From the Sasquatch Cave

This is the writing sasquatch's version of a kitchen sink kinda blog post. We're in the midst of a snow storm and not only are my feet cold (fuzzy sock kinda night) my brain is a bit mush and I don't think it's because of the zombies that seem to be out there. 


Here goes:


The wastebasket is a writer's best friend.  ~Isaac Bashevis Singer

Clearly, Isaac wrote this before they invented the delete button. A 21st Century version would be:


Write
Delete
Re-write


Repeat the above over and over until your fingers bleed and you are typing with knuckle stumps. Repeat until the moon shines off the hard, craggy rock of your sasquatch cave. Repeat until your eyelid is twitching from staring at the screen for too long and eating too many sour ju jubes.   

Because: Easy reading is damn hard writing.  ~Nathaniel Hawthorne 


True dat Nathaniel!


You know when you venture out of your sasquatch writing cave and meet someone, and they tell you their whole life story including their issues with toe jam, their battles with halitosis and the dog that bit them 20 years ago? 


Well, here are some tidbits of genius from the mind of Tim Wynne Jones from the Surrey International Writers Conference (SiWC):


Meeting a character in a novel is like meeting them in real life - you don't want to know everything about them when you first meet them. You want to be intrigued. You want to gradually get to know them. So no back story in chapter one. And keep your toe jam issues to yourself ... just saying!  


We'll let Anton take us out on the note ...
 
Don't tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass.  ~Anton Chekhov



Now returning to my regularly programed sasquatch cave to warm my feet!