Nethermore

Rough night for writing. I’ve been averaging 1000 words an hour, but last night I averaged between six and seven hundred. Just had a tough time getting into the writing thing. Even though I was undisturbed at the cat house, a recent conversation with a friend had me a little distracted.

But I’m not going to let a random thing derail me.

I finished writing a night sparring scene that was punctuated by fireworks. I don’t know if it will work, but it had the feeling of an art movie in my head while I wrote it. Think the movie Hero, but with fireworks instead of colors.

I also finished Chapter Three, hit the 10% mark on the progress bar, and made a few notes for the next few chapters. Things are coming along.

In other news, nethermore.com received just over one hundred unique hits on Wednesday. Thanks to all of you who are stopping by. By the end of the weekend, I hope to have some galleries up on the as-of-yet unposted artwork section. I’m also looking to be around 30k words by Monday.

Here’s a funny little article that gave me a laugh.

–Stewart!

I braved the house of cats last night and had a surprisingly calm evening. The cats didn’t ask me to leave when eleven o’clock came around, and they even refrained from barfing. At least I think they did. I was very consumed with listening to soundtracks and writing.

I’m learning a lot of things, not just about the characters and the story, but about writing in general—most specifically my personal style of writing. Now, I don’t know if the way I’m going about things is right or wrong. I’m trying to avoid even thinking about that right now so that I can just let my natural writing flow out.

There are four viewpoint characters. So far I’ve written from the viewpoint of three of them. A friend suggested that I save the fourth viewpoint until about a third of the way through the book, otherwise I run the risk of confusing readers.

I’ve noticed a few interesting patterns as I change viewpoints. I’ll post the pattern here.

Chapter 1. Sid’s Point of View (POV). I introduce Sid, his place in society, his personal conflicts, and his relationship to the characters around him.

Chapter 2. Sid’s POV. I show how Sid’s personal conflict relates to the main conflict of the novel.

Chapter 3. Josuae’s POV. I introduce Josuae, his place in society, his personal conflicts, and his relationship to the characters around him.

Chapter 4. Josuae’s POV. I introduce how Josuae’s personal conflict relates to the main conflict of the novel.

And this same pattern is showing up in the Comtessa’s chapters.

All of this I’ve done unconsciously up to this point, and so it’s fascinating for me to go back and discover that out of all the chaos in my head, some sort of organization is flowing out onto the paper.

There may or may not be other viewpoints placed in between these chapters when the book is all done, but the pattern is the same. The character’s first chapter is always an introduction to relationships and personal conflicts. The character’s second chapter is about how the character’s personal conflicts are related to the main conflict of the novel.

I won’t know if this pattern is working until I finish the book and get it off to my alpha readers, but it’s very interesting to me that because of all my experiences, something in my brain has decided that this is a good way to organize things.

In addition to everything else I learned, I took Hobo’s suggestion and added Jikkoms to the novel.

Here’s a nice little article by Mike Stackpole about writing and rewriting. He sums up some of my thoughts on the whole idea that you just have to get the story down on the first draft and then fix everything else in post, as they say in the movie industry.

Got kicked out of a campus building last night because it closed at 11pm and I was still there at a quarter to midnight. I wanted to tell the security guard, “Can’t you see I’m writing an important book here!” But I could tell that he was worried that I might do something heinous, like drink from the water fountain after hours or maybe even grade papers.

I started packing up. I mean, if a building’s closed, it’s closed. But he had to sit there and watch me turn off my computer, put up my music and notes, and gather everything up. Then he escorted me three floors down and out the front of the building. He even pulled the door closed and smirked, as if I was going to try to get back in after the door had locked.

Guess he just has a job to do. Wish he were a little more happy about it, though. I could have said something like, “Your llama wears pink pantyhose,” and he wouldn’t have even blinked an eye. He wasn’t even nice about the whole thing.

But I did write 2000 more words . . . and on a Tuesday night. I never get things done on a Tuesday night because I hang out with writing buddies after our writing group. But tonight we had the group, we hung out, and I still had time enough to meet my writing goal. Hallelujah! Even the universe is bending so I can get this book done.

Better not count my eggs just yet. I’m not even 10% done. A sixteen-wheeler could run over my hands day after tomorrow. Then where would I be? I’d probably still try to write my novel, even though I might end up using my elbows to type.

Upon hearing the unhappy guard story, a co-worker suggested I use his house as a writing haven since nobody’s really there this week. It’s quiet, and I could even do my laundry (if I leave quarters).

“It’ll be perfectly silent,” he said, “except for maybe the cats barfing.”

I do a lot of graphic design on the side. It all started when I thought I wanted to become an optometrist, and I quit my animation job and then needed to get another job to make ends meet. So I worked for a nozzle company for about six months creating their logo, their catalog, and their whole corporate identity. I wasn’t responsible for the design of their website–but I quite like their motorcycle-inspired logo I came up with for them.

Anyway, I discovered the wonderful world of fonts, and here I share one of my favorite font sites: Blambot. Each month Nate Piekos creates a new pay font and a new free font. These things are great, especially for indie comic creators.

Our scottish friend at the top of the screen speaks using one of the Blambot fonts.

Check out the May Issue of Deep Magic. Brandon Sanderson’s got an article on how he takes ideas and turns them into stories.

Here’s a quote from the article that reinforces some of the things I’ve been riffing on lately:

“One idea, no matter how brilliant, does not make a novel! One idea probably won’t even make a short story. I’d say that a novel needs at least six, a short story at least two. The numbers will differ, but the thing to keep in mind is that you can’t generally carry a story on just one concept.”

When a writer lets those ideas grow without writing them down, pretty soon he has a novel with fifty ideas. I don’t know where the cut off point is on how many ideas to put into a book, but I’d say that fifty as way too many–at least in a book by a beginner. Somewhere the ideas multiply until the writer loses control of the book. There’s no longer a focus, and if the author isn’t focused, then the reader will lose interest.

Read Brandon’s article! It’s full of great advice. Plus, he talks about his new novel Mistborn: the Final Empire coming out this July from Tor Books. When the book comes out, look for the person who did the maps and the interior art. I think you’ll recognize his name. Oh, and the book is an excellent read; one of the best fantasies I’ve read in years. So don’t buy it just for the maps.

–Stewart!