Yeah, not the greatest picture. The SO took it with my cameraphone. I remember my laptop and forget my digital camera. And since I was first in line I was kind of shy and didn't get beside him for a posed shot - but others after me did. oh well.
While waiting I got to know people in the seats around me. They were all young - late teens and early twenties. Nice kids. One gal had brought a "luggage" she had crafted in ceramics class which Terry graciously signed. It was really well done. Someone brought him a drink with an umbrella in - I wonder what it was. Not being a fanatical fan I'm a bit out of the loop on some of that stuff.
Mr. Pratchett told a funny story about undergoing angioplasty (!) involving him "seeing" a man with sandwiches while he was fully anesthetized. Apparently he kept sitting up and trying to go after them. He spoke about the next Tiffany Aching books and thoughts on the next Discworld books. The LJ Discworld community has a post by another person who was there and he/she has a better memory than I or took notes, so there are a few details there you might want to read if you're a fan.
Terry has a light engaging style of speaking, full of wit and some outright standup comic funny stuff. Some day if I have real $$ and he's still doing conventions I really would like to see him do some panels or a longer talk.
The nicest thing of the evening though, was that he was very open about how he writes. He talked about letting the characters tell the story. Although he has a 'vague' idea about what's going to happen in the end he mostly sets things up and lets the characters create the story. The subconscious mind is always working on the story and sometimes very interesting things he had no idea were going to happen just do. That's the magic.
The SO pokes me about then and gives me a look. He's convinced that I can capture that magic. We even talked about it in the car as we were taking our cat to the emergency vet (there's another story for another time...*sigh*). My response is but I don't have any ideas! I mean if I did I could probably set up characters and get them to tell the story, but what story? I just don't have an idea. I keep dabbling at a story I started back in February - and it kinda has an idea but I just can't get enough of it figured out to know who needs to be doing what. It's hard to explain, but the more I chip away at this maybe the closer I'll get to figuring it out.
It may be that I read so much and read such great stuff that I've just decided that there's no way I can write nearly as well so why bother? Especially at my age - I mean I don't have 25 years to break into print - the way my mind is going to the dogs I'll be lucky to have 10 more.
Anyway, I haven't been to many author talks/signings in my life so this is a signal moment and I'm so glad I could take the time off and really enjoy the whole day.
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1 comment:
hey dawno! I could really relate to what you are talking about feeling like you can't write as well as some others. What cured me of that was reading writers who were actually crummier than me! That gave me perspective. When I sit there and read stuff like "Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood" and I think "well, if I was an overwraught southerner, I could do this. no big whup." I get some perspective.
And I know when someone's written a book I could never write. When I think of books like "Angela's Ashes," I admire the writer, but never let the writer or the story intimidate me.
I don't compare someone else's insides with mine and every writer's process is different. I love the people who say it's all magic. good for them! But I admire the ones who tell me it took years to develop their styles and that the book went thru lots of rewrites. I like knowing how tough the job was, not the old "I went to sleep and it wrote itself!" that, to me, indicates a writer just isn't aware of his/her processes. That's all fine and dandy, but since I'm sure it won't happen for me that way, I don't worry too much about it.
Perhaps looking at some writers that are great worker bees would be helpful...and let the magicians entertain you when they can!
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