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((And then restored it from a saved draft. The original subject line was something like "Slipping this one in just under the wire," but, perhaps appropriately, LJ didn't restore that.))
And I'll admit I'm still not sure what I want to talk about. But it's important to me to just keep putting words on page, habitually, any day, no matter how uninspired I may feel, until it's a permanent, automatic behavior pattern. Or that's the hope.
Sadly, it's not just the blog that's dry and empty right now. My notebooks are also feeling a bit neglected. It's been six months, and I'm still adjusting to the fact that Running In Her Veins is over and done with, and I haven't entirely settled on a single other project. I'm researching a talking-animal story, working title of Cat Among The Rushes, that Megan and I started talking about one night as something to co-write, starting this summer if she has the time. While there are enough cliches in the animal-story genre that I cringe to think of it, some of my favorite books fall under the heading: Watership Down, Redwall (I don't care much for the later Redwall books, but the first few are just so much fun), Book of Night With Moon... and I think we've got an angle on the genre I haven't seen before. But no actual work has been done on the story yet...
Allegedly, I'm working on The Hellion Prince, first in a trilogy of dark, swashbuckling secondary-world fantasy stories about treachery and politics in a human magocracy surrounded by the fey. I have over twenty thousand words written, and I confess that I like those words very much, and I have a very clear vision of how this book should go and... it's not working. Most of the 20k consists of two extended conversations written for backstory purposes, and the not-quite-hero of the tale is limp and uninspiring in all the scenes necessary to the plot. Something needs to be shaken up about this story and this character, but I'm not sure what.
And then, of course, there's the third book I'm not really working on right now: A Stain Upon His Hands, the sequel to Running In Her Veins. I decided to put it off and work on The Hellion Prince because, put simply, I'm not that good yet - I don't have the chops to pull off the book I want Stain (or ASUHH, my usual abbreviation) to be. I've got the first three pages done, relatively satisfactorily, but as with RIHV, the transitions in between major plot points are still totally obscure to me, and I realized the other day that, when written out, there are 15 discernible story arcs within the novel as outlined. That's a few too many, I think, but I have absolutely no clue where or how to trim pieces off or divide the sucker into two books. So...
... like here on the blog, I'm left to meander, and reflect, and peck out a page or two here or there, waiting to see what happens. I can live with that.
((and LJ ate the line I wrote to conclude this post, too! OUTRAGED. I can't remember what it was and I'm too tired to try. Pretend it was pithy!))
And I'll admit I'm still not sure what I want to talk about. But it's important to me to just keep putting words on page, habitually, any day, no matter how uninspired I may feel, until it's a permanent, automatic behavior pattern. Or that's the hope.
Sadly, it's not just the blog that's dry and empty right now. My notebooks are also feeling a bit neglected. It's been six months, and I'm still adjusting to the fact that Running In Her Veins is over and done with, and I haven't entirely settled on a single other project. I'm researching a talking-animal story, working title of Cat Among The Rushes, that Megan and I started talking about one night as something to co-write, starting this summer if she has the time. While there are enough cliches in the animal-story genre that I cringe to think of it, some of my favorite books fall under the heading: Watership Down, Redwall (I don't care much for the later Redwall books, but the first few are just so much fun), Book of Night With Moon... and I think we've got an angle on the genre I haven't seen before. But no actual work has been done on the story yet...
Allegedly, I'm working on The Hellion Prince, first in a trilogy of dark, swashbuckling secondary-world fantasy stories about treachery and politics in a human magocracy surrounded by the fey. I have over twenty thousand words written, and I confess that I like those words very much, and I have a very clear vision of how this book should go and... it's not working. Most of the 20k consists of two extended conversations written for backstory purposes, and the not-quite-hero of the tale is limp and uninspiring in all the scenes necessary to the plot. Something needs to be shaken up about this story and this character, but I'm not sure what.
And then, of course, there's the third book I'm not really working on right now: A Stain Upon His Hands, the sequel to Running In Her Veins. I decided to put it off and work on The Hellion Prince because, put simply, I'm not that good yet - I don't have the chops to pull off the book I want Stain (or ASUHH, my usual abbreviation) to be. I've got the first three pages done, relatively satisfactorily, but as with RIHV, the transitions in between major plot points are still totally obscure to me, and I realized the other day that, when written out, there are 15 discernible story arcs within the novel as outlined. That's a few too many, I think, but I have absolutely no clue where or how to trim pieces off or divide the sucker into two books. So...
... like here on the blog, I'm left to meander, and reflect, and peck out a page or two here or there, waiting to see what happens. I can live with that.
((and LJ ate the line I wrote to conclude this post, too! OUTRAGED. I can't remember what it was and I'm too tired to try. Pretend it was pithy!))
