Saying thanks, and all that: ebook versions of The Fourth Law and Echoes of Family Lost will be available for FREE on Smashwords.com between now and New Years Day.
Category: science fiction
Feed.Back
From a few in-person, including my wife, but mostly via email. Why almost no one ever leaves comments here, I don’t know.
There was much unhappiness how I wrapped up Defiant Act 2.5: at the pool with Joe’s diagnosis. If I were to distill is all down, I guess “casually tossing out a main character!” would be the flak I caught.
Yeah. I did. Because this was never meant to be a coherent novel, but a nine-month long writing exercise, the break from Acts 2 and 3 was huge. 2.5 was meant to be a bridge; but, it seems that like the Lewis & Clarke, it was a bridge too far. The anchor issue is that Joe MUST have cancer and go to Japan for treatment: he’s on the boat back to Portland with Maya in “Cursed Hearts.”
Is it the hyper-sexualized environment of the pool, and the emotional whiplash after, when Nichole5 realizes her First Friend is sick? A human girl would have no idea about his illness and banged him then and there. Nichole5 chose to shatter the moment for everyone in face of what she sees as a medical emergency.
Perhaps I went too far, too fast. I’ll give some thought as to how I might re-write this. Suggestions welcome, as I see nothing, right now.
Tears, sweat, blood
To cite Arkada of Glass Reflections: ladies, gentlemen, and others, I present to you the final installment of Act 2.5 of “Defiant.” Yes, you read that right: the writing component is complete. Editing and ret-conning the four parts of this 18-month, 85.5k writing exercise into a proper novel will begin.
And therein lies your chance, you followers of this blog and those that have wandered in via my sole social media presence on Gab.ai: if you so desire, you can d/l and read the entire story between now and Saturday, for free. It’s very, very rough, but you’ll get what you pay for. Come Saturday, whenever I wake up, I’ll be pulling the entire ‘free webnovel’ down as I begin to turn it into a commercial novel. As always, I’ll do the first-pass editing myself. Second and copyediting – and a cover – are as yet an unknown; after the layabout wife and the Dog With the Golden Nose, it’s all ramen and Taco Bell salsa packets here. My sole, possible, hard-deadline, is January 26th, when I might have another Creative Writing panel at Ohayocon. If I do, I’d like to say, “since my last panel, I’ve published two books… what did you do?” Keeps the snarkers from snarking.
Anyway, there’s just over thirty five hundred fricking words below the fold! Open a bottle of wine or make a pot of coffee, the one right next to that bottle of bourbon, sit back, and, please, see what I’ve seen… and have fun!
AM or PM?
“Meet me at eight!”
Who hasn’t been there at some moment of their life? In this case, Nichole and Joe go back to Portland, a diversion to Zom’s, some other characters show up… for dinner…
Oh my God, they leave the battlezone at dawn! That has them back into the City around 0800! What the hell am I supposed to do for the next nine to ten hours?!
“You Are In My Vision”
Eleven days straight at Day Job. At least I was able to think a great deal about what the hell might or might not be going on. True to my style, I went for the minimalist approach. So, we get a little overlap of the last scene from Joe’s perspective, followed by Nichole doing gallant machine things and Joe doing gallant human things.
I am genuinely happy when machines and humans compliment one another as men and women do.
Last Sunday, our parish priest – in anticipation of Thanksgiving – asked us to consider what we’re thankful for. Besides the trite answers (“my family!”), what I really thought was that God let me see, and write, stories like this. I don’t deserve it.
Life Imitates Art II
Very good introductory to quantum computing. Much promise in this field, especially to meet new friends! Someone should write about… oh…
Peace is Our Profession
As Churchill noted, jaw-jaw is better than war-war. But, there are some people that just need killin.’ Cannibals, for instance. I know way back in Defiant Act I, wrote that how they were dressed and cut their heads, “it was hard to tell the men from women.” So, I could be really edgy and call them tranny-cannies; that should trigger a few thousand hate-hits to my little blog.
Meh. I’m just here to tell the stories they show me; as Nichole discovers, sitting across from Mayor Johnson, in his study, politics is work.
“When in doubt…
…start blowing stuff up.” I realized Wednesday, after a small psychotic incident (when you wake up wondering if you’ve had a stroke, the rest of your day will not unfold well), that cutting myself off from creative works was turning into a very bad idea. After scaring the hell out of my boss with my borderline behavior, I excused myself at 1300 and went home to stare off my deck into my backyard.
After an hour of that, I got a notepad & pen and began. Nothing detailed, just trying to SEE. Made about a page and a half while my aggregates slowly coalesced into normalcy. In downtime on Friday, did some checking and realized the nuke plant NNW of Portland, from my childhood memory, was out: the progs have obliterated all trace of it. But, there is a bridge, about a mile north… about 3/4 page of notes.
Today, half of #fam was at swim meet, so more waiting to SEE. Finally got it: a wrap to the Cannibal Army from Act I, as well as exposition of local politics, more friend Mackenzie, and how Joe actually falls for Nichole. Literally: from an exploding bridge blanketed by nerve gas.
No story below the fold, but I did want to share my notes; they’re 1;4 and 2;3 in the pics, so don’t get confused. I’ve made a gallon of my super-concentrated tea for tomorrow and am going to bed early. Hoping for much friendship, politics, and mayhem, tomorrow!
Walkies
It always make my dogs feel better. Me, too.
A long, dry spell of not-writing. Day Job has blown and several family issues. Getting back on track. This was a productive weekend, even if I’m another US$3000 in the hole.
“Defiant” – VERY likely under another name, my free webnovel, shall be published by Christmas. Read about how I’m completing it, below the fold.
Heading back Down in the Park
With Pirate Twins, my 4000, er, 17,000 word writing exercise complete, I am now returning to my free webnovel, Defiant, to flesh it out into a proper novel.
. . .
I had nothing. For about two days. As usual, at Mass this evening, reflecting on the Gospel reading from Mathew (so you know ‘gnashing of teeth’ will be involved…) about forgiveness. I don’t know why, but I was led to think about the last paragraph of Act II, when Mackenzie accidently finds out what Nichole is.
In an instant, I ‘saw’ their conversation and reconciliation. Later that morning, they stand along the west bank of the Willamette River, watching the slow departure of HMIJS Kongo. That’s 3k words, right there. I was going to roll that over into going to class later that day or the next morning, but instead realized, with a smile, they’d be stopping in a Zom’s for a parfait or something. Add a heaping of Nike and there’s 2k more words.
It’s only when I try do I eff everything up. Shut up, Clayton, and write down what they show you….
machciv 