# In-da-gada-da-vida



## paradojas (Feb 28, 2008)

Privyet,

Stumbled on to this site late last night in a semi-stupor after a day of snow shoveling, X-C skiing, and the convoluted prose of Philip Roth (anyone else read _The Human Stain_?)

Once upon a time I used to post over at Writers Net; however, that forum has lost its edginess, or perhaps I overstayed my welcome--I guess it's all in the eye of the beholder.

Not sure I will be a consistent poster here, as from the sample of posts I've read, this site seems to lean toward fantasy: my mother married a vampire and birthed a werewolf who was destined to save the human race from dragon-headed aliens. Not that there's anything wrong with that, it's just not my schtick. But then again, I've only perused a brief sample of the threads, and I may be a bit sardonic from dealing with the business of publishing and seeing what passes as literature today, as opposed to what was being produced and consumed 40, 30, or even 20 years ago. (Doesn't it appear as if anyone with a laptop and thesaurus can call themselves a writer and flood the desks of agents with their tritisms?)

Also there may be a decided generation gap between myself and most of the contributors here, and rather than become more sardonic than I already am, it may be better to keep my satiric prose where it belongs--in my second novel. Having said all that, it's great places like this exist: it definitely keeps people off the streets. See, my sarcasm is already manifesting itself... 

Paka

Rodya


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## Nickie (Feb 28, 2008)

Welcome to Writing Forums, Rodya. I'm not one of the youngest myself, and sometimes share the same meaning.


Nickie


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## joifulartist84 (Feb 28, 2008)

Hi there, Rodya.  I'll gladly take your sarcasm if it helps me to write better!

What genre will your second novel be in?


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## ArlenOrobono (Feb 28, 2008)

Welcome to the forums!
I hope you enjoy your stay .


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## Sam (Feb 28, 2008)

Hello and welcome to the forums!

Sam.


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## paradojas (Feb 28, 2008)

Nickie:

Congrats on your publishing successes. You write in Dutch as well as English--that's impressive. I enjoyed reading some of your interviews. There's some comfort in knowing a writer like Archer (I think I have his name right) was rejected 17 times before getting published. I haven't reached that number yet...

I was unable to access samples of your writing as a message read that page on skynet was unavailable. Historical fiction I'm more attuned to than fantasy. BTW, I _am_ a scifi fan, ala Bradbury, Heinlein, and Arthur C. Clarke.

joiful:

I write mainstream fiction with literary overtones. My first novel takes place in Moscow, 2002, and is what I would call a socio-dramatic mystery. Ditto for what I'm writing now, except it is taking place in the US, 2007-8. 

As far as helping someone to write better, there's plenty of info out there on the web, and most of what I would have to say would parrot that. What I have learned in this process is that nothing you write is as good as you first think it is. The keys to writing good fiction are saying more with less, ie., eliminating verbage, involving the reader with your characters and their conflicts, avoiding cliched metaphors and nondescriptive adverbs, and most important--rewriting, rewriting, rewriting...


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## paradojas (Feb 28, 2008)

Thanks for the bienvenidos Sam and Arlen. 

Arlen, I'm just up the road from you in central Vermont.

Sam, I remember you wrote something over on that "paradice-creature" thread that struck me as being spot on. I'll have to read more. BTW, your photo looks like it was lifted right out of GQ. Maybe you should write yourself into a screenplay.


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## Olly Buckle (Feb 28, 2008)

If you like them have you tried Bob Shaw and Ursula LeGuin?


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## rumpole40k (Feb 28, 2008)

Hi and welcome to the forums.


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## Shinn (Feb 28, 2008)

Hello there Royda and welcome


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## paradojas (Feb 28, 2008)

Hi everyone,

No Olly, I haven't read Shaw or LeGuin. Started _Dune_ once, but got distracted and never came back. Haven't read SciFi now for a number of years. My tastes have evolved into other areas. 

For a while I read everything Russian in sight, both fiction and nonfiction, both pre-revolution and Soviet era. Anyone else either read or heard of _The Master and Margarita _by Mikhail Bulgakov? Now there's some fantasy: The Devil and his entourage appear in a Moscow park and commence to create havoc. Bulgakov wrote it as a satire on Soviet culture and politics after his plays were banned from the stage by Bolshevik censors. Many critics, both western and Russian, consider Bulgakov's masterpiece to be one of the 20th century's best pieces of fiction, yet it is really heard of in the West. 

Another good one--_The Twelve Chairs _by Ilf and Petrov. This is classic satire and should be made into a movie someday. The protagonist, Ostap Bender, is the con man of all con men. 

We western writers think we have it so bad today, what with agents not returning our emails and our fulls and partials languishing for months on the transom. In the USSR writers were executed, exiled, compromised, and hospitalized in asylums for expressing themselves in ways we either take for granted or have absolutely no conception of. Today mediocrity has become the norm and everyone is out for their 15 minutes.


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## A-L (Feb 28, 2008)

Nice to have you one the forum! I kind of write sci-fi but my novel is a mixture of both sci-fi and fantasy I guess, yeah, its mixed up a bit.


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## Ty_lol (Feb 29, 2008)

Good to have yea here.  Welcome.


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## Mike C (Feb 29, 2008)

Welcome.

You'll be pleased to know that not everyone here writes fantasy, and some of us at least are old enough to know who Iron Butterfly is.


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## paradojas (Feb 29, 2008)

Glad to know that, Mike. I've always liked the way it sounds---in-da-gada-da-vida--kind of rhymes with _In the Garden of Good and Evil. _I dropped more than a few tabs to that one...


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## Olly Buckle (Feb 29, 2008)

Ursula Leguin was the daughter of Alexander Kroeber, one of the last all round social scientists who wrote "Configurations of culture growth". Her mother was also a social scientist who wrote "Ishi, last of his tribe" about an Ameroindian who escaped the massacre of his people to share his culture with a museum director (True story). As you can imagine she uses s.f. to write socially insightful novels. Bob Shaw writes from the technology perspective, in my opinion his best was "Other days other eyes" in which some one invents sloglass, a substance that light travels through at sub light speeds, and he exp;ores the development of it and the social consequences over time.


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## Mike C (Feb 29, 2008)

paradojas said:


> Glad to know that, Mike. I've always liked the way it sounds---in-da-gada-da-vida--kind of rhymes with _In the Garden of Good and Evil. _I dropped more than a few tabs to that one...




Heh. I'm sure I don't know what you're talking about...


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## Mike C (Feb 29, 2008)

Olly Buckle said:


> Ursula Leguin was...



or is, one of the best SF writers ever, and explored social mores and interactions rather than technology. _The Left Hand of Darkness_ I would consider required reading, and if you like the Russian novelists I think you'll detect some feint echos in her work. 

I've only read Shaw's shorts, including _Other Days, Other Eyes_ (was that a novella?) and one of his, I sadly forget the title, about a robotic boy, brought tears to my eyes. Very sad.

Can you help with the title, Olly?


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## Olly Buckle (Feb 29, 2008)

Mike:-
or is, one of the best SF writers ever, and explored social mores and interactions rather than technology.
 That's what I said isn't it? Sorry, can't help you with the title to that one.


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## Mike C (Mar 1, 2008)

Olly Buckle said:


> That's what I said isn't it?



Yea, I just said it in a different way in the hope that I'd sound original and clever, maybe a little intellectual. Thanks for exposing me.


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