Alex Hughes - Author of the Mindspace Investigations series

Author of Mystery, Science Fiction and Fantasy

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Life of a Writer: The Ten Minute Rule

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As those of you who’ve been following me for awhile have seen, I’ve slowed down a lot since having a baby in terms of production. Some of this has been the simple fact of postpartum depression–a truly nasty thing no one should experience. But the clouds are lifting and I’m mostly on the other side.

No, at this point what I’m realizing more than anything else is that the writing life is intensely energy intensive. My old process pre-baby was predicated on having a block of at least five hours (it takes awhile to force myself into “flow” if my mood is pretty off to start) and being fully rested–or having the freedom and time to take a nap to become fully rested. Sadly, with the kiddo still up at night multiple times on many occasions, that’s not really something I can count on. I am exhausted–a lot. And my old system falls apart under these circumstances.

So, obviously, it’s time to find a new system. I’ve tried about a half-dozen things, including dictation, and will probably try a dozen more. Life with toddler is a moving target so it makes sense my work habits will have to become so as well, but I’m going to make this work and start getting books out the door again, even if it takes trying All the Things.

The biggest takeaway? There needs to be a plan for the day I’m so tired I can’t cope, otherwise one day will turn into two will turn into five of me doing just the minimum. I’ve been working with Cathy Yardley on finding that system, and here’s our big (and surprisingly effective) takeaway:

Ten minutes.

Yep, you read that right. Just ten minutes. Turns out hours of writing is too much to get my head around. Twenty minutes when I’m that tired seems like a billion, and I end up on the internet surfing. But ten? Ten is my magic number, apparently. I can manage ten minutes on a day I’m so tired I think my head’s going to explode. And ten focused minutes for me is often 300 words. So it’s little, and it’s not everything–there will be much experimentation yet to do, I’m sure–but having a plan in place for the day when everything goes wrong and I’ve got *nothing* is going to be important.

Because it’s always something.

Exhaustion & Updates

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So I’m coming up on the halfway mark for this whole gestating-a-human-being thing, and I’m learning (slowly and painfully) that I can’t do quite as much creative work as I would like to do at any given time. Pregnancy is exhausting, for one. Bone-crushingly exhausting. I literally spent ten minutes this afternoon fantasizing about taking a nap. (I reserve the right to take one later, if I get my work done). There’s also a TON to do to get ready for Pip when she arrives. The nursery is still in shambles. Closets are still full of things that we probably don’t need, and are empty of baby things we will need. And I have a strong hormonal urge to Nest. In my case, that means going through old financial records and closets and drawers, getting everything in order and shredding / donating the unnecessary. I’ve been to drop things off at Goodwill twice already, and am about to run a load of books to the library. This is very strange. I’m exhausted–I mean, really, crazy exhausted, even now in second trimester–and yet I’ll get up to clean closets. Holy crap. Weird.

I’m also figuring out, that despite all good intentions to the contrary, I’m good for a half day of creative work at best. Then napping or cleaning has to happen. Preferably napping then cleaning then more napping. Sam, friends, and all have been very, very supportive, but while my mother claims she could take on the world in second trimester, I am not having this experience. Working half-time is about as good as it’s going to get right now, I think. Which frustrates me on several levels, as I need to Get Things Done. Seriously.

But I have been moving forward, if slowly. How to Drive Yourself Crazy as a Writer, my awesome satirical how-to writer’s book, is coming out on Tuesday. (Preorder at Amazon, Kobo, or Barnes & Noble.) I’m very excited about proud of this one, since I wrote it during the middle of my very tough winter, and laughing really helped me.

I also figured out this past week that I had one too many subplots in Book Five, so I decided to spin one of them off into a novella. Since my writing progress has been a little slower than planned these last few weeks (and it looks like it’s going to be late November or early December before I can get Book Five out), I thought I’d go ahead and get the novella done and release it earlier to give you guys something to read from Mindspace in the meantime. Currently halfway done on the writing piece and feeling good about it.

So, to recap: Book Five will be out late November / early December, it looks like, and you’ll get a 15-20k novella from me earlier (hopefully in late September or early October). 

I’ve also accepted that I probably won’t figure out how to record and stream video for the blog to answer the amazing questions you guys asked me a few months ago. The learning curve is just a little too steep for me right now, apologies. I will gladly answer any questions you have at our next Facebook chat (focused on Sharp & Payoff but open to others) on August the 8th at 1pm CST / 2 pm EST on my official Facebook page here. I’d love to figure out video at some future point but it’s not going to happen now 🙂

My planned short story project and Mindspace Extras book are also going to the backburner. They will happen when they happen. If I can only work half days at most, I’ll need to focus all of the time I have available on Mindspace. You guys have been extraordinarily patient with me, and I want to make sure I release something great without making you wait too much longer. I am so grateful to you guys, the fans, for reading and for all your encouragement in these last months.

I’m tired, but very grateful.

The Trouble With the Back…

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So I hurt my back this week. You know, the normal way, lifting something unusually heavy several times this weekend followed by toting an insanely heavy bag all over the coworking facility in high heels. Twice. Then lifting said bag at lunch, from the floor, twisting. #ouch #andtherewenttheback

The trouble with the back is that it’s connected to freaking everything. You can’t prop your back up while you work. You can’t wrap it with an ace bandage so tight you can’t move it. You can’t lie down and hope it feels better (clue: lying flat hurt *worse*). And toilets are inconveniently located for people with back problems. Sad truth.

So, I spent most of Wednesday afternoon curled up under a heating blanket in the fetal position, doing research on pain tolerance and back pain for some future book as yet unnamed. Thursday was moderately better, if mincing around the house in a slightly-bent posture with funny faces is better. Friday and Saturday were delightful, because we’d hit the point where ibuprofen worked–for real. During the two-hour window of ibuprofen awesomeness I could get up and down from a chair again and even pick up (one or two) things from the floor. Sunday and today I have full range of motion back, if still a little sore and still on meds.

I have learned several important things from this experience:

1. Writing full time is poor preparation for heavy lifting. Experts should be hired, or weight slowly built to, not just randomly picked up like I can handle it (I can’t, apparently, even if it seems okay at the time).

2. Back pain is distracting. Like, really distracting.

3. My back recovers from *everything* much slower in my thirties than it did in my twenties. I should plan accordingly.

4. They make laptop bags / mobile offices with wheels and a handle. For under $100. I’ve bought one and thinking about a second.

5. High heels are not my friend, at least not at this weight. Oh, look, they make lots of pretty flats.

6. Pain is very motivating.

What about you guys? Have any interesting stories from back or shoulder injuries you want to share?

Too Many Choices

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There are two great truths in any life:

  1. Given enough time, resources, and energy, you can do anything.
  2. There will never be enough time, resources, and energy to do everything.

I am running up against the second rule like crazy right now. I have literally a pile of “Someday/Maybe” work and an even bigger pile of work I’d like to do reasonably soon. At last count, I had six projects thought out enough to become good novels, maybe four more still thinking through, an idea for a play, a video game, and a host of short stories, not to mention old projects I could revise and/or finish. The more I train my brain to come up with good stories, the more I come up with good stories. This is a lovely problem to have! But sometimes it’s like trying to drink out of a fire hose. A great novel takes time and focused attention, meaning I have to actively choose not to work on All the Other Things, sigh.

Of course writing isn’t all I do. I’m going to New York ComicCon at the end of the week (if you’re around there, do drop by my Dr. Who panel Sunday to say hi) I’m also working on classes I’ll be teaching in the next few months, and all the host of little business decisions that go along with writing professionally. I’d like to get back to writing short shorts for the email newsletter, for example, and I have a book launch coming up. Not to mention email, which seems to breed like rabbits whenever I leave it alone for very long.

When I worked in marketing, it was a point of professional pride that nothing I was in charge of ever got dropped. I worked in a team of at least four people to make sure that was always true. Now that I’m the one running my own working life, I’m finding out it’s not so easy. For every Thing I choose to do, there is another Thing (or five) that I cannot. Those decisions were always handled by the executive types, or the manager types above me, and I’m starting to appreciate how hard they worked to say no. It is a skill I must master this year, I think. Right now it feels like that impossible yoga pose where you balance on one leg with your knee over your shoulder, but I’ve seen people do that, too. It is not impossible! Or so I tell myself. I can do this.

So, time to stretch out the mental skills. Time to learn priorities, and do deep thinking about the novel I’ll be drafting in NaNo this year. And time, most of all, to accept that All the Things will not happen at once.

I feel very old, and very limited, all at once.

What about you guys? How do you cope with difficult decisions and juggling too many things? I’d love to hear any tips and tricks you have.

Impossible Things Before Breakfast: Or, the Mindset of the Writer of Fiction

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To be a writer of fiction, you must believe in several impossible things before breakfast. You must believe in people who never lived, places that never existed, and series of events that never happened. This is the easy part.

What is harder is seeing these made-up things clearly, so clearly that you can describe them to someone who’s never been there. To choose the specific and vivid details that will make these not-real things become real in the mind of the reader. As Viggo Mortensen said in an interview about the Lord of the Rings, “It’s just a movie. But, the more you can believe it’s not a movie, that it’s real, the better movie it will be.” A writer, like an actor, has to try to believe in his world unabashedly and with a whole heart.

Say you can do this. See the impossible made real. Put words on paper that inspire people to believe too. Say you can stitch together something special, and that you can revise it to make it even stronger.

Well, now you have to believe two impossible things at once.

First, that your work isn’t good enough yet, that you have to work to hone it and polish it until it shines, that it can always be better. That you have to always be better. That you can’t rest until you are. Stay up late, get up early, sweat and cry and shape the work over and over because it just isn’t good enough. Without this deep-rooted sense of work left to be done, you’ll never revise as you should. You’ll never challenge yourself to do the bigger, more ambitious, scarier thing. And you need to challenge yourself, over and over.

Because, at the same impossible time you know your work needs improvement, you have to somehow stretch your brain to also believe you’re brilliant. You have to believe your work has a spark of genius, a message and a truth worth saying. That you’re truly special and that your work is like nothing else in the world. That it’s worth every bit of the sweat and blood and tears and that someone, somewhere will be profoundly touched by what you have to say. Without this unshakeable faith, you’ll never keep writing. You’ll never settle in to the hard, bitter work of writing and keep going despite all odds.

In an art where we regularly describe six impossible things before breakfast in vivid detail, perhaps we can open our minds a bit more. Perhaps we can embrace the two contradictory truths:

None of us are half as good as we need to be. Our work needs more work.

But, all of us have something rare and important to say, something that needs to be said.

 

What inspires you to keep writing?

 

A Dream Realized – Two Book Deal

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Well, the announcement came out yesterday, so I can finally talk about my big news! Here’s the quote from Publisher’s Lunch, which covers the latest sales of books to publishers:

Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award semi-finalist Alex Hughes’s first two books in a dystopian thriller series featuring a telepath forced to assist a hostile Atlanta police department, to Jesse Feldman at Roc, by Alexandra Machinist at Janklow & Nesbit (World English).

In other words, my book Clean and its sequel (as yet unwritten) sold to Penguin! This is a lifelong dream for me and a chance to see my books on the shelf in a real bookstore. Plus I’ve always liked the Roc imprint – the idea that I could be a part of such a great brand is just an amazing thought.

So, how did it all happen? I got a call from Jesse Feldman from Penguin the first day of Odyssey, in the afternoon. “Penguin?” I stammered, “As in the publisher?” Yes, indeed, Jesse said. She wanted to buy my book, you know, the one I submitted to the ABNA? I sat down.

I spent the next few days (after freaking out in front of all the other writers there) talking to my agent, Ms. Alexandra Machinist, the most patient person in the world and very smart. I talked to Jeanne, the head of Odyssey, who at one point was a book editor, and asked lots of questions. And then, when I had absorbed as much information as my head could hold, I sat back while Alexandra and Jesse talked about details. For several weeks.

Fortunately, there wasn’t much time to freak out. I had work to do for Odyssey, after all. But by the time I finished the program, we had an agreement. I was going to be a published author! At Roc! With two books! Needless to say, I did a very wild happy dance all around the dorms.

Then I settled down to business. As Jeanne says, you only get one chance to be a first-time novelist. There’s a lot of work to be done and a lot of things to think about. I’m still over the moon, despite the time that has passed. But I’m also very aware this is only Step One out of twenty or so to reach my goal: a real career as a writer.

I’ll keep you informed as all of this shakes out.

Update & Happiness

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I’ve been holding off on updating the blog since I’ve gotten to Odyssey, partly because of the intense workload, and party because I’ve been waiting to share the details of the happy phone call I got on the first day. Still waiting for some of the details on that to work out (more details later) but what I can share is this:

The lovely agent who contacted me a few weeks ago for the full manuscript of Clean has signed me on as a client!! Exciting times!

After all this time trying to break in, turns out a contest I didn’t win made all the difference. 🙂 Crazy world, isn’t it? It’s a huge validation for all the work I’ve been doing to keep getting better and make the writing as strong as possible. Persistence pays off.

 

A Dilemma Solved

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As most of you know already, the last few weeks I’ve been facing an interesting dilemma: namely, the possibility that I would have to choose between the Odyssey Writing Workshop (who already has my money) and the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Awards finalist trip. A small possibility, for certain – perhaps 6% statistically – but a real one. Neither party was willing to budge on their requirements, and it would be nearly impossible to do both.

This week, I found out through the resounding silence that Amazon has probably not picked me for their small group of finalists this year. They had promised to contact finalists “on or about May 16th” by phone or email, and as of this morning I have still heard absolutely nothing. It’s a little like finding out someone has broken up with you because they don’t call – it’s unsettling. But, the announcement of the finalists will be next week, so, like receiving an engagement announcement 2 weeks after the breakup, I’ll get to know for certain that it wasn’t me.

But, after a couple days of carrying my phone with my everywhere, I’m actually not as sad as I expected. Top fifty out of five thousand is still amazing. I’ve still gotten a chance to prove I can write, and to see my name next to “author” on Amazon. That’s a dream in and of itself. Plus, with the agent’s full manuscript request of last week, I’ve made it one more step in the publishing process. So, all in all, it’s a win.

So now, it’s time to settle down and prepare for Odyssey with a singleminded focus. It’s going to be a ride.

Happy Dance!

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I found out Tuesday that I made the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Awards SemiFinalists! For those that don’t know, that’s top 50 out of 5,000. It’s a miracle, and a dream, and only one cut away from a trip to New York.

I’ve said since January that this was going to be the year – and it looks like it’s starting. 🙂 I literally jumped up and down when I heard the news, called everyone I knew, and told my hubbie we were going out for a celebratory dinner and champagne. It still doesn’t seem real!

Even better than the news though is the feedback I got from the Publisher’s Weekly Reviewer. I’ll reprint it below so you can celebrate with me too:

—–

The nameless narrator of this hard-bitten futuristic detective yarn struggles with addiction and recovery throughout a solid, tightly-written story. Years ago, the human race nearly destroyed itself in a series of wars and other catastrophic events. In a world of AirCruiser vehicles, teleporting techniques, and telepathic abilities – all skillfully woven into the story – the narrator, a telepath, stumbles across a serial murder case that pits the police department against the the Telepaths’ Guild. As the narrator and his partner, homicide detective Isabella Cherabino, untangle clues in a race to solve the murders and catch the killer, they slowly acknowledge their mutual attraction. The backgrounds of the narrator and Cherabino come to light via snippets of information that serve to delineate each character. The narrator’s former addiction to super-drug Satin is well represented in his struggles and cravings as he attempts to come to grips with his past mistakes. Written with clean strokes and a sturdy grasp of plot structure, this manuscript reaches a neat conclusion that isn’t too pat, while setting up hope for the future of the flawed narrator.

—

How amazing is that? Off to *Squee!* And celebrate some more!

Wrestling with the Dragon: Taming Insecurities

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Most highly creative people struggle with self-doubt. Am I good enough? Is the work good enough? The difficulty of “breaking in” to most any creative field makes it that much harder. You’re inundated with rejection notes. Passes at auditions. People criticizing you at every turn.

But far worse is the Inner Critic – you know who I’m talking about. The one that mocks the work even before you sit down to write it. The one that makes the first part of your creative life living hell. The little voice inside you that insists you’re not good enough, you’re not smart enough, you’re not succeeding and you might as well go home. The Inner Critic will do its very, very best to make you give up – or at least put off your dreams. It will remind you of every failure, every stumble, and every insecurity you’ve ever had.

But guess what? Every other successful creative person has faced that same voice, those same insecurities. Every success has stood against this dragon, nostrils belching smoke, and heard the evil words masquerading as realism. Every one has faced this first and most deadly enemy of the creative mind. And every one – all of the successes you hear and read and watch – have found a way to knock it down.

There’s the brute force approach. With a sharp sword of cussed determination, you can walk up to the dragon and tell it to F**k Off – or whatever conveys your personal disgust. If you are resolute and unflinching, the dragon will back down. But it will be back.

If your resolution wavers in the face of such a fearsome beast, try another approach. Bribery sometimes works – offer it chocolate. Or literary praise. But if more than ten minutes have elapsed and it will not leave, grow more stern. You will do this, tell it. You will do this with or without it. Wouldn’t it rather take its chocolate and leave? Then, hands shaking, heart sinking, slog through the Swamp of Despair with it by your side. Do your creative thing with difficulty and repetition until it leaves.

Or, you might try trickery. Dragons are quite stupid, actually, and dragons of insecurity rarely think for themselves. If it speaks in your Aunt Ethel’s voice, tell it Aunt Ethel is a fool who knows nothing of art and move on. Or, if it taunts you with the thought that your work will be terrible, agree with it promptly, and send it off with your thanks. By the time you’ve written your next scene or chapter (badly if necessary), it will have gotten lost in the woods somewhere, hopefully not to return. After all, you don’t have to share your work with anyone else if you don’t like it. The creative process is a happily solitary one.

But, in the nasty event that your dragon latches on with words like Failure, Dismal, and Not Enough, you may be forced to wrestle. This is a painful process that should be avoided if possible, but in the case of a latched-on parasitic dragon, must be done or you risk losing any joy you have in your art. Take a deep breath. Gather your arsenal of weapons against the dragon – compliments if necessary, the reasons you love what you do, and any past successes – and cock your first arrow to the bow. Fire every arrow you have at it – with repetition, and with posts on the wall –  and if it still will not let go, get out your knife.

If you must cut out your regrets, your shame, your fears along with its claws, it must be done. Pour out the words onto a notebook. Name your fears. Then, with sharp pen and stubborn bravery, face them. Tear them out of the notebook and up into small pieces. Say, this thing will not stop me anymore. Then, take a day for your heart to heal. Rest. Then take up your creativity again, and go bravely into the night. Your path is worth it.

When the dragon comes back – and one day it will – say to it, I have defeated you once and I will again. I will not stop, I will not turn back, I will not falter. Then start again on your strategies.

Your journey of creativity, your art, is worth the struggle. It is worth the pain. It is worth the trouble. Because, whether it ever receives the world’s attention, it has done something powerful for you: it has made you a better person, a stronger one, someone who is brave enough to look in the mirror of art and dare to dream anew.

Do not give up. Do not give up. And…. when the going gets tough and you look at someone else’s successes, when the dragon looks bigger than it ever has, when it screams at you with fiery darts…. do *not* give up. The hero is the one who does not and will not turn back.