I turned in my first story on Tuesday (after almost dying from lack of real food and sleep for two days), and I'll be workshopped next Tuesday. My story is set in modern Japan, and is about a woman who secretly lives in a man's closet (unbeknownst to the man) (this is the first time I've ever used "unbeknownst" in my life, and it is awesome).

Things I Think I Have Going for My Story:
-An overload of cultural details and information. I can write Japan way better than I can write America. Maybe because I don't write America. Or anywhere else, besides Vague Generic Unidentified Land.
-Plot. I do have a real plot with developments, and it might be kind of interesting. The progression is mostly logical, though perhaps not linked as well on paper as it is in my head.

Things That I Think Suck About My Story:
-The ending. I struggled so much with the last scene, and it's only the way it is now because I ran out of time to mess with it any longer. I'm sure I'll be embarrassed when I go back and read it. Lame.

-My writing. I am not a lyrical, poetic, or flowery writer. I suspect my style is "fanfic style," if there is such a thing. Direct and unadorned. Gets to the action, but doesn't really have any literary merit to speak of. I guess that's what I get for reading too much fanfiction and too little of other things.

-My man character is not developed enough. I spent most of my time trying to figure out my woman, since it's her POV.

-Information overload? I think I stuff too many ideas into my story, and not all of them are necessary. Some of this is probably information about Japan that I just wanted to stick in for the sake of having it there to educate my readers.

Anyways, there is so much wrong with my story, I can't wait to be ripped apart and shredded into tiny pieces (with some sugar coating, because the workshop folk are all nice people).

I wrote a 7-page short story in Chinese as my final paper for Chinese class last quarter. Despite coming up with it on the spur of the moment, and despite no one being able to understand what was really going on in it, I thought it had actual potential (the premise: when the world forgets how to read). So tonight I did a quick rough translation of it into English. And whoa. The story idea is still not bad, I think, but whoa. I wince. Everything has to be completely rewritten, starting with the tone. It's one thing to write like a crazy person in Chinese where I misuse and abuse the language horribly, I'm sure, but knowing exactly what I sound like in English, I just can't keep up the crazy person tone for an entire story. That's why there are only short scenes told from K's POV in my novel, and I still have trouble deciding how crazy she should sound.

Also, I need to stop playing mindless games like Minesweeper and this matching game in the HP game Purble Place. Gaaah. Such a waste of time.

Reading a fanfic online tonight, I found I was annoyed by this use of the ellipse: "For the first time, he felt something like...hope." The line already gets its own paragraph. I think there's an implied emphasis on hope even without the ellipse. Let's look at it ellipse-less: "For the first time, he felt something like hope." Much smoother, mmm.