The Inner Evil Author

  My friends, today I come to you with a warning. Beware of the Inner Evil Author. It dwells inside every writer, and rears its ugly head often. If a writer makes a comment about it, more often than not, you need to go hide and fear for your favorite characters.
  Horrible things happen when writers succumb to their Inner Evil Author. Horrible things. For some reason, everyone's Evil Author seemed to be very active today on Go Teen Writers Facebook group. Let's see ... One writer took a prompt to the extreme, killing off her character by his very worst fear. (The details of this were horrible. Involving the slow, painful death of at least one other, much loved character.) She even threw herself into WID. (Reference previous post.)
  And when I gave into my Evil Author and wrote my MC's death into the plot line, I had at LEAST one person wanting to kill me. Possibly two or more.
  In short, the Inner Evil Author is dangerous, to both characters and writers. Beware.
  For those of you non-writers, I will give you an example of the typical conversation we writers have with our Inner Evil Author.

Author: *writes peacefully* This is such a cute scene.
Inner Evil Author: Nobody likes "cute." Kill off Joe.
Author: NOOOO! Do you know what that would do to Jane?
Inner Evil Author: Yes. Tension. The mid-novel crisis that you need.
Author: What would I do without him?!
Inner Evil Author: Give Jane all sorts of breakdowns and suicidal funks. It'll be great.
Author: NO. It would be mean. Besides, everyone will hate me for it.
Inner Evil Author: This is why your writing is dry.
Author: Is that a challenge?

The Definition of Insanity

  I read somewhere that the definition of insanity was to do something repeatedly, expecting different results each time. And I realized that when you look up "insanity" in the dictionary, the definition should be "a writer."
  Before you can understand this, though, you need to understand the emotional trauma writers go through.
  Readers have it bad enough, but actually writing those feels-crushing stories is a whole 'nother animal. A reader can't control the outcome of the story. Writers have to make the decisions about how they're going to make their characters suffer. And then they have to be inside their characters' heads, watching and feeling their suffering and knowing they could have prevented it. And they constantly have the carrot dangling in front of them to change their characters' lives- at least reduce their pain.
  And then there are the accidents. These tend to happen in character chats, when you make a small sub plot for interest. I tried this last night, and it exploded into a horrible, feels-crushing plot twist. While it was perfect, it was very painful. And then, being in my MC's head at the time, I felt it like she did. It even caused me to have a bout of WID. (Writing Induced Depression- a term coined by Leah K. Oxendine over on her blog.)
And after that ramble, back to my main point. Writers go through this in every story. Crying over wayward charries, wishing they wouldn't turn. Being miserable because our poor MC is. And yet we continue to write, thinking that somehow the results will be different next time.
So, the true definition of insanity is a writer.

Plays and Character Chats

I'm getting off to a rather horrible start of blogging regularly, aren't I? I kind of have an excuse, but then again, I guess I always will. I guess I'll give you one of my excuses. A play. I wrote it without knowing what I was getting into.
  Making a play from scratch takes a whole lot more effort than you would think. It's one thing to start with a ready-made script and set instructions. It's a whole 'nother animal to actually make all these things.
  First, there's the writing of the script. This is difficult enough even when you don't have a pastor that writes and critiques every sentence within an inch of its life. (Don't get me started.) I've found I much prefer writing stories. You don't have to worry about actors or sets or making your pastor happy.
  Then there's the actors. At our small church, this is a rather difficult part.
  Then the sets. Again with the small church thing.
  I should probably stop ranting about the play now. On to other topics. Such as ... Let's see here. Give me a little while to think.
(*Three hours later*)
 Aha! For lack of something better, I'll discuss character chats.  This quirky activity is a character development technique that a bunch of writers use. A couple writers chat with each other as their characters.
  These things often get confusing. Very confusing. And things can get interesting, if you get the right writers with the right characters together. And I'll prove my point with a few examples. One of these involved two demons and two demons fighters. With three authors involved. So the clashing of three worlds and characters that naturally didn't get along was ... interesting.
  Then there was the infamous one titled "In which there are demons and stars and healers and alternate selves and pendants that HURT LIKE THE DICKENS." I think the title speaks for itself on that one.
  Then there was one that involved several characters from dystopian worlds, a character from a fantasy world, a character from the 1800's, and a talking wolf. Add in that at least one character there had superpowers ... Yeah ...
  Have I gotten across how crazy those things can get?
  Sorry for the ramble, everyone!

"Monster"

We shall kick this blog off with a piece of flash fiction of mine, titled "Monster."



A monster.

I scan the clearing. Where?

Not the trees. A life of their own, but not a monster. At least not the one I fear.

Fear. Something clawing at me, threating to hold me captive. Or maybe it already has me.

Labored breaths, the reek of blood. Steamy, bubbling ... Who's blood? A dagger-like claw, dripping now-cooling red. Black eyes, watching me. Dead, yet never dead. Lustful eyes. Blood lust.

Eyeing its next victim. The thought sets a tremor to my bones. Bones this creature would love to gnaw. But this monster lives off more than flesh.

Fear mounts inside my chest, threatening to choke me, reminding me what else it feeds off of.

Don't feed the monster. Like a sign at a zoo, only this one impossible to obey.

How can you stop something that comes so naturally?

Something that feeds a monster that comes so naturally.

Then I realize. This monster, the one I've run from my entire life, feared, fed ...

Is me.

Suddenly my fear has an outlet. This monster.

Me.

Get away. Run from it, fight it.

But which?

My fear, so close to being free, forces my legs into motion.

Run.

Its rank breath on my neck. More terror than I thought possible coursing through me. I can't run any more. I stumble.

If I close my eyes, maybe it'll go away.

A foul claw, raking across my neck.

Eyes closed or not, I'm about to be eaten alive. By myself.

Eyes still closed. I can't face this.

Blood. But not someone else's. Mine.

Death. Inevitable. Fear. Eternal.

Black eyes, mocking me. No escape.

Or is there?