Alexander Corby 🇵🇷

#ScribesAndMakers 3/22 Micro-fiction in 6 words

“I’m sure those oysters are fine.”

And that was 11 km for the jog this morning! The furthest I’ve ever run nonstop.

Mind you, it’s easy to find the motivation when your route looks like this.

#running #PuertoRico #SundayJog

#WordWeavers 3/21 Where does your MC fall on a scale of timid to recklessly brave?

Taliesin was reckless once and once was enough. For the most part, he's fairly cautious and calculating, but it's easy to plan out your moves when you have the privilege of second sight.

However, that doesn't mean that I wouldn't consider him brave. He understands the risks, the consequences for each action, but chooses to undertake the risks anyway for the greater good.

That's a braver choice than going in blind and hoping everything will miraculously work out, in my opinion.

#ScribesAndMakers 3/17 What's a creative habit you've wanted to adopt but haven't yet? Well, I suppose I've always wanted to pick up an instrument for fun so I could just jam out after a hard day. Oh, wait. I DID do that! I think it was two years ago, more or less, that I bought myself a moderately priced (cheap) ukulele and started teaching myself. I'm not exactly top-notch, but I've put together a sizeable repertoire and it's wonderful to step onto my porch and strum a few tunes just to relax. My two latest additions were Simon & Garfunkle's "Sound of Silence" and Billy Bragg's "Help Save the Youth of America" Sorry if this is twisting the prompt a bit, but I couldn't think of a better response and wanted to acknowledge my persistence in developing a new skill that I didn't quite have before.

#WordWeavers 3/17 Did you ever receive formal education in creative writing? I had decent English courses in high school, but the best education I had in writing probably came from clown school. Actually, "clown school" is what my patronizing friends and relatives called it. It was a year-long intensive training at the Dell' Arte International School of Physical Theater in Blue Lake, CA. Clown was just one part of the curriculum. Our plays and projects were 'written' by the actors as we developed the scene, not before. In addition we had weekly writing labs where we were encouraged to spend 10-15 minutes writing nonstop on a given prompt. When I say nonstop I mean it! We were forbidden to stop moving our pens even if we ran out of ideas. "Write the alphabet if you have to, write garbly-guk, just keep writing and don't worry about what comes out" Obviously this isn't how you get a final draft, nor is it the best strategy for everyone, but I for one found it very liberating and was frequently surprised by what my brain churned out when given the space to do it.

On this blessed Pi day, please remember that you are necessary and important, even if you're irrational. #PiDay #Pi #MmmPie

Apron’s stocked, time for some serious balloon twisting’!

#ScribesAndMakers 3/7 Are you able to communicate in sign language? Not really, but I know some curse signs. My mom was a deaf ed teacher for a long time, so she is (or was at least) fluent. I learned the alphabet at one point, some random signs like tree, forest, turtle, bear, I love you, purple, father, mother, grandfather, grandmother, that's about it. I was fortunate enough to work a camp where we had several deaf campers and counselors. I still remember one of the young girls who was determined to learn to ride my unicycle and managed to get the hang of it by the end 😊

#WritersCoffeeClub 3/5 How do you make sure you don't leave plot holes? Test readers. I push them onto the manuscript and watch where they step. If they fall down into a bottomless pit of confusion, I tape up that part of the story and try again. But then I need another test reader. Plot holes are something I worry about in drafts 2-7. Obviously if I'm creating a giant crater while I draft, I rethink my direction, but the smaller plot holes get patched up after draft 1.

#WritersCoffeeClub 3/4 Share a recent experience where something just 'clicked'. I've made some good strides revising my WIP and am finding great bits to salvage from the first draft, but not so many 'click' moments lately. I did have a fun revelation while jogging last weekend where I realized that people probably based the mile off of kilometers. To me, it makes no sense that someone said "ooh! We're going to take 5,512 arbitrary feet and call it a mile" when 1600 meters fits perfectly into a mile. I imagine they measured out the meters and started calling that a mile first and then figured how many feet that worked out to be. I haven't checked that. It could be wrong.

#ScribesAndMakers 3/1 (Happy St. David’s!) How much time do you expect to have for creative pursuits this month?

A lot, and yet not enough! I’m doing a cubic crap tonne of creative work for school organizing a play. Don’t get me wrong, it’s the better part of my job, but so time-consuming!

In honor of the day, I’m making a commitment to make the Taliesin sequel published by the end of the year or earlier, so I’ll be squaring away time for that.

Anyone who has time to donate please send to…

#ScribesAndMakers 2/26 Do you abandon creative projects? Abandon? No, I prefer to think of it as a mercy killing.

Even if gen AI was environmentally safe and ethically trained (it is neither of those things) I'd still wouldn't use or endorse it. I think what unnerves me more than anything is this horrible misconception that art/writing is only worth the product it creates. That's BS The process of a creative pursuit transforms the creator as much as the creator shapes the creation. If we denigrate art down to a product that can be slammed out with the push of a button, we rob ourselves of self-reflection, vision, discipline, and visceral knowledge the creativity fosters. I'm already seeing young students unable to imagine their own ideas for projects and such either because they aren't developing the necessary critical thinking skills, or because they don't want to risk creating a finished product that isn't "good enough". But, as most creators I'm sure would agree, you will learn so much more from creating a failure that being handed a success. That's why I will not assign any work that uses "AI". I absolutely cannot rob my students of that self-discovery.

#WritersCoffeeClub 2/26 Does your current WIP have an antagonist? So far, I've been identifying King Matholwch as the main antagonist for the Taliesin sequel, and that's not wrong, but incomplete. Matholwch is the main obstacle to the other characters' goals (namely rescuing Branwen) but there are more antagonists lurking in the shadows. Arawn, lord of the Welsh otherworld, Annwn, appears to pull choice strings when he can. Even on the 'good' side (bad concept I know) we have antagonistic voices. Efnysien is often in direct opposition to Taliesin. He's as bloodthirsty as they come and Tali is far more diplomatic regarding the war between the Welsh and Irish.

#WordWeavers 2/25 How is light created in your book? 6th century Wales had sunlight, moonlight, candle light, and torch light.

#ScribesAndMakers 2/18 Have you ever or would you ever do you own cover? If I can help it, no. I'd prefer to find someone who knows how to really create visual art and commission them for the cover. I did that for Taliesin and was very happy with the results. For smaller, less marketable projects, I've cobbled together my own cover once or twice. I'm not the best (or worst) artist so it can feel pretty good when it works. The one thing I will never, ever, ever resort to is GenAI to create a cover...or anything for that matter.

#WordWeavers 2/17 Would you still write if you had to use a typewriter or pen and paper?

Are you kidding? I might write even more! I still draft certain things with pen and paper. Let’s compare the pros and cons, shall we?

Cons -No spellcheck -No internet for research -Editing becomes much more difficult

Pros

• far more versatile
• no files getting corrupted/lost/wiped, stored in physical folder -no internet for distractions -typewriters make that fun sounding DING! after every sentence and then I get to slap that weird cylinder thing back in place. It’s like a verbal slot machine!

#WritersCoffeeClub 2/16 What's the most ridiculous place you've tried to sneak in some writing? A few times, when my classes are cancelled for whatever reason, I'll lie and say that I still have admin work to do at school. Then, I'll take a drive up the nearby mountains, perch next to a small roadside cafe, and write in my car while looking over this majestic view of the valley below. It's a delicious guilty pleasure of mine.

Raise your hand if you'd rather have a world run by artists, scientists, teachers, and doctors instead of industrialists, bankers, warmongers, and psychopaths.

#ScribesAndMakers 2/13 How well do you sing? If you don't consider yourself a good singer, do you sing anyway? I actually love to sing! I'm just not very good at it. Singing used to be very difficult for me, and I was deathly shy of singing in public. I've gotten over it and sang to my daughter a lot when she was a baby. Now I love crooning along on my ukulele and could see myself including music in my performance art, but not as a main act, just some diddies to throw in with comedy. I think it was Dana Carvey (Garth from Wayne's World) that explained that as a musician he was a terrible drummer, but as a comedian/actor he was an amazing drummer!

#WritersCoffeeClub 2/13 Do you use maps as a reference materials as you write? Considering I write historical fiction, absolutely! I've even used google earth to check out the different altitudes and depths of the places I'm writing about. Currently, the maximum depth of the Irish sea is about 375 feet. And that's why Bran is is exactly 395 feet tall.

#WordWeavers 2/12 What would you tell a fellow writer who was struggling with self-doubt? ME: Self-doubt? Well, of course you have self-doubt! All of us have self doubt as writers, and that's a good thing. It means you have standards, that you recognize that you have limitations and, most importantly, that you're open to learning from your mistakes. Self doubt is the hallmark of a creative writer. FELLOW WRITER: Wow! Thanks, I feel so much more confident now! ME: (Facepalming) No, no. You just missed the point, here.

#WordWeavers 2/11 MC POV: Sit down, close your eyes, and take a few deep breaths. What do you see in your mind's eye? TALIESIN: ....everything...

#ScribesAndMakers 2/11 Aside from the official birthday song and the ubiquitous Beatles song, is there a song about birthdays you like? Futurama had a different Bday song that was kinda clever, but I can't sing Happy Birthday anymore without following it up with the Puerto Rican cumpleaños song. Feliz, feliz en su día, Amiguito(a) que Dios te bendiga, Y reina en paz en su día, Y que cumple mucho más!

#WordWeavers 2/5 If you found out that someone had to live your MC's life would you change the story? Someone DID have to live the life of my MC, albeit in a slightly more realistic version of their life. Would I change things? No, not really. I'd like to think that the point of the story is too pertinent to water down for the sake of Tali's comfort, and with the character's love of stories and his respect for their power, I'd like to think Tali would agree.

#WritersCoffeeClub 2/1 How satisfied are you with your current writerly 'voice'? I wish it would stop cracking. Still going through writer's puberty. For my current histfic books, I like to think that my 'author' voice is as inconspicuous as possible. For some short stories, I try sometime to be more playful. I'm generally satisfied with it. As for my erotic work, I strive to get closer to a Barry White voice. Opinions are mixed on that.