I just sent to my publisher these four things: the ms of Somewhere Else, the first chapter of the ‘sapling’ now known as Sunrise, a stylesheet and a map of Camp Flotsam aka The Academy of Heroes. How does that feel? Incredibly, deeply satisfying. I have done it; I have reached a goal. I’m happy with what I have done and eager to do it all over for Sunrise. I don’t think things get better than that.

This last week one of the giants in the forest of writing, Ray Bradbury, fell. He was a man who understood and ran arms open to the addictive pleasures of writing. I am trying now, instead of being scared, to open my own arms to the powerful compulsion to write more and more. These quotes from Ray say it like I want it to be:

“You must stay drunk on writing so reality cannot destroy you.”
― Ray Bradbury, Zen in the Art of Writing

“You grow ravenous. You run fevers. You know exhilarations. You can’t sleep at night, because your beast-creature ideas want out and turn you in your bed. It is a grand way to live.”
― Ray Bradbury, Zen in the Art of Writing

I often feel the latter sensation and it is a grand way to live.

Finally I have two links to share. One is a great series of thoughts about story telling from one of Pixar’s staff and the other is the art of a great designer, Francois Schuiten,  from Brussels. He created cities that shaped his characters and I really love some of what is pictured (via Dylan Horrocks).