I HAVE A HUGE PROBLEM, & I NEED ADVICE BADLY!

Actually, this is my mom's former profession/current hobby. I listen politely for a while, but there's no way I'm ever going to get as worked up about her new sewing machine as she is. She did make me a nice waistcoat though, so...

I've never read a screenplay, and I never will, because they aren't meant to be read. I mean, if you're in Hollywood or something, of course you read screenplays, but most of us don't have the mental tools to enjoy them, they're meant to be put on screen. And lest you think I'm dissing screenwriters, I don't like to read Shakespeare either; he was a playwright, not an author. The medium matters.

Yup, exactly. It frustrates me that Mrs. A's English isn't up to the level where she can read and enjoy my stories, but I couldn't write a Dick & Jane book in Japanese, so that's fair enough. She does support me in that she leaves me alone when I need writing time and asks how my stories are going, but barring Hollywood or a trad publisher with an international translation division getting involved, she'll never if they're any good or not.

Leave your mom be, write your stuff, do your best to get it published, that's really all there is to be said, especially when you're over thirty.

 

lol welcome home

 

When you know your writing a good screenplay you know your writing a good screenplay. lol..
But Ihave 100% confidence in it and I don't quite yet have 100% confidence in my novel that
I'm also tackling. That's much lower in the sense that it's still far from completion and needs
a lot of work in general.

And yes, I may be an unpublished writer, but I have been cooking up stories for 25 years,
I am past the humility.

Also, I have examples of my writing on here if anybody cares to look.
Can U Decipher My Story?That thread features a few excerpts from my
working novel and not my script.

 

Pretty nearly every writer has plenty to learn.

 

Very true. I've learned a lot in the last two months alone.
Even something like pacing, which may apply more to screenwriting,
but it seems like I'm learning something new everyday.

 

I've been reading most of this thread with wide eyes, but this really seals it for me. If you're past humility you're living in fantasy land, where your dreams and vision eclipse reality. Good luck with that.

 

I'm probably not past humility i'm just saying that come on now.lol I'm just so eager that's all.
Aren't we all?
If my screenplay doesn't get recognized I will just write another one.
With all this drama already on this thread about how far fetched I sound to you
I'm probably just going to end up jinxing myself anyway.
In that case, I'll probably just end up turning my script into a novel.
There's just so many other options which is good.

 

If you're going to be a writer I'd get used to expressing yourself in a way that folks can take you at your written word, and not have to do a lot of mental gymnastics after the fact.

 

I knowall about it and I know I'm blowing it with you guys on here too with how
I'm acting & expressing myself, my writing, etc..

I'll post some work soon maybe tomorrow for you guys to check out.

 

I'd go one better, @james82 . MENTION the fact that you have written a screenplay to your aunt. If she offers to read it, then you've struck pay dirt. However, unless she offers, just leave it alone. You've shown her the bait. It's up to her whether she takes it or not. The last thing you should want to do is employ emotional blackmail to the process, by making her feel that—because you're her nephew—she HAS to read what you've written or she's letting you down, somehow. Reluctant beta readers are not going to be much help to you.

I can happily say I've had about 40 beta readers (actually I lost count a long time ago) who have read and offered feedback on my novel ...which is a long one, and took me 5 straight years of writing every day to get a first draft completed. Some of them read the first draft, others have read subsequent drafts. Not all of the readers have liked it, and a couple never got back to me about it. A couple of my closest friends (who are still my closest friends) didn't particularly like the story. Several people who surprised me a lot really DID like the story. Some people are fellow writers who have either liked or not liked it. Some people gave extremely valuable feedback. In other words, there was a variety of reaction, but enough of it was positive and/or enthusiastic, to make me realise I've 'got something here,' and that I will have an audience for the finished product. However, I have NEVER ASKED anybody to read it. I just let it be known I'd written something. People who were interested volunteered. People who were not interested, didn't.

There is no point in getting het up, when somebody you think ought to be interested isn't.

Stop trying to gain approval from somebody who isn't interested. You're getting yourself all worked up about something you can't actually control. Just move on. Join a writer's group. Join a group that specialises in screenplays. Etc. Pursue your hobby/vocation, but don't expect others to share it. I'm sure if you get published eventually, they'll be pleased for you. They probably still won't want to read it. That's the way things are in this world. Don't get hung up on rejection. Just move on.

 

Hello James,

Are you living with Mum?

She might love you absolutely, just with the host of common anxieties - about you finding your feet, about you establishing a roof over your head, you & a relationship to bring you some tenderness and joy in your life ...

...she might find the focus of her son's attention oppressive.

Parents feel a bucket of personal failure supporting a guy in his pyjamas, feeding him his cocoa pops and he's twittering on about his visions again. And still, after all these years, she is the absolute focus and root of all the man's complexities, all his own anxieties. It wears her down. She has done nothing, she thinks. But she loves her son more than ever.

'Uhuh, have you finished? You want some toast?'

'Then in chapter twelve, do you want me to show you..? Mum, mum, listen..!

'How was the bar last night, oh you sat on your own? For nine hours? And then you hung out with the homeless guys? No, that is funny, like you say. And the police...what did they say?'

So you might mix the prose with some optimism for her about all those pedestrian issues - that are so meaningless - and you are probably right - but which are so important to our mental health, as parents.

 

You speak the truth my friend. Are you ready for this?

Yeah I live with Mom.Well it's actually vise-versa. She lives with me but in separate levels.

She lives in an apartment below me and I have the whole upstairs to myself although we
see each other pretty much everyday. But the kicker is.... the house that we share is both of ours!
In other words, our names our both on the deed and here's why....

I have already done that. I have no mortgage. I paid our house off that we share by busting
my ass in a restaurant for 19 years! I managed to pay off our mortgage just over 2 years ago,
and I also quit my job at the restaurant after managing to save a hefty amount of $.

I quite my job do to ongoing verbal abuse and harassment that was going on in that
kitchen for many years. I couldn't take it anymore.

But here's how all of this transpired....

My father passed away when I was 19. He was a machinist his whole life and his death
was accidental. The very milling machine that he worked on for over 20 years ultimately
was the one that would take his life... due to a malfunction. He was crushed and
he died of asphyxiation.

At the time of his death my sister was in college and my Mother was living with her
boyfriend in a studio apartment that her Father, my Grandfather, had paid off by
winning $50K on a 5 dollar scratch ticket!

All Mom had to do was pay a measly $260 payment a month plus a few utility bills.
She was set. And myself I was living at home with Dad during the time of his death
so I was all alone andthe house fell on me!

Again, this started at 19. so I struggled paying the mortgage for 13 years. But in the long run
I managed to pay it off by working at the restaurant. My house even almost foreclosed
a couple of times due to falling behind on payments. It was rut after rut after rut.

I also fell into a downward spiral after my Dad's death and sort of took advantage of
having a house to myself and started throwing parties. Eventually it got so out of hand
that Mom had to move in.. then she lost her studio apartment due to other
circumstances.

But... during most of her tenure living with me from 21 until now I secured our financials.
I was the one paying the mortgage and was the one who payed off the house!And I was the one
who payed for most of the work that gone done on the house, such as the remodeling of the
upstairs bathroom. If it wasn't for me, and my hard work over the years, sticking it out,
we wouldn't even have a house. It's a fact.

It may seem like I feel she owes my something but that's not really the case.
So now I have $ saved (for marketing my material) a housepayed off, and my passion
for writing was reignited after I left my job. I've been on a writing rampage ever since.

The script I'm working on now, the primary spark for it literally dates back to
when I was sixteen years old when I made a short with my Dad's Sonycam and
a group of buddies of mine.
So the script is practically 20 years in the making and the story was always a movie.

There's even more to my story, such as how my Dad would work all kinds of overtime
at his job and sometimes he would come home at 1AM on school nights and I would
hear him come in the front door from the bedroom. And on the night he was killed,
I thought the knock on the door at 1Am was him! Maybe he forgot his house key...
But... when I got up off the couch to go answer the door, it was actually the police,
there to inform me, a 19 years old at 1Am in the morning on a school night,
that my Father had been killed.

I reflect on this all the time my life journey, which has been tough but I realize
that I'm in a very fortunate position even after all of this.

Another crazy thing that happened is my Mother just started collecting a widow pension last
year yet she was qualified to receive it the day she turned 60. Because she was still
legally married to my Dad during his death so she went 3 straight years not knowing
she had access to that money. Crazy. That is also why her name went on the deed so
if we ever decide to sell the house, since both are names are on it than we would
have to split the $& then go our separate ways.

I hope you guys understand. We all have rocky roads that we've traveled and it all leads
back to what we put down on the page! Which in my case does sort of play out like that.
My aunt, the one that's an author herself she penned a beautiful book chronicling my
father's life so right now I feel I don't have to write about the experience aside from
what I'm typing now.

I have to make the best of my, OUR hobby, while I can and while I'm situated with a roof over my head
and with less worries to accompany me.
That's all this is about. Thanks for listening.

 

Read through this thread and can't agree more with what everyone else has said. Why on earth are you worried what your mother thinks, but i would go a bit further and say why care what anyone thinks. Ultimately we have no power what other people, say do and think so why worry about it.
I think your major problem is the same major problem most people suffer from, a need for validation and acceptance from others. Let go of that idea and you'll be fine. Good luck with your writing.

 

Probably. Thanks.

 

You showed em, James. Arrogant WFers:"Living with his mummy, heheh, I think I'll make a not so cryptic jest this time." (nice one, @matjoke)
Now show them again by getting your stuff out there.

 

I'll try my earnest.
We're all trying to survive!
and in a way we're all doing it together,
...in this timeLet's do it... let's write!

 

Okay @12, you shit.

'Who paid for this, who bust his ass at Happy Chickens for twenty-seven years for this? Who? It was me, mommy, me. Now, read my picture book you slut.'

'I am reading it boy, it's really good, nng.'

'And the metaphor, what about the metaphor?'

'A really lovely book for all kiddies.'

'It is for adults, that is the whole god-damn point of my irony. I hate you.'

'Okay, I'm going to the bathroom a minute...'

'Why are you always going to the bathroom. I am listening, you ain't doing nothing in there. Come out, COME OUT...MOMMY!'

 

Not sure what that meant but it was hilarious.

 

Brutal.

 

with love

 

Such melodrama, such self-absorbed decadence.

My mom and dad supported my every artistic pursuit, but alas, I needed them for nothing. I made my own way in the world and had little to do with my childhood family. I love them dearly, and my nieces too, but at a distance and no more than a week at a time or I would go straight out of my head. Don't dwell on the past. There's no profit in it.

 

My mom and dad supported my every artistic pursuit, but alas, I needed them for nothing. I made my own way in the world and had little to do with my childhood family. I love them dearly, and my nieces too, but at a distance and no more than a week at a time or I would go straight out of my head. Don't dwell on the past. There's no profit in it.

 

I accept not having a good grasp of the English language isn't the end of the world when it comes to creative writing, and this is in no way meant to poke fun, but I think any publisher would hear alarm bells when they spot basic spelling errors like the ones you've demonstrated here.

 

I get it. You don't have to try to prove me or my writing wrong by commenting
on a 'spelling error' in a singular sentence that is only a snippet of what is already a mammoth essay
of info that I've already laid out on this thread! you're< derrr. I'm not proof reading everything I type here
I've been at this a long time. I'm no rookie writer.

P.S. I type 60 words per minute & sometimes my mind races faster than my fingers.
My accuracy is a little off that's all.

 

Emphasis above added by me.

It sounds like you worked hard for that money, and it sounds like you may be in serious danger of throwing it away on a misguided marketing attempt. I would strongly urge you to research the odds of financial success for each of your endeavors, and seriously consider the very high likelihood that financial success will not be forthcoming, especially on a self-funded, self-marketed effort. That's not a comment on the quality of your writing. It's about the odds, no matter how good your writing might be.

Whether your writing is good or bad, there is ZERO assurance that it will be profitable. And your insistence that you, alone, apparently with no input, can judge that your writing is magnificent, worries me and makes me afraid that you will burn your chance at real writing success by burning your money on marketing.

You know Elizabeth Gilbert, who made All The Money on Eat Pray Love? She does not recommend quitting your day job to write. She worked a day job for a lot of years, and published more than one book, before she hit all that money with Eat Pray Love.

Ann Patchett, winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award and the Orange Prize for Fiction, who has had more than one NYT bestseller, does not recommend going into debt on an MFA; she recommends that if you don't get scholarships/grants this year, you wait and apply again next year and next year until you do--or you just write; she emphasizes that you don't need an MFA. (Yes, you're not talking about an MFA, but you are talking about burning money on another writing-related expense.) And her fiction didn't pay her way for a very long time; she survived by teaching, by waitressing, by getting those scholarships and grants, and by writing--not the writing that was her passion, just writing what she was told to write, on assignment--for whatever periodicals paid well.

The resolution, "I'm going to dedicate my life to writing!" does NOT assure that you will make money with your writing any time soon. From absolutely everything I've read, you have the best odds if you prepare for the long haul, not a quick splashy success.

If you have money saved, I think that the very, very best way that that money could serve your writing would be in sitting there in the bank giving you some flexibility--spent frugally, it can give you the opportunity to take more pleasant if lower-paying jobs, the opportunity to wait a little while for a more pleasant job, the opportunity to work part time instead of full time, the opportunity to take a little time recovering from the job that you describe.

A quote from Elizabeth Gilbert, who, even if you may sneer at personal travel/romance memoirs, certainly made plenty of money. (And, by the way, got some good critical success on her less well-known books):

I held on to those other sources of income for so long because I never wanted to burden my writing with the responsibility of paying for my life. I knew better than to ask this of my writing, because over the years, I have watched so many other people murder their creativity by demanding that their art pay the bills. I’ve seen artists drive themselves broke and crazy because of this insistence that they are not legitimate creators unless they can exclusively live off their creativity. And when their creativity fails them (meaning: doesn’t pay the rent), they descend into resentment, anxiety, or even bankruptcy. Worst of all, they often quit creating at all. I’ve always felt like this is so cruel to your work— to demand a regular paycheck from it, as if creativity were a government job, or a trust fund.​