It’s funny that people think I’m going to curse up a storm upon meeting them.

It’s understandable. I tend to be rather profane on this here blog (er, this here motherfucking bastard of a blog). I like to curse! Profanity is a circus of language. It’s a spoken world of dizzying trapeze jumps and exploding clowns and lions eating bears or whatever the hell happens at the circus (I haven’t been to the circus in a long while, shut up).

But I thought I should warn you, since this seems like it might be of some disappointment:

I don’t actually curse that much in person.

At least, not in polite company. Like, if I just meet you, I’m not going to be like, “WHAT UP MOTHERFUCKER” and then give you a wedgie. I’m not going to abrade you with my beard and say words like “shit-turkey” or “cock-spackle” or “fuck-sundae” unbidden. I’m certainly not going to get on a panel (where children might be present) and talk about, y’know, jizz or whatever.

As I grow more comfortable with you, I may pepper in a little profanity. And if we become truly close — like, my beard cilia begin to harvest your flesh — I may utter a steady stream of gibbered profanities from the Time Before Man into your ear in a ritual unlocking so that I may milk your pineal gland of all its wisdom and turn you into another one of my Wendigo-Puppets.

(AKA “Wendogs.”)

But, just to warn you: I probably won’t be all that cursey when we meet.

Probably.

Last week’s challenge: “Must Contain…“

Cyberpunk. Steampunk. Dieselpunk.

The literary subgenre -punk contains, as I see it, a couple key features —

a) A world taken over by the technology or fuel source or by humans (often in an authoritarian role) attempting to control the utilization and implementation of that tech or resource.

and

b) Characters who represent an anarchic, rebel “punk” vibe in this world.

Certainly other definitions could apply, but this is the one I’m going for today. The Matrix works as cyberpunk because you have the authoritarian machine regime and also the radical activists who dress all bad-ass and work to break the regime and its system to itty bitty pieces. Is Star Wars spacepunk? Forcepunk? If you really wanted to be cynical, you might suggest that we — right now — live in an Oilpunk world. BUT I DETECT NO CYNICS HERE. Ahem.

Anyway.

Your job is to write 1000 words of fiction in a new SomethingPunk world.

Where [Something] is a noun (tech/resource, most likely) you choose.

Definitely no cyberpunk, steampunk, dieselpunk.

That said, if you’re feeling a bit daunted by this initial open choice, I’ve included ten options below that you could grab and use in order to write this flash fiction challenge. Grab a d10 or choose randomly. If you grab from the list, the interpretation you choose is entirely up to you. (Most of those can go several ways, I suspect.)

You’ve got one week, par usual — due by noon EST on March 21st (Friday).

Post at your blog or online space. Link to your story in the comments below.

SomethingPunk Possibilities

1. Ghostpunk
2. Hellpunk
3. Cowpunk
4. Bloodpunk
5. Soulpunk
6. Geopunk
7. Godpunk*
8. Beastpunk
9. Dustpunk
10. Germpunk

* originally written “godspunk,” which sounds like “god-spunk” instead of “gods-punk.”

Mexican Federal Agent Marcos Camarena dedicated his life to the job. But in a country where white knights die meaningless deaths, martyred in a hole with fifty other headless bodies in the desert, corruption is not an attribute but a scale; no longer a stigma but the status quo. When Marcos’s life is threatened, he leaves law enforcement and his life in Mexico City behind for a coastal resort town—until an old friend asks him to look after an outspoken politician, a woman who knows cartel violence all too well. Despite his best efforts, Marcos can’t find it in his heart to refuse, and soon finds himself isolated on the political front lines of the war on drugs.

Write to find your voice.

I read a lot of fiction. Between books and short stories the word count can, at times, become ridiculous to the point that my brain can’t retain it all and I have to take a day or two to reflect and decompress. Reading is important, as they say, to the development of a writer. It’s true and unfortunate for a lot of writers that reading is the first activity to feel the squeeze when more is added to the already full plate of family, work, friends, writing, etc. Such is life, even for those of us who cut sleep to the bone.

But I think even more important – as such wise sages as Joe R. Lansdale and Chuck Wendig will also tell you – is to get your ass in the seat, buckle down and write. Every day. Every other day. Whatever – you make the goal. I wrote my first novel in mid-2012. Thought I could surpass my fellow first novelists’ problems (too long, too short, too fat, too skinny, you name it) and plot-wise promptly ended up with everything AND the kitchen sink. But it’s my first novel and it rocks so let’s kick it to agents, shall we? Crickets.

I received one piece of feedback from a respected agent that drove me on. To summarize: This is good, but it’s not you.

It’s not you.

Damn, right? But I continued to write, almost every day, and I think over the past eighteen months between Federales and a range of short stories, I’ve found my voice. Is it good? Who knows, that’s for the reader to judge. Will it evolve? Yes, I’m learning more every day. But it’s me. Thinking about it didn’t get me there, writing did.

Less is More.

With finding my voice came a discovery of my style – less is more. I don’t mean “minimalism” and don’t get me wrong: I love a gritty crime novel stuffed with violence and action, even ‘forget reloading’ over-the-top action. But it’s not me. I’ve tried (and will again) with short fiction but when I sit back and take it all in, I always seem to find a slow burn staring back at me.

Maybe it’s in my DNA. I’m certain it’s the kind of books and television I enjoy. True Detective, Drive, Memories of Murder, The Wrestler, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. Queenpin by Megan Abbott, Battleborn by Claire Vaye Watkins, In a Lonely Place by Dorothy B. Hughes, “A Good Man is Hard to Find” by Flannery O’Conner. I’m inspired by the likes of these works daily. The way a story can hinge on one action, one scene, burning an image into your mind. Something as subtle as the significance of a dress hanging in a closet, or a character’s grim determination hinting at stubbornness that you know can only lead down a dark road. What’s said and more importantly, what isn’t said. The impact of each heightened by the subdued surroundings where they might otherwise be lost amid the static.

Perhaps it’s the slow burn mentality so rooted in the history of the noir subgenre (at least with Cain and Hughes) that rings with me. The underdogs and their irrational hope in the face of almost certain failure. Here, I think, I’ve found where I fit.

It has a name: Hamartia.

The classical Greek term for the hero’s “tragic flaw.” The downfall of the White Knight. Despite a character’s best efforts at becoming cynical and immune to his sympathies for others, he remains devoted to The Right Thing. He tries to do X, but his actions have the opposite effect, resulting in the ultimate tragedy that is his disastrous fate.

An idea I subconsciously knew, but hadn’t fully wrapped my arms around.  Thanks to my man, Bracken MacLeod, for the lesson.

Researching Mexico, noir central.

Politics and Spring Break aside, the country of Mexico is largely out of sight, out of mind for Americans. The goods come in, the goods go out. Drugs come in, money goes out. And I heard there’s violence, right? Lots of violence. But not in my neighborhood.

The violence in Mexico is extreme. Estimates of the number of people killed in drug-related violence since 2006 hover around 60,000. But what I find even more chilling is the threat of violence. Can you imagine police in the United States (I use the U.S. as an example because it is where I live, but take your pick of the First World) covering their face during an arrest, at a crime scene or press conference for fear of being recognized and putting their friends and family in the cross hairs of retaliation? Can you imagine paramedics waiting for a victim of a shooting to die before providing aid, because his survival means their deaths? Or thousands of armed vigilantes patrolling a state, complete with sandbag bunkers and checkpoints, because the police, or in this case, the military, have failed to bring law and order to their lives? It’s not just the stuff of fiction.

Love to write? Love to edit.

I’ve found most of the writers I know fall into one of two camps: Those that love the draft (crank it out, it’s shit anyway) and the meticulous editor. I fall into the latter category, sometimes to the extreme, especially while writing short stories. I find a first draft can be downright frightening at times. At the start of my current WIP novel, I sat writing and rewriting and rewriting the first sentence for an hour before I just gave up and moved on. Just last week I put out a meager 400 words in three hours because I was afraid of the garbage that would spill out. But that’s what a first draft is, right? Garbage. So you just have to power through and get it all down on the page.

While I find it satisfying to finish a writing session with a solid word count, it doesn’t compare to the high of the editorial process. Spending a morning revisiting a chapter, playing with sentences, adding key details here and there. Moving on to the next chapter knowing (hoping?) you’ve got something great that you can pass on to your writing group/spouse/editor/etc. for further critique. There’s nothing better in the writing process than that, for me.

Christopher Irvin: Website | Twitter

Federales: Amazon

I feel like I should say more than that, but really, that’s all that matters. If you swing by Goodreads, you can sign up for a free giveaway of the newest Miriam Black book, The Cormorant.

So, you should go do that now:

Goodreads Giveaway Link for The Cormorant.

Make with the clicky-clicky.

Maybe get a free book.

MAYBE GET A FREE PONY.*

* no pony.

Hey, did you know I’m gonna be at the Tucson Festival of Books this weekend?

OH BUT I AM.

I shall be flying in for the weekend and doing battle with various saguaro cacti and black widow spiders in order to bring you me, the beard, my books, and my wisdom — er, “wisdom.” Sorry, I was told by a court of law that I had to put that in very obvious air quotes. Whatever. Stupid judge. Point is! I’m going to be there, and so will other awesome people like, ohhh, say: Kevin Hearne, Sam Sykes, Elizabeth Bear, Jonathan Maberry, and more.

My schedule is below (or you can see it here at the festival website).

Workshop: How to Hook Readers With Your Blog

A central component of many an author’s online presence is the blog or web log, an easy-to-update website that makes it simple to keep in touch with your fans. How do you get readers to visit your blog in the first place, and what makes a blog compelling and entertaining enough that visitors will want to come back to it again and again?

Integrated Learning Center Room 137 (Seats 60, Wheelchair accessible)

Sat, Mar 15, 10:00 am – 11:00 am

Book/Movie Biz

Signing area: Sales & Signing Area #4 – Integrated Learning Center (following presentation)

Panelists: Shari Stauch, Chuck Wendig

Signing: UA Tent

Sat, Mar 15, 1:00pm

Signing will be located in the University of Arizona bookstore;s main tent on the UA mall.

Building Your Platform

What is an author’s platform, anyway? Industry professionals use the idea to refer to several things, but perhaps the easiest way to think about it is that your platform is made up of the people who know you and your work: your fans, in other words. In addition to writing great books, building your fan base is critical to your long-term success as an author: discover how to do it in this session.

Integrated Learning Center Room 130 (Seats 143, Wheelchair accessible)

Sat, Mar 15, 2:30 pm – 3:30 pm

Book/Movie Biz

Signing area: Sales & Signing Area #4 – Integrated Learning Center (following presentation)

Panelists: Vickie Mullins, Grael Norton, Chuck Wendig

Moderator: Mary Holden

World Building: Creating Imaginary Worlds

Fantasy authors use their imaginations to create richly detailed worlds with their own geographies, histories, cultures, languages, and inhabitants. Four authors will share their processes of world building.

Education Kiva (Seats 200)

Sun, Mar 16, 11:30 am – 12:30 pm

Children/Teens

Signing area: Signing Area #3 – Children’s (following presentation)

Panelists: Cornelia Funke, Aprilynne Pike, Janni Lee Simner, Chuck Wendig

Moderator: Nancy Brown

Writing for the YA Market

This panel of successful authors of young adult fiction will share their analysis of the current YA market and their strategies as authors of different genres, including realistic fiction, fantasy and science fiction.

Student Union Santa Rita (Seats 120)

Sun, Mar 16, 2:30 pm – 3:30 pm

Book/Movie Biz

Signing area: Sales & Signing Area #1 – UA BookStore Tent (following presentation)

Panelists: Nicole McInnes, Page Morgan, Chuck Wendig

I’ve talked about this before, and I certainly like to joke that my creative process takes a certain path, and that writing a book tends to go through a certain set of stages — and that remains true but as I write book after book (being fortunate enough to have a rather large slate of books released in a very short amount of time), I’m learning that while many of these emotional pivot points seem guaranteed, what isn’t guaranteed is the order in which they present themselves.

What follows are many of the, erm, feelings I seem to experience while writing books. I can experience these feelings week to week, day to day, even hour to hour.

(Oh, and the solution to many of these is simple: just keep writing. Get it done. Fix it in post.)

1. Everything Is Awesome

STORYTIME DANCE PARTY. Everything is fireworks and rainbows and hoverboards. Sometimes you’re writing and everything just feels good. Shit just works. It’s like a day where everyone is on time and you find money in the pocket of an old jacket and it’s lights and colors and you can smell numbers and taste dreams. You feel like, this is the best thing I’ve ever done, this is the next level, all the words are lining up like they’re supposed to. It’s high-fives and blow-jobs. It’s cosmic cunnilingus from the gods themselves.

2. Everything Is Nuclear Dogshit

Ahh, the emotion that so frequently follows the everything is awesome stage — this is the crash after a high, this is the hard landing after a flight, this is the doom volcano erupting in order to end your civilization’s Golden Age. You hit this point where nothing works. All the words taste of ash and pee. Your entire book sounds like this inside your head: BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH BUH BUH BBBBBT FZZZZ AAAAAAAAH. You’re not even sure you’re writing in your native language anymore. You seriously contemplate not only deleting the manuscript, but actually hitting your computer with a hammer so that no remnant of your awfulness may remain to poison the lovely world to which you should have never been born.

3. Everything Is Distracting

Hey, guys, Twitter is on! So is Facebook! Hey, an email. Hey, new iPhone game. Hey, the finale to last night’s Favorite Show was on. I don’t wanna miss it! Jeez, what’s the weather doing? What’s the weather doing in Chicago? Toronto? Capetown? Xibalba? How’s the moon? Is the moon good? HA HA HA look at this funny meme where they take kangaroos and dress them up as the Queen of England and then they punch children. Goddamn kangaroos, you hilarious. Ooh video games. And candy. Dopamine delights! Don’t I have some cocaine? COKE BINGE, that’ll help the writing. Jeez, what’s the weather doing? COKE BINGE PART TWO! Did I write any words today?

4. Everyone Is Bothering Me

People won’t shut up. The dog won’t stop farting in your office. A toddler is at your door and it’s not even your toddler. The trash truck is outside rattling cans and they’ve been there for — *checks watch* — 47 minutes. Car alarm. Phone calls from your mother. Overzealous helper monkey. Just as you start to gain a little momentum, something undercuts it — and then going back to the words feels like just getting going again.

5. Don’t Worry, I’m Doing Things That Feel Like Writing!

I’m researching! Worldbuilding! Outlining! Reoutlining! Re-reoutlining! I’m reading about writing! I’m reading about publishing! I’m finding celebrity photos of who should play my characters in the eventual movie! Now I’m Photoshopping them because I wanna know what Brad Pitt and Jennifer Lawrence’s children will look like (SO GOLDEN, LIKE LITTLE HUMAN OSCAR STATUETTES.) I will now take time to imagine what my book cover will look like. So photorealistic! Now I’m tweeting — I mean, “building my platform or brand or base or audience or something professional-sounding.” I’ve written nothing today! Ha ha ha *weeps*

6. The Blank Page Is A Terrifying Polar Expanse Where I Will Die

It’s a big blank page. Tabula rasa, baby. It’s biggest and emptiest on the first day of writing, though nearly any day of writing can see you confronted by a new page, devoid of words. Some writers get excited. Me? It freaks me out. It’s too big. Too white. I feel like I’m just gonna shit up this pretty snowscape with my trompy stompy dirty boots. It’s like a mountain before an avalanche. It’s like the white light of death. It’s the sheer infinity of potential. The unrefined expanse of utter possibility. And anything I do feels like ruining it.

7. Course Correction: Glue, Duct Tape, Bubble Gum, A Sextant

You realize something’s wrong. But you don’t feel like fixing it. So it’s clumsy patch job time — so you MacGuyver the story, making swift changes with the dearest hopes you can fix it in the edit. (Any beta reader would be like, “Why does the main character suddenly become a woman? And his magic talking sword just became her magic talking shotgun. Where’d that wombat come from?”) The attitude is basically: WHATEVER, FUCK IT, NO TIME TO FIX, MOVE, MOVE, MOVE.

8. I Made A Wrong Turn At Albuquerque

You realize something’s wrong. And it went wrong about 100 pages ago. Which makes the last 100 pages a miserable, meaningless wander into the wilderness. Devoid of value. Epic waste of time. You suddenly see no way forward without going back and fixing the part where your character stepped on a butterfly and ruined everything you stupid character. Behold the gut-wrenching, sphincter-clenching dread of deleting 100 pages from your manuscript. Your tears will taste of printer ink. Your mouth will taste of char.

9. Oh, Crap, None Of This Makes Sense At All

That terrible moment when you realize the entirety of your story hinges on a thing that doesn’t make any sense. It’s not a plothole so much as the hole in a well-tied plot-noose. If the character on page ten would just do the logical sensible thing and throw away the Doomed Widget of Kjarn, the entire book falls apart. You realize suddenly that everything hangs on a broken hinge, the whole conflict held fast to some kind of Escherprint logic that throws the whole tale into the fucking woodchipper. “Wait, the main character could’ve just pushed a button in the first act that would’ve solved the whole thing? OH GODDAMNIT.”

10. Old Man Lost In A Shopping Mall (aka, Me In A CD Store, Circa 1997)

You wander. Aimlessly. You’re pretty sure a plot will come along and introduce itself eventually? The characters seemed like they had motivation but nothing is really happening? The conflict seemed like a good one but now seems as tense as a damp shirt draped over a drooping clothesline. You just keep writing because that feels like what you’re supposed to do.

11. I Should Not Be A Writer And My Soul Is Forfeit

This can happen at any point. Before the day’s writing begins. At the day’s end. At the book’s end. In the middle of a fucking sentence. It’s just — wham. You hit this point where existential panic throttles the little writer that pilots you. You’re suddenly all, “I can’t do this. I am not good at this. I can’t hack it. I should not be a writer. I am not a writer.” And you start looking for an eject button or a trap-door. You hit the Select All shortcut and contemplate stabbing the delete button with an angry finger. Dread and doom and lifeless void. Breathless fear of failure, fear of success, fear of judgment. Grave uncertainty. Dry mouth. Squeaky hiss from the back of your throat. Everyone is better than me, you think. My cat would make a better writer.

12. I Wrote Four Words Today (“The Trickled Pee”)

Every word is like extracting a rotten tooth with a pair of rusty needle-nose pliers. It is a day of great effort that yields nearly no result. A rich, full fruit tree with one fucking apple dangling.

13. I Wrote Forty Thousand Words Today (“Drinking From The Firehose”)

The words won’t stop. You can’t stanch the flow.  Story geyser. You’re not sure if it’s a firehose shooting top-shelf whisk(e)y or a cannon lobbing gobbets of sewage — all you know is, by the time you’re done you’re trembling and frothy with sweat and you just wrote like, 15% of your book in one day. It’s like a fugue state meets automatic writing.

14. Picking Nits

You’re afraid to move forward and so you hover, or even drift backward, editing the work as you go. You just can’t stop messing with it — like fidgeting with a hangnail instead of letting it heal. Does it come from a lack of confidence? A fear of moving forward? An obsessive nature? No matter the origin, it undercuts momentum. Like repeatedly stopping to tie your shoes during a marathon.

15. Meh

Says it all.

16. I Love This One Line So Much

One sentence out of everything you wrote today is beautiful and powerful and impactful and it makes all of it worth it. All the doubt, all the terror, all the existential dread. One sentence, its component words shining like scattered diamonds. One line, giving you the guts to move forward without hitting delete and going downstairs to cry-eat a handful of cake.

17. It Sounded Good In My Head

Your brain is such an asshole. You had an idea. It unfolded into a book. With characters. And plots. And ideas emerging from other ideas. And then you started writing it. And now you’re like, “This is just… this is dumb as shit. It’s stu… it’s so stupid. The Muse lied. What the fuck was I thinking? Oh, god. I’ve wasted so much time on this.”

18. I Hate This Character

You know characters can be unlikable. But readers have to spend time with this character. Worse, you have to spend time with him, too. And now you despise him. He’s a wanking, preening peacock. Or a dickish dickhead who just dicks everything up. He’s precious. Or dumb. Or irritating. You just wanna punch him in his doofusy face. You’re now seriously considering killing him off at the midpoint of the novel and quietly installing a new protagonist. Goddamnit.

19. I Love This Character And Cannot Hurt Them

The character is the best. You understand her. She’s already been through Hell and suddenly you don’t want to put her through any more. You’ve lost empathy and found sympathy. You’re supposed to be throwing her into a pit with demons and yetis and ex-lovers and sharp pointy sticks and instead your greatest urge is to coddle and protect and keep her safe.

20. This Subplot Just Took Over

It’s like an invasive species, this subplot. A root that started small but now it just choked out the biggest tree in the forest without you even realizing it. You’ve created a subplot that is way more interesting than the main plot. Crap crap crap crap crap. On the one hand: yay for a compelling plot. On the other hand: boo for having to rewrite the whole story to make it work.

21. Wouldn’t It Be Cool If…

A flash of inspiration! Like a spear of light pinning your mind right to the story. Revelation and epiphany! Wouldn’t it be cool if [insert cool plot hook here, maybe something featuring orangutan spies or jetpack ladies or some kind of time-traveling pterodactyl paradox].

22. Wait, Shit, That Doesn’t Work

Your balloon animal just popped. The cool idea you just had? Won’t work. Wilting story boner. Sad trombone. Cool idea cannot justify its own existence. Back to the idea factory.

23. I Have Way Too Much / Not Enough Story 

You’re 50,000 words into the story. And you realize one of two things: a) “Hey, I’m almost done this bo… oh god I’m only 50,000 words in and the book is already done? This is supposed to be an epic fantasy!” or b) “Holy fucksocks, I’m 50k deep and I haven’t even introduced the main character yet.” You have not enough story or too much. You are feast or famine. You have underwritten or overwritten. Cue the cold saline rush of terror.

24. Everything Just Clicked

Hear that sound? It’s the sound of dominoes falling together in a neat line — it’s like the playing card in a child’s bicycle spokes. Everything clicks. Everything works. Everything makes sense. You don’t know if it’s good or right or how much you’ll have to fix but none of that matters. Because it all feels right and your march to the end of this story feels suddenly ineluctable — forward progress is now unstoppable. You can do this.

25. Apex Or Nadir

The ending. Game over, man, game over. You don’t know if it’s the height of art or the deepest pit of poo-slurry. Maybe it’s all 1s, maybe it’s all 0s. You have no perspective, but what matters is, you’re done. And finishing a story — particularly a whole novel — comes complete with a host of its own divergent emotions. Maybe you feel excited. Triumphant. Tired. Spent. Maybe you’re hungry. Are you hungry? You’re probably hungry. Maybe you’re happy it’s done. Or mad because you want more. Happy-mad. Mad-happy. Who knows? Whether everything is sheer apotheosis or just raw open ass, you did it. You’re done (for now). Walk away as the building explodes behind you. Go have a snack and a nap. Then hunker down for the edits.

* * *