Hopping from Book to Book

The Read ...

I like to give new authors a try.  This time I bombed out ... on a recent grocery story buy.   Paid full price which stabbed a cheapskate's heart.  Did read a couple pages before I bought the unknown author.  The first chapter was nice, if slow.  The concept of a runty, near-sighted goblin was appealing ... but the next three chapters bogged me down.  On the second day of reading ... when I found myself rereading similar dialog on the part of the adventurers who captured the goblin, I gave up.  

A lot of people, though, must have liked the book since it had a couple sequels.  Maybe they were desperate for a new supernatural being?  Or, is that paranormal now?  Maybe someone will be happy to find it used.

Jumped into Christine Feehan's Dark Slayer, the umpteenth book in her Carpathian series.  You have to admire any writer who can keep three different series front and center on the bookshelves.  Must admit the middle ones didn't grab my interest much.  You can only take so many hunky Carpathians forcing their attentions on their newly discovered "life mates".  Granted the stakes are high.  The nocturnal Carpathians turn into particularly nasty vampires when they don't find their one [and only] true love.

Then, Feehan put the villain she'd hinted at in previous books front and center.  The books now have a cagey and powerful nemesis to defeat.  Result.  More exciting books.  For example in the first chapter, tons of back story about Carpathians is incorporated into a fight with a powerful vampire.  At the end of the chapter, the MC discovers the sprawled body of her life mate, "the curse of all Carpathian women", sprawled in the snow as the sun is close to rising, and she needs to seek her lair.

In the second chapter, she saves a child from a vampire trap but is confronted by a more powerful vampire, who just happens to be one of her brothers who thinks the MC is dead.  By the end of the chapter, her problems are complicated when she is confronted by the Carpathians, whom she hates for good reason, who insist on healing her wounds, a offer she resists.  The story is off and running.  I'm a fourth way through, and the story line hasn't lagged yet.  

The only problem.  I'm busy.  I barely got down to the TV to watch Castle last night.

Web and Other Stuff ...

Guess I hit Barnes and Noble wrong.  Today, we had to pick up a book the old man ordered.  Found the books books I bought on the display shelves ... on a Monday.  So, the scenario, went to the store on Wednesday.  They stock on Thursdays. I bought at the grocery store on Friday.  Bottom line:  they lost the revenue on four books. 

I wouldn't have ordered them either.  This writer business is keeping me too busy.  Guess I could have gone to my used book sites to find them ... but, again, too time consuming.

Progress ...

Did get my short story up ...Stubborn Is As Half-Elven Does ... still with no artwork.  The details are on my Half-Elven blog. 

What I wasted my writing time on -- agent queries.  All those listings for fantasy agents makes it seem like a large market.  Then, you look at the websites, interviews, and blogs.  You discover they don't really care much for the type of fantasy you're trying to flog.  Then, you go to the AW Water Cooler and find some have a questionable reputation.  Ugh.  I've landed square in "query hell".

Trivia ...

The old man went to take a shower after the news last night ... and no hot water.  The hot water heater died just when the dishwasher was full and waiting.  The part has to be ordered, and we may get convenient hot water heater by tomorrow ... if they overnight the part.  Until then, the stove's been drafted.

Oh, Oh. Writing the Same Way

The Read and Progress???

Discovered Simon R Green's new series introduction, Ghost of a Chance, and discovered half-way through it that I was writing the same way in my struggle to finish a short story for Renna's Tales.   Way too much exposition.  Like telling, telling, and more telling.   While I'll grant, Green sticks mainly to the events at hand, I kept trying to expand the story into the larger political battles in mine.

The reason I'm late in getting this blog up is:  1) the Renna story, and 2) I couldn't get to the end of Green's book.  I decided to put it on the trade pile just when the evil villains were winning the fight with the associates while the leader of the ghost hunters went chasing a ghost through the London Underground.  [The half-way turning point of the story.]  Granted, Green's Nightside series had a lot of exposition, but it came across as a ballerina pirouetting rather than the giant clomping in his seven league boots.  Or, was that seven inch boots?

Other Progress ...

Voices is lying fallow again.  Got one revising run through done on the computer.  Now I have to print out a copy to revise.  Also, do I have any excuses not to query agents?  No, but I doubt I will.

Oh, remember Maren who I couldn't turn into a novel?  Well, she's back haunting me saying she's a short story or maybe a novelette.  I wonder if I can turn her into a full blown novella ... if I dramatize the exposition.  Hey, maybe I didn't learn something from my reading.

Web Stuff ...

I enjoy way too many blogs, but Justine Musk posted one every new and experienced writer should read about blogging last week.   [Reducing the number of times I blog ... builds in some delays in my comments.  I apologize if the ideas have already turned into compost for you.]

The if agent queries are haunting you, you might find Jessica Faust's blog on openings and the following comments helpful.

Perhaps the most important bit of info for me came from a link from the Writer Beware blog of ....  If any of you are considering e-publishing as I am [for Dark Solstice] you might be interested in what ... has to say about "The Seven Secrets to e-Book Publishing Failure".  Some of the ideas might even apply to "traditional" publishing.  This is one of the few articles I bookmarked. 

Then, there's promotion of what you publish ... either on the web or on paper.  1st Turning Point points presents a blog by Cristyn West on how to get the best use out of Twitter to promote your blog, book, or whatever.  Title:  Using Twitter to Expand Your Readership.  Yeah, another bookmark.

Trivia ...

Got a chuckle when I traced one of my stats for referring urls ... and it was an air conditioning site.   Then, there's google search engines.  For some reason, I'm getting a lot of hits for the Half-Elven website from a Cyrillic alphabet site.

I've never grown out of being a "bad girl" ... a habit that exasperated her mother.  Why else would I get such inordinate pleasure from eating unhealthy meals.  Oh, I ate two vegies and a fruit ... plus a little starch and some shrimp (sauteed in butter with garlic).  But gasp, the vegies were both light colored.  (cauliflower and cucumber)   So much for Dr. whomever and his call to eat bright colored vegies.

 

Formatting and Being Well-Spooked

The Read ...

Abandoned the book I was reading again ... for the new book I ordered:  Mary Downing Hahn's The Ghost of Crutchfield Hall.  The clone of The Secret Garden mixed up with The Turn of the Screw and a host of other ghostly classics makes a good read even if written for young readers.  The other book only featured Mexican vampires doing vampire things.  I read a Crutchfield review somewhere and ordered it and was immediately hooked by the first paragraph while drinking coffee at the bookstore.

"Take good care of this girl," Miss Beatty told the coachman.  "She's an orphan, you know, and never set foot out of London.  Make sure she gets were she's going safely."

[Many writing gurus say you aren't supposed to start with dialog, but this works ... even if it breaks the "fiction formula".]

The book is early middle grade as you might guess from the reading level above, but it makes it all the easier to see the structure of the novel.  The introductions of the somewhat cliched characters and the bits that individualize them, the hints, and the growing power of the ghost all happen in the midst of the action.   The end result a scary story in the grand tradition that can hold the attention of an adult.

Hahn follows the "fiction formula" for story arc.  Looked down at the page numbers of the chapter where the new girl meets her secretive invalid cousin ... and it was indeed half way through the book.  If your having problems with you story flow, I suggest you buy the book and study it.  

Is Hahn worth studying?  Well, she's the award winning author of some 20 books.  [I may loan the Crutchfield Hall book to the step-grandkid, but I want it back.]

The book I abandoned?  I stayed up last night until after midnight to read it, but I won't be commenting.  Not only did it have a strange chapters long flashback (novella length) ... just when the story started to get rolling, but the characters weren't much more than cardboard stand-ins.  Two boys and girl, helped by an old codger, fighting evil Mayan vampires.

Web Stuff ...

For all the time I spend at the AW Water Cooler, you'd think there was nothing new to discover there but the daily posts.  Wrong.  While seeking tech info on formatting I found an article by one of the members on using Microsoft Word for quick edits covering such items as word frequency counter, and phrase frequency counter.  Carlson also gives instructions to highlight passive words and adverbs.  These come from Robert J. Carlson , and you can check his website for the whole story.

Of course, you smarties already know this ... but I flunked computers. Now I have to get up the courage to download the band-aids and use them.

Progress ...

Nothing spectacular or even much worth mentioning. -- Entered a flash fiction piece in the Jeffrey Archer/St. Martin's  short story contest.  -- Revising/editing of the Voices of Ghosts Creek continues, but I'm starting to worry because I like it too much.  --  Mariah is still pondering how to one-up Martonsfeld in the Half-Elven saga.  --  Still, thinking about sending out agent queries.  [Only have two books to submit.], but can't get interested.  

Yeah ... I really did have a piece of fiction that was more literary/mainstream and not fantasy.  (Thanks to a Northern Colorado Writers class given by fantasy writer Victoria Hanley.)   Got the contest info at AW Water Cooler too.

Oh, and I'm trying to format Dark Solstice, the most worked Half-Elven manuscript, to submit to an e-publisher.  Got the 1.5 spacing done.  Can't figure out how to get the extra space deleted from my periods.  Got some answers at AW Water Cooler and gave rep points.  Unfortunately, after I follow the directions, the form says it "made 0 replacements'.  --  Have I ever said I hate computers ... or is that Microsoft Word?  I never had such problems with WordPerfect.

Trivia...

Fall's happening.  

While the temperatures are dropping, the leaves have started to drop too ... right in my front yard.  Have never figured out why the Lindens (Lime trees in England) are the last to leaf out and the first to drop them. 

The jays have also moved in to harvest the acorns in the backyard.  One got territorial and dropped an acorn on the old man's head when he got too close to the tree.  I prefer the robin song in the spring to the jays' squawks in the morning.

Avoiding Series Traps

First, a Warning ...

I picked up a virus on Sunday night.  As soon as the little shield on my bottom tool-bar popped up, I shut the computer off -- so I don't think I infected anyone.  But, if you visit a lot of the stuff I do, you probably already know you've been infected.  Whatever, it took two days to get the computer guru here to remove the stuff.

Seems to be a lot of the stuff going around from the stories the guru told me.  So, if you haven't updated your security lately ... you should look into it.  I've added two new security systems.  A Windows Security thing and some anti-Malware stuff.  Don't ask this computer idiot anything more.

The Read ...

Kay Hooper is an author I look for, but I almost missed her new book -- Blood Ties -- because of the similarities in the title with others in this trilogy (Blood Dreams and Blood Sins).  My momentary lapse in judgment ... or was it because I haven't visited B&N recently and the book was buried at the bottom of the supermarket shelves.  Unless you shop a lot on line, readers as much as authors are at the mercy of book placement on the shelves.

A structural tidbit:  Within 25 pages there are two murders with similarities to other murders in the region.  Halfway through the book, the FBI Special Crimes Unit realizes they aren't dealing with a  garden variety serial killer, but one that's targeting the unit for some not so obvious reasons.

That said, it was comforting to sit into a comfortable read by an author who avoided the common series traps.  The characters I have known and enjoyed continue to grow as people while in the middle of life and death situations with truly sinister opponents.  Yes, Hooper's plotting is masterful and suspenseful ... making me want to get up and take a break from reading to relieve the tension in my mind as well as my back.  She gives just enough setting to picture the Southern background of poor county sheriff departments that can't afford all the forensic bells and whistles.  [Yeah, I know other parts of the country can't afford them either.]  The villains, of course are satisfying as well as not the usual suspects.

And yes, Hooper has left, I think, an intriguing lead-in to the next trilogy when the evil genius of the Blood one is reincarnated.  I think it'll be a long time before Hooper stagnates.  The thought warms the cockles of my heart.

Then, there was R. L. LaFevers third Theodosia book -- Theodosia and the Eyes of Horus.  While the book was entertaining, I felt she landed two-feet-square in the writer's trap Kay Hooper avoided.  She had her structure set and filled in the blanks with new bits of information, all of which were interesting.

Problem:  Theodosia didn't grow ... just kept doing her remarkable things.  Worse, at the end, her cantankerous grandmother emerged as a deus ex machina.

Web Stuff ...

Got a big surprise last Friday (besides the one at the supermarket cash register).  Was strolling down the blogs I read, and there was Emma staring me in the face.  Ariel Emerald at Writer's Craze query critiques gave me one. :)  I had forgotten I had sent it out to be critiqued (by a publisher slush pile reader).  

The first thing I noticed was:  I didn't put the "pitch in" right after the description of the book.  Not that that would've done much good.  The critiquer said you should jump right into the premise.  My choice of vernacular (from my search for my "voice") also lead to some misunderstandings.  [Gotta tell the internal editor to keep the vernacular to the dialog and out of the exposition.]

Ahh ... another example of where you get conflicting advice.  Of course, he had a bunch of other nits to pick ... or maybe they were full grown lice.

Progress ...

Still deep into revisions of Voices of Ghost Creek, a never-ending process.  But, I don't mind I'll be doing it at least twice more after I get to the end.  I don't know about you.  Here, I'm always finding new stuff to change.  Must say, though, I feel like clapping when I get through a page without a change. 

My next Renna's tale is progressing too.  Felt good when I was able to eliminate a lot of back story.  Does anyone else see the stuff better when it's on the computer screen?

Trivia ...

The annual plum kuchen is made.  (Feeling very virtuous since I don't really like the stuff.)  More important the tree apples are gone.  Put a couple gallons of applesauce and two pies in the freezer.  The apple crisp from the pie leftovers evaporated. 

Suzanne Collins: War's Not Glorious

The Read ...

Ever since I listened to World War II tales as a kid, I knew war wasn't "glorious" -- in spite of having heros.  The impression I got was more like war was the "drizzling shits".   

Over the weekend, I immersed myself in Suzanne Collins' Catching Fire and Mockingjay.  Along with the Hunger Games, the books well deserve the raves the trilogy is getting.  Collins lets you know front and center that even just rebellions are dirty, disgusting, and fearsome things that damage people even if they manage to survive.

Again, Collins' lean prose impresses even if the violence in the books upsets some people.  War is violent by definition ...  and it hits the most submissive the hardest.  Collins had me suspending my disbelief and totally immersed in her world.  So, immersed that I haven't started reading another book since Sunday.  [I'm watching the DVD and VHS of two different versions of Pride and Prejudice instead.  How's that for escaping?]

Opening hook in the first three sentences of Catching Fire.  "I clasp the flask between my hands even though the warmth from the tea has long since leached into the frozen air.  My muscles are clenched tight against the cold.  If a pack of wild dogs were to appear at this moment, the odds of scaling a tree before they attacked are not in my favor."   The paragraph ends:  "I can't fight the sun.  I can only watch helplessly as it drags me into a day that I've been dreading for months."

The reader knows immediately what were the effects of the Hunger Games on Katniss Everdeen.

Mockingjay has a brilliant opening hook too.  "I stare down at my shoes, watching as a fine layer of ash settles on the worn leather.  This is where the bed I shared with my sister, Prim, stood.  Over there was the kitchen table.  The bricks of the chimney, which collapsed in a charred heap, provide a point of reference for the rest of the house.  How else could I orient myself in this sea of gray?"

If I ever wore a hat, I'd take it off to Collins.  Even her secondary ... and tertiary ... characters are well, and pointedly drawn.  I don't think I'll ever forget Snow and his bleeding mouth he got from ingesting the poisons he killed people with.  [While not stated, I assume it was the old mystery writers' arsenic ploy: build up a resistance and you eliminate yourself from suspicion.]

Progress...

Yeah,  I'm worrying about opening hooks at the moment.  There's these two projects I want to query Emma and There Be Demons.  I'm seem to be bumping my head against a blank wall when searching for marvelous images.  No changes in the manuscripts yet.

The demon book may break too many rules, especially the ones about presenting your viewpoint characters, but then again, I use two main viewpoints in a tween book.  Emma is more conventional middle grade book.  Okay, in Demons, I've got the demon rising from the portal, but he doesn't appear again until the end of the book.  :throws hands in the air:

Rules.  Rules.  Am back on the fence for Dark Solstice  [About my Half-Elven, not Tolkien's]  There's entirely too much telling, I think, for current tastes ... plus I have all sorts of multiple viewpoints giving their interpretation of the same events.  Does that sound like literary?  Maybe, I'll just self-publish the thing ... and go on and finish the trilogy about Kerry as a young adult.  In short, I don't know what I'll do.

Be careful when you complete more than one project.  Your headaches increase exponentially.

Web Stuff ...

Voice is an important problem for writers.  Even though I've given up on what I "sound" like when I write, Justine Musk has an significant blog on the distinctions between your  "essential self" and your "social self".  With the rush to e-publishing and building platforms, I think it's especially important.  Include, chasing an agent too in this discussion too.

[I gave up on figuring out what my voice is long ago.  If it's there, it's there.  If it's not, I don't know under which rock to find it.]

Had the above all set up for my web comment when I read Scarlett Parrish's blog on Erotica vs Porn  -- Let's Talk About Sex on Sunday night.  A lot of writers shy away from writing sex scenes, ie. the story fades to black when he carries her up the stairs.  Others jump in with both hands and feet, giving the reader minutes details.  Parrish makes a good distinction between what makes explicit sex in a book/story a part of the plot ... or porn.  [Don't ask me what porn is unless someone is getting hurt against their will, either.]

[My "sex" writing?  Well, I did indicate the females in my Gorsfeld story were running around without shirts on while they worked in the field.  I also implied a threesome ... which is a big plot point in Dark Solstice.  Sorry, no groping.] 

Then, there are the invaluable Beta readers and critique partners.  The GotYA blog has a neat bit on comparing them to characters in the Lord of the Rings.  Check it out for fun, if nothing else.

Trivia ...

The last of the home-grown peaches are eaten.  We had to buy more at the farmers' market.  Raspberries too.

Avoiding Glops of Infodump

The Read ...

All fiction writers wrestle with backstory.  Fantasy writers have an added nemesis -- infodumps that try to explain the characters' world without slowing down the story.  While browsing the bookstore shelves, I picked a random volumne of Rachel Caine's Morganville Vampires series.  If I remember right, she's going to be at MileHi Con in Denver.  Thought it'd be politick to read a couple more of the books.  I was rewarded by a skillful example of feeding backstory/world info into the story line without slowing it down.

The book:  Feast of Fools, the fourth in the series.  I know I read Glass Houses, the first in the series, and I'm sure I haven't read any others.  Still, her first chapter was masterful in leading the reader into the new installment of "how to deal with benign and not-so-benign vampires".  I really sat up and took notice when I learned the MC's over-protective parents had moved to Morganville and needed protection from their daughter in this new environment.  Whatever, by the end of the first chapter, I was back in the loop with a good idea of the new problems facing Claire, new villains, and what had happened to the main/secondary characters in the previous books.   All as the story surged ahead.

Loved the opening hook for the book too.  "It was hard to imagine how Claire's day -- even by Morganville standards -- could get any worse ... and then the vampires holding her hostage wanted breakfast."  I leave you to wonder what the big, bad vampires wanted for breakfast.

Web Stuff ...

Trying to get my first Renna's Tale up on the blog.   Grump.  Grump.  Snarl.  Blogger won't let you cut and paste from Word docs.  Anyone have any ideas  besides typing the story in ... all nine pages?

Progress ...

Just be fiddling with the website ... trying to get stat counters in and other such necessities.

Did get Dark Solstice re-editing done -- mostly duplicate comments (telling and then showing or vice-versa), changing passive that still lurked, and other miscellaneous.  Now I've got to think of marketing.

Trivia ...

Am deep in Suzanne Collins' Catching Fire, but keep slapping my hand when I pick up Mockingjay.  I don't think it's a good idea to read two books in a series at the same time.

Oh, the vampires.  They wanted scrambled eggs, which was good since Claire didn't know how to cook eggs over easy.  A sad commentary on today's young adults.  My kids, even the male, could cook a whole meal by the time they were 12. 

Keepers: Better the ?th Time Around?

The Reads ... [or rather, Re-reads]

Do books improve ... or at least, keep your interest the ?th time around?  That's the purpose of bookshelves, isn't it?  ... To hold the books you might want to read again sometime?  Well, I put the idea to the test over the week-end.  Between a party, the New West Fest [before the riot] and visiting our daughter ... I decided I didn't want to think, so I re-read a couple of my favorite Stephanie Laurens' Cynster books:  On A Wild Night and On A Wicked Dawn.

Before you go eeeewwww ... a romance, think.  I'll argue that romances are prime fantasy concoctions.  Nothing could be further from real life.  Laurens gives her readers an added bonus to the sexy romp, her Cynster novels also contain a neat little mystery.  [Maybe this is why I keep them.]  In each book, Laurens drops clues  to the murder and the thefts that create the turning points in each novel.

Fantasy rears its head when the two protagonists go looking for true romance in a Regency/post-Regency setting in non-conformist ways.  One by visiting the scandalous fringes of society and the other by indulging in sexual escapades in empty rooms at ton parties -- both keeping their reputations intact.  In real life, they would have been caught, and their reputations ruined.

Don't be too impressed by my reading two 400+ page books over the week-end.  I skipped over the 2-3-4 pages of description of having sex ... over and over again.  Guess my romantic genes came atrophied.  When I think of falling into flaming abysses, pagan sacrifices to the gods come to mind faster than passion between the sheets.

Now, I'm wondering whether I should trade Laurens to make more shelf space.

Web Stuff ...

The only web stuff I spent much time on was my own site.  After two half-day sessions, I think I got the GoDaddy pictures up on my Half-Elven site.  In the process though, my author bio disappeared.  I'm not going to sweat it, though.  There're links to both my blogs where my bio is intact.

Then, Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins lept onto the publishing scene, and people were actually getting their hands on it, like E. J. Wesley, at midnight no less.   Then there were the agent blogs.  Suzie Townsend did a photo essay, showing one of the few benefits of living in New York City.  Janet Reid even got into the act with her own movie.  I'll end the links with GotYA's Mockingjay give-away.

Writing Progress ...

None.  Oh, I did get a couple more chapters of Dark Solstice read with copy edits.   The manuscripts bothering me, a bit.  I can see where I can make changes, but I like the story as it is.

Trivia ...

Got delicious ice cream cones at the farmers' market.  [butter pecan]  ...  Then had a corn-on-the-cob lunch at home before we headed to the New West Fest, where we didn't spend anything.  Did get coffee at a downtown bookstore, though, including a snickerdoodle.  Didn't have to eat dinner.

Distopian Fiction -- Commercial or Literary?

The Read ...

When I think of futuristic distopian  fiction, I think of commercial fiction ... like science fiction.  Of course, there are literary writers who do crossovers like Margaret Atwood, but I don't think any one has done it like Suzanne Collins with her Hunger Games.  Collins has "crossed-over" in a couple ways -- I know of several adult literary book groups who have included her on their reading lists.  

For years (since 2008?), I think I glanced at her rankings on the New York Times best seller lists.  She's been there for good reason -- magnificent writing that far surpasses her first series. [Gregor-something-or-other which I've picked up in the past and put back down.]  

Just read this opening hook if you haven't already:  "When I wake up, the other side of the bed is cold.  My fingers stretch out, seeking Prim's warmth but finding only the rough canvas cover of the mattress.  She must have had bad dreams and climbed in with our mother.  Of course, she did.  This is the day of the reaping."  So much of the coming story is hinted at in the coming story in that one paragraph that I'm lost in amazement [ ... and envy?... ]

Took me a long time to buy the book, given my congenital cheapness, but I found a used copy of The Hunger Games ... and read it in two sittings, in spite of having episodes of True Blood sitting in the DVD player.  She hooked me on the series when she got me sniveling in a couple spots -- no misty-eyed sadness here, but nose-blowing sniveling.  I was lucky enough to find a used copy of the hardback of the sequel [Catching Fire], but I've ordered  Mocking Jay, which hasn't been released yet.

How's that for faith in a series.  Hope more adults cross-over and read her "kid's" books.

Media Stuff ...

A lot's being written about e-readers ... about buying books for them.  I'm not opposed to them.  In fact I plan to buy one when the technology allows me to buy books from any retailer I want.  Hey, I've bought CDs that work in my CD player in Cardiff, Wales ... London, UK ... and Sogenfiord, Norway. 

I think e-reader technology should allow you to do the same.  When I buy a book, I want to own it ... not rent it.  From what I've read, it seems that the purveyor of an e-book can yank it off your reader -- after you've paid good money for it -- when it gets upset with the original publisher or author.

Actually, my questions go farther.  No one talks about the people who don't own computers and/or e-readers.  Print stuff lays around used ... and cheap, if you look in the right places ... and doesn't need any technology [except electricity at night] to read.  A poor kid can give up a couple chips-and-soft-drink and buy a book, if they're so inclined.  End of expenditure.  With the the corporate paradigm taking over so much of our economy/social contacts, I worry that the poor will be left even further behind.  I call it the new serfdom.

Progress ...

Still trying to cross Renna's gossip about Mariah with a narrative short story.  So far, it's telling ... tellling and more telling.  I'm writing the short story to give away on my Half-Elven site ... aka adding content to the thing.  Need to work fast on it because I have a critique session coming up.  Words are coming out really slow ... and I've deleted maybe 20% of the ones I thought I was going to keep.  Unfortunately,  they were side-tracks or backstory ... and I still have huge amounts of backstory in the thing ... the first two pages.

Of course, I'm non-conformist enough to go against the fiction formulas and decrease my chances of major publishing.  How non-conformist am I?  Well, recently read an article on query advice that said you needed to format your query only in New Times Roman.  I prefer Ariel.  Nuf said.

Did come up with good advice from two writers on Twitter that all writers should heed:  writers should write ... even if they think what they are writing isn't any good.  I'm paraphrasing Yasmine Galenorn and Laurell K. Hamilton here but that's the gist of what they said.

Trivia ...

Took off yesterday to do a day trip --  over Cameron Pass up to Laramie, Wyoming and down again.  Was rewarded by mile after mile of beetle-kill spread across the mountain and road sides.

 

Book Series Failure

The Read ...

What do you do when the subsequent books in a series leave you lukewarm?  

Over the weekend, I read German writer, Kai Meyer's The Water Mirror, the first of his YA Dark Reflections trilogy.  The book was filled with adventures -- starting with an escape from an orphanage to an apprenticeship that turned into a jump into danger to greater danger as the magician pharaoh of Eqypt conquers the city of Venice, using mummies of the dead he exhumed from the other countries he conquered.  

Set in an alternative world, Meyer gives fantasy readers of number of different paranormal elements not usually seen in American ficton.  A mirror of water (that never spills) instead of glass.  Intelligent mermaids.  Living stone lions (symbol of Venice).  A magical Flowing Queen who had used the waters of the canals to save Venice from the pharaoh -- until she was captured by treachery and saved by the two main characters of the book.  The plot moved, the writing was elegant, and the characters well-defined.  

Over all it was an engrossing read so I jumped into the other two books, looking forward to a couple good reads.

Again, there were some delicious elements like the magic of Baba Yaga saving Czarist Russia from the pharaoh and his army of mummies.  [Russian soldiers wear chicken feet around their necks.]  The two heros and the Flowing Queen trying for an alliance with the denizens of Hell to save Venice after the Venetians killed the first Hellish emissary.  The friends of the heroes fighting in the Venetian resistance.  I especially liked the lion motif that expanded into a sphinx motif when the main characters took the battle to Eqypt.

While the books had all the right pieces, I found myself skimming them rather than reading them.  The elegance had disappeared ... and I think that was mostly due to the translation.  Rather sad, I think.  Meyer offers the reader some interesting ideas. 

[So, now I'm wondering what kind of translation my books might get --  if they ever get sold.]

Progress ...

I mention most of the "progress" I made at the Half-Elven blog ... which was mostly learning stuff I should already know.  Still, I think I've made the Half-Elven site more understandable.  Now I have to add some content ... which I'll probably get criticized because I'm intentionally using "telling" mode for my free stories.

Queries.  Am sending two manuscripts out for rejection, [probably not for the execution so much as the content].  There Be Demons and Dark Solstice.  Since I'm putting the Half-Elven site up, I thought I should go back and try to market the main book of the sequence.  [It's also the one that's "done".] 

I've got my fantasy agent list almost compiled, courtesy of Agent Query and a lot of agent blogging.  It's a dishearteningly short list ... but at least the agents sound like they might be interest in the kind of fantasy I write.  Of course, I am complicating things by having an adult, a young adult, and a couple of middle grade manuscripts ready or almost ready.

I'm sending out several queries a week, and I'm already getting the "I'm sorry but this project isn't right for me" letters.

Trivia ...

Just doing our usual boring stuff, like going to farmers' markets even though most of our fruit and vegetables are coming out of our own yard now.  The apricots are all eaten, but the peaches are coming on. 

Did get a little excitement yesterday when a thunder-bunder crashed on top of the house.  The cats jumped and ran every which way.  I jumped, but stayed sat in my living room chair and thanked my crossed toes the computer was turned off.

Starting a New Series

The Read ...

My "cockles" were nicely warmed by the opening of Yasmine Galenorn's new series about the Indigo Court of vampiric fae -- Night Myst.  Frankly, I'm a little tired of her D'Artigo sisters.  [I'd still read them, but the competition for my time is too great at the moment.]  

The book set up might be considered a cliche -- a roaming family member (Cicely) being called home because of a death.  When Cicely returns home, she's discovers she's inherited the position of head witch in the town, and all hell's breaking  out.  Yeah, it gets off the blocks fast and keeps racing from one disaster to another.

That said, watching Galenorn set up the coming books in the series is a writing lesson in itself.  The end of the book leaves the reader anticipating several threads:

--Cecily inheriting responsibility for the safety of humans and witches in the town threatened by the Indigo Court, 

--The MC lover a captive of the Indigo Court queen, 

--A battle between two tribes of fae, one of which was supposedly destroyed by the Indigo Court,

--Not only can Cicely talk to a wind elemental by can turn into an owl which is the enemy of the queen of the Indigo Court,
--The Indigo Court of Vampiric fae out to destroy the Red Court of normal vampires, which are wickedly delicious and self-centered, the poster-people for unreliable allies. 
-- Cicely discovers her father is a fae from yet a different tribe, and

--There's a reincarnation thing going on.

 

Oh, there are some mild sex scenes and reserve partners in the wings to complicate future plots.

 

That's just what I remember from the top of my head.  I'll close my comments by thanking Galenorn for not sanitizing her vampires.

Media Buzz ...

Promoting Your Book:  The web has been busy catching my interest.  Maybe one of the most important posts I've read lately comes from Eric at Pimp My Novel -- an author's 12 Step Program.  Yay!  A nice step-by-step list of things you need to do to promote your books -- even if you hit the big time since publishers are publicizing less and less. 

I'm sort of stuck on #5 ... I skipped the agent bit on the list when I sold Taking Vengeance to WolfSinger Publications.  Laughed at the party suggestion.  I just went comatose when I got the email saying WolfSinger had accepted the novelette.  [Remember, this is super small time even if it's occupying enormous amounts of my time.]

Bureaucratic Sillyness:  I start out my day reading the New York Times.  [Actually, it's skimming the NYT.  The old man reads it.]  A recent gem was an article on how print books help avoid the "summer slump" affecting so many low income school kids, all of whom can't afford to forgot what they learned the previous year.  Seems their heads retain more if they have books to read.  Also seems, it works best when the kids pick out their own books.

With school districts cutting summer programs right and left because their tax base has evaporated, research has revealed a cost-effective solution -- give the kids books they pick out for themselves, even if the subject is "frivolous".  Hey, that might even get boys reading.

Progress ...

The site for the Half-Elven of the Far Isles is now up and under construction.  If you're curious, you can visit the site ... or the blog.  Did you guess I've put my other projects on the back burner to start another edit of Dark Solstice -- in spite of coming down with something with a fever?

Trivia ...

Got my desk cleaned off again ... Does that mean I'll start revising Voices??????  Maybe next week.  I'm still cleaning stuff -- both computer and print -- up.   The changes in Dark Solstice are minor -- so maybe I can do both.

Spinning My Wheels

The Reads ...

How do you pretend you are accomplishing something instead of spinning your wheels in the sand?  I decided to please myself and spend the weekend finishing Tamora Pierce's The Immortals series, again set in the world of Tortall during a series of medevial style magico-political wars.  

Really don't have any criticism.  Time is long gone for that.  The series was published in the 90s.  It was quite startling to see mention of CompuServ in the acknowledgments.  Pierce researched on the internet as well as the library.  A good reminder to hermit-me that even fantasy is based in the real world.

Must confess, I took some comfort in other pieces of writing (from The Realm of the Gods).  First, it had a prologue which gave me the courage to put the prologue back on Demons.  More important, Piece opened by setting the scene.

""The Stormwing sat on a low wooden perch like a king on his throne.  All around him torches flickered; men spoke quietly as they prepared the evening meal.  He was a creature of bad dreams, a giant bird with the head and chest of a man."  Did you guess this is the villain? 

Web Buzz ...

You shouldn't be surprised that I follow Tamora Pierce's blog.  Her latest discussed the eternal question of boys vs girls in YA fiction.   The title:  Dare to be Stupid.  It's worth reading by writers in all genres, I think.

Progress ...

For all my head spinning, I am making progress.  I think I've gotten all the loose ends of There Be Demons tied ... and put the prologue back on.  Why since so many dislike them?  Well, if I didn't, the arch-villain of the book doesn't appear until the second to the last chapter except as the addressee of various demonic letters.

Got my first rejection from my Demon queries.  Sent the query out last night.  The rejection was waiting in my inbox this morning.  No.  My feelings weren't hurt.  I expect this manuscript to get rejected often because the subject matter/story telling is unconventional.

Dark Solstice.  Have the revised query almost done ... and even found a few agents who haven't rejected it.  Of course, it's been so long since most of the agents have seen it and the thing have been extensively revised -- that I might just requery.  Again the story is off center.  Anyone know off hand someone interested in the grandmother rescuing a granddaughter from the villain who's plotting to usurp the ruler?

Trivia ...

I've been so wrapped up in doing websites, I haven't been doing much besides yakking at my kids on the phone.