Idea Process or Why it's Really Important to Steal From Others.

Stealing is bad. Stealing will get your ass tossed in jail. Unless you're a great writer.

"Good writers borrow from other writers. Great writers steal from them outright."

It's very important early in your writing career to leech onto a writing process. Discover what works best for you and stick with it until it no longer makes sense or doesn't work. I was lucky enough to stumble upon a comic that had a very simple Stan Lee script inside. The Marvel Way was what it was called. I stole what Stan carelessly left lying around and I made it the bitch that it is today.

Big Idea!

The idea, the scene or the character. (Sometime the title.) Is always where I start. For this we are gonna talk about Coffin Hunters. It's been my main focus lately. (Please check out the Coffin Hunters tumblr page.) Freshly on my mind.

Coffin Hunters came from my love of westerns, reading about grave robbing and Abbott and Costello. When it's an idea I almost always start with; What If...? What if Abbott and Costello were not total nincompoots, but a pair of fairly competent cowboys with a volatile relationship.

I already had a title; Coffin Hunters and the basis of the characters. Abbott and Costello. All I really had to do was just flesh them out.

Enter J.K. Rowlings. Harry Potter was on everyones mind. I messed around with the idea of Bing Blanchard and O'Toole being wizards. Replacing guns with wands and having them flying around the wild west on broom sticks. Fun as that sounds now it really never interested beyond the What if? stage. That is until I read Jim Zub Skullkickers several years later and it all came to me.

Mystery.

The reader is not sure who the main characters of Skullkickers really are, we just know they kickass and they seem out of place in their setting.

Blame!

That's what I wanted with Coffin Hunters main characters. They need to have that sense of mystery surround them. Who are these guys? I came up with an ever changing logline...

Two east coast cops, that don't like each other much, chase nefarious grave diggers and other oddities across the weird wild west. 

and Coffin Hunters idea was unofficially born.

Every writer is a thief. Some of us are more clever than others at disguising our robberies. 

Tools of Madness

Tools, Tools, Tools. You wanna be good at something you need a good set of tools. For writers there is a lot of great tools available. I find it fascinating when other writers talk about their tools.

MY WORKPLACE.

70% of my writing is done right in my kitchen. It's the quietest place in my little apartment. Easy access to the fridge and my favorite snacks. It's actually a nice set-up perfect amount of light, the backdoor is right next to my chair. Most workplaces I've seen are cluttered and look like Oscar Madison's bedroom. Not me, I'm fairly uncluttered.

MY "OTHER" WORKPLACE.

The other 30% is a mixture of my bedroom, work and car. If you're like me your best ideas come when you're about to fall asleep, working or driving.

MY PHONE.

I really don't write as much as I should. Still not comfortable enough with the small keypad. I have an LG LG2 which has an above average screen. It's not a bad phone for reading. I think I might give the Galaxy Note II (or best version available when my contract is up for an upgrade.)

MY COMPUTER.

It is what is it. My space is limited to my kitchen table and I would love to get a second monitor. Even though it's a buncha years old and way past that upgrade point. I'm very happy with it. It's actually portable enough where I don't need much space to work because it's an All-In-One computer. I do a fair amount of side work lettering comic books. Work a great deal with Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop and dabble with HTML programs.

I've thought about getting a laptop for the bedroom but...

MY TABLET.

I think is perfect for the bedroom. Lots of time I find myself lying there composing songs and thinking up new ways to kill off new and old characters. I own a Kindle and Android tablet. They both do a great job for what I need them for.

SOFTWARE/APPS

I couldn't live without Google Doc. Everything I write eventually goes up into the google doc cloud. Doc is my primary writing tool. Period. I use it on my phone. I use it on my tablet. I use it on computer. When I'm not using doc, i'll use Final Draft like most rooty tooty writers. Another good writing program is Open Office.

I use Google Hangouts a shit ton. Coffin Hunters co-creator and collaborator Joe Simmons and I are always chatting it up. Working on new ideas for Coffin Hunters and other dream projects.

For the longest time Thunderbird was my writing software of choice. Now it just home to my most used gmail accounts. (NOTE: Google just released INBOX and it's sexy as hell.)

Dropbox and Evernote are my other two most used apps for sharing files and writing. I should probably use Evernote more than I do.

SOCIAL MEDIA OR TIME WASTERS.

I won't lie. Social Media and forums are my kryptonite. I send a good 20 hours of my day on place like Twitter, Tumblr, Blogger and Instagram. Thankfully they don't suck as much time as Facebook did. Which I 100% avoid when I can nowadays. There is a new spot on the web called Ello I kinda dig because of it's simpleness. I still enjoy hanging out on forums. Meet a lot of creative people there. One particular place Digital Webbing.

OTHERS.

I always have a pen and notebook nearby. I'd love to have a fancy pen, but with a five year old and a middle school teenager. They would just go missing. A simple Papermate, Sharpie or a good old fashion #2 pencil isn't far out of reach.

Same stories with notebooks. Loved to have a buncha Moleskin journals but they would just end up being a coloring book. Nothing wrong with a Steno Pad.

I always have Spotify playing in the background.

Not far out of reach are some of my favorite books. I'm always flipping through them whenever I get stuck. Doug TenNaple, Carl Hiaasen, Jasper Fford, Lewis Carrol, J.M. Barrie and Showcase Present books are a personal favorite.

THINGS I NEED.

Things I need could and should be it's own post. But the biggest thing would have to be a way to control my writing time. Most common suggestion is getting a cooking clicker.

That's about does it. I'm sure I will have an "Oh Yeah!" moment and want to add something later.

Carry on,

Publishing Goals For 2015

In effort to post more to this new shiny blog and to continue to ploog towards my ultimate goal of scratching eeking out a living writing. I've put together a goal and schedule of things I need to have done by this time next year.

SHORT FICTION OR ZERO-FUCKERY STORYTELLING: I'd like to write one or two short stories a month for my patreon page. (http://www.patreon.com/fisticuffswriting) Get some content flowing and build an audience.

MARTIANS BOOKS: Martians Hate Earth is the first book (novella, short story, comic book, whatever) in the series of three books. The first book is plotted out.

COFFIN HUNTERS: I really want this to be a comic book, maybe even a novella, too. Thankfully everybody's pal Joe Simmons and co-creators of those knuckleheads Bing and O'Toole. Is really pushing hard to make this happen.

SHARK TOWN, USA: Is calling my name hard. I hope I want to get to plotting it out some more this year.

READ MORE AND OF COURSE SUCK LESS: If I can accomplish a third of this list of goals. I think I would be happy with that. Life and technology seem to get in the way 7 out 10 times when I make these sorta things.

Carry On

OFFLINE MODE OR ANOTHER #NANOWRIMO UPDATE

Had a bit of an internet snafu that keep me away from posting. #NANOWRIMO update as stands. While I was offline I managed another 1856 words. Putting above 11K!

Not entirely sure i love the direction the book is taking. I'm happy I'm writing.

#NANOWRIMO Update Sorta

Yesterday I somehow wrote 1796 words for a whooping grand total 8731! The fact that I've written that many words is very much a miracle. If I continue on this pace. I should finish Disaster Porn sometime on or around January 31. Writing action AND comedy can be very exhausting, 

Quick Script - IRON MAN IN POTTY TIME OUT

Wrote this on my lunch break. Thought it was funny.

IRON MAN  IN POTTY TIME OUT

Page 1

Tony is working on something. Pepper brings him a coffee X6

Page 2

Jarvis calls Tony, Fin Fang Foom is tearing up a small village. (That no good bastard!)

Tony suits up.

Cut to Iron Man flying through the sky toward the village.

Foom is blasting the village!!

Page 3

Iron Man arrives. Realize he had too much coffee, calls for a potty break time out.

Foom waits as Iron Man pees

Waiting

and waits

Foom gets bored leaves

Villagers celebrate Iron Man victory as he STILL pees

END

Story Hell

That's exactly where we stand with Disaster Porn. I have the beginning outlined. I know the heroes and villains. I can safely say that I have the best possible ending. I have a sweet cover idea.

What the fuck is my problem? Why am I not writing? Not desire. Not the burning vengeance that is consuming away at my soul. Then what is the problem...? Self confidence? Nah, too cliche. Drugs?

I'll finger it out and when I do -- DISASTER PORN will taste like vengeance.