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Back From Futurescapes 2018

I spent last week attending the Futurescapes 2018 workshop, which was held in Sundance, Utah. I flew in a day early in order to visit the Great Salt Lake, which was impressive. I drove out to the Antelope Island Park to take in the otherworldly landscape. To reach the park, I had to drive across the seven-mile causeway to the island, marveling at the floats of grebes and other waterbirds that had gathered to feed (only brine shrimp and brine flies can survive the salinity of the waters), and nest. I would have liked to have seen one of the bison that live in the park, but not this time. On the following day, I drove up to Sundance.

 

 

The resort was lovely. Very conducive to serene self-reflection.

 

Overall, I felt Futurescapes to be just the right fit for where I am in my writing. There was good advice to be had from established authors, agents and editors from a craft and business perspective. I came away from the conference refreshed and with new insight.

The main point I was made aware of: what I thought was the beginning of my novel is the midpoint, or the start of the third act.

This showed me one of my blind spots. Writing short fiction for as long as I have, now, my instinct was to start as late as possible into the story. Looking back over what I’ve written so far, I was able to see the parts I’d compressed to get to where my short-story-writing self wanted to begin. Now, all I have to do is accordion out those parts and flesh them out.

No big.