Paksworld

You very patient people deserve another snippet from Kings of the North, as a Happy New Year present…or Bye-bye 2010 present.   Oh, what the heck.  Two presents, one for each year.     I’ll be keying this in from my reference ARC, so do not assume that any typos here are actually in the book (I sure hope not…)

Spoiler-phobes, don’t read below the line.

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As I sit here bleary-eyed after midnight yet again…I’m issuing a warning to anyone contemplating facing the same situation.  Do Not Try This At Home.  Yeah, eventually, every writer is in this spot, but it’s often (not always!) avoidable and avoidance has many benefits.

Such as a full night’s sleep at least every other night.

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Just when you think it’s going smoothly and all will sail happily along a flowing tide into the sunset (can you tell it’s late and I’m punchy?  I thought so) ….you find the Scylla and Charybdis of revision in your path.

These problems take various forms, but always present as the writer’s need to show something from various angles/viewpoints/political or social stances…and the reader’s strong desire not to be caught in a whirlpool where the same situation is recounted over and over and over.

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Fossils and Blind Alleys.    Discovery writers (raises hand, waving wildly) are not filled constantly with the pure essence of creativity, and so spend some time trying to muscle the story into shape.   Intellect (invaluable in revision) with  its conscious logic replaces instinct (invaluable in primary creation)  with its unconscious logic.  Sometimes intellect and instinct agree.  Sometimes they don’t.   When they don’t, instinct is nearly always right…especially in terms of the deep logic of the plot, or “what really happened.”

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When writing fast,  I often write “what happened” and not “where/when/how/why”–without much context.  Sometimes whole important conversations, because I’m “hearing” the people talking to one another, without any guide to who said what.

This requires backfilling.    Scenes must have context (physical, emotional, whatever else is needed) and transitions from previous scenes.  Conversations that run on for a couple of pages with no “he said/she said” or “[name] said/ [othername] said”  lead to reader confusion…and lack the cues to reaction to the previous speaker’s words.

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Herewith a post that may grow over the days, for your amusement, as I jot down some details of revising a big book at top speed (also lets me take a short break each time.)

1. How could I have gone over this chapter several times (which I have) and not seen that “he’d had a good” was not a complete clause in that sentence?  A good what??    Adjectives need nouns.   (Nouns often don’t need adjectives, if you use the right noun.)

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The last “block” of Book III fell into place with the completion of the swordfight at, um, 2:15 am this morning.    So between now and January 1,  there are decisions to be made, and multiple rewrites/cleanups to be done.  More text may need to be added (transition cues, scenes that now,  though not formerly, need enhancement.)     About 4-6 weeks of work is going to have to be accomplished in 10 days, two of which are Christmas Eve (when I have two church services to attend and one to sing in) and Christmas (when I won’t be working on the book–I’ll be sleeping and recovering from Christmas Eve.)  Plus a necessary social thing on 12/26 (annual party at close friend’s house given by her kids…not missing that.)   Hence, “writer as whirlwind.”

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You folks are owed some snippets, and you have my apologies for falling short in the snippet department this year.    Those who haven’t read Oath of Fealty are welcome to peek past the “more” warning, but you will find spoilers.   (Those completely unfamiliar with the Paksworld universe will benefit from a quick side trip to the Paksworld website, which has maps and names and other useful stuff.)

Today’s snippet is from Kings of the North, partway through Chapter One.

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Very, very, VERY big plot bomb.   Jaw-dropping for the writer looking at the mass of Story that just exploded into her head and is wondering how the heck to write it as well as it deserves.  This one covers a lot of ground, temporal and geographic.

All praise to the Plot Daemon, who has outdone himself.  (“All right, all right, lassie.  Now will you just go back up there and steer?”)

(Back to work.)

This book…I’ll swear this book wants to drive its writer crazy.   Where did this new character come from?   And why, once she arrived, didn’t she behave like a normal character (if Kuakkgani are ever normal, that is?)    Not only do I now know a lot more about how someone becomes a Kuakgan (some of it I knew years ago, but I’ve learned more in the past couple of years) but I just found out what can happen to a young (in experience) Kuakgan during his/her first spring out in the world.

“The green blood is strong in this one…”

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