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Inkabout L. Darby Gibbs

Science Fiction & Fantasy author

Health

Why when my treadmill dies, I’m buying another one

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My treadmill: an oldie but a goodie
It has been interesting how my writing process has changed
over time. I’ve always approached every writing project with an idea of how the
story was going to end. Sometimes I have an outline but usually not. Looking
back, I can see some constants: a title tends to come to me first followed by
the main characters. Over the last two years, I have found that the book cover is my most
inspiring starting point. It follows on the heels of the other two constants. The
cover acts as a focal point I can return to as I progress through the story.
Book 1, Standing Stone Series
My second series, Standing Stone, had its covers before I
even started writing. The same has occurred with my third series of books
(Solstice Dragon World) that I’m working on now. Each Standing Stone cover provides
a key character and the stone that is the crux of the story. In the case of SDW
novels, it is the main character and the location where key events take place.
Each of these covers help ground my writing and are designed to give my reader
a sense of the story. I feel with the covers done, I am certain the novel has a
developed core. 
I have a contemporary story with about 18,000 words, no
cover yet. It’s been sitting for three years. I know the characters, the title
and the end point moment. I think I need that cover. I have a space opera: 30K words. No cover. I don’t want to admit how long its been sitting. It really needs a cover.
Knowing the ending is very important to me. I don’t need to know the
details, just a key moment that will test the main character and bring them out the other side of a conflict, and even that is mutable. It becomes my north star. I may tack numerous
directions on my way to it, but having that fixed point in the back of my mind
keeps the story rolling. I can ask myself, “How does this relate to that? How
does this decision ultimately lead the character there?” I find the answers on the treadmill.
Writing itself has changed for me as well. The treadmill has
become a source of inspiration and direction. While striding along, I can focus
on one question, one scene, one direction that needs development. Nothing else
will interfere. My husband isn’t going to show up to talk to me. He
respects exercise too much. My time on the treadmill is set, so there’s no
getting off which can sometimes create an urgency in me to write as soon as my time is up. 
Since I exercise every morning before I head to my job, that urgency
has is flaws, but that impetus to write with a fully-developed idea gives my
writing direction and flow even if I have to wait to write until that evening or after a mound of grading. It is an appointment I feel I must keep
because I know being on the treadmill will result in a better first draft. It is also my best opportunity to go over a scene numerous times and realize what I missed or how
I can incorporate more character or plot development. Of course, there is the
added positive of keeping me in shape since writing means I’m sitting in a
chair often for hours at a time.
I talked about change in my writing, and I have mainly
covered what I do now. So what was my approach in the past? 
The past:

  • An idea would come to me. I’d sit down and
    write. Then stop where my idea ended.
  • I’d lay down on the couch and think about a
    question, such as “How is he going to deal with his daughter’s unwillingness to talk to
    him?” Fifty percent of the time, this resulted in an unplanned nap.
  • I would have a title and a vague notion of how
    the character was dealing with a situation or causing a situation 
  •  I’d sit at the computer and hope more words were
    going to come soon
  • I would develop when I redrafted, slide in side
    stories and look for inconsistencies
  • Writing a novel was a yearlong process
  • No cover
  • A working title (very much subject to change)
  • Ill-defined characters, setting and plot that took a lot more work to develop and clean up
  • One novel at a time
  • One book a year and a full-time job

VS the present

  • An idea comes to me. I get on the treadmill and walk (fast and on
    an incline: don’t want you thinking this is a walk in the park 🙂 ) and
    hash out the idea, Socratic method.
  • I write through the developed scenes (after that
    visit to the treadmill)
  • Title, character with backstory and fully-fleshed
    appearance and behaviors. Distinct main conflict and side conflicts. 
  •  I’m at the computer to write, not sit
  • Development occurs in process, daily, a much
    more recursive process that results in a better first draft
  • Redrafting occurs daily and is more about layering in deeper
    description, searching out inconsistencies, clarifying, and copy editing in an
    ongoing approach (more about this in another post)
  • Writing a first draft of a novel takes a month
    and a half, average word count 90K (summer time writing – six months during the active school year)
  • A cover (changes subtly over time, but the main
    concept is set)
  • A title (still may change but rarely) 
  • Well-defined characters with greater depth,
    setting is full of sensory details, the plot is organized and part of a greater
    series
  • Three novels in development and linked together
    by plot, setting or characters
  • 3+ books a year and a full-time job

I’m pleased with the changes and enjoying how it makes my
writing better and though nothing makes writing a novel easier, this process
does make for better flow and direction to my writing, which, after all is said
and done, is what makes writing an enjoyable activity. This is why my husband
will say, “I know you want to write today and you enjoy that, but can we do
something fun together?” I can walk away from the computer not feeling like I’m
losing my “special time with my story” to my “special time with my husband.”
That’s why my treadmill isn’t going anywhere. It takes my writing where I want it to go. So what fosters your creative side? Tell me in the comment box below, and it doesn’t have to be about writing.
If you’re interested in checking out my books, click the menu tab My Published Books at the top. If you’d like to tweet or share this post click the icon below. Feel free to comment as well.
#writing
#treadmills
#plot

When you gotta build a castle, research is the answer

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Every time I start a new novel, I find myself researching a variety of items, especially with the fantasy novels I’ve been writing lately. I have selected the 1700s as my template years for technology, clothing, architecture, and transportation.

Picture credit: Okamatsu Fujikawa from on Unsplash

Since drafting my newest fantasy novel, I’ve found the need to increase my areas of research. Castles. I need to know more about castles, especially, older castles versus new versions, defensibility determined by terrain, and terminology and personnel.

Research is a double-edged sword. It needs to be done, but if you’re like me, it is easy to get sidetracked by interesting sites, such as the following site which actually BUILDS castles. BUILDS them! CastleMagic Castle Building. At first I thought it was a spoof that would turn out to be about building paper castles. The drawings were pencil sketches, and the video showing an example of the building process reminded me of Minecraft. But then I looked at their other pictures and videos. They BUILD castles. So you see I did get a bit sidetracked and for good reason. Too bad I don’t have the money to have them build me a castle. They do a really good job and can include secret passages. Hmm, secret passages.

This is a site I found for terminology called appropriately Castle Terminology.  Every term I could possibly need, their definitions and alternatives seem to be on this site. Though I don’t intend to be dropping castle terms all over my draft, I know I should refer to specific parts of castles correctly.

I toured two castles about ten years ago, both in Sweden which is helpful as the location of the castle in my novel is in mountainious terrain and very cold.

Laying out my castle is my biggest issue. I need to configue it to fit the story but stay within the standards of castles. Thus the following site is useful. It supplied a variety of layouts of castles and the reasoning behind them. Medieval Castle Layout. It’s proving useful as I plan out my version. I’ll probably have to plan out two more as well. Hmm, a castle building author is never done.

You know, I have to make room for a dragon in my castle. But enough about my research.

What research are you doing lately, and what about it sidetracks you?

16 Actions You Can Do to Improve Your Memory

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Be the Butterfly – Enjoy life and remember

I’ve been studying memory and what I can do to maintain and improve my own. My mother and father-in-law have both suffered from Alzheimer’s related dementia and memory loss. It has been heartbreaking. What has been even more an issue is the effort those around them go to looking for ways to hold back or even turn back the loss of memory our loved ones suffer.

My father-in-law’s memory of all children, grandchildren, friends and even his wife was completely gone in the last year, and his death in late last year was gut-wrenching. For all of that loss, we kept reminding each other that it was his last three years that were the most troubling. Not such a long period of time when we remembered that he lived to 93 in good health and gleeful about life and family.

What did he do that probably helped stave off a disease that had been diagnose early in his 70’s?

  1. He was active all his life and played competitive tennis into his 70s, practicing daily when not competing in seniors tennis.
  2. He played tennis into his 80s. Then played vicariously via watching the US Open and other major tennis meets. Did you know your muscles will actually be stimulated if you watch a sporting activity with interest and interaction?
  3. He watched his diet, eating balanced meals and taking appropriate levels of vitamins, minerals and herbs.
  4. He treated everyone respectfully and with kindness.
  5. He was strongly involved in his church and spent many years with his wife as a marriage-encounter teacher.
  6. He wrote his children letters often (not typing or email).
  7. He maintained a positive attitude and encouraged others to as well.

But as I said I’ve been studying memory. And there are numerous ways to maintain memory even against debilitating diseases.

  1. Stay active – tennis, walking, indoor skydiving, yoga, jogging, jumping rope, ping pong – get your heart rate up and move around. Physical activity and Risk of Cognitive Impairment and Dementia in Elderly Persons
  2. Eat intelligently and selectively. There are numerous foods that are said to help your body combat illness and disease – blueberries, cranberries, cherries, coconut oil, olive oil, fish, garlic, oatmeal, broccoli (I’m one of those people who think broccoli is nasty tasting, but broccoli spears don’t seem to bother me) Can blueberries assist in maintaining memory?
  3. Listen to music, classical, instrumental, music from your favorite memories, jazz, new age, etc.
  4. Learn to play a musical instrument – kazoo, harmonica, guitar, flute, piano – anything that forces you to learn the musical language and reproduce it with sound. Heck, play your armpit. How Music Affects the Brain for the Better
  5. Reduce stress in your life and develop ways to combat and deal with it when it arrives – exercising maybe or the next suggestion Chronic Stress Can Hurt Your Memory
  6. Get enough sleep, not too much nor too little too often. Routine sleep habits that provide the amount of sleep your body needs can help deal with stress, reduce stress and even help you not approach stressful situations as stress inducing Too Little Sleep, and Too Much Sleep, Affect Memory
  7. Hang around positive people who care about you and enjoy your positive company Optimism and Your Health
  8. Marry the person that makes your life complete and whose life you bring happiness and security to
  9. Take vitamins (cautiously, of course. Do your research) Vitamin Bible
  10. Challenge yourself daily to recall memories important to you The Effects of Aging on Memory
  11. Write a book – you’d be surprised how demanding it is to create lives for several other people, plot out the difficulties they are going through and figure out how to get them out of the inescapable corners you back them into. Write flash fiction if you want the same challenge but on a much tighter scale
  12. Meditate – you don’t have to turn your legs into a pretzel. Lay down on the couch and decompress for fifteen minutes. Meditation Benefits
  13. Simplify – I don’t mean sell everything and move into a tiny house. Just remove some of the complications in your life
  14. Research your family history – keeping track of all those ancestral lines is going to work your mind and give you an alternative to think about when life is handing you tough stuff.They got through it; you will too.
  15. Garden, keep a bonzai or raise koi – being involved with something that takes time, and takes it slowly will give you time to reflect and gain strength in watching your efforts create beauty in nature
  16. Don’t do everything listed above – pick out a few to add to your life (activity) and a few to alter your life (diet)

#memory
#meditation

Yup, you can learn to be helpless

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Opportunity: learn from failure

However, you can also learn to help yourself and learn you are capable of improving. Let yourself fail; let others fail. Then give yourself and others the opportunity to learn from that failure.

I read this great article about how people learn to be helpless through experience and environment. The piece was tweeted by Cash Nickerson (@cashnickerson). The article “Don’t Give Learned Helplessness a Chance” was written by Patrick Willer who first explains how the process occurs in animals and then relates it to human behavior.

Why did I connect so quickly to this article? I have been battling this phenomenon in my students for nearly 20 years now. I hear “I don’t know (IDK)” and the ever popular condition of “I’m bad at that.” They have become convinced that they are helpless. Willer’s article though brief offers great insight into how this behavioral response can become embedded rather quickly.

Willard brings up a common example that I have found students to feel: ” A classic example is that of a child failing a test at school. The child
may think he or she is dumb, which is not necessarily the case.” A true assessment or not, the belief can set the child into a pattern of failure through actions that prove the belief correct.

Freedom to fail and learn from the experience without recrimination is important. Freedom to ask questions and be given answers that validate the concern or confusion open up opportunity for change and the belief that things can be changed. Knowing that others are finding this to be true is just as important, so interpersonal engagement must be encouraged.

Willard was applying “learned helplessness” to the business world, but it certainly fit the start of each year in my classroom and the push to giving my students the opportunity to change their negative perceptions of themselves both individually and as a group through their own actions and how I received them.

But it’s more useful knowledge than that, though increasing confidence in employees and students is worthy enough. It applies just as well to writers working on character development. I have two characters who have been effected by the feeling of not being able to change what has been a major part of their lives. The opportunity to challenge the belief helped them both change over time and take control over their lives and their perceptions of self. Choices that destroyed their friendship held two characters back from rebuilding it until both had the motivation to break out of their past and the belief that it was possible.

excerpt from The Sharded Boy

   Jahl tried to imagine how he would work on the type of items
the Marsons tended to do. It would mean Jahl would have to take a stone in most
cases to their shop which would either take away time that he could be earning
from proper clientele or he would have to rent a stone an additional day if he
was taking it for the evening.

   Rouen hung his head. “I’m sorry for never sticking up
for you. I should have. We were best friends and I did nothing.”

   Jahl hadn’t wanted to think back to those days. The two boys
had been best friends. But it had been more than that. Until Jahl was nine he
had been friends with all the children. And then one day a new kid in town had
pointed out Jahl’s crippled leg and his slowness in play. Crimlo had made fun
of him until the children were rolling on the ground giggling, gleeful over the
creativity of the barbs Crimlo had flung. No day after was ever like the days
before that child had come to town. Rouen and Jahl never spoke again.

   Anger from the treatment had long since been overshadowed by
the general pain of living. Jahl didn’t know what to say. But he knew he wanted
the work. “Why can’t anyone know?”

   Rouen’s face looked relieved that Jahl had not wanted to
talk about their days as children. But his answer to Jahl’s questions
pained him. “What if my father never returns to work? People will stop
coming to us. We’ll lose our livelihood. Please Jahl, do this for us. I wasn’t
the best friend I should have been, but you have always been a good person. We
know we can trust you not to tell anyone. Say you’ll do it. I have a week’s
worth of work backed up. I’ll never get it done. And new work is coming in
every day. I’ve not turned anyone away.”
 

   Often those who most seem to be out to help us, intentionally or accidentally encourage these negative beliefs.

excerpt from The Sharded Boy

   “I have always looked forward to seeing you at the
mercantile. When I didn’t spy you out front as usual, I worried. What happened?
A couple of day’s illness wouldn’t do this.” He gestured at Jahl’s thinness.

   “I tripped on the stairs and was knocked unconscious. Rouen
found me. By then I had caught a chest cold and been without food a couple of
days, and then I couldn’t eat what with being sick. Today is my first really
good day.” Jahl wondered if he had laid that on a bit thick and if perhaps
Bragg had seen him answer the door earlier. But that would have been okay. Mom
wasn’t here being a mother hen yet. “Actually, Mom is just being a bit
overzealous. I was moving about the house earlier. But she doesn’t believe me.”

  “Loving mothers are like that.”

   Jahl caught the sourness again in Bragg’s tone and wondered
if the man had been aware of his mom’s rough mothering. “I suppose.” Jahl
attempted to put the same degree of dissatisfaction in his voice. Over the big
man’s shoulder, he saw his mother wince.

   “Overzealous or not, it is best not to overdo.” He surveyed
the room again. “Take it slow getting this old house together. You have time.”
He grinned. “But I, though willing to come to your rescue, which I am happy to
see is not needed, am rather short of time. Ona is home preparing supper and
wondering where I am, so I’ll be off.” Bragg laid his hand on Jahl’s shoulder
and squeezed the thinness. “Mahre, feed this boy. Get some meat on his bones
before he shrivels away. And, young man, conserve your strength. You’ve not
been strong, and overexerting yourself will only pull you down further.”

   “I’ll take things easier.”

   Bragg pointed to the closed door of the workroom. “Perhaps
you should turn one of these rooms into a bedroom so you don’t have to go
upstairs at all. Your room at home was downstairs, wasn’t.”

   “True, but I won’t get stronger if I don’t push myself.”

   “But you have limitations that can’t be altered.” Bragg
turned to address Jahl’s mother in the hall. “Right, Mahre, he shouldn’t go
beyond what his body can take, should he?”
Allow yourself to fail, allow others to fail, allow your characters to fail, but also give yourself and others the opportunity to rise out of that failure. 
#writing
#learning
#failing

Nope, it has nothing to do with that. Nothing. Nothing at all.

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Empty: a metaphor

It’s a one-word-in-front-of-the-other night. I don’t see the light at the end, but I know if I just keep typing, words will keep dropping down in front of me. This always works, yet I have not been applying this highly reliable rule in my life. Sit down, turn on computer, double click WIP and let the words drop. Nope, I’ve not been doing it.

The real fly in this ointment is that last year I had so much to write and so little time, yet I managed to write my longest book to date (100K), get it to my beta readers, edit it about 50 times in a variety of ways and publish it. I even updated some book covers, rewrote my blurbs and maintained my blog. Now with time streaming out my ears, my blog is a wee bit anemic, I’ve written very little on the book that has been dogging me for about two years and which I had to hold off until book 4 of the Students of Jump series was done and published, and I have just 13,000 words written so far of Joanie and Friends. Appalling. And I have no excuse. It’s February, for gosh sakes!

I haven’t been on Twitter, Google+ or Pinterest in what seems like ages.

My life has been no more engulfing than anybody else’s, a loss here and there, a gain or two, a lot of smooth sailing and generally the normal actions of a busy life. And I am not alone in my sluggishness. My husband is just as unfocused. He says its having our daughter away at college. Could that be it? The mother part of me is missing?

*************************************************************************

Okay, had to stop and digest that.
Writers nurture ideas.
We foster growth and change in our characters.
We step back and watch them make mistakes, hope they gather their wits about them and come out of the stituation okay and when all else fails, we step in and give them a prod or two rolling again in the right direction.
Writers consider possible consequences of actions, follow out scenarios and shift the possibilities.
Writers tuck their books into bed and hope they go out into the world and make good, reliable friends. We tell people about our story’s beginnings, shout out our grandest schemes coming to fruition, trouble our friends with our plot glitches and compare the poor scribbled things to successful writers’ works.
Writers are parents, and perhaps my parenting mode is still recovering from sending off a much more prized creation than any book I’ve ever written.

***************************************************************************

Alright, let’s not get carried away. I’ve just been lazy, luxuriating in my extra breathing space this year. I’m a writer and writers write, so soon I will be tapping away my usual word count, characters bobbing about between my ears, chatting away, rustling through my days for the next opportunity to get back to writing. Yup, enough playing around.

This has nothing to do with my daughter being off to college with no one she’s known for years watching her back. Nothing to do with going to bed not knowing if she’s yet in bed. Nothing to do with avoiding eye contact with my partner because if I do hold his gaze too long, he’s liable to start talking about how much he misses her, and then I’ll think I hear a crack in his voice, see the early mist of a tear in his eye, a sigh on the rise in his chest. Then I’ll start to cry. Silly me. I just need to sit down and write something.

#writing
#daughter

We Write from Memory, for Memory and Sometimes to Memory

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Memory is essential for everything we do. We learn through memory, understand through memory, forgive and even forget by way of memory. We revisit our past and consider our futures all through memories built from ours and others recall.

Recently, chatting with H. M. Jones whom I met on GooglePlus just a week or so after reading her book Monochrome (filled with the underpinnings of what motherhood is, not to mention the very important feature of memory) got me thinking back on the other avenues of writing I had taken.

Jones invited me to consider submitting a poem to a women’s online anthology she has started up to give a voice to women finding publication difficult. I haven’t tried to publish any poetry in many years, so I was surprised at how intrigued I was by the opportunity.

Memory: I remembered my pregnancy-inspired poetry from nearly twenty years ago.  I am certain her book and the various topics we touched on in our discussions were the trigger. I checked out Jones’s Brazen Bitches anthology link on her H. M. Jones Writes website. I knew instantly which one of my poems belonged among the selection she had already posted.

I searched for the one I had in mind within my file of long packed away poems. It was just as I remembered it. I returned to those strong maternal feelings for a child yet to be born and realized that my daughter had reached the age when seeing this poem inspired by her beginning would show her what my hopes had been and what they still are.

I sent “Sister Clytemnestra” to H. M. Jones and held my breath that it was ready to speak for itself.

Memory: without it writers have nothing to give. It is through memory that we find a way to speak for those not yet ready to voice for themselves or not yet filled with remembering or the remembered.

When Hannah Jones (H. M. Jones) let me know that she would be adding my poem to the anthology, I felt exuberant, and the first thought I had was that my daughter must see this poem.

I have to admit I was more excited to show her than she was to see it. But she did read it and we talked briefly about its origins and inspiration. I was expecting a, “Gee, mom, you really were thinking about me.”

That’s not what she said though. She saw familiar mythology, and remembered texts she has read and studied.

I had forgotten she was an aspiring/growing writer herself. I realize now it will be a bit before the intent of the poem and its direct connection to her rises past the other aspects she was more focused on noting.

My daughter is a designer/engineer at heart. What grabs her attention fits more under the vocabulary of “foundation,” “process,” “structure,” and “skill.” She was busy dissecting not appreciating.

But I remind myself of memory. She will remember after a bit that the poem I showed her belongs to her more than anyone else. It may speak to others, but it was speaking to her long before she was listening. And one day, she will get past the what of it and see the intent I had that she become the women that she has grown into without ever knowing that was my wish until it had already happened.

#memory
#motherhood