Posted by nightphoenix on Feb 2, 2011 in
Input My son turns 5 today. Long overdue, if you ask me. It’s interesting, watching one’s own child’s succession of birthdays. I’ve noticed that he starts acting the age he’s turning several months before February, and mentally I start thinking of him as being that age. Makes the actual day feel a little anti-climactic, at least for me. (Probably not to him. At least I hope not.)
I’ve been making an Excel list of agents to query. Today I will be sending out a query to the agent I met at the writer’s conference, and then picking out 10 or so others to send a first round of emails out to. Man, talk about a complicated process. Every agent wants something different. Some want just a letter. Some want a letter and a writing sample. Some want all that and a synopsis of the story.
Of the ones who want a sample, some want a chapter. Some want 3 chapters. Some want 5 pages. Some want 10 pages. At least one wants 50 pages (!). That means, for each one of these, I have to find a break somewhere in that neighborhood. Some want said pages attached. Most want the sample in the email body and will delete anything with attachments.
Of the ones who want a synopsis, most want a page or two. Some want 5 pages. One wants 3-5 paragraphs. *eyeroll* How many bloody synposises (synposi?) do I have to write?
Some want you to query just one agent at the agency. Some say that a query to one is a query to all. Some will let you submit to another agent at the agency if the first rejects you. Some stipulate that a rejection from one is a rejection from all. Most want an email. Some have a weird online form you have to use instead. Some respond to everyone. Most warn that prolonged silence is a no. Response time is anywhere between 1 week and 6 months.
Are you beginning to see the need for a spreadsheet to keep all this straight?? Now I figure if I can navigate all this excitement, I’ll be a step ahead of most people who go through this process.
I’m finally reading Towers of Midnight. I have to say, sometimes the library has good timing. I knew I had requested the book sometime back, and I was terrified it was going to come in during those couple of weeks before the conference. You know, when I was busy copyediting and preparing and most definitely not having time to start an 843 page beast. (That’s, er, overlooking the fact that I did read Fallen by Lauren Kate, and the final Vampire Academy book Last Sacrifice during that time. Um, yeah.)
I’ve also been reading the Maximum Ride books by James Patterson. Those are fun, though the super-short chapters get annoying pretty fast. I mean, when every single chapter is a page or two long? It starts to feel like this breathless, chronological montage of…stuff happening. Or like watching a fan blade turn round and round. It becomes a gimmick for making the book seem fast paced, but here’s the thing. These books don’t need it. They’re face-paced enough. Choppy chapter breaks are unnecessary, especially when they don’t really…divide…anything.
And here it comes, the deep thought for the day. Read more…
Tags: business of writing, musings, the real world
Posted by nightphoenix on Jan 25, 2011 in
Input So what does rape culture have to do with atrocities in the Bible? Nothing, really, except my reaction to it. (Warning, I use some language in this post that I don’t often use.) Read more…
Tags: rants
Posted by nightphoenix on Jan 25, 2011 in
Input When I started this blog, I said I wasn’t going to make posts about politics or religion. Because, for the most part, discussing such things just gets me riled up and irritated with nowhere to direct it, and that’s an unpleasant feeling. And, for the most part, I think I’ve stuck by that. Anything I talk about here, I try to make it relate to writing or creativity, at least tangentially.
The point of the above disclaimer is to assure whomever is reading this that yes, I really am going to make this about my writing.
I read something disturbing the other night, which ties in rather…uncomfortably…with some other issues that have been on my mind lately. Read more…
Tags: rants
Posted by nightphoenix on Jan 24, 2011 in
Input,
Output Well, there’s one week until the conference.
I’ve finished the copyedit…finally…so this thing is about as good as I can make it. I just need to do a run of business cards, and finish up the bags we’re going to hand out to the speakers. I’ve been slowly working on a synopsis, and I’ve been doing some digging around on AgentQuery.com’s articles about agents and query letters. Boy, that’s going to be a…process.
Started an Excel worksheet of all the agents I’m going to query. Slow work.
I’ve also been taking a long look at my writing queue, and rethinking what I should work on next.
Obviously Shades has first priority. Now that I have the first book done, I really need to get the second and third books written. The overall story is incomplete. However, I’ve been poking around on some writing forums, and realizing that in the interest of furthering my writing career, dedicating myself to working exclusively on a series may not be the smartest thing for me to do.
Even if I get an agent for Shades, the first book may not sell. Then my agent is going to turn to me and say, “Well, what else have you got?” And if all I’ve got is the rest of that trilogy…yeah. Or, the book may sell but not do all that well once it’s published. The publisher may not want to put out the other two books, or at least not right away. Again, they’ll turn and ask “What else have you got?” Or heck, the book may do well enough, but the publisher wants to space out the trilogy and have me release something else in the meantime…and it’s back to that question.
What else have I got?
I’ve made the decision that I don’t want to work on Mask of Eldarmarch next, like I’d planned. I’m just…not all that enthused about it right now, and I’ve gotten a lot of other ideas over the past few years that I’d really like to tackle first. Right now Dragon Singer is at the top of the queue, but now I’m wondering if that’s a good idea. Dragon Singer is going to be a challenge…complicated plot with time travel, and a lot of research about stuff I don’t know a whole lot about. Maybe I should start with something simpler, you know?
I’d probably start with the Waters, if I was going to pick one. Straightforward romance. Fantasy setting. The research is on stuff I already know a lot about (sailing ships), and on stuff I can utilize my “artistic license” (what was Earhart’s personality like after X years in a place that doesn’t actually exist?). Then I’d tackle Windwaker, another relatively easy one. Then, then maybe I’d be ready for Dragon Singer.
What I think I’m going to do is try and work on Shades plus another project in tandem. (And yes, I know you aren’t supposed to do that.) Shades needs to get done, but I want to have another project in the works in case I need it.
Hopefully I won’t. Hopefully Shades will take off, and I’ll have people frothing at the mouth saying, “Where’s the rest of it???” At that point, yeah, I can focus my efforts.
Tags: business of writing, the queue
Posted by nightphoenix on Jan 14, 2011 in
Novels,
Output,
Process Well, I finished the line edit a week or so ago, and have been (mostly) diligently working on copyediting. And realizing that there’s often a wide gulf between what I think I wrote and what the sentence actually says. And that I tend to read what I think I wrote. Blarg.
I’m also working on a synopsis, which is more blarg…but not as bad as it could be, since I had the foresight to sum up all the important events of Hands on index cards in preparation for editing. I think I’ll have everything ready for the conference.
Speaking of: Hey, the Space Coast Writers Guild conference is coming up! Jan. 28th and 29th (which is a Friday and a Saturday). It’s a great conference, and not too pricey, as far as writing conferences go. Click here for details and a registration form. You can also walk in and register the day of.
I did the conference booklet again this year (yeah…last weekend’s mad project), and I hope it looks as good printed as it does on a computer screen. The registration booklet I did was a little graphics-busy, IMO.
So…one might ask why I’m blogging when I probably should be copyediting or synopsising or somesuch. Well, I’m feeling a bit burnt out and I figured writing something is at least more productive than reading pages upon pages of Slacktivist comments. Not that those aren’t interesting, and un-productive…anyway. Read more…
Tags: business of writing, Shades, the real world
Posted by nightphoenix on Dec 20, 2010 in
Art,
Output They happen. Sometimes I go through stages where I just have to draw something before I can write again. Anyway, I’ve started something of a series. I’m (maybe) going to do a shot of every hero and heroine from each of my story ideas paired together. I finished Saeli and Raphel this morning, and have put together the guide for Caleb and Fayna (Briar Rose).
So here’s the one I finished. Keep in mind I did this really fast. For some reason, the skin color I used for the shadows in Saeli’s face came out really dark on the web…makes her look kinda dead or something. 
Oh well.
Saeli / Raphel
In other news, I’ve been line editing…slowly…and also creating a basic overarching plot for my Grimms concept. Oh, and wrapping presents. And making presents. Speaking of…I should probably get to that at some point today.
Tags: digital, Raphel, Saeli, Shades
Posted by nightphoenix on Dec 10, 2010 in
Film,
Output,
Short Stories Remember how I said I discovered a great, gaping hole in my Grimms premise?
Part of the idea is that children are kidnapped by faeries when they are babies and toddlers, because children who grow up in Arcadia make better, more docile slaves. It’s all they know. All my Grimms are kidnapped as toddlers, and rescued as teenagers. But the problem with that is, and I can’t believe this never occurred to me before:
See title of post. Read more…
Tags: Grimms, worldbuilding
Posted by nightphoenix on Dec 10, 2010 in
Books,
Novels,
Output First, Shades. I’ve finished the bird edit, and am now about two chapters into the line edit. Line editing is hard, mostly because I’m realizing how much I skim when I’m reading. Now I’m forcing myself to actually read every sentence, and make a judgment on whether that sentence says what I want to say in as few words as possible. Slow work. One interesting thing I’ve discovered are…well, I’m calling them “remnants”. Little snippets of phrasing in certain places that are from two or three drafts back. Most of them no longer belong, because the wording and motivation and flow of the scene have evolved so much. Interesting how common they are, and how easy they are to miss on a casual read-through.
I’ve begun re-reading my First Draft in 30 Days book, and thinking about how I’m going to approach re-writing the second installment in Shades. At the conference, I want to at least be able to say that I’m “working on” the second book. Hopefully if I start the re-write with a system, it will go faster than this first book has. Read more…
Tags: books, reviews, Shades
Posted by nightphoenix on Nov 30, 2010 in
Novels,
Output This is something, thankfully, that I know nothing about firsthand. I don’t think I’ve ever spent a significant amount of time with anyone who would fall under that category (if I have, they hid it really well). But alas, that means everything I know is going to come from reading the experiences of others, and reading the sort of official literature on the subject. Which, on one hand, is by far the closest I want to get to dealing with an abuser…but on the other hand, there will always be that voice in the back of my head saying, “You aren’t qualified to write this…you don’t really know what it’s like to be taken in by someone like that.”
I say all this because Raphel has what I’d call an abusive personality. In this, the first book, he’s very, very subtle about it. But in a way, that means this is the book where I have to walk the finest line between dark hero and villain. I don’t want Saeli to know she’s dealing with an abuser, but I do want the reader to start wondering. One of the things I find myself pulling out of this edit is the tendency of abusers to blame their actions on the victim. “Look what you made me do.” “It’s your fault I had to do this.” Raphel does this to Saeli a lot in “justifying” his kills. “I wouldn’t have had to kill this person if you had done *this*…” I haven’t even had to bring it out except in one scene…I was putting it in there all along without realizing it. He doesn’t outright blame her; she wouldn’t stand for that, not yet. But the implication is clear.
Raphel does it for control. If Saeli is too busy blaming herself for all the bad stuff that happens, she won’t think to blame Raphel and she won’t question him. Late in the second book, things will probably get to a point where Raphel doesn’t even have to make excuses for himself anymore; Saeli will just automatically cast Raphel as the victim of her own incompetence. She’ll start seeing herself as directly responsible for Raphel’s morality; she’ll start thinking in terms of being good enough and pure enough to save him from his own dark side. Thus, when he “fails” and kills someone, or whatnot, Saeli fails. Bad mental place to be. Especially since Raphel is the one who orchestrated that mindset in the first place, and will actively use it to his advantage.
I have to plant the seeds in this first book, or no one will believe it when Raphel gets worse later on. I’m working to make those seeds as subtle as I can, because I know from hearing people’s stories that abusers are really difficult to spot early on in the relationship. Raphel has to be particularly careful with Saeli, because she could at any moment hide herself inside Aschamon and be out of his reach forever. (Which is why one of the first things he does is start undermining her faith in Aschamon’s defenses. Part of the reason she decides to hear him out at all is because she’s afraid the school can’t protect her if she refuses.) He can’t afford to scare her off, so he’s cautious and gentle with her. But if a guy slaps you across the face within five minutes of first meeting you, he is not a nice person. (If he later confirms that he’s not a nice person, you might want to listen.) If he starts making you responsible for the deaths he could cause, unless you do what he says, he is manipulating you. If he kills people and then tries to make it sound like he wouldn’t have had to if you had done something different, he is manipulating you. If I can get readers to recognize the signs in this story, I hope it will help them recognize those signs in real life.
I imagine there will still be readers who will be upset with me for not redeeming Raphel in the end, but I don’t want that to be because the clues weren’t in place for them to see his downfall coming. Part of the overall theme of Shades is the inherent tragedy one faces in cutting oneself loose from someone you love who is abusing you. (And recognizing the fact that they are, in fact, abusing you.) You cannot help a person who refuses to be helped, and staying with them does not help them. It enables them to keep abusing. You have to get yourself out, even if that means abandoning them to their own darkness. That’s what Saeli essentially has to do.
I’m a little more than halfway through this second pass of this edit. My word count is essentially unchanged…I guess I’ve been taking out more or less the same amount of words I’ve been adding. The next edit will be a line edit, which will be loads of unfun, I imagine.
Tags: editing and revisions, Raphel, Saeli, Shades
Posted by nightphoenix on Nov 22, 2010 in
Novels,
Output Well, the editing has begun. The bird edit is going to take two passes, I realize. The first will involve going back and putting in the birds, lizards, ambiance, etc, and also marking passages that I think could be deleted or need to be changed. Some, I’m just going ahead and fixing. I’m already about 3/4 of the way through that first pass, as I’m mostly adding, and not reading every word.
The second pass will be in more detail. I’m actually going to go through and look at my verb and adjective choices, and see where those can be tweaked to suggest a culture where birds are so common that people actually think in terms of them. I’ll also be checking the consistency of all the idioms and phrases unique to that world, and making sure I haven’t used any cliches from this world. I’ll also fix and/or delete my highlighted spots, and do another word count to see where I’m at.
Then I’ll start the line edit as a new save.
This is not taking me as long as I feared. Of course this is a third draft, and I have this tendency to edit as I go, so a lot of what I’ve written is pretty polished already. I’m setting my completion goal for the end of December. I don’t know that it will take me that long, but with the holidays and everything I have to do for that, it very well might. Then I can take January and work on deciding who to submit to, and the dreaded query letter.
My blogging may be sparse for a while.
Tags: editing and revisions, goals, Shades
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