Adventures in writing …

I’ve been writing since 2010, mainly under my main site on blogger, TestSheepNZ.

It started out as a testing blog, but over time I found myself wanting to push the limits and boundaries — as of course any good tester should. It included politics, critical thinking, management, emotions.

Over the years I’ve received a lot of support for what I’d written, and the blog was pretty popular. But I also received some criticism about the blog being “all over the place” in it’s topics, and sometimes undermining what testing should be about.

I’d love to say “screw those naysayers”, and in a way, this year I did just that!

This year has been about trying some new things, some have worked, some not-so-much. But in that kind of reflection that you only get at the end of the year, there’s been a common theme which has come out again and again of “moving out of my comfort zone”.

So, I’m going to talk a little about things I’ve been trying in writing — the success, the failure, the reflection …

Everyone has a book in them!

I’ve been working on and off on a book about a girl who moves to a lunar colony since 2003. It was a collection of notes, world building, and sample chapters which I wasn’t happy with.

In 2008, I gave it another go. I wrote about 30 pages, but lost steam. I had a great idea but something was missing — not helped by me losing about an additional 20 pages of work on a laptop which crashed.

However in the tail end of 2016, the idea came alive again. It was missing a couple of elements I could see — a bit more of a villain, giving the protagonist a voice closer to my own. It clicked.

I became utterly hooked on writing it, and indeed as a piece of hope, published part of it in November 2016. The book was finished in February, went through some beta readers and rewrites into June. Just finishing it was a very emotional achievement.

I’m currently pedaling it to agents — and I have to admit as much as I and beta readers have loved it, the odds are against me. There’s a lot of would-be sci fi writers out there.

And to be honest, selling the book is nowhere near as fun as writing it. It’s a routine of sending something in, writing up the pitch of what the books about, and waiting several weeks for a response.

What’s unnerving is the sound of rejection isn’t a “no”, it’s simply being in week 11 of “we’ll let you know in 10 weeks”, and realising you won’t hear anything.

President Sidious blog

This was an attempt to do something different which didn’t really work out. What if The Emperor of the Star Wars Universe angry blogged in the voice of Donald Trump?

The idea was to create blogs which mocked news stories as they came out of President Trump’s chaotic office. The problem was, things are so farcical, I felt a bit like how Tom Lehrer did “political satire became obsolete when they awarded (controversial figure) Henry Kissinger the Nobel Peace Prize”.

The problem was, trying to keep up with real world events, I was always on the backfoot, and simply couldn’t. I had ideas to try to incorporate multiple characters and viewpoints, as well as threads between the blogs to keep things interesting. For instance, President Sidious was going to develop an unrequited attraction for a rebel leader.

The individual entries were fun, but as part of a larger narrative, it felt it wasn’t going anywhere. And working within Star Wars there was always going to be limits.

Thinking about this, I’d like to have another go at it, there’s a lot to mine from the insecure “supreme leader”, but maybe not so much using Trump or Star Wars. It’d be good to develop my own characters using sci fi archetypes.

The move to Medium

Medium allows a single author to work off multiple publications — so has been an ideal move for someone like me who wants to work in different area. The two main spin offs have been “The Test Sheep” (which is about testing) and “The Human Revolution” (which is about critical thinking and being human).

A main focus on my testing blog this year has been about AI, particularly designing chatbots. I have a few draft articles on NFR testing, and a particularly important one on the theory of testing. I’ve written it up a few months ago, but it doesn’t quite work yet. There are some articles that you have to revisit and revisit until it works, and unfortunately this is one of them. If you work with me / have caught me at conference, I’ve probably given you the verbal version of this “theory of variation” though.

I also have about a dozen articles written for an astronomy blog I keep meaning to launch, but I’m hoping to include videos with it, and have been working like crazy at how to record videos. You’ll see some of my video dabbling in the upcoming Automation Guild.

My biggest lesson of 2017

It’s very tempting if something is working to stick “doing more of the same”. If I had a revelation in 2017 it’s that we’re all creatures of habit who really like to stay where we’re most comfortable, and where we feel safe.

To learn, to grow, to gain experience means stepping outside of your comfort zone. But it also is important to feel safe.

I created President Sidious, and it didn’t really take off — but the world didn’t end (hmmm — I feel like tempting fate saying that in regards to anything that mocks Trumps presidency). Heck, I even have ideas now from trying that to do something a little different, but building on what worked / what didn’t.

Whatever you’re doing in 2018, I’m hoping you’re feeling safe to step out of your comfort zone, and experiment a little!