Hello, imaginary internet people!
Look at us! We made it into 2024 somehow. And I managed a 2nd issue of the newsletter, which you are reading right now, unless you haven't opened it yet, and I'm just staring at you from your inbox. Yes, I know what you did. But you looked *fabulous* doing it.
What's everyone up to? Did anyone do Dry January? Last time I did Dry January, David Bowie died and I had to go to a funeral (not his), so never again. But I did attempt Try-To-Stop-Stuffing-My-Face January, as I ate a lot of nice food during the Christmas break, and am feeling it. I've been on an exercise/workout trip for over a year now, and am really enjoying it, so I just need to hold off on having quite so many snacks. Last year I signed up for The Pump, which is Arnold Schwarzenegger's workout app, and I've been loving that. I'm currently working my way through the Foundation sets, and am on the second phase. His daily newsletter is also a lovely slice of positivity, and the site has free workouts too. I've gone from someone who dreads any sort of exercise to the type of person who looks forward to new workouts that punish me. Hey, I'm a writer, we're all basically masochists anyway, I suppose.
Writing stuff
Like most writers, I use a lot of tools and websites to help with research, and sometimes that starts even before you know exactly what you're writing. I'm terrible at coming up with titles of projects, names of characters, and names of places. As you can imagine, this can make it difficult to get started on things - even if it's a rough draft, I need *some* sort of title, and names for characters at the very least. And when the title and names aren't quite right, you can feel it in your guts, and it puts you off. Anything that's even a tiny distraction can slow you down, and that's not what you want when you're powering through that rough draft as fast as possible. Side note: that's how I roll with my multi-stage writing process, which I'll go into another time, your mileage/process may vary. Side-side-note: You may already know some of these sites, but I'm guessing there's at least one you haven't seen.
Whatever stage you're at in the project, you'll need a title, you'll need character names, and you may need place names too, unless you're using real locations. I have a few random name generators I use that sometimes helps to throw up interesting suggestions. Sometimes I'll go to name meaning sites, and reverse search - I'll look for all names that mean a certain thing that fits the character, like strength, nobility, etc. Sometimes it'll be an unexpected mix of sounds that just feels right. It's like a song, you know it when you hear it.
For titles, if I'm stuck, I'll write up a few words that sound like elements of the theme or plot summary, then just trawl through a Thesaurus to find interesting words that mean the same thing. If that doesn't help, I'll search for common phrases or expressions that include one of the words, or song titles, etc.
Place names are another thing though. Sometimes you want to set the story in a real place, sometimes you want to invent a place. But what's a good name for it? First time this happened, I went down an internet rabbit hole to find out how places got their names, and found a really useful page on Wikipedia - it breaks down the components of place names in the UK, explaining the original meaning behind them. Take the (real) Ashbourne, for example - "ash" means "ash tree", "bourne" means "large stream/small river", so presumably it was once a settlement by a large ash tree next to a river. Similarly, Bournemouth was originally called that because it was once an area at the mouth of a river.
You can use some of these fragments to construct your own place names, and it's really interesting to mix and match them. For my Doctor Who Storybook story The Haldenmor Fugue, part of the plot revolved around an ancient English town from the Viking era, so I needed a suitably old sounding name. I took the "Hal" from Halifax, because I liked the sound of it, then went with some place name parts - "den" can mean valley or hill, "more" means large or great. I took off the "e" in "more", and ended up with Haldenmor, which felt exactly right. I've done this a few times, and I always like the results. You can do the same with Irish place names, or any other country you need.
Even if you're not a writer, the webpage is really interesting, and once you know the basics, you'll be able to unpick a lot of other place names. This is all genuinely useful to me for my writing work, but at the same time, it's procrastination. Let's call it procrastiwork.
Work stuff
Speaking of work, there isn't much to report at the moment. January is always quiet in this industry as all the companies and agencies slowly start coming back to life. The audio stuff and comic thing are still in the pipeline, early days on those. I'm waiting to hear back on several others, but there's a new US project that suddenly came to life just before Christmas, so I've been having some planning meetings on that, to try and get it set up. Again, early days, which is a phrase I'll probably use a lot.
One big job I was up for just before Christmas, where I made it to a second meeting with the execs, I just heard that I didn't get. Feels like I got really close with this one, I was really passionate about the story, and put so much work and love into pitching for it - but it wasn't to be. This happens all the time, to all of us in this business. My consolation in this, as with every job I don't get, is that I know I put everything into it, and couldn't have done anything more. In the end, sometimes it just comes down to which "take" they prefer. You have to dive in with both feet for pitches, which is why it can be a huge downer if you don't get it. You fall in love with it, get massively excited, flesh out the universe in your head, you can see and hear how it will work, it feels like a perfect fit - then you have to just walk away. For pitches on existing projects, you can't even reuse your material, because it's all based on someone else's work. It's hard letting it go, but it's just how it goes sometimes. It's a bit of a gut punch to how I intended to attack 2024 and hit the ground running, but hey. You're allowed 24 hours to wallow and feel sorry for yourself, then you have to get back on the horse and keep going. So if anyone has any work going, now would be a really great time!
The first work week of January was spent catching up on admin bits and pieces, and sending overly cheerful "hey happy new year hahaha wooooo anyway is this project still happening no worries if not" emails. You have to do a lot of your own hustle, your agent can only do so much, and they expect you to generate some work and manage your networking anyway. It's tricky to strike a balance between persistent and annoying, and you always feel like you're bothering people. But sometimes they do forget, or things pile up and they don't realise how long it's been, so you still have to do it, and feel incredibly awkward. These are the things they don't put in the endless screenwriting books...
Movie stuff
Awards season is still upon us, so I've been working through a ton of screeners. Past Lives is as beautiful as everyone says, The Zone of Interest is even more harrowing than everyone says, and The Holdovers is like finding a lost 1970s movie playing on TV in the mid 80s, film grain and wobbly crash zooms and all - Paul Giamatti basically walking away with the Oscar this year, I'm calling it now. American Fiction is hilarious, Killers of the Flower Moon is incredible but depressing (on purpose), Priscilla is also incredible but depressing (but kudos to her and everything she achieved since then, what a smart lady), Dream Scenario is Nic Cage's best movie in years (although I love all his movies), Bottoms and Polite Society are both an absolute riot of fun and joy. Oh, I also really enjoyed A Haunting in Venice, it's really fun and weird and atmospheric.
The great thing about awards screeners is finding movies I would never have sought out. I wouldn't have chosen to see Past Lives, or The Holdovers, for example, and I would have totally missed out on amazing movies. Similarly, there are usually a couple of big, popular ones that I look forward to but then they just don't do anything for me. All subjective, of course, and depends on the mood you're in. First time I saw Fury Road, at the cinema, I thought "meh, is that it? Boring." Second time I saw it, on blu-ray and a small TV, because someone else wanted to see it, I sighed, expecting to have a nap, but then got swept up the second it started, and now I think it's one of the greatest action masterpieces ever made. You just never know. And that's brilliant.
If I mention stuff here that I enjoyed, you can assume that if I haven't mentioned something else, I either haven't seen it, or didn't really like it. But nobody gains anything from me saying I didn't like a movie, I might put someone off watching that could love it, and it just makes me sound miserable. Talking about stuff I loved, on the other hand, might convince someone to give it a try, and share the joy. Everybody wins. So I'd much rather do that.
Oh, it's not from this year, but we caught up with Leave the World Behind on Netflix the other day. It's an absolutely amazing film, terrifying, depressing, and brilliant. I'll never watch it again. It's too good, and it scared the pants off me.
Waffle stuff
I'll wrap this up now, it's rambling slightly, but that's what January is for, really. I know, it's February now, but give me a break, January lasted for a *thousand years*. I'll try to keep these a bit shorter in future, I'm still figuring out the right sort of length as I go, so bear with me. They'll probably be monthly, unless life gets in the way, but we'll figure that out together, I'm sure.
Thanks to all of you who have decided to put up with this nonsense! Welcome to 2024. Let's get on it like a car bonnet.
James Moran
http://www.jamesmoran.com/
The Pump app (with 7-day free trial), and free daily newsletter:
https://arnoldspumpclub.com/blogs/newsletter/welcome-pump-app
Random name generator:
http://random-name-generator.info/random/
Find names with particular meanings:
https://www.behindthename.com/meanings/
Thesaurus:
https://www.thesaurus.com/
Search phrases:
https://www.phrases.com/
Toponymy - the meaning of place names:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_generic_forms_in_place_names_in_the_British_Isles
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Place_names_in_Ireland
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toponymy
The Haldenmor Fugue, my Doctor Who Storybook story, free on my website:
http://www.jamesmoran.com/ - click on Free Stuff