Hi!

Hi! 😊

Motivation is a double-faced friend in this house. A whimsical pixie who finds a lot of fun at playing "trick or treat", just... all year round.  And it's not alone in that! It always roams my disgracefully messy mind-bedroom (don't look under the bed, ever) with its newfound hench...thing, Procrastination. You have to see them, bouncing on my bed like some crazed kids high on sugar, giggling their heads off while my lungs are catching fire with all my screaming for them to behave.

Actually, there's a whole gang in there, Motivation and Procrastination leading the reins of a squad of thugs: Anxiety, Joy , Desillusion, Excitement, Doubt, Confidence, Self-Deprecation (that one's a real pest!) and more. And God, they're hungry monsters, this lot! They grow from blank documents, missing punctuation, grammar atomic mushrooms, plot earthquakes. But also from the kudos, the "*** left a comment on...", wonderful readers who show so much attachment to my characters, smooth dialogues, that one time witty punchline I keep on repeating myself in the hope another shows up, or some on-point music to match that DAMN scene I couldn't seem to get right. I love these brats so much then.

*fake-annoyed sigh* I guess I'm stuck with them.

So, now I'm trying to muster them in a (kinda) organized rank and make them help me get back to my two-timeline wip. Each chapter is structured along two timelines (past and present) with correspondences and bridges between the two. But here's the thing, I've been writing steady on one timeline; a lot even: I have the current chapter covered and the next pretty much started. So much so that I can't get back to the other timeline...  

So, if someone could take Despondency and Weariness for a vacation somewhere, I'll be super grateful (if they fall off a boat without life-vests on, it's okay)

Thank you @the-wip-project for this amazing idea of sharing and writing 💜🙏 It’s going to be fun!

Happy writing everyone!

2021-06-01 Day One

Yay! Are you excited? I’m excited. I can’t wait to see what you all think and like to talk about. Let me give you a question for an easy start.

We’re starting with a bit of thinking about motivation. Write about what your motivation is to write at all. What got you started? What keeps you going?

The daily questions and mini-essays are just an offer to give you an idea to write about, you don’t have to use them. You can talk about whatever you want and show off whatever you like. You can reblog from this post or make your own post. Tag with #100daysofwriting, mention this blog, keep mature themes under a cut.

Mentions under the cut.

Afficher davantage

[The Stars In Your Eyes] ⭐ #JIMIN 🐥 #JUNGKOOK 🐰

I love a good thesaurus. ~ eP

Of loss and love

@the-wip-project Day 3:

What’s your character’s motivation? What motivates them to act like they do?

Since my current wip is structured along with two timelines, the plot revolves around two protagonists, namely a 2020-young man, and his lost-and-found grandpa when himself was young, in 1950.

Let's start in chronological order:

Grandpa is young and is about to come of age in a changing world, when his own country is literally birthing itself, in the most violent manner: invaders taking advantage of a vulnerable people, setting them against one another in a ruthless clash. Changing times, changing norms. Almost everything this character knows is questioned: his upbringing, his family dynamics, his feelings, even the relative peace he enjoyed when a child. But he soon learns that the future is out of the question however; only the present counts. Needless to say, it is hard for this character to find his way in the middle of chaos, and to learn who he is, where his place is. As he figures out as he goes how to deal with survival, loss and love, with little guidance, some decisions are going to be drastic, and their consequences dramatic.

His grandson goes through the same process actually (I play a lot on coincidences and parallels) but in the modern world. Changes are not as dramatic, nor violent, but it doesn't mean there aren't any. They're here, undercover still, subdued, internal. And when he discovers a whole part of his origins has been kept hidden from him, the same questioning occurs, and with it the same themes, with the same potential rifts with his family. But rather than risking major upheavals in his life because losing the ones he loves scares him, he tries to run with the hare and hunt with the hounds (looove that phrase) and it works... for some time. But he can't avoid decisions to be taken too at some point; reconciliation is a decision, which parties have to agree on.

*rolls sleeves up to get to work* Right...

Thoughts On Having a Writing Partner

The first time I was published in the New Yorker was the most amazing thrill. A career highlight. Nothing will beat that feeling of seeing my drawing and idea printed in the pages of a magazine I’d been reading since I stole copies from my Dentist’s office in Perth. (Sorry, Dr Farrugia).

But there is an aspect to our trade with which every cartoonist or stand-up comic is intimately familiar:  and that is the solitude of being a ‘one-man-band’. For the highest of highs (rare) and the lowest of lows (frequent), there is nobody to share it with, outside of an on-looking spouse or a flatulent dog at your feet.

This week’s issue of the New Yorker prompted me to write this post about teaming-up with a fellow comedy writer for writing cartoons, since it may well be the record for the most publicly acknowledged* cartoonist duos in an issue of the New Yorker. *(Gag writers never used to be credited. I’ll explain below**.)

In 2018, after 15 years of freelancing as a cartoonist and having been published many times flying solo, I started collaborating with my friend and fellow comic, Scott Dooley to share the frequent anxiety (and sporadic joy) of submitting New Yorker cartoons.

I hadn’t done this before and immediately found it so enlightening. Watching one of my own ideas go through the filter of somebody else’s comedy brain-wiring and come out the other end with a lateral tag or alt. punch  I’d never have considered myself was addictive, and it suddenly clicked as to why there were such things as ‘writers rooms’. (I’m slow on the uptake.)

READ MORE

A good partner is an editor, audience, fan and favorite author rolled into one. This goes for all business partners - not just writing partners. ~ eP

Sneak Peek

@the-wip-project Day 6

I couldn't seem to find an appropriate answer to today's question, but since I've been working on my wip tonight, here's a sneak peek 😊

"It had been an interesting night spent by his mother's side, drawing a short family tree on one of the pieces of paper lying around on the kitchen shelves, scribbling names, dates, ages, places. Jungkook feels warmth spread all over his body at the memory, a smile naturally stretching on his face. He had not felt so connected to his mother in so long that he couldn’t get enough of her invigorating excitement. They hadn’t delved into the sensitive topics that night, and Jungkook hadn’t felt the need to. He never expressed it yet, but he’s been jittery with anticipation at his mother’s idea since then. Obviously, the idea of showing up there without informing them beforehand wasn’t exactly his idea of a first meeting, and the risk of their visit being bothersome was a probability to take into consideration. But he wasn’t going to tell her that. Instead, he had prayed, crossed all the fingers he could and sacrificed his sleep on the Fate altar for her initiative to be rewarded with a positive outcome."