Tag: UCLA

New WIP: Exhume

Posted on by Robert Tomoguchi

In my last post I mentioned a screenplay I was thinking of novelizing. Well, guess what? That’s what I’ve been doing every day since January 7. I wrote the screenplay in 2006 while I was in the Professional Program in Screenwriting at UCLA. The screenplay was titled Exhume. I toyed around with renaming it and did rename it when I began the novel version, but I have since returned to the title Exhume. It’s about a string quartet who heads out to a remote location in Amish country to work on new music. There they do something they shouldn’t, and all hell breaks loose. The screenplay received an honorable mention in the annual competition at the end of the UCLA program. I thought it worked well as a screenplay, but we’ll have to see about the novel version. It might be too early to call it a novel. At the rate I’m going, it’s feeling more like novella length. I’m already appreciating getting to explore my main character more deeply writing it as fiction than I could as a screenplay. I hope I’ll finish it this year and plan to send it out to agents in the hopes of traditionally publishing it.

Lately, I’ve been on a reading streak where I’ve been reading very good books. Right now, I’m reading War and Peace and To Live by Yu Hua. A couple weeks ago I finished reading For Whom the Bell Tolls and was in awe for many reasons. I’ve also been reading the manga series Tokyo Tarareba Girls by Akiko Higashimura (my crush) which has been a lot of fun but whose viewpoints I’m often surprised by.

Two days ago, marked one year of being off social media. I don’t feel lacking because of it other than wondering if I’ve missed any messages from readers, but those are rare.

Well, that’s basically all I can think of mentioning. I hope you’re well and reading something really good.

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Mistaken

Posted on by Robert Tomoguchi

In my last post, way back in May, I said I chose to write and began writing Forever Candy as a novel. Today, in August, I’m letting you know I stopped. It fizzled out weeks ago. The voice I was writing in just fell flat. It didn’t feel authentic. I considered starting over in a different voice, but right now, I think I must walk away from it. Maybe someday I’ll try again.  

I finished my first UCLA Extension Creative Writing class, but I dropped the second class.

In the weeks since I stopped writing, I’ve become depressed. I feel adrift and without purpose. But I’ve been putting in a lot of effort in my sessions with my psychologist. I recently began considering writing about my childhood best friend. In the preceding post, titled Pushpins, our story is laid out in the fourth row of note cards and is something I intended to weave into another story I refer to as Candela.

Writing about my childhood best friend is something I think I can only write privately, without the intention of anyone ever seeing it. I think it’s essential in order to tell our story honestly. 

So, for the readers I do have, you may not get anything new from me for a long while.

Delete TwitterI deleted my Twitter accounts. I think Facebook will be on the chopping block next. Social media has proven to be more detrimental than beneficial for me, and after being off it for over 180 days now, the feelings of FOMO rarely surface.

I feel like disappearing. 

I told my psychologist that by my next session I would open a new Scrivener document and save it for the new writing project. That next session is tomorrow. I’ve been struggling with what to save it as for a working title. I could stick with calling it Candela, but I feel like I should start fresh. I’m leaning toward saving it as I Was Mistaken.  

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Pushpins

Posted on by Robert Tomoguchi

Bulletin Board of Notecards
Three stories in notecards.

I know my last two blog posts suggested I was leaning toward writing a novel version of Filming Tara Raikatuji, but I no longer think it’s going to be my next project. I took six days off from my day job, with the intention of resting before my busy fiscal closing period. On Thursday I mapped out the three stories I’ve been kicking around in my head using note cards to identify the major beats of each story. I typically lay out six beats per story. The stories were Filming Tara Raikatuji, Forever Candy, and something I for now just refer to as Candela. The Candela story has two rows of cards because there are two parallel stories in it. I pinned them to my bulletin board but ran out of pushpins. I don’t know how that happened. I’ve had many more cards on this board before. Anyhow, I felt good after pinning the cards up because it told me I did have things I’d be able to write from beginning to end. In general, I won’t start writing until I know my beginning and ending.

I spent the rest of the day and Friday evaluating which of the three stories I should pursue, and I landed on Forever Candy. It’s the least brave story to write because it’s the least personal, but I chose it for two reasons. The first is that I’ve been worrying about what writing I can share if I continue in this creative writing program at UCLA Extension, because it’s online, and so the instructor and students are all faceless and I don’t find myself getting to know them. I realized that it’s difficult for me to share drafts of things that are very personal with people I don’t know. The second reason is that it’s my goal to traditionally publish my next book, and I think Forever Candy is the easiest to explain and the most marketable.

Saturday, I wrote a prologue for Forever Candy. It was only five hundred words, but it was a beginning, and I’m still happy with how it came out. Yesterday, I pushed myself to shift settings and begin the first chapter. After a couple hours, I only settled on the first three sentences—32 words. But it’s a start. I’m a little intimidated to embark on this book because I’m writing in third person, which I don’t typically do. I also have a major character who’s male, something else I’m not accustomed to if I’m not that male, and especially after spending the last eight years writing Orly Bialek.

But hey, the point is, I began something I feel like I might be able to write all the way to its ending. As always happens at the beginning of any writing project, I think I’ll be able to write this story quickly, in this case, a year. If history is any indication, it’ll likely be at least two years. At least I’m writing again. Yay me.

Okayo, my Love Village favorite.
Okayo, my Love Village crush.

On a totally unrelated note, can I mention just how much I love the new show on Netflix, Love Village? It’s a more mature version of Ainori Love Wagon, which I absolutely loved and made me cry more than any other show I’ve watched. Love Village is making me gush buckets too. If I have any influence over my readers, I highly recommend.

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Inspiring Tara Raikatuji

Posted on by Robert Tomoguchi

Muraki and Saeko from Pale Flower
Muraki and Saeko from Pale Flower

I’m still spinning my wheels, trying to figure out what to write next. I signed up for a creative writing class through UCLA Extension. It’s an introductory course. I’ve already signed up for the Novel I course in the next term. Depending on how that goes, I may sign up for the Creative Writing Certificate Program which is a total of 21 units and at the end of it, I should have a new book, or at least something that is 250 pages. I’m in the third week of my beginning course, but I don’t know if online learning is for me; I’m assigned reading and given writing prompts, but there’s very little input made by the instructor. Regardless, I will finish the course.

I’ve continued to watch yakuza films. I was particularly moved by Pale Flower. Like Branded to Kill had, but in a different way, Pale Flower inspired me to try rewriting Filming Tara Raikatuji. Their female leads make me feel like I want to bring Tara to life and that it’s possible some readers will actually understand her. I’m scared of sharing her though, because it’s sharing a lot, and it’s that fear that’s preventing me from putting down the first word.  

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