face. “Namjoon, if I’m the problem, I don’t have to take this one on. I can find you another agent for this book I won’t take it personally, I promise.”

“No!” His response is short but loud, causing you to flinch back in surprise. “Sorry, it’s hard for me, but I still want you to be the first person to read it.”

You find his unwavering loyalty endearing, you’ve always been the first to read his stories from when he started writing as a teenager up until now. The twists and turns of his plots never ceasing to amaze you.

“What have you written so far?”

“I’m actually starting with the end, I’ve found it to be more captivating than the beginning.” He smirks as holds on to the secret twist you have yet to see.

“Who wins?” You ask prodding for clues.

“Not too sure yet, that depends on how the story progresses.”

“You should let the villain win this time.”

He chokes on his food for a second. Letting out a loud cough and taking a long sip of water before answering you. “You think so?” He asks cautiously.

“Absolutely, it’ll make for something different, and if we follow him the whole time I’ll find it depressing to see him loose.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” He chuckles at your insight, “Wouldn’t want to upset you now, would I? ”

“Nope.” You slurp up the last of your noodles with the excess of sauce. Making a complete mess of yourself, but you’ve succeeded in bring another laugh to his lips.

“You never change,” Namjoon mutters while wiping your face with his thumb. “God I missed you.” He pauses for a second, letting his hand linger before pulling the digit back to his own mouth and licking it carefully. You find him slowing inching towards you on the couch. “Tell me again why we can’t take this further...” You still while observing his unexpected words and actions.

 He continues to press on his lip while eyeing you up as if you might be the next course.

“Don’t tease me Namjoon.” You chide him, trying to convince yourself that he can’t be serious. You place your bowl on the table giving you a reason to divert your eyes for a moment. Maintaining rational thought while looking upon him is an impossibility, taking even a second away from his eyes helps to build your conviction before looking back to him.

But he continues to tear away at the foundation of your determination.

“Why would I tease you? Teasing implies that I won’t give you what you want, I intend to give you everything.” He carefully brushes the hair from your face, dragging the back of his fingers across your cheek before pulling his hand away.  

“Namjoon we’ve talked about this.”

“Yes, but we never did come to an agreement on it.”

“You know we shouldn’t do this. Working together as friends already poses it’s challenges. Adding sex won’t make it easier.” You are already far too lenient with him in comparison to your other clients, you dread to think what effect consistent intimacy would have on your professional relationship.

“When was the last time you’ve had someone?”

Your mouth falls open at the question. “Excuse me?” It’s been awhile but he doesn’t need to know that.

“You just said we are friends right? You would talk to your friend about sexual exploits, why not me? It might be good for my work, get those creative juices flowing.” The corner of his mouth pulls up followed by a bite to his bottom lip.

“Are you trying to use your writing as an excuse?”

“You think of everything with regards to work. I’m just trying to speak your language.”

You know he doesn’t wish to just talk about it but act on it.

Namjoon’s hand now takes your chin as he leans in even further, close enough for you to feel his breath upon your skin. “How long has it been?” He asks again. His eyes narrow as they search your expression for any clue you might give.

“Too long.” You whisper a blush creeping into your face giving you away as you look down.

“So you and Seokjin...”

“Nothing happened, I was too self conscious around him.”

Namjoon tilts your head to the side and places his lips near your throat, his other hand now resting on your thigh right at the start of the hem of your skirt. A faint growl of pleasure leaves him. “So you need someone you’re comfortable with.” His fingers begin to draw small circles on your thigh. “Someone who you’ve known for a while, someone you feel a connection with.”

“Someone who I don’t work with,” You counter back.

“Very well. I’m terminating our contract for the next hour. We can renegotiate after I’ve met your needs.” His lips finally touch you neck focusing right below your ear the heat flowing from that one spot makes you gasp. “Consider this my pitch.” He smirks whispering into your ear as his hand moves further up your leg. “Would you like to proceed?”

Fuck him and his way with words. Who are you kidding you knew you would cave to any desire of his the second you saw him in a towel. You can have sex just this once and stop it after that right? This isn’t going to be a regular occurrence just a one time thing you promise yourself. Just something to get the tension out of the way.

You finally nod leaning back on his sofa, giving in to him completely, letting his finger press your underwear to the side and then sink inside.

He acts surprised to find you already wet with arousal, “So receptive already? That’s not how you negotiate.”

“As if you didn’t know.”

“Do you dislike my ability to read you?” He mutters between the soft kisses to your throat.

“No I just wish I could do the same.”

“That can be arranged.” He answers back with a smug grin. You gasp as he pushes a second finger between you folds, curling it inside of you until you unleash a louder response to his touch. “Shall I give you an oral rundown of my work?”

Unable to form coherent words you nod again letting him lift up your skirt completely, he takes his fingers out for a moment so he can fully remove your underwear. Namjoon lowers himself so his head is level with you hips as he looks upon your pink entrance. His tongue starts rolling along the length of your slit. He hums with agreement as you raise your legs placing the back of your knees on his shoulders.

As he reaches the crest he gives a flick of the tongue, you buck from the sensation causing him to place a hand on your lower stomach directly between your hips. When you flinch again he presses down to keep you in place, the tug of his hold exposes your clit to him even more. His fingers return to their home inside you and he attaches his mouth to the area surrounding your bud.

You bite your lip to prevent an excess of noise as his lips tug on your knot. Noticing your sudden silence Namjoon stops and looks up to you. “Don’t hold back on me, no one else can hear you I promise.” He gives a sudden thrust of his fingers, the shock forcing you to cry out. “Good girl, let me listen to you.”

His long fingers continue to reach deeper, the pads of his fingers slowly stroking as his mouth returns to suck on your mound, with another flick of the tongue and fingers you dissolve in his grasp. Even as you reach your high he refuses to let go riding each wave of pleasure he sends through you. Only extracting himself when you call out his name in the form of a plea, unable to take the stimulation any longer. He takes his fingers from you bringing them to his mouth while he watches over you.

Awash with the warmth he has brought you your breathing is slow to return to an even pace. He groans as his hand passes over himself. With his eyes still focused on you, he palms what looks to be a painfully large erection beneath his jeans. Licking his lips he looks as though he might go down for another taste of you from the source, clearly not satisfied with what he took from his hands.

You sit up, fixing your skirt before you push Namjoon back into his seat on the couch. Taking up position in front of him, kneeling on the hardwood floor, your hands poise to lower his zipper.

“What are you...” He sputters as you open his jeans carefully. Your finger tracing the long bulge concealed by his boxers. “No I couldn’t ask you to do that.”

“What reciprocate? I know you Namjoon, I know your games. I can hear it now, the next time I remind you of a deadline all I’ll get back is, ‘But remember that time I made you come?’ Besides,” You pry the elastic of his underwear back to reveal the throbbing head.  “I think I’ll enjoy doing this just as much.” Who doesn’t take pleasure in someone falling to pieces in their grasp. Namjoon has always had the upper hand in your friendship, now is your chance to take it back.

He helps you by shifting his pants down so you can expose the rest of him. You cup his sac with letting your middle finger trace along the raphe. Your other hand guiding the tip of him to your mouth. The slight saltiness of precum hits you as your tongue as it brushes the head.

Within seconds Namjoon lets out audible groans from your ministrations. You resist the urge to smile at the sounds your touch produces. The hand that brought him to you now rests at his base. You open your mouth wide as you slide down his shaft. Your tongue presses against the soft skin as you glide his cock to the back of your throat.

His whole body tenses while you linger close to the base having taken as much as you can. You can hear a faint whimper as you pull your lips back to the top. With one of his hands clenched the other traces the line of your jaw and flows to your hair, gripping the strands as it falls in place at the back of your head. You curl your tongue around the rim of his tip before proceeding back down.

His hand continues to cradle your head while he falls back against the couch. Several expletives leave his lips as you quicken your pace. Each time you slide down you attempt to take him a little further to the point where your eyes begin to water. You look up to him as he draws his hand to his mouth biting down on the knuckle in an attempt to muffle the groans emitting from him. You allow him the vice that he took from you, enjoying the sight of his clenched jaw and focused expression.

When he meets your eyes he finally unravels, a flurry of heavy breathing escapes him. His hips come to meet you this time, with one final thrust, his hand keeps you in place. With each pulse you swallow to around his tip, his cum hitting the back of your throat. You linger for as long as you can until your lungs scream for air forcing you to pull back.

You wipe the saliva from your lips as you look upon his fallen state. His head lolled back, his breath nothing more than a shudder. It had definitely been worth it to see him like this, but you slowly draw back to reality knowing it can’t happen again. There’s too much at stake. If the other authors you represented found out, it could ruin your career, not to mention what would become of your friendship. Namjoon had one night stands before surely he could be content with just this once.         

...

After that night Namjoon spends the next two days locked away writing. He asks you to stall with the publishers for as long as you can. Your excuses to them grow more pathetic by the day.

He calls you on the second evening while you’re on your way home from work. “Namjoon are you almost done with your sample? I can’t hold them off much longer, by the way if anyone asks you were sick and then you had a car accident.”

“But I don’t have a car.”

“No because you totaled it in the wreck, come on play along.”

He chuckles a thank you and then shares his news with you. “I think it’s ready. Is it okay if I drop it off at your place now? I have plans for tonight and I don’t want to be late.” He pauses as if to consider his words, “That is unless you would rather go on a date with me. I would cancel everything for that.”

“Namjoon,” You whine back, “Professional boundaries you promised!”

“You’re right I did. Can I still drop off my work?”

“I’m not back yet. Just use your spare key and leave the draft on my table.”

“Will do.”

When you arrive home not only is there a manuscript but he’s also throw in a bottle of his families homemade soju and a note.

...I figured you might as well have a drink at my expense while reading this. Sorry it took so long, I just had to be sure.   -Namjoon...

The sample work he’s left strikes you as unusual, bound in a red journal, and upon opening you find his work in longhand. Written on the inside cover is the explanation.

...Possible marketing design, journal format to fit the theme. I would prefer to somehow mimic the handwriting as well rather than text, as it adds to the tone of the story.

Working title: Diary of a Villain

A character slowly driven mad by desire and longing, trying to hold himself together and not reveal his true self...

Namjoon is right, it’s vastly different than what he’s written in the past. Even though the passages he has given you fall closer to the middle and end of the story, you soon find yourself lost in the passion and intensity of the main character's thoughts. He’s been stalking the love of his life but he makes it sound so reasonable. Conveying that this is his purpose in life, to stay by her. Watching her through the windows, breaking into her home when she’s not there just to take in the smell of her sheets. Wishing to collect and study every part of her.

Your heart even breaks as he describes his time away from her. When his desire would overwhelm him, when he could longer be content with just watching, he would have to leave the city just to keep her safe from him. As you continue you notice the change in the writing style going from a tidy scrawl to a haphazard scribble as if the person writing these words was slowly becoming unhinged.

When you reach a part where the main character invites the focus of his affection over, you notice Namjoon has kindly put a small sticky note in the margin.

...If you haven’t started drink already I would highly suggest it now. I dislike the thought of you reading this part sober...

You glance at the next few lines muttering to yourself, “Is this a sex scene? He never writes about intimacy.” He’s right though the thought reading a sensual act written by your very attractive, untouchable friend requires a drink. After taking a shot of the soju he kindly provided you proceed.

The lead up dialogue seems oddly familiar.

...“Why would I tease you? Teasing implies that I won’t give you what you want, I intend to give you everything.”...  

Your eyes trace every line carefully as you read, your mind tries to second guess itself wondering if those were are actually the words he spoke to you. But when you hit another familiar passage you begin to blush, no longer able to deny the truth.  

...“You need someone you’re comfortable with. Someone who you’ve known for a while, someone you feel a connection with.”...

You take another shot of the soju as the story continues to unfold in a similar way as the events of two days ago. He goes into a vivid replay of how he satisfied you with his tongue and fingers. Each stroke of pleasure is written out on the page exactly how it happened. You’re not sure if you should be upset or flattered that he’s narrated the scene for the whole world to read. Regardless of your feelings your arousal begins to climb while remember how it felt when he touched you.

You interest grows when you read of the female character returning the favour. How her actions matched yours. You can't help but imprint the main characters feelings onto Namjoon. As if he is describing how it felt when you sucked his cock.

...Fuck she took me so well. How could I have ever let anyone else touch me other than her. I might have used them all as distractions, but now I see that nothing could compare. Her tongue dragged along my shaft, so talented in tracing the veins as she placed me at the back of her mouth. Her throat clenched around my tip. The thought of coming inside her was so overwhelming it brought me to the verge quickly. I had to dig my nails into my palm and bite my knuckles to distract myself with the pain. I gladly fought through it just to enjoy the moment a little longer. When I released inside of her mouth I could feel her throat swallow round my head, taking every drop I gave...

You nibble the tip of your finger and smile at the thought that you might have given Namjoon this much pleasure. But you soon find yourself trying to dissociate him from the main character once he returns to his obsessive tendencies.

...She told me this was it, that we couldn’t act on our urges ever again. She had given me the taste of heaven and was now locking the gate forever. I promised her that I would respect her decision, but there was no way I could abide. If she refused to let me in, I would simply drag her down to hell with me...

You find yourself overwhelmed with anxiety, your heart rate and thoughts racing from the ongoing similarities.

...I left a gift at her house, with the hopes that she would enjoy my hard work, with the dream that she would finally understand. She didn’t realize until it was too late that I had drugged her drink, that I had never left but was spying through the bedroom door. I had left it slightly ajar, wanting nothing more than to watch her expression as everything unraveled...

You breathing stops as you look over to your bedroom, the door resting open ever so slightly.

...It was a strong sedative that I used to dose her. The first recorded side effect is often dizziness...

Your hand clings to the couch in an attempt to stay upright as you head swims.

...Followed by loss of motor control...

Your legs begin to tingle, falling numb beneath you, any hope of fleeing snatched away.

...And finally the drug snares the remaining senses from it’s victims before a complete loss of consciousness. She didn’t last long...

Your hearing becomes muffled, and your eyes widen with terror trying to keep them from succumbing to the darkness that slowly closes in on you. The last sight you witness before falling under is the door opening to reveal Namjoon, wearing the smirk you used to love so much.

...

You fight through the haze of exhaustion to bring your mind to where you are. Lying down on your side in a bed you stare at a wall that you know to be in Namjoon’s home. Warm fingertips brush your shoulder as you slowly wake, followed by the soft press of lips to your skin.

You try to lift a hand to cradle your head and relieve the dull ache that’s surfacing, but you find your arms restrained, pulled behind your back and tied in place. You jerk at the bonds in an attempt you free yourself, but now a large hand holds you in place too.

“Don’t move, you’ll only hurt yourself.” Namjoon’s voice trails from behind you, his soft tone attempts to convey comfort but sends you into a panic as you remember his actions.  

“Namjoon?” You ask with a sob.

“Shhhh, I’m right here.”

“W-why?” You stutter as your chest begins to heave, “Why did you do this?”

“I thought that was obvious.” He places the journal you were just reading on the bed next to you. “You refused to see reason so I tried to show you. This is everything I feel for you, everything I’ve done for you, and yet you still push me away. I don’t want to work together, I don’t want to be friends if it means I can’t have you. I’ll take you away from everything so you don’t have to make that choice.” He lowers his lips to your ear his tone becoming hushed as if he is sharing a desperate desire. “I’ll be the villain so you can be mine.”

“Namjoon please, just let me go.” Your fingers attempt to find the knots in the binding, straining for any hope of release.

“But that’s not where the story goes next, I would rather continue where you left off. I have so much more in store for you, for us.” He paces around the bed finally coming into your view. A sly smile crosses his face as he sits down on the mattress in front of you. A finger raises your chin so you meet his eyes. “Shall I read the end to you? I think you’ll like it. I took your advice.”  

[justforbooks]

I suppose it’s O.K. to give away the address now. The books are gone, packed up in dozens of cardboard boxes and hauled away. When you ring the buzzer for apartment No. 7, nothing happens any longer, and won’t, probably, until someone else moves in. The old feeling you’d get, that you had sprung a trapdoor, discovered a secret passage, won’t come anymore.

Michael Seidenberg’s one-of-a-kind bookshop, Brazenhead Books, closed last month. For seven years, it operated out of an apartment at 235 East Eighty-fourth Street. Of course no bookstore or other business had any business being there, in that rent-stabilized apartment, so it was, strictly speaking, illegal, and because it was illegal it had to be secret. The secret was known to a small number of discreet patrons and shared strictly by word of mouth. (At first, Michael saw customers by appointment only.) Inside, the windows were blacked out and covered with shelves. On bookcases, in every room, volumes of all sizes in serried ranks rose two deep from floor to ceiling. More were stacked on desks and tables and grew in unsteady columns from the floor. There was a stereo (covered in books), a few chairs, and a large desk in the front room (likewise all but submerged), on which Michael kept a half dozen or so bottles of wine and spirits, a tower of plastic cups, and a bucket of ice.

Walking in, you might find a handful of patrons lounging on chairs with drinks in their hands, or browsing amiably, making conversation, generally about books, but often ranging widely into art, politics, personal life stories, and the history of New York. In the same way that children imagine adults living in perfect freedom, enjoying all the cookies and television they want and staying up till all hours, Michael’s shop was what a bookish child might dream up as a fantasy home for himself, a place far from any responsibilities, where he would never run out of stories.

It was, of course, no more practical than a gingerbread house. There was no bathroom or kitchen. (When nature called, customers had to knock on the next-door neighbor’s apartment and ask to be let in.) The affable if somewhat inscrutable proprietor, potbellied and gray-bearded, in his late fifties, lived elsewhere, and held court in the shop on Saturday nights. At least, that was how things stood in the summer of 2011, when I first started visiting.

The story of Brazenhead goes like this: in the nineteen-seventies, Michael ran a bookstore in Brooklyn. That was the first Brazenhead Books. The novelist Jonathan Lethem, as Patricia Marx reported in Talk of the Town, in 2008, worked there when he was fourteen years old. (He was paid with books.) Michael eventually moved his shop to the Upper East Side, only to lose his lease several years later when the rent quadrupled. Lacking options, he moved the books into his own apartment, but there were too many—so many that he and his wife moved out to make room for them all. After that, he plied his trade occasionally, and more or less thanklessly, at book fairs and on city streets. Otherwise, in the apartment on East Eighty-fourth Street, the books gathered dust. It was not until 2007 that his friend George Bisacca, a longtime conservator of paintings at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, helped Michael turn the apartment into the place I came to know. The Times, writing about Brazenhead in the fall of 2011, was near the mark in calling it a “literary speakeasy.”

In the years after I discovered the shop, I occasionally introduced others to it, bringing them with me one at a time, as if inducting them into a secret society. With time came practical improvements: the addition of a working toilet (but no sink), better-organized collections of Russian, Japanese, and Latin American literature. Michael even hired an assistant. As a result, the contents of the shop, formerly in a state of apparent chaos, began to assume a peculiarly perfect kind of order.

But the unlikeliness of the place never dissipated. On one of my first visits, Michael and I bonded over a shared fascination with the work of Edward Whittemore, an unjustly neglected American writer who, after graduating from Yale, in 1955, served in the Marines and as a C.I.A. operative in the Far East and Jerusalem. The first of his books, “Quin’s Shanghai Circus,” was published by Henry Holt, in 1974, and was described in the Times as “a war novel without the usual furniture of war,” “peopled with circus masters, prostitutes, priests, gangsters, voyeurs, retarded man-boys, pornography collectors, pederasts, dwarfs, fat American giants and sadfaced secret-service agents, who change identities from time to time and drift through landscapes that resemble Tokyo, Shanghai and the Bronx.”

There was a copy of the novel on a low shelf in Brazenhead’s back room, the first-edition room. Beside it were the hardcover volumes of Whittemore's magnum opus, the Jerusalem Quartet, all long out of print, which stand in relation to “Quin’s” much as “The Lord of the Rings” stands to “The Hobbit.” (Paperback reissues of the five novels, published by Old Earth Books, in 2002, are likewise out of print.) Frustratingly, though, Brazenhead had only books two, three, and four of the quartet; the first volume, “Sinai Tapestry,” was missing. I bought “Quin’s,” and asked after “Sinai Tapestry.” Michael indicated that it was in his private collection, and not for sale.

If it seemed strange for a bookseller not to sell a particular book, it was stranger still to let people treat his shop as a hangout without pressuring them to buy anything. His patrons, a mix of bright young things and old eccentrics, were fiercely loyal. The considerate ones bought books, or at least brought a handle of booze once in a while to replenish the bar. The inconsiderate treated Brazenhead like their own parlor—drinking up the whiskey and port, blocking the doorways, rarely buying anything. On any given night you were liable to encounter a poetry reading or a musical performance. For a time, on Thursday nights, the bookshop hosted weekly meetings of the staff of the New Inquiry, the lefty Web magazine, until Michael had what he described as a falling-out with the editors. From then on, Thursday was an open salon night, just like Saturday.

But for me, the books were always the biggest draw. Michael’s collection seemed incomparable in both its idiosyncrasy and its quality. There was a wall of poetry, another of science fiction. A special New York section. General fiction and literature were organized alphabetically, more or less, and stretched across several bookcases. Pulp novels higgledy-piggledy in one corner; art books enshrined in another nook; a few shelves reserved for the collected letters and journals of Edith Wharton, Hart Crane, James Joyce, and their peers. There were trashy paperbacks and American first editions of Yukio Mishima. One night, one of the New Inquiry editors and I gave an impromptu reading of a poem by Suzanne Somers—that Suzanne Somers—from a collection called “Touch Me,” a slim volume I was half-convinced Michael had somehow dreamed into existence. The poem was called “I Want to Be a Little Girl,” and was even more unsettling than it sounds. When I’d looked inside the front flap to see Michael’s asking price, there was no dollar figure, just one word, in pencil: “Priceless.”

When the notice of eviction came down, in the summer of 2014, the whole dynamic changed. All at once, Brazenhead was on borrowed time. No one knew how much. Patrons began to be looser with the address. There was a rumor that someone’s posting of the address online—a big no-no—had attracted crowds finally too large to ignore, and that this was what had occasioned the eviction notice.

As word got around, the crowds swelled. Minor celebrities dropped in. Everywhere you looked, on a Saturday night, you saw people guzzling red wine and Wild Turkey. Pot smoke was general, and it became hard to see the books through the throng. Michael and his shop were featured in the oddball web series “The Impossibilities.” He officiated at least one wedding on the premises.

Each supposed last night gave way to another. Nobody wanted to say goodbye. On July 28th, Michael advertised a final poetry reading—“apocalypse edition”—on Facebook. “See you there or on the other side,” he wrote.

Where will that other side be? Michael does plan to reopen somewhere, somehow. “The future will begin in September,” he told me recently. I don’t know whether he has chosen a location, or whether the store will retain its semi-clandestine nature. When I pressed him, he said only that he was off to the country to relax, and would be “back in September for Brazenhead—whatever that will be.”

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at http://justforbooks.tumblr.com

[translationandbetrayals]

Approach to cyberpunk in anime

When think about the word cyberpunk neon lights in a futuristic city comes  to our heads, as well as the location of Neo Tokyo, this simple features that we resemble in our minds is just a product of  what oriental animation has shown us over the years.

  This genre went through long before reaching anime and exploding as such, since the genre began its literary paths in science fiction along with its predecessors Bruce Sterling, William Gibson and John Shirley, a movement that was born in the decade of the 80 one of the most recognized is William Gibson with his work Neuromancer. Cyberpunk was present in all media: animation, movies (suc h as the Matrix) and literature. You cannot fail to highlight Blade Runner and its creator and writer by Philip K. Dick. with its original name of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? that shows us what our minds and past minds once thought of this cyber era and imagined with the movie.

  In anime, all began with the film Akira in 1988 which marked an historical milestone that even now is revered and admired by young people and no longer so young, the movie portrays an era in ruin, full of advanced yet worthless technology, violence, rebellion, and of course, an extremely dangerous power which is about to be free and cause devastation. Akira is followed by movies like Ghost in The Shell (1995) telling us about this cyber-agent who must deal with an expert hacker from getting into the programming systems of hybrids half-human-half-robot beings. An also Parasite Doll (2003) introducing Agent Buzz, a lieutenant in a secret division of the AD police. The mission of this secret division of the police is to protect humans from the human-shaped androids that populate the streets of Mega Tokyo. (We still can find cyberpunk now days in anime like Psychopass or Ergo Proxy, but the list would be to long)

  As we can tell, it is all about post-apocalyptic world united in technology and ruins. Also, the loss of the essence of being human to feel body and mind, all your humanity in absence, everything becomes a machine without feelings, product of an era without hopes or divinities.

  At the end of all Japanese animation it was an essential part of this movement that exploded to the world  thanks to the illustration and animation of every written and imagined scene about a chilling, not-so-bright future, but somehow too interesting and enchanting, I mean who doesn´t want to see a car fly, time travel or to have a robotic hand ? sink into an infinite matrix a totally artificial world. This genre is full of psychology and reflections because no matter how many years pass, we will always see the cyberpunk era as a future that may lies ahead.

Sara Cruz

[thedaywebuiltthefort-blog]

No 95 - Become A Published Author (a work in progress)

When I was little, my primary school English teacher told my parents that I was a very good writer but that I should stop trying to write in other genres and stick to shawls and petticoats.

In retrospect, as annoyed as that made me at the time, he was probably onto something. The majority of my characters these days do in fact wear shawls and petticoats - mostly the female ones but not always.

Just to be clear about this, I have always written. There is a huge difference between someone that writes and someone who is trying to be a writer. In my case, the shift from one to the other has been quite recent. I wish I had done it a long time ago.

In my head though, there was always this image of what I believed an author should look and sound like. Sometimes I feel like I ought to be more thespian like, more academic. I should extend my social circle to include a variety of artistic, creative types that sit around coffee shops discussing theology and Greek tragedy. I feel like I should own a lot more scarves.

I’d like to join a writers circle or club but I’m too paranoid that when I get there they’ll want to ask me questions about Tolstoy or get me to give my opinions on neoclassical literature. My favourite author is Steven Pressfield. The last thing I read was Yahoo news.

I don’t have a beautiful antique desk upon which my manuscripts sit in neat piles. I don’t spend sunny days sitting in the garden drinking tea and scribbling genius ideas into a notepad. I tried to use a typewriter once and spent three hours trying to type one word.

In comparison to the image in my head, the reality of writing is much less glamorous.

Most of my work is done at the kitchen table, empty red bull cans wedged between piles of washing that has been sitting there so long I can no longer tell if it’s dirty or clean. Every ten minutes I have to remove a cat from my keyboard. As far as the sun goes, unless I have something particular to do, I often go days without seeing it. It seems like the ideal time to write is at about two thirty in the morning after twelve cups of instant coffee.

I have become a master of midnight editing, sitting in bed on my phone and saying things like ‘what the hell does that mean?’ and ‘what was I thinking?’ whilst trying not to wake up the rest of the house. Writing seems to amount to spending 20% of your time typing, 20% of your time lamenting over the awfulness of your work and the rest of the day googling things like ‘do frogs have toes?’ and ‘when were kettles invented?’ for research purposes.

Every day I seem to stumble across some new rule in the idiots guide to becoming an author. Rules that I had no idea existed. Things like the fact that you’re not allowed to use most of the words that exist in the English language. Even then you find most of the words you can use, have been used incorrectly.

It is all ridiculously complicated. Traversing the murky waters of editing, querying and getting work out there is akin to trying to find your way out of a dark room with your face covered in mashed potato. Working out what you should and shouldn’t be doing is like a Lord Of The Rings-esque quest. I feel like I need to spend eight hours walking across a mountain landscape so that I can fling my manuscript into the flames of Mordor.

I’m expecting a response via ork in twelve to sixteen weeks.

Several months after my first submission I can confirm I am no closer to being the next literary sensation than I was when I started, although I do now have much less memory space on my laptop. I have three and a half completed manuscripts in various stages of editing. The folder on my desktop contains roughly 480,000 words of my pure unbridled genius. It contains a further 500,000 words of total garbage.

The first novel, a fantasy adventure, is in the process of being beta read. I have convinced myself several times now, that it is in fact completely finished. That idea has turned out to be very much incorrect. I have put it out to agents and the response has been the same from each. It’s not what they’re looking for at the moment. I suspect I am getting stock answers but at least none of them have told me to never contact them again, or taken out restraining orders. There has actually been one or two that have in fact been quite encouraging.

Writing a novel is easy. The difficult bit is writing a novel that is a) actually good and b) people will want to read. Anyone can vomit words onto a page – something that I have proven consistently for the past year.

My first novel was written in a matter of several weeks. Granted, over those several weeks I was sitting hunched over the kitchen table for eighteen hours a day and my fingers ended up like gnarled flesh stumps, but still, it was done pretty quickly. It has since been rewritten at least twenty times. I’m still not happy with it.

I once read somewhere that a first draft is like shovelling sand into a box so that you can build sand castles with it later. If that is the case, editing feels like trying to bail out a waterlogged sailing boat with a teaspoon. You know there’s something salvageable in there somewhere, but you get the horrible feeling it’s going to sink before anyone else can see it.

I’ve started putting out some of my work on Wattpad, which is a way for writers to publish their work online for critique and feedback. The novel that is on there is one that has been knocking around in the back of my brain for about three years.

Unlike the fantasy novel, this one is turning out to be much tougher to write. I can feel it crawling around under my skin, but it seems to be like one of those itches that you can’t quite scratch. The minute you know where it is, it moves somewhere else. All of a sudden I am much more aware of what is going into the story. I find myself scrutinizing every word obsessively. I hate it all. A few hours later I love it again.

Mostly I am just worried that I’ve made a horrible mistake. It is one thing to sit at your kitchen table pouring your soul into something only for it to sit on your computer screen where only you can see it. Putting your work out there for other people to read and judge feels like standing at a precipice waiting to fling yourself over the edge.

I wake up in the morning and my first thought is about writing. As I fall asleep my last thoughts each night are about writing. It has consumed my life and is both wonderful and exhausting in equal measure. I am no longer just me. There are dozens of characters living and breathing inside my head. I know them, I feel them. When they get hurt, when they feel something – I feel it too. Maybe that makes me crazy. Perhaps it makes me passionate. I’m not quite sure yet.

Either way, it is that more than anything that drives me to keep going. It is an overwhelming need to bring life to these characters. I need to make them real. I need to tell their stories.

The truth of the matter is, that in the end, it doesn’t really matter if I get published or not. It would be amazing if it happened. But I don’t know that I’m good enough for that. I don’t know if I can compete against the millions and millions of people putting work out there, fighting for a place at the table. People ask you what’s special about you, what’s special about your work. I can’t answer that. I don’t know the answer. It’s probably nothing.

All I know is that these are my stories and writing them feels like breathing. Every time one of these characters moves from my brain, through my fingers and out onto the page, I feel like I have become a little more of myself. Each time I complete a project, it completes a little bit more of me and I feel like a better person for it.

I know I may come to regret some of the choices that I’ve made in recent months further down the line. I’ve given up an awful lot to do this (mostly money). The sensible part of me keeps trying to tell me that I ought to go back to working nine to five, and just write as and when I get the time.

The last decade of my life has been spent pursuing one horrible, spirit-crushing job after the other, each time convincing myself that I was climbing the ladder only to find myself unceremoniously shoved back down. It wasn’t until I sat down and poured my heart and soul out onto the screen that I realised how miserable I had made myself.

The best way I can put it is that as each character comes to life, so do I. I’ve never felt that way about anything before. That is why whenever I hear that voice in my head telling me to be realistic, to get on the job sites and start acting like a sensible person, I tell that voice to shut its face. Then I listen to the other voice - the one that says do not stop.

                       Holly

[char27martin]

10 Ways to Overcome Lonely Writer Syndrome

One of the downsides to becoming a fulltime author or writer is that, by its very nature, writing can be a very lonely business. Typically, it’s just you and a computer, shut off from the rest of the world, all alone with your thoughts.

If you’re someone who is not totally comfortable being a literary hermit like me, you might experience feelings of loneliness and depression, or what I call Lonely Writer Syndrome.

There are things you can do to avoid such feelings. It starts with changing your surroundings and your routine. To that end, here are my Top 10 Tips on how to avoid lonely writer syndrome and become a happy hermit.

2. Create A Positive Workspace

For me, it all begins with the space where I spend most of my day writing, which is my home office. The space must be comfortable and convenient to work in, and conducive to the task of writing. Otherwise, you may spend most of the time being distracted by negative things like a messy desk or rickety chair, or outside distractions like traffic noise or the kid next door banging a ball against the house.

I’m also a bit of a neat freak. If my workspace is a mess, I’m unable to focus on the writing, so my creativity goes to pot. There is nothing on my desk but a computer and the legal pad and pen I use to doodle when my brain needs a break from writing. I don’t buy into the adage that “a messy desk is the sign of a creative mind.” To me, a messy desk is a sign of a person too lazy to clean up their desk.

The same is true of the ergonomics of the profession. Writers sit a lot, usually hunched over a desk or a table at Starbucks. If your chair is uncomfortable or your setup awkward, you could suffer back or wrist pain, or lose feeling in your backside. That’s going to affect your creativity and your mood.

Investing in a chair or desk that is ergonomically-designed for how you work could be the best money you’ll ever spend. Notice that I didn’t advise you to buy a comfy chair. It’s been my experience that getting too comfortable can be just as detrimental to the writing process as being too uncomfortable.

Remember high school typing class from the dark ages, boys and girls: feet flat on the floor, spine straight, shoulders back, arms extended at the elbows, wrists in a relaxed position, fingers on keys. Who knew that old Mrs. Reed the typing teacher really knew what she was talking about?

2. Invest in Modern Technology

Nothing is more frustrating (at least to me) than being in the middle of a thought and having my computer crash, which is why I recommend investing in a good computer that doesn’t freeze up every time you launch Word or Scrivener.

Trying to write on a 10-year-old laptop is like hammering words into a stone with a dull chisel.

Basic, reliable computers are cheap. Buy one. Today. You’re welcome.

[Scrivener 3.0 Update: What’s inside, and is it worth the cost?]

3. Take Frequent Breaks

When I tell people that I make my living as a writer, they say witty things like, “It must be great being a writer. All you do is sit all day long.”

What they don’t understand is that sitting too long at a computer can be mentally and physically exhausting. I’ve found that taking frequent breaks helps refresh my body, mind, and mood.

I write in thirty-minute chunks, which means every thirty-minutes I get up and stretch for a few minutes, or grab a cup of coffee, or just walk around the house. Thirty on, ten off is what works for me. Try it and you’ll soon figure out what works best for you.

4. Get Out of The House

At least once a day I shut down the computer and get out of the house for an hour. I may go out to lunch, take a walk around the neighborhood, go to the gym, or run errands. The point is to disconnect the digital umbilical and come out of your cave for at least an hour every day, even if you have no particular place to go. I find that I’m usually eager to get back to work after such a break, which increases my productivity and satisfaction.

5. Interact with Others in The Same Boat as You

As I said in the beginning, writing can be a lonely business. That’s why I recommend that you find ways to interact with other writers, virtually and in the real world.

Joining online and local writer’s groups is one of the best way to do this—if you can avoid the aspects of such groups that often eat into your writing time (drama, committees, you read mine and I’ll read yours).

Spending time with others in the same boat as you will often keep you from having those feelings that your boat is sinking.

One additional word of warning: don’t waste time writing long Facebook posts or getting into philosophical arguments in forums to prove how well you can write or how smart you are. These groups can have positive and negative effects, so participate and contribute wisely.

Upcoming Online Courses:

Advanced Novel Writing with Mark Spencer Writing Nonfiction with Carolyn Walker Short Story Fundamentals with John DeChancie Query Letter in 14 Days with Jack Adler Writing the Picture Book with Terri Valentine

6. Attend Writer’s Conferences

This takes No. 5 to the next level. If you can afford to travel, check out the various writers and publishing conferences that are held around the country every year. Choose the one or two that you feel are best for you and plan to attend. Some writers prefer small regional conferences while others enjoy the big nationals.

My advice would be to choose a conference that fits your niche and needs (romance, sci-fi, etc.) rather than a large general conference that may not focus on things you’re most interested in.

Either way, conferences are a great way to meet other writers, agents, editors, and publishers. I always come away from conferences with a renewed energy and list of new contacts. Since attending conferences can be expensive, do your research and attend only those that you feel will give you the biggest bang for your buck.

7. Coauthor with Other Writers

This is one of my favorite ways to shake off those feelings of loneliness and depression because it forces you to communicate with others on a regular basis.

Coauthoring simply means that you write a book (and share credit) with a writing partner, or someone who can provide complimentary skills to your own.

For example, I coauthor with several writers in the science fiction and space opera genres. Sometimes, we both contribute to the writing equally while other times I might do the lion’s share of the writing while they handle most of the editorial and marketing tasks.

Coauthoring is a great way to build your brand and reach a wider audience. And while the project is in full swing, you will have frequent chats with your writing partner. You may find coauthoring so appealing that you never want to work alone again.

8. Ignore the Bad Stuff

There’s nothing more depressing to some writers than getting a bad review or receiving yet another rejection letter. Those things used to bother me, too, but now, not so much. If I get a bad review, I determine whether it’s just some jack wagon who didn’t even read the book or a serious reader with something genuinely worthwhile to say.

Genuine reviews, negative or not, should be considered valuable feedback from readers, and can give you great insight into what you may need to do differently next time.

Don’t let the bad reviews get you down. Garner what lessons you can from them and move on.

The same is true with rejection, typically from agents or publishers. I have enough agent rejection letters to wallpaper my master bathroom.

Every author, from King to Grisham to Rowling has been rejected dozens of times. Consider yourself part of the elite club: authors who are not afraid to try.

9. Learn to Meditate

One of my favorite ways to recharge my mental batteries and shake off feelings of loneliness and depression is through meditation. The thing I love most about meditation is that I can do it anywhere, anytime, all I need is ten minutes and a quiet place to sit.

You don’t have to take classes or read books to learn how to meditate. I simply go into my den or office where there’s no noise or distractions, sit in a comfy chair, close my eyes, focus on my breathing, and let my mind wander for a few minutes.

At first, you may find turning off your thoughts to be difficult, but over time you will learn to shut out the world. In the meantime, you can wear noise-cancelling headphones or listen to soothing music to block out noise.

The key is to keep at it until you are meditating for at least ten minutes a day. Or ten minutes in the morning and ten minutes in the afternoon. Or whenever you feel stressed or alone. Meditation is a tool you can use at will. I highly recommend doing so. I think you’ll find it to be a great way to keep the writing process positive and productive.

10. Listen to Upbeat Music

When I write, I prefer a quiet environment, but many writers believe that listening to upbeat or inspirational music helps them stay motivated and in a creative mood. The key is to listen to music that inspires rather than interrupts the thought patterns, which is why many prefer instrumentals. If you find yourself singing along rather than writing, you might want to change your playlist.

[Want some music recommendations? Check out Robert Lee Brewer’s 20 Best Songs for Writers and About Writing.]

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Once more, writing can be a lonely business, but there are ways to help battle those feelings of loneliness and depression.

Give these tips a try to see if you find them helpful. And feel free to share other tips you might have in the comments below!

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