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So as I’m slogging, lurching, struggling through the mental swamp that is this part of Book IV, I realize that what keeps tripping me up is the E subplot. (As opposed to A, B, C, and D.) What the heck is going on with E-subplot (or, to shorten things, Eplot.
As usual, now that I’m more than a book ahead of you, I can’t tell you what Eplot is about and ask for help or anything. Eplot has its roots way, way back–it’s part of the Old Stuff that’s coming boiling up in the new group of books. I have the feeling (or maybe blind hope) that if I can get Eplot sorted, everything else will unkink and line out at a nice brisk trot. Right now, the characters who (present day) are dealing with elements of Eplot want to infodump and tell me (and you) all about it. I need to know; you don’t. Or at least, you don’t need to know about it in the sort of plot malfeasance that occurred in one mystery I read (and consider this instance a perfect example of how not to impart information)…the protagonist, galloping full speed towards the now-discovered murderer who was galloping full speed away, starts lecturing the reader on how the height of horses is measured.
So in the midst of other things going on, I won’t let my character suddenly give you a thousand years of history in a very large nutshell. And you should be very, very glad. Because even the best, most interesting and active characters, aren’t interesting when they become mouthpieces for the writer trying to figure out who did what to whom when and why it matters now.
Unfortunately (and it is unfortunate) I have to write, and then read, the lecture(s) so that I can then use them in writing the actual story. If it really turns out that Deceased A and Live B had a child C who, though now Deceased, fathered D, I will be very annoyed with them for not telling me that earlier. Since A and B quarreled before A died (why did they quarrel???) there’s the question of why C was hanging around A, esp. as A didn’t much like C. But if C wasn’t A and B’s child, and was only B’s child, that makes “why was C hanging around A even more important.
At the moment, I can trace only three of A’s children for sure. Two are dead, and only one (of the dead ones) had children. If A and B were C’s parents, then C had children too. (Yes, scribbly charts on cards and random pieces of paper have been done, scratched out, done again.) In one sense, it would be tidy for A and B to be C’s parents, and tidy in a different way for B to be C’s parent (but not A) but is it real? Feeling my way back alone the connections among people alive generations ago is…tricky. The conscious plotter (as opposed to the Plot Daemon, who’s presently sound asleep and snoring loudly to prove it) is apt to go for “Oh, way cool idea!” and not some deeper truth.
So here I am, muddy and sweaty and very tired of the swamp, but still clinging to the line of Eplot until I find its source and trace its course. Meanwhile, over on Cplot, someone’s jumping up and down and wanting to tell me something, but he’ll have to wait. All this stuff has to connect at the end, in the right way…so slogging is necessary now.
Comment by tuppenny — May 4, 2011 @ 10:22 am
Egregious infodumps always make me think of the old radio westerns when the voice over intoned “Meanwhile back at the ranch….”
Comment by elizabeth — May 4, 2011 @ 11:27 am
When you’re short of space, that’s often the most efficient way to change locations. It has the advantage of letting the reader/listener know exactly where the new material is located (and keeping readers oriented is important.) But what follows “Meanwhile, back at the ranch” should be action, not infodump.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Joe and Billy-Bob have discovered that the Skillers gang had cut the fence and rustled 247 cattle. They know it was 247 because Billy-Bob, who is a master tracker, had memorized the unique hoof structure of every animal on the ranch and can tell at a glance which animal made which track. This level of tracking prowess was unusual, of course, and Billy-Bob was taught the skill by the Old Indian who used to come to his father’s place every fall and help with the cattle drive. It took Billy-Bob only a half hour to determine that the count missing was 247, though the last track gave him some problems… (infodump!!! Yawn…..)
versus:
Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Joe and Billy-Bob arrived in Lonesome Valley by mid-morning. “Where’s the herd?” Joe asked. “They’re usually at water this time of day.”
“There’s one,” said Billy-Bob, pointing to a gaunt cow limping toward the creek.
“One!” Joe said. “Two days ago there was 250 head up here. We better find ’em.” They rode down to the muddy bank of the creek. By now two more cows had shown up, but no more.
“Fresh horse tracks,” Billy-Bob said, pointing. The trace of many cattle moving down-slope required no comment. “I’ll bet some rustlers got in.” They looked at each other. “Skiller’s gang,” Billy-Bob said. “And that means they’ve cut the fence, low end of the valley. Not much lead on us–them tracks is only a couple hours old.” As they followed the tracks down the valley, Billy-Bob took note of those he recognized and memorized the tracks of the rustlers’ horses.
“Make sure your rifle’s loaded,” Joe said… (not great, but not infodumpy. Offers the possibility of a confrontation.)
Comment by Linda — May 4, 2011 @ 7:05 pm
Well gosh, now you have me thinking tangled things like “If A and B maybe had a child C (as well as two kids) who had a child D” how much time are we talking about?
Which character (the so called D and presumably already introduced) having a living grandparent could it be? Can’t be one of Alvaric’s grandkids as grandmum is still alive. Could the living grandparent be the Lady? Only if C in not Kieri’s mother, because you said C “fathered” D.
And suddenly my mind is running down a muddy track after Kieri’s grandfather, wondering if he was enough like Arian’s father (Dameroth) to have caused the Lady’s seemingly irrational hatred of both father and daughter.
I think I’d do better with 247 head of missing cattle. Anyway, thanks for giving me something to think about other than confusing technology and an Aran sweater with five cable patterns and a not so obvious mistake somewhere.
I wonder if we’ll be able to spot A,B.C. and D two or three years from now when we finally run across them. ; )
Comment by arthur Piantadosi — May 4, 2011 @ 7:18 pm
This is Arthur. here is my Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/?sk=h
Convoluted plot, eh? Well, ALL history, when you look at it reasonably, and not just cursory, is complicated. What you did with Jeddrin and his journey changed his outlook on a lot of things, though not everything. He still though of some things from the point of view of his time and place, but because of the secret of his ancestors origins, he is seriously freaking out. You have Paksenarrion being a catalyst for a LOT of good, like Eris and Torfinn. Torfinn was my favorite character in Kings, having read it once. I really thought the disconnect between what the Pargunese believe and what the Finthans and Tsaians believe was pretty huge.
Comment by Daniel Glover — May 4, 2011 @ 9:09 pm
My, my, my. Now I have a conjecture, but that would be playing in to spoiler space. All I can say is wow if it’s true. Thanks for sharing though. The writer’s life can be a tough one. All the best in getting all the right characters to share with you their stories.
Comment by Alaska Fan — May 4, 2011 @ 11:27 pm
Um. I think you may have telegraphed some stuff there, Ms. Moon, but that’s fine with me.
Have you read Rosemary Kirstein’s excellent “Steerswoman” series? She’s a master … mistress … at telegraphing big events and defying the reader to figure it out. It’s an art I think you are mastering.
Comment by elizabeth — May 5, 2011 @ 8:01 am
I sortakinda hope you don’t figure out which family it is, but if you do (when Book IV comes out) that’s OK. There are a lot of families in this group and they are all sufficiently complex and tangled that I’m having to make new charts. Human, elven, and now gnomish (stuff you’ll find out from Echoes of Betrayal) spread across the whole map. They insist on influencing one another…and there are so MANY. And then the Fellowship of Gird, where the relationships important to the plot aren’t familial but “working”–Marshals to Marshal-General, yeoman-marshals to Marshals, etc. It’s bad enough with the humans–with the elven families, where a thousand or so years is nothing much to immortals, and the gnomish, who aren’t immortal but very, VERY long-lived, I’m having to think in a peculiar way (for a mortal human in this world my age.)
In other words, I’m drowning in familial stuff (mostly) at the moment, and scribbling/crossing out/rescribbling to try to get some things straight. Writing Paks was much easier–she didn’t KNOW anything, and had no reason to learn most of what I’m digging up now. But kings and such own libraries and archives and are aware of the complex relationships that drive behavior.
Comment by elizabeth — May 5, 2011 @ 8:03 am
You’re right, Arthur, that the disconnect between Pargunese and Tsaian/Finthan/Lyonyan cultures is great–but no greater than that between some cultures on this planet.
Comment by elizabeth — May 5, 2011 @ 8:05 am
No, I haven’t read those books. Sounds like something to look up when I’m through with this.
Comment by elizabeth — May 5, 2011 @ 8:05 am
You’re right–discussing it more would be risking spoilers.
Comment by jjmcgaffey — May 5, 2011 @ 6:21 pm
Yes, you should read the Steerswoman series – they’re fantastic (especially the first two – the last two get more confusing, to me at least).
One thing I’ve found very strange in the new series is how much more magic there is around – not just stuff like what Dorrin’s running into, but things like the black swords. That took outside help to deal with, and are nastier than anything (that we knew about) that they ran into in the campaign against Sinavia (nastier in effect – they’re meant as traps as much as weapons). Now, given your comment above, I’m wondering if it’s just that Paks wasn’t aware of such things – she was certainly startled when she encountered the healing potion.
Comment by elizabeth — May 5, 2011 @ 10:37 pm
When & where Paks grew up, magic was talked about, but not known directly…it was something somewhere else, done by people no one had seen, maybe long ago…maybe last year…nobody knew. There was a lot Paks didn’t know (everything, just about) that I knew but held in reserve because she could not know it until it hit her. Over the course of the first three books, more and more of it showed, as she experienced it. Now we’re dealing with older protagonists, men and women who have much wider experience.
Comment by Genko — May 6, 2011 @ 3:51 pm
All fascinating stuff. I was noticing that there are archives at Fin Panir (including some that Paks brought them), and of course Jeddrin has a lot of archives. Is there any way to have them see each others’ archives? I realize they are separated by a LOT of distance (geographic and cultural), which isn’t that easy to get across.
One other thing puzzled me in Kings. At one point Jeddrin reads “the keys are lost.” Then it says it took him days to find out what the keys were, and suddenly Alured’s soldiers show up, and we’re off to that confrontation. Okay, Jeddrin presumably knows what the keys are, but I, the poor reader, do not.
Will we ever find out? Or does it really not matter?
Comment by elizabeth — May 6, 2011 @ 10:03 pm
I don’t think there’s any chance that Andressat will go north again and see the Girdish archives in Fin Panir or that the Marshal-General will see his. And I’m not sure that Andressat is right about his conjecture about what “the keys” were. (I don’t even know if we’ll ever find out. If it’s essential to the plot, it will put itself in…otherwise, it may or may not.)