Works in progress, October edition
I’m changing the format to make this easier to read and a lot less stream of conscious.
I’ve made very little progress in anything this month. That’s a bit depressing. I’m blaming Patrick Rothfuss. I keep losing hours to The Name of the Wind. It’s an awesome book that I highly recommend. Anyway, NaNoWriMo is coming up, and hopefully I’ll have 50k words added to one of these at the end of November. Or 25k and 25k more of No More Lies edited. I haven’t decided which I’m doing yet.
- Richie
Synopsis: Slice-of-life in a space opera setting about an up-and-coming rock star trying to juggle that with family life.
First paragraph: Somewhere out there in the tri-galaxies, one of Richie’s older sisters was fighting to free a world from tyranny. Somewhere out there, another of his older sisters was engaging in a bit of smuggling. He, however, was in the nursery of his house in Namenlose Province, Sweytz, trying to convince his daughters to take a nap.
Present status: 1,622 words written, possibly stuck
Aiming for: Novel or series of novels
- Kayden
Synopsis: Slice-of-life in a space opera setting about a stay-at-home dad, his apprentice jeweler husband, their baby girl, and Kayden’s large family, most of whom are in some sort of exciting career. Focus would be on the contrast between his life and that of his siblings.
Present status: Vague ideas
Aiming for: Novel or series of novels
- Bobby’s Daughter
Synopsis: This is sort of a sequel to the novel I’ll have coming out next year, No More Lies. Twentysomething years after it, someone shows up on Bobby,’s the main character of both stories, porch claiming to be his daughter. A bit of self-loathing occurs and disappointment from just about everyone, then adventure will happen. And a bit of stupidity. It’s a space opera, though a bit small scale for one.
First paragraph: The knock on the door surprised me a bit. Most people who’d be visiting unannounced at that time of day would’ve just walked in. I slid a knife into my left hand and opened the door with my right, figuring I could never be too cautious . . . especially after the shit with Andrei last year.
Present status: 4,172 words written, have possibly plotted myself into a corner and need to rethink things
Aiming for: Novella or novel
- Giant Space Spider
Synopsis: In a different, more pulpy space opera setting than the other works, a ship goes to investigate a world no ship has ever been able to get past.
First paragraph: No one knew what lurked beyond Alzas. Spacer rumors had put everything from ancient evils from before the dawn of time to pirates very determined to keep their stronghold secret. All that was known for sure was that something was there, and that something didn’t let anyone past.
Present status: 789 words written, possibly stuck
Aiming for: Novella or novel
- Jake’s Early Years
Synopsis: This is a prequel to my novella Jake’s Last Mission. This would be the story of how Jake went orphaned ranch hand to military officer. It’ll start a space western and shift as it goes on to military space opera.
First paragraph: “I can quit school. I already know how to read and do math and such. I can figure out anything else, Dad,” I said, sounding as mature as I could at eleven years old.
Present status: Don’t know how many words written as some is handwritten. I idiotically switched from third to first person, so I’ve got to decide which I’m using and rewrite the rest.
Aiming for: Novella or novel
- Second Kavaliro Cousin
Synopsis: Lyndsey and Taliza, the main characters from my novella The Crown of Eldrete, and a team are going to Polthaina to try to secure the space port and naval base with the help of local rebels. Someone’s been feeding the bad guys intel. It’s space opera.
First paragraph: When Lyndsey got to the bridge of the yacht, Taliza was already there and talking to someone. “I understand that,” she was saying, “but we’re unarmed, so clearly there’s no reason to fire on us.” Taliza hit the button that let other occupants of the bridge hear what was being said over the comm.
Alternate first paragraph: Polthaina had been attacked by enemies so often in its long history that the entirety of the world was covered in ruins. Lyndsey paused to try to read an inscription on a vine and moss covered arch in one of these ruins. “Hey, Cousin? You got any clue what this says?”
Present status: 2,553 words written in one version, 363 of another. The existence of two different versions that are that incomplete should make clear how very badly this story is going.
Aiming for: Novella
- Lyn, Rek, Ana, and Bobby Have An Adventure
Synopsis: This is set years before the Kavaliro Cousins series when Lyndsey’s wife, Anastasia, was a Dagger (rebel-for-hire) too. She and Lyndsey were on a mission when they ran into Bobby (from No More Lies and Bobby’s Daughter) and his best friend, Rek, who are on a mission for the Sweytzian Defense Force Special Forces. The two groups are targeting the same organization, but for different reasons. It starts with Rek’s disguise being good enough to fool Lyndsey so she shoots him, and things go downhill from there. This one is also space opera.
First paragraph: Son of a fucking bitch! Lyndsey thought as the guard got into sight. He was looking right at her. Guess I’m not as well hidden as I thought. With a quick prayer, she pulled her holdout blaster and shot the guard. Having not taken the time to aim, the bolt only scorched his leg a bit. Should at least slow him down some, she thought, quickly hitting a button on her comm with the hand that didn’t have a blaster in it.
Present status: 6,809 words written. Might need to back up a bit and rewrite from there.
Aiming for: Novella or novel
- Magi
Synopsis: Elianthir has just become a mage. His grandfather died under mysterious circumstances years ago. His girlfriend, who’s a member of his hometown, just found brutally killed sheep. An evil mage is somehow involved in all of this. That’s all I know so far.
First paragraph: Elianthir touched the intricately carved silver cover of the codex with trepidation. He knew that once he opened it, all of his grandfather’s hard won knowledge would disappear from its pages. The words — those the Order of Tylar considered important anyway — had been carefully copied into the Grand Codex of Tylar, of course. But that didn’t stop Elianthir from feeling like he was about to destroy something of great value, to destroy the last remaining bit of his grandfather, who’d vanished in a cloud of pale blue smoke while fighting a telazir years before.
Present status: 2,619 words written. I need to do some world-building first.
Aiming for: Novel or series of novels
- Loving Her
Synopsis: Renata, Bobby’s sister and Lyndsey’s mother, is stabbed in the lung and nearly dies. The story contrasts the way her husband of thirty-three years and her “not-a-boyfriend” of a year and a half handle this, and the “not-a-boyfriend” realizing he can’t keep up the charade that he doesn’t love love her. Her marriage is open, so this has nothing to do with a love triangle or anything like that. This will be a romance in a space opera setting. It also will have stuff about her debating retiring from being a Dagger.
First paragraph: Renata and I had been enjoying each other’s company in my tent when the alarm sounded. Within moments, ((enemies)) were pouring into the camp from every direction. The battle was long and hard, but I don’t remember much about it now. Nothing about it was nearly as important as what happened near the end.
Present status: 2,601 words, and some bits here and there from a writing exercise thing that I might be able to incorporate, written. This and two of the other things on this list have overlapping timeframes and characters, so I . . . am getting an idea that I’m not sure I’ve actually got the skill to pull off, especially as the plots, themes, etc. don’t really . . . wait, I just might be able to make this work! Hmmm . . . this, 3, 2, 1, and 12 may all end up combined into one longass, about as many viewpoints as A Song of Ice and Fire story. Maybe. Or this could be a “sounds good at 4 in the morning” idea and tomorrow I’ll be like “What the fuck was I thinking?!”
Aiming for: Novel
- Super Hero Story
Synopsis: Super villain stole an important thing. Super hero team that usually deals with such things is too well known to super villain, so they’re recruiting a new team. I think I was planning to go with something Avengers like . . . new team learning to work together while thrust into the crucible sort of thing.
First paragraph: The red energy field contained by the pentagon pulsated. Mona Cathar, known to most as the Pink Spider, studied it from afar, daring not to get close enough to be tempted to try to touch it. The others present, actual scientists, unlike her, jabbered about “revolutionizing our understanding of Quaglon science” and “non-electrical power” and other such things. Mona, however, saw one thing when she looked at it: Money.
Amount already have: 372 words written. Pretty sure this is stuck, which is sad. I have the bad guys and their motivations, but the good guys are proving much harder.
Aiming for: Novel or series of novels
- Viktor’s Life Story
Synopsis: Viktor has finally conceded to have an official biography written, decades after killing the tyrant Drochslem and bringing peace to the Vorton galaxy. That’s the frame story to him telling the tale of how he went from quiet bookish teenager to war hero to Dagger to Drochslem’s slave to Drochslem’s killer to crippled bar owner, poet, and professor. Space opera, needless to say. Space fantasy to a certain extent too, I think.
First paragraph: I wasn’t sure exactly what I’d expected Viktor Blue to look like, but it certainly wasn’t the gentleman standing in front of me. His silver hair, the only part of him that betrayed his age, hung to just past his waist, part of it pulled back in an elaborate braid. His clothing was much like that his husband normally wears, but tamer: a loose, long-sleeved white shirt with ruffles at the cuff and collar; a black vest with silver embroidery; black silk pants; and black boots polished to a gleaming shine. His jewelry was plentiful, but simple and understated, save a pair of silver filigree earrings he absent-mindedly untangled from his hair as he limped towards me. There was a black cane with a pearlescent handle next to his chair, but he’d left it behind. He was tall with piercing blue eyes and spoke in a cultured baritone. He sighed softly before asking, “You’re the Royal Historian, I presume?” His accent was odd, which I didn’t find surprising since he hadn’t learned to speak Allurian until he was in his thirties.
Present status: 1,111 words written. Like this story, but am just not feeling inspired.
Aiming for: Novel or series of novels
- Rusark and Lyn
Synopsis: Rusark is a widowed Sweytzian Defense Force Special Forces officer. He’s rather calm, collected, and rational. Lyndsey is a Dagger fighter pilot/ninja who is considered eccentric, if not outright crazy, by other fighter pilots and Daggers. The Daggers and the SDFSF are friendly rivals. They fall in love, despite Rusark not really wanting to be involved with someone who’s so likely to die young.
First paragraph: My new friends had decided I was going to enjoy myself that night regardless of what I wanted. It’d only been two sulida since Tanya and I had broken up. I’d thrown myself into work instead of dwelling on how broken-hearted I was over her behavior. Dalrek and Harrison decided I’d thrown myself into work a little too much, apparently, and pestered me about needing to go have some fun until I’d relented.
Present status: 2,260 words written. Have made a previous attempt at it, so the next 6000ish words will be rewriting stuff I’ve already written. This is what I’m planning to work on for NaNoWriMo, but now that I’ve got that new idea of combining lots of things . . . ~sigh~ I’ve got to do some thinking.
Aiming for: Novel
- No More Lies
Back cover blurb: Years ago, Bobby Kavaliro ran away from Sweytz, from everything and everyone he’d ever known, lured by promises of money and power made by the smooth-talking dictator of Anerix.
A few years later Bobby came to realize how stupid he’d been and became a spy for the very world he left.
A spy posing as an assassin.
A spy whose best friend and mentor has just had his cover blown.
A spy who jilted someone who would now like to see him dead.
A spy, in other words, who needs a vacation. And a spy who is hoping to meet someone to share his bed while on that vacation.
Bobby finds more than that when he meets Karen. So much more, in fact, that before too long he’s moving back to Sweytz, looking for a job, and trying to quickly learn how to be a responsible adult for the first time in his life.
Meanwhile, Anerix’s High Command, now very much suspecting he was a spy, are sending assassins after him . . . and after Karen.
And, as if that wasn’t enough, Karen doesn’t believe half of what he’s told her about his past, nor is she sure she wants to be with him after she gets to know just how temperamental and immature he can be.
Bobby has to grow up fast to keep her love, deal with everything he’s missed while he was gone, try to avoid being killed, try to keep Karen safe, and try to rebuild his relationship with his family, all at the same time.
First paragraph: This is exactly what I needed, I thought, as I leaned back against a tree in Thil Park on Sarglerich and began tuning my loothin, a break from sneaking around listening to things I could get killed for overhearing, worrying every second that somebody’s gonna figure out what I’m up to and kill me, and all the other shit that goes along with my job.
Present status: 4,111 words written in second draft. 112,000ish to go before I start looking for beta readers!
Is: Novel
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NaNoWriMo and me
Bean icon (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
That time of year is nearly upon us again when writers all over the world abandon family, friends, pets, and good sense and attempt to commit to paper (or screen more commonly, I assume) 50,000 words in thirty days. This will be my third NaNoWriMo.
I can’t recall when I first heard of NaNoWriMo. I think it was in 2003 or 4, way back when it was nowhere near as huge as it is now. Long enough ago that I heard about on a newsgroup . . . does anybody else remember those? I thought it sounded horribly stupid. Fifty thousand words doesn’t make a novel! Why, you could just write “the” fifty thousand times and win! It belittles the noble profession of writing!
Please note at this time I had never finished writing anything that wasn’t for an school assignment. Yeah. My ego was a little out of control.
Then a few years later, after everyone and their brother started doing it, I heard about it again. By then I’d finished a few short stories, all in the under 5,000 word range (even the ones that really should have been longer). So I didn’t need NaNoWriMo. I was a short story author. My novel idea wasn’t suffering from me lacking the discipline to write; it was suffering from me not being able to get it perfect.
(By the way, I blame my drive for perfection in rough drafts on one too many English teachers who told me my rough draft was perfect enough that I didn’t need to revise. I have since reread some of these papers. My English teachers didn’t know what the fuck they were talking about.)
Then 2012 came along. I woke up with an idea one day in late October and ended up writing 10,000 words in five days. At the time, this was an amazing amount for me. The longest thing I’d ever finished was only 7,700 words. I decided I’d do NaNoWriMo, especially once I heard about Rebels, people who did things like work on things they were already working on. So, I did it, and I learned some very important things about my writing process:
1) I need to keep my word processor open all the time. If I close it, I tend to find things to do besides write.
2) I do best when I don’t let myself go to bed until I’ve written at least a scene a day.
3) I can start out pantsing, but if I don’t ever come up with some kind of plan, the story will end up a horribly tangled mess. I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned this on here before.
4) I need to only work on one thing at a time if I want to get anything finished.
That story ended up a mess and too short for me to win with just it, but I was able to finish a novella I’d been working on.
I couldn’t maintain the discipline I’d learned for various reasons throughout 2013, some of which were health related, some of which were pet related, and some of which were just me procrastinating, really. But I still almost successfully did one of the Camps (I cheated and counted some notes to win, because I would’ve won if I hadn’t come down with some horrid virus from the ninth layer of the Abyss).
Then NaNoWriMo 2013 happened and, though I won, something terribly dreadful happened that has been affecting my writing ever since. You see, my writing speed had been steadily increasing, from less than 200 words an hour back when I was trying to write perfect rough drafts to an average of about 1050 words an hour, sometimes as much as 1200. I also discovered that I could keep this up for about four or five hours at a stretch.
So, being an inherently lazy person, I decided that I didn’t need to write every day. If I could write 5000 words in just five hours, thought I, and I’d set a goal for myself for the month of only 20,000, why then I only needed to write four days a month! Ignoring, of course, that I’d worked that goal out based on figuring I could find the time 20 days of the month to write 1000 words. No, I don’t make sense, even to myself.
April started with my spouse needing surgery, so it wasn’t my fault I only got 10,000 words during that Camp. July though . . . I just kept putting it off because “I can catch up later.” I know better than this. I learned time and again in high school and college both that waiting to the last minute is a very bad plan.
But I did it anyway.
I won, once I lowered my word count to 10,000. I even finally finished No More Lies.
I took a break after that. A planned one. I’d been writing the same story for a year, with only small breaks. I was starting to sound like the narrator, Bobby, in real life, which, as he’s an abrasive jerk at times, was not a good thing.
I have no idea how many words I’ve written in September and October. I know it’s been a lot of a bit here, a bit there sort of stuff as I tried to figure out what I really wanted to work on next. I also know it’s nowhere near the amount it would’ve been if I’d just sat my butt down and written five days a week like I always put on my planner that I’m going to do.
So, that’s my goal for NaNoWriMo this year: Get back in the habit of writing at least three days a week, five preferably. Because I know I can do 50,000 words in a month. That’s not a problem. Been there, done that, twice. Now I need to develop the discipline to get a respectable word count every month. Not 50,000. That is a bit of a stretch for me, involving late nights, even by my standards, and writing during meals and such, but I can do 20,000 easily. I just haven’t been.
If you want to friend me on nanowrimo.com, my name there is ziresta.
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Trying something new
I’m shamelessly ripping bits of this off from Mary Robinette Kowal. Just thought I should acknowledge that first.
I’ve always been a big believer in writing as a solitary process, but it’s becoming horribly clear to me that my stories could stand to have a few more sets of eyes looking over my early drafts, to catch little problems before they become big problems. I’m not looking for beta readers. Maybe in a month or so for No More Lies, but not now. I’m looking for alpha readers for a currently unnamed story, readers who read my first draft and tell me how they feel about the story. Readers, basically, who maybe can tell me before I get there if I’m about to write myself into a big, tangled mess like I’m getting far too good at. Readers who can tell me what words I need to define because context doesn’t make them clear. Readers who can tell me what cultural oddities need footnotes and which ones can go without. Readers who can overlook typos and punctuation mistakes and concentrate on things like (this is the bit I stole):
- What bores you
- What confuses you
- What don’t you believe
- What’s cool? (So I don’t accidentally “fix” it.)
I have a couple of caveats that you probably should be aware of before jumping in and agreeing to this:
- If this proves to stressful for me . . . too many people telling me drastically different things can be hard for me to handle, so if there’s a lack of consensus it could be an issue for me . . . I might cease this.
- If you can’t refrain from giving grammatical and punctuation feedback as well, I will drop you, but maybe keep you in mind as a beta reader.
- I know all too well the tendency of authors to tell how they’d have written something instead of giving their opinion of what they’ve actually read. Because of this, I’d really like to have some non-writers too.
If interested, comment and tell me.
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Five star reviews — The Enchanted Castle (Shioni of Sheba #1) by Marc Secchia
Welcome to the new feature I promised a few days ago. Every threeish weeks (I have a rough schedule for my posts, but I’m not letting myself make it a straight-jacket) I will be posting a review for a book I have given five stars to. Some of these will be books I received free copies of to review, others will just be books that I read.
This first one was one I decided to read and review based on the first few pages of the Kindle sample. In just a few pages, the author had mesmerized me with his language use and the setting.
Here’s the summary of the book, via Goodreads:
“A king bent on conquest.
A murderous warrior tribe.
And the slave-girl who dares to stand between them!
Shioni of Sheba: The Enchanted Castle is the first book in a unique African fantasy series set in the ancient Kingdom of Sheba and is written for middle grades/secondary school reading age.
“A cracking story which catches the imagination…” “I was enthralled, each character came alive off the page”
When Shioni, slave to the Princess of Sheba, travels to the legendary Simien Mountains of Ethiopia, she encounters adventure beyond her wildest dreams. Little does she imagine the powerful forces lurking in this jagged volcanic wilderness; forces that could tear the Kingdom of Sheba apart.
Kalcha, the Wasabi leader, has prepared a deadly trap, an evil sorcery rooted within the castle the King has chosen for his fortress. Kalcha is massing her warriors and her giant hyenas, intent on annihilating the Sheban forces.
As the Wasabi attack it is left to Shioni to show the way with courage and the conviction of her heart. Can she overcome the wrath of a lion, outwit the treacherous Captain Dabir, and defuse General Getu’s inexplicable hatred? With the help of her friends Mama Nomuula, Princess Annakiya, and the fiuri Azurelle, Shioni must uncover the hidden secrets of the Enchanted Castle before Kalcha destroys all she holds dear.
Experience the myth and magic of ancient Sheba in this truly African adventure. Includes original illustrations by the Ethiopian artist Senait.”
And my review, which now strikes me as a little light on content, but oh well. I don’t feel like rewriting it at the moment:
“This book was wonderful. I loved the characters, especially Shioni and Mama Nomuula. The only character I didn’t particularly care for was the villain who seemed a little too over-the-top. It had some of the best similes I’ve ever read, like “Fears like vultures began to encircle her courage.” and “eyes had fairly popped out of their heads, like a snail’s eyes on stalks.” And the illustrations were very nice.
It was not, however, perfect. The pacing was uneven, at times moving along at a nice clip and at others dragging, and that Shioni is mistreated and disliked by some is shown often enough that it got a bit annoying that it kept being told too. So maybe it should be more like 4.5 stars, but since that’s not possible, I’m still giving it five.”
I would probably literally kill to be able to come up with similes like this author sprinkled throughout the book. I read it months ago and that’s what I remember most clearly.
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Not every story needs to be a novel
Today’s post starts a series that’s aimed at NaNoWriMoers, but should contain advice useful to all authors. Non-authory content will still be posted roughly once a week though, including a new feature starting later this week!
Today I’m going to talk about story length. Now, this is a kind of odd thing for me to be talking about, since I am the person who tried to write a 3000 word short story and ended up with a 121,000 word novel, but maybe that makes me super qualified to talk about this, since I learned the hard way not to force a story into a length it shouldn’t be.
I understand the urge to make every story novel length. I’ve seen the articles about novel sales versus shorter fiction sales too. The money is in novels.
But the money isn’t in artificially long novels. If your idea is very simple without a lot of twists and turns, then most likely it would be better served by being a short story, novelette, or novella. Don’t add padding to bring a short story length idea up to novel length. It will show. I mean, if you need to do it just to win NaNoWriMo, that’s one thing. That’s no different than the time I counted my notes for Camp NaNoWriMo when I came up a couple thousand words shy (shhh . . . nobody else knows about that.). But, please, please, I’m begging you, cut the padding before you publish! It will show.
Now, don’t think that I’m saying that things like characterization and description don’t belong in shorter works . . . yes, I’ve read advice that says just that . . . I’m saying don’t have things like “Then he walked to the large, upholstered brown chair, and then he sat down in it and put on his left shoe, a brown suede oxford with tan laces, and then his matching right shoe, and then he stood up and walked the three feet to the door.” Yes, it’s more word count. Yes, it is more description. But it’s tedious and boring to read. (And probably a run-on, but we’ll ignore that for now. Run-ons are my specialty.) Especially don’t do that when none of the information contained in that long sentence is remotely relevant. I’ve read books lately that could’ve lost whole chapters and still told the exact same story. Not just the same plot. The same story. My understanding of neither the characters, nor the setting, nor anything else was deepened by these scenes. I’ve started referring to these books as “obvious NaNo projects.” Don’t publish one of those. It’s one of those things that makes people not take self-published authors seriously.
By the same token, don’t try to force a novel sized idea into a short story or novella because you’re hoping to enter it into some contest or submit it somewhere or whatever. This is the lesson I learned with No More Lies. It was supposed to be the story Bobby told in an anthology I was working on, since abandoned. All of the other stories were around 3000 words, so I wanted it to be too. The problem was, it was a much more complex story than any of the others, so it ran long. Somewhere around word 6000, I gave in and rewrote it with the intent it would be a novella, as I’d never written anything more than 40,000 words before. Soon I’ll be rewriting the beginning yet again so its pacing is appropriate for the novel it turned into. If I hadn’t tried to force it to be something it didn’t want to be at first, maybe I could’ve spared myself this particular annoyance.
And before anyone chimes in with “This doesn’t happen if you outline” or anything like that, I’m, to use George R. R. Martin‘s analogy, a gardener, not an architect. At least at the start. I have to do some planning as I get further in, as I may have mentioned in a previous entry, or I start wandering off after every shiny subplot my brain throws me and end up with too much of a mess for any amount of editing to help.
And in case this didn’t make it clear, I’ll be doing NaNoWriMo. Contact me through this site if you want to friend me there as I’d like to minimize the number of things connecting my username there with my real name, as I use the same one in other places that I don’t want connected with my professional life. (Yes, I realize how that sounds. No, that’s not what I meant. I’ve just said some dumb stuff on some forums in the past and haven’t gotten around to deleting it all yet.)
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Super short story: Drunken Darts
What’s odd about this dartboard? (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
I wrote this a couple of years ago. Apparently it was inspired by something that happened in the rpg version of the setting. ~shrugs~ I no longer remember the inspiration, but that’s what the email where I first sent it to a beta reader says.
Anyway, Kenshin Kenodori is a major character in my upcoming novel, No More Lies. He’s a retired Sweytzian Special Forces spy/commando. He’s also an honest-to-god ninja master. He left Earth as a young man and ended up stranded on Sweytz with his best friend during a misadventure that involved a prostitute, a stolen wallet, and a sure bet that wasn’t. I really need to write that someday. I think I’ve got a brief biography of him around here that I could post someday . . .
I think Lyndsey and Katri are explained well enough in the story. Though posting this did remind me that I never did the post about just what the Daggers are.
I’m not to be held responsible if anyone gets the bright idea to try any of the activities discussed in this story.
Also, I’m leaving the time units and units of measure Sweytzian. I think you can understand the story without knowing exactly what they mean.
Here’s the story — vignette, if you want to get technical — edited some from the version some of you may have previously read. And if anyone has a time machine, I’d like to borrow it to go smack two-years-ago me in the head for all the damned unnecessary commas I’ve found.:
Kenshin wasn’t much of a drinker, but he still seemed to end up at The Sword & Scroll Tavern at least once a sulid. Damned near everyone in the area did. Being near a starport, there wasn’t a lack of bars in and near Lus Ville, but to anyone who wanted more than a drink — or who didn’t want a drink at all — the only one was The Sword & Scroll. And, as ex-military, he got a 10% discount.
As soon as he walked in that night, he noticed the unusual amount of noise and the large crowd near one of the dartboards.
“Ha! Beat that!” said a voice he knew very well. I wonder what she’s up to now, he thought as he wandered over to join the crowd watching the young ninja and a young man that he thought was one of the newer Daggers.
As he approached, he saw the young man take a swig of something clear and far too innocent looking for Kenshin to believe it was anything except high proof alcohol. Then the young man was blindfolded by an attractive young woman who seemed quite pleased to have an excuse to touch him. Kenshin had never known getting blindfolded to involve so much groping. Oh, drunken blindfolded darts again. I guess Viktor’s not here tonight. Viktor, one of the proprietors, and Lyndsey’s father, had explicitly forbidden blindfolded darts, with or without the additional complication of being drunk, thinking that the game was a tragic accident waiting to happen. Bobby, the other proprietor — and, incidentally, Kenshin’s apprentice — took a much more relaxed outlook and just discouraged those who weren’t ninja, Daggers, or Special Forces from playing.
To Kenshin’s surprise, the young man produced a very nice looking throwing knife out of seemingly nowhere and flung it at the dartboard. They wouldn’t, he thought before looking at the board; sure enough, a throwing knife he recognized as Lyndsey’s was just a touch farther from the bullseye than the young man’s.
“Impressive,” he commented.
The young man shrugged, looking upset. “Not really. Was a bit off.”
“But you won this round anyway,” Lyndsey said, handing over twenty credits. Noticing Kenshin, she said, “Hey, sensei!” The alcohol smell on the short woman’s breath was overpowering enough that he wondered how she was still standing. “I can do better than that, but was takin’ it easy on Katri.”
“Taking it . . . fine, triple or nothing. And no ‘going easy’, eh?” Katri said in an unmistakably lower class Ruvellian accent.
Lyndsey’s smile was huge and cocky. “You’re on.”
Kenshin smirked, looked at where their knives had hit the board, estimated how drunk they already were, and said, “Let me show you both how to do this right.”
*****
Half an nulaire later, at least a hundred credits richer — he’d lost count after winning seventy-five, and more than a bit tipsy himself, Kenshin, now smiling broadly, refused their offer of another round. “I’ve won plenty off of you kids tonight. And I think you’re both about to get alcohol poisoning. Why don’t you go home and sleep it off? Maybe we’ll have a rematch the next time we’re all here?”
He walked away before they could argue, thinking that he should go to the bar more often. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had that much fun.
*****
Kenshin later heard that Lyndsey tried to explain to her father, when Viktor got word of the game, that the notice by the dartboard just said no drunken blindfolded darts, nothing whatsoever about knives, but he was, in her words, “completely unreasonable. Kept going on about how someone could’ve gotten hurt or killed, like the three of us didn’t know what we were doin’, even that fucking drunk!”
The notice was changed. The next time Kenshin was at The Sword & Scroll it read:
Blindfolded darts is forbidden.
Drunken blindfolded darts is especially forbidden.
Substituting throwing knives for darts is forbidden.
Even if you can hit a bullseye with a throwing knife from 1000 varĵé away.
This applies to you too, Kenshin Kenodori.
He smiled at the last line. It had been decades since he’d been specifically mentioned in a list of rules like that.
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Screw you, Amazon and Google
I try to keep this blog professional and only related to my life as a writer, but this time I really need to vent where it might be seen. Besides, ranting about the Kindle app for Mac not working is sort of related to writing.
Yesterday I opened my Kindle app and started to read a book. Everything worked just fine. I closed the program and went on about my day.
Today, I opened it and it told me to register. Since “forgot your password” was an option, I assumed this was just the stupidass version of a login screen.
Nope! It opened a Kindle library with nothing but a couple of free books in it!
Much crying and cursing later, I found where the other books are stored on the hard drive, at least, so I can open them. But there’s one very annoying problem: Amazon IDs are the filenames, so I have no fucking clue what anything is.
So, I did what anybody does in a situation like this: I googled my problem. First match was Amazon’s troubleshooting page for the app. It’s utterly, totally, and completely useless. That’s not redundancy; that’s really how useless it is. Most of the other matches were about problems with iBooks and Nook. Because somehow putting “reauthorize Kindle for Mac” into Google matches “Nook for Mac won’t sync”. I’m getting really tired of this sort of thing.
Google, if I type particular words in the search bar, it means I want to search for those fucking words! Quit trying to be smarter than me. You aren’t. Keep this shit up, and I’m going to give Bing a try.
Amazon, don’t bother with having troubleshooting pages if they only are going to list problems that I’m pretty sure my baby niece could manage to solve. Congratulations. This was your last chance after several screwups. I’ll only be using your app for books that … no, wait: I’ll see if Calibre does a good job of converting books that are only available for your app to .epub. If it does, then I will not be touching your piece of shit app again.
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Wanna help me make a decision?
Which of these should I work on for NaNoWriMo?
Space Opera: The Artist’s Book, Michael J. Weller (Visual Associations, 2000) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
- Richie
Synopsis: Slice-of-life in a space opera setting about an up-and-coming rock star trying to juggle that with family life.
First paragraph: Somewhere out there in the tri-galaxies, one of Richie’s older sisters was fighting to free a world from tyranny. Somewhere out there, another of his older sisters was engaging in a bit of smuggling. He, however, was in the nursery of his house in Namenlose Province, Sweytz, trying to convince his daughters to take a nap.
Pros: It’s different, which might be what I need to recharge. Despite this, it’s a setting I know very, very well. I love Richie.
Cons: Richie presently occupies an annoying place between ordinary person and could be the protagonist of a more exciting story, which makes it awkward to write. It’s been over a year since I touched it.
Amount already written: 1,622 words
Aiming for: Novel or series of novels
- Kayden
Synopsis: Slice-of-life in a space opera setting about a stay-at-home dad, his apprentice jeweler husband, their baby girl, and Kayden’s large family, most of whom are in some sort of exciting career. Focus would be on the contrast between his life and that of his siblings.
Pros: It’s different, which might be what I need to recharge. Despite this, it’s a setting I know very, very well.
Con: Kayden might be too boring to carry even a slice-of-life story.
Amount already written: Nothing
Aiming for: Novel or series of novels
- Bobby’s Daughter
Synopsis: This is sort of a sequel to the novel I’ll have coming out next year, No More Lies. Twentysomething years after it, someone shows up on Bobby,’s the main character of both stories, porch claiming to be his daughter. A bit of self-loathing occurs and disappointment from just about everyone, then adventure will happen. And a bit of stupidity. It’s a space opera, though a bit small scale for one.
First paragraph: The knock on the door surprised me a bit. Most people who’d be visiting unannounced at that time of day would’ve just walked in. I slid a knife into my left hand and opened the door with my right, figuring I could never be too cautious . . . especially after the shit with Andrei last year.
Pros: I just wrote a whole novel and rewrote a short story in Bobby’s voice, so I’m very, very familiar with it now. I know the setting very, very well. I have notes on some of what will happen next, so I’m not completely pantsing it.
Cons: I’m a bit tired of Bobby and would like a break. Feeling less than confident in my ability to handle any kind of story that requires an actiony plot after getting lots of bad reviews in the past couple of months.
Amount already written: 4,172 words
Aiming for: Novella or novel
- Giant Space Spider
Synopsis: In a different, more pulpy space opera setting than the other works, a ship goes to investigate a world no ship has ever been able to get past.
First paragraph: No one knew what lurked beyond Alzas. Spacer rumors had put everything from ancient evils from before the dawn of time to pirates very determined to keep their stronghold secret. All that was known for sure was that something was there, and that something didn’t let anyone past.
Pros: It’s different, which might be what I need to recharge. It’s more pulpy than any of the others on this list, so I don’t have to worry about so much about things like psychological realism.
Cons: I know no more about the setting or story or characters than what I’ve already written. It’s been over a year since I touched it. Feeling less than confident in my ability to handle any kind of story that requires an actiony plot after getting lots of bad reviews in the past couple of months.
Amount already written: 789 words
Aiming for: Novella or novel
- Jake’s Early Years
Synopsis: This is a prequel to my novella Jake’s Last Mission. This would be the story of how Jake went orphaned ranch hand to military officer. It’ll start a space western and shift as it goes on to military space opera.
First paragraph: “I can quit school. I already know how to read and do math and such. I can figure out anything else, Dad,” I said, sounding as mature as I could at eleven years old.
Pros: I know the setting very, very well. I love Jake. I already have a timeline of the major events in it.
Cons: I stupidly switched from first to third person partway through the part that’s already written, so I need to rewrite it. I’m not sure it’ll actually be that interesting.
Amount already written: Don’t know as some of it is handwritten.
Aiming for: Novella or novel
- Second Kavaliro Cousin, Version 1
Synopsis: Lyndsey and Taliza, the main characters from my novella The Crown of Eldrete, and a team are going to Polthaina to try to secure the space port and naval base with the help of local rebels. Someone’s been feeding the bad guys intel. It’s space opera.
First paragraph: When Lyndsey got to the bridge of the yacht, Taliza was already there and talking to someone. “I understand that,” she was saying, “but we’re unarmed, so clearly there’s no reason to fire on us.” Taliza hit the button that let other occupants of the bridge hear what was being said over the comm.
Pros: I know the setting very, very well. I get to write Lyndsey and Taliza again.
Cons: I don’t know if I really want to continue this version of it. I’ve already cut 9,000 words. I’m not completely more than the plot of the bit I left is salvagable. I haven’t touched it in over a year. Feeling less than confident in my ability to handle any kind of story that requires an actiony plot after getting lots of bad reviews in the past couple of months.
Amount already written: 2,553 words
Aiming for: Novella
- Second Kavaliro Cousin, Version 2
Synopsis: Lyndsey and Taliza are meeting up with rebels on Polthaina. That’s all I know. This one is more space fantasy than straight up space opera.
First paragraph: Polthaina had been attacked by enemies so often in its long history that the entirety of the world was covered in ruins. Lyndsey paused to try to read an inscription on a vine and moss covered arch in one of these ruins. “Hey, Cousin? You got any clue what this says?”
Pros: I know the setting very, very well. I get to write Lyndsey and Taliza again.
Cons: I have no clue where to go from the beginning I’ve got. I haven’t touched it in over a year. Feeling less than confident in my ability to handle any kind of story that requires an actiony plot after getting lots of bad reviews in the past couple of months.
Amount already written: 363 words
Aiming for: Novella
- Lyn, Rek, Ana, and Bobby Have An Adventure
Synopsis: This is set years before the Kavaliro Cousins series when Lyndsey’s wife, Anastasia, was a Dagger (rebel-for-hire) too. She and Lyndsey were on a mission when they ran into Bobby (from No More Lies and Bobby’s Daughter) and his best friend, Rek, who are on a mission for the Sweytzian Defense Force Special Forces. The two groups are targeting the same organization, but for different reasons. It starts with Rek’s disguise being good enough to fool Lyndsey so she shoots him, and things go downhill from there. This one is also space opera.
First paragraph: Son of a fucking bitch! Lyndsey thought as the guard got into sight. He was looking right at her. Guess I’m not as well hidden as I thought. With a quick prayer, she pulled her holdout blaster and shot the guard. Having not taken the time to aim, the bolt only scorched his leg a bit. Should at least slow him down some, she thought, quickly hitting a button on her comm with the hand that didn’t have a blaster in it.
Pros: I know the setting very, very well. I get to write Lyndsey and Bobby. It’s probably going to be pretty fun.
Cons: Feeling less than confident in my ability to handle any kind of story that requires an actiony plot after getting lots of bad reviews in the past couple of months. I think I might want to switch it to first person, which would mean rewriting what I already have. If I do that, it would mean more Bobby first person stuff which I’d like a break from.
Amount already written; 6,809 words
Aiming for: Novella or novel
- Magi
Synopsis: Elianthir has just become a mage. His grandfather died under mysterious circumstances years ago. His girlfriend, who’s a member of his hometown, just found brutally killed sheep. An evil mage is somehow involved in all of this. That’s all I know so far.
First paragraph: Elianthir touched the intricately carved silver cover of the codex with trepidation. He knew that once he opened it, all of his grandfather’s hard won knowledge would disappear from its pages. The words — those the Order of Tylar considered important anyway — had been carefully copied into the Grand Codex of Tylar, of course. But that didn’t stop Elianthir from feeling like he was about to destroy something of great value, to destroy the last remaining bit of his grandfather, who’d vanished in a cloud of pale blue smoke while fighting a telazir years before.
Pros: It’s different, which might be what I need to recharge. It’s fantasy which is what I really wanted to write for years.
Cons: I know nothing more about the setting, story, or characters than what I’ve already written. Feeling less than confident in my ability to handle any kind of story that requires an actiony plot after getting lots of bad reviews in the past couple of months. Been reading Name of the Wind and now feel like my idea is seriously lacking in awesomeness. I’ve not been able to finish a fantasy story since a horrible creative writing class in college.
Amount already have: 2,619 words
Aiming for: Novel or series of novels
- Loving Her
Synopsis: Renata, Bobby’s sister and Lyndsey’s mother, is stabbed in the lung and nearly dies. The story contrasts the way her husband of thirty-three years and her “not-a-boyfriend” of a year and a half handle this, and the “not-a-boyfriend” realizing he can’t keep up the charade that he doesn’t love love her. Her marriage is open, so this has nothing to do with a love triangle or anything like that. This will be a romance in a space opera setting. It also will have stuff about her debating retiring from being a Dagger.
First paragraph: Renata and I had been enjoying each other’s company in my tent when the alarm sounded. Within moments, ((enemies)) were pouring into the camp from every direction. The battle was long and hard, but I don’t remember much about it now. Nothing about it was nearly as important as what happened near the end.
Pros: I’ve got lots of little ideas for bits to have in this. I know the setting very, very well. Quinn and Viktor are interesting to write from the viewpoints of.
Cons: I’m not really 100% sure what tone to take with this. I’ve already started it over once because of this. It’s a bit more depressing than I tend to like writing.
Amount already have: 2,601 words, and some bits here and there from a writing exercise thing that I might be able to incorporate
Aiming for: Novel
- Super Hero Story
Synopsis: Super villain stole an important thing. Super hero team that usually deals with such things is too well known to super villain, so they’re recruiting a new team. I think I was planning to go with something Avengers like . . . new team learning to work together while thrust into the crucible sort of thing.
First paragraph: The red energy field contained by the pentagon pulsated. Mona Cathar, known to most as the Pink Spider, studied it from afar, daring not to get close enough to be tempted to try to touch it. The others present, actual scientists, unlike her, jabbered about “revolutionizing our understanding of Quaglon science” and “non-electrical power” and other such things. Mona, however, saw one thing when she looked at it: Money.
Pros: It’s different, which might be what I need to recharge. It’ll probably be really fun.
Cons: I haven’t touched it in over a year. I know nothing more of the characters, setting, or story than what I’ve already written. Feeling less than confident in my ability to handle any kind of story that requires an actiony plot after getting lots of bad reviews in the past couple of months.
Amount already have: 372 words
Aiming for: Novel or series of novels
- Viktor’s Life Story
Synopsis: Viktor has finally conceded to have an official biography written, decades after killing the tyrant Drochslem and bringing peace to the Vorton galaxy. That’s the frame story to him telling the tale of how he went from quiet bookish teenager to war hero to Dagger to Drochslem’s slave to Drochslem’s killer to crippled bar owner, poet, and professor. Space opera, needless to say. Space fantasy to a certain extent too, I think.
First paragraph: I wasn’t sure exactly what I’d expected Viktor Blue to look like, but it certainly wasn’t the gentleman standing in front of me. His silver hair, the only part of him that betrayed his age, hung to just past his waist, part of it pulled back in an elaborate braid. His clothing was much like that his husband normally wears, but tamer: a loose, long-sleeved white shirt with ruffles at the cuff and collar; a black vest with silver embroidery; black silk pants; and black boots polished to a gleaming shine. His jewelry was plentiful, but simple and understated, save a pair of silver filigree earrings he absent-mindedly untangled from his hair as he limped towards me. There was a black cane with a pearlescent handle next to his chair, but he’d left it behind. He was tall with piercing blue eyes and spoke in a cultured baritone. He sighed softly before asking, “You’re the Royal Historian, I presume?” His accent was odd, which I didn’t find surprising since he hadn’t learned to speak Allurian until he was in his thirties.
Pros: It’s interesting to write from Viktor’s viewpoint, partially because I get to describe things more. I have very old versions of some bits of this to draw from. I know the setting very, very well.
Cons: I feel like maybe I’m ripping off Name of the Wind a bit much with how the frame story goes. I’m worried that maybe his life story isn’t actually going to be as interesting as I’ve always thought it would be. There are parts of this that will be very, very depressing. Feeling less than confident in my ability to handle any kind of story that requires an actiony plot after getting lots of bad reviews in the past couple of months. This is my severalth attempt at this, so I’m not altogether confident I’ll ever be able to finish it.
Amount already have: 1,111 words
Aiming for: Novel or series of novels
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Confession time
I have a confession to make that won’t make me many friends: I like hyper-competent beautiful characters.
Notice I didn’t say “I like Mary Sues.” There’s a reason for this . . . read carefully because lots of people seem to have trouble with this one, more every year: They’re not the same thing!
First, let’s recall what sort of character “Mary Sue” originally referred to: the idealized, usually teenaged, self-insert in fanfic, the sort that could out-logic Spock, out-captain Kirk, out-doctor McCoy, out-engineer Scotty, and seduce all of them easily . . . at least as far as I’ve been able to tell. That’s pretty damned far from the definition used today. Today, I’ve seen the term used for anything from a female character that is good-looking and good at anything, which is so annoyingly sexist that it makes me want to ask what decade the person saying it time-travelled from, to characters who have become super-competent at one skill through a lifetime of hard work, but most commonly it refers to any character who commits the current literary (or at least pop culture literature) sin of being both beautiful (or handsome) and skilled in more than one thing, especially if they have an angsty backstory. People defend this definition by saying that characters like that are unbelievable, that they warp reality around themselves and therefore ruin the suspension of disbelief necessary to enjoy a story.
I say “Bullshit.” Some characters like that do, in fact, ruin a story. But some don’t. It’s a matter of, more than anything else, the writer’s skill. Look at Verity Price. In the hands of many authors, she would be utterly unbearable, but in Seanan McGuire’s hands, she’s a talented dancer, cryptozoologist, and . . . parkour-doing-person, I don’t know the word . . . but utterly believable, at least within the confines of the story, because she still has problems that we can identify with, and these problems aren’t exaggerated to make her more pathetic. She feels like a real person. That’s the mark of a good character, regradless of how talented they are.
You know, I had a similar discussion years and years ago on an rpg forum. I was explaining why I like high level/high point total characters and was told, pretty much, that I was engaging in silly wish fulfillment gaming instead of Serious Mature Gaming. What’s wrong with a little bit of wish fulfillment? Do most people really want to pretend to be commoners in revolutionary France . . . this is a real GURPS game someone I talked to was running once, by the way? Do they really want to read about Joe Ordinary and his ordinary day? Of course not! That shit’d get really boring, really fast! We want to read about John Carter, Conway Costigan, Lazarus Long, Wolverine, Snake Eyes, Verity Price . . . even Jo March and Anne Shirley weren’t ordinary people. Or at least that’s the sort of character I want to read about. I, by the way, write for people who want those sorts of characters. If you don’t, sorry, mate, you aren’t my target audience.
There was another point made in that long ago discussion that is relevant to the whole thing about alleged Mary Sues ruining stories. That was that it’s too hard to identify with powerful characters. Again I say, “Bullshit.” Too many people have been reading superhero comics for too many decades for me to believe. People identify with characters that are believable, as I said above. Characters with flaws and problems, but not ones that are so overwhelming that it’s unbelievable they’re not curled up in a corner crying all the time. Characters that, regardless of how beautiful they are, can’t get every person they want to fall in love or lust with them. You know, characters that are like people . . . but a little better in some way so they’re interesting enough to read about, because, as I said, we don’t want to read about perfectly ordinary people doing ordinary things . . . Bilbo was not an ordinary hobbit, before anybody says it. Tookishness, remember?
I guess, in short, what I’m saying is that traits aren’t what makes a character a Sue or not. It’s how they’re handled. Look at the original definition. That’s not a character. That is just wish fulfillment. Unless you’ve got a damned good explanation of how they got to be so smart and irrestible to men who I’d imagine have very diverse tastes. See? Even then it comes down to how well written the character is.
