Timewaster's Guide Archive

When you say 17k, you mean number of words right?  Do you have a link to more contest details?

Chaos is completely shameless when it comes to plugging our group. But yes, he's covered it well here.

I already signed up 

Well...  My name is Sean.  I'm going to try to introduce myself as concisely as possible, but that might be difficult.  Here goes:

Lets start with the present.  I'm an attorney.  I graduated from law school in April '08 from BYU Law.  I currently work for a judge helping him draft the court's legal opinions.  While in law school, I managed to get a scholarly work published dealing with Native American property rights and how they relate to tax exemptions on oil production... boring, but it got me the job with the judge I'm pretty sure.  Yeah.  Not too keen on my current job track.

Before law school I was  an English major, with a creative writing emphasis.  I managed to get a personal essay published in BYU's Inscape, but The Leading Edge rejected the one science fiction submission I sent to them.  As yet, I have failed to break into the one type of writing I'd really like to work in: science fiction and fantasy, but then I haven't tried too terribly hard.  I was too busy thinking I wanted to be a lawyer.

I've written various short stories and essays that have won prizes or contests, but nothing major, certainly not enough to pay the bills.  My dream is to make enough money that I can quit my day job and write full time.  Unfortunately, it took working full time as an attorney to realize how much I really wanted to be a writer.  I hadn't pursued it before because I didn't think it was a practical way to earn a living.  I don't care so much about practical anymore, but I have a family to feed, so I'm going to have to do writing on the side.

As to why I want to write, well, I love stories.  My favorite kinds of video games have strong story lines.  I can't sleep if the tv is on because I want to see the story through, even if already know how it will end.  If I start reading a book and get involved enough in the story line, I won't put it down, because I have to see how it all ends.  I especially love stories that have an original idea.  I love it when a book surprises me, gives me something novel to chew on.  That is what I want to write, short stories (and then books) that have at their core, an original idea.

A short list of my favorite authors before I end: Sanderson, Pratchett, Gould, Jordan, McAffery, Steakly, Poe, Card, L'amour, Harry Harrison, and hundreds more.  I can't even begin to give you a list of favorite books.   I used to down books like candy, but that slowed down a lot when I started college.

Anyway, that is the long and short about me.  I look forward to working with you all.

Yeah... Ironically I went to law school to avoid being a broke writer only to end up as broke government attorney.  It had always been a pipe dream to write books on the side while I practiced law, but I think I secretly figured I'd make enough money as a lawyer that it wouldn't be necessary to write--nor would I have the time.

You see what trying to plan your life does to you?

That totally depends on the games you play.   I think games sap the time better spent doing other things, but they can give some inspiration as well.  I just finished Assassins Creed and it's given me a few ideas that seem interesting.  Wow will give you ideas (if you look for them) but by the time you get around to doing anything other than playing wow, the world might be about to end...

I agree with you about Assassin's Creed.  That was a game with some very original ideas , very "Armour" esc (if you haven't read the book Armour--sometimes published as Armor--by Steakly, then I highly recommend it).  However, games like wow don't do anything for creativity for me.  I get so obsessed with leveling that the story just blows by without my even noticing it.  I suppose that's the competitive lawyer-jerk part of me that wants to be the best possible.  Unfortunately, that part can get so focused that it excludes everything else.  Then I "win" (i.e. hit level 80) and wake up.  I don't play wow anymore.

Anyway, it looks like the consensus wins.  I will begin my book devouring once more.  I used to manage several books a week. Now with a job and responsibilities and a newly acquired wife who doesn't understand fanatical reading/video game playing... we'll just have to see.

So, I am still attempting to decide what to title this post.  If you are reading this, then perhaps I was successful enough in my nomenclature to lure a few of you in here.  The long and short of this post is: I need help.

I'm a (semi) successful writer.  I've managed to get a few things published, fiction and non-fiction.  I've won contests, gotten a (very) little bit of money from writing, and managed to land a job involving very heavy writing, albeit the wrong kind. 

And now we get to my problem.  I am a lawyer.  Yes, that's a problem, but not the one I'm looking for help with.  That one requires special psychological attention.  What I need help with is this: my legal training and writing has managed to kill my ability to write creatively.  I'm not sure whether it was the years of law school training, or this past year writing boring legal documents at a government job, but something died, and I want to see if I can resurrect it.  I realized the other day that I really don't want to write boring crap documents for the rest of my life, and to get out of that, I want to start writing sci-fi and fantasy again.  Hopefully (crosses fingers) I'll find enough success that I can ditch the legal docs.

I just need to find a way to jump start the part of my brain with the creative juices.  Law teaches you to make creative strategies, but not creative writing ideas.  Creativity in writing is frowned upon because generally that means you don't have a leg to stand on in the case.

So there it is.  They taught me how to think like a lawyer, and I want to make it stop.  Please.  Please make the bad man stop...