Category: writing

Pause; and begin again.

At dinner last night, I looked over at the laptop my wife had gotten for me to ‘write anywhere!’  And no, I didn’t write at dinner with my family.  I do have some manners.

Back to the story:  as I looked at it, it occurred to me that I could take it to bed, and write there.  Wow!  Beloved wife playing Candycrush to my left, dogs at my feet, huge glass of wine at my right, computer in my lap… and off I went!

“Should I post this?  It’s awesome!”  My wife didn’t look up.  “You always say, ‘write drunk; edit sober.’  You really want to post that?”  Errr….guess not.

So now, I’ve edited about half of what I wrote, but there was a good break-point, so I wanted to push it out for everyone.  There are times I think that if I let the reins of this story go for just a minute, I’ll end up in places I literally cannot imagine.

Continue reading “Pause; and begin again.” →

Dramatis Personae

I’ve “seen” the next episode – and even a little beyond it.  But I was also encountering… friction.  This story is unfolding so fast that I’m starting to lose track of everyone in my head.  So, it was time to start a ‘cast of characters’ page where I keep notes about appearances, behaviors, relations . . . really, anything that I might forget about a character.

As there are semi-spoilers in my notes to myself, I’m not posting it.  Yet.  Maybe around Ep 15 or 20 I’ll create a cleaned-up version suitable for public consumption.  As it is, “Defiant” has twenty three people wandering about it!  Once I know what few outfits Nichole brought with her to wear, then I’ll post Ep 11.  This is supposed to be a university!  Everyone finally heads off to class (more characters!  Ack!) and we finally get a good dose of Portland ‘liquid sunshine.’

Thanks for all that are following along.  If you’ve any questions or comments, please let me know; I enjoy feedback!

Four

That number keeps coming up:  four loves, four laws.  I wonder where it will surprise me, next?

Another ‘transitional’ episode, but Nichole does have a sudden realization.  Amazing to think that both she and I didn’t know these things 24 hours ago.  I love writing.  Oh:  I wrote this on a new laptop in Word, so the formatting is chewed, again.  I’ll try to fix it for Ep11.

And I think I’ve a working link for Episodes 1-10 there at the left.  Stupid formatting….

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Organization

Another real life conversation:  ‘following this story in reverse order is hard!’  I’m paraphrasing, but I get the point.  After hunting tomorrow AM (at the supermarket), I’m going to try to create a sidebar link or something that makes it easier to follow “Defiant.”

But keep this in mind!  The purpose of this blog is not to announce the release of new books, but to keep me writing!  If I hit a wall on “Defiant,” I might just switch to “Hot Rod” or something else entirely.  I love what I see right now, but time will tell how far it goes.

Now, back to the rooftop, when Mackenzie asks an innocuous question.

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Back on Track…

…which is not the same thing as back on rails (to make an RPG reference).  I’d seen most of this yesterday evening, but as important writing is, family – even just day to day family stuff – always comes first.

I also realized that my episodes were getting unwieldy in size, so I’m trying to pare that back, too.  There’s more on the roof next time.  Maybe the walk back to campus in a light rain after that.  Does Mackenzie explode under the attention?  Joe develop PTSD?  Gil confront Nichole about her connexion to Kongo?

I’ve no clue; but, I’m having so much fun!

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Chasing Rabbits

Ideas, really.  But the point’s the same:  they’re hard to catch.  Snares work better.  I’ve made the mistake of chasing ideas down rabbit holes.  I’ve lost track of my own story, dammit.

My wife read the update before this one.  “That was good, but how is this a romance story?”  Oh…yeah.  So, I’ve made some changes to Ep7-1 and now roll out Ep7-2 with the express purpose of getting Joe out of this combat zone as quickly as seems reasonable.  Not to give away below the fold, but the original version of this had Phillip dying, and the HUGE can of worms that opened….

This is a romance story, how?  I’ve explored three of the Four Loves between machines and humans in my two novels.  I wanted to see what I could do with the remaining fourth:  eros.  Guess this means fewer battle scenes…more classes and coffee shops.  More pools and less clothes.

I wonder if Nichole is buoyant?  Have to think about that.  For now, let’s start wrapping up the cluster-eff I made on the Columbia River.  Hope to get everyone back together in Episode 8!

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Real World…and editing

Someone asked me about what was the mechanism behind what I call the Breakup:  the near-overnight collapse of the US economy.  The short answer, from my notes of the never finished “Crosses and Doublecrosses,” was that China, Russia, and India created a new currency called the ‘Ria’ backed by gold and oil.  This displaced the US Dollar as the world’s reserve currency, causing it to be dumped overnight.  The velocity of money in the US dropped to zero, and within 24 hours, cities were starving.

The slightly longer answers can be found at these links, here and here.

Story-wise…I’ve an uneasy feeling about what I just posted for “Defiant.”  I’m going to edit what I wrote yesterday before I go any further.  Hopefully later today, but we’ll see.

Writing: and not being an a**hole

That’s the distinct ‘between the lines’ message a got from a RealLife(TM) co-worker today.  She’d not seen me since I’d started “Defiant,” and it was easy to see that she thought better of my now that I’m writing again.

I agree complete.  I’m not a likeable person to begin with, and not being able to creatively express myself these last few months has made me worse.  So, let’s let the cure roll on….

Continue reading “Writing: and not being an a**hole” →