Paksworld

I think I mentioned that thanks to reader comments I’ve now found a way to change one of the A- names (Alured the Black) to something else for a logical reason in K-II.   Alured considers his current name too plebian and associated too closely with his criminal past, so he wants a fancier name.  He has some genealogical records that he thinks relate to his real parentage, so he picks a non-A (not his reason but mine) name from among them.

Read the rest of this entry »

K-II being its “stable name,” that is.

Editor says that no amount of backfilling will allow readers who start with K-II to understand everything that went before.

There’s a lot of before.   Although K-I, now known formally as Oath of Fealty, covers only about a quarter year of that world’s time, it’s a quarter year in which a great deal happens.    Some of the problems mentioned about K-II arose from not knowing what was in K-I, but others were real problems.

Read the rest of this entry »

Today I went to the publisher’s office–the Random House/Bertelsman offices–in Manhattan.   It strikes humility in the heart of the writer to see the display of all the other titles–well, a very large selection of the titles–that Random House has published over its history.   The ground floor display is amazing and wonderful.

Read the rest of this entry »

You could be forgiven for thinking “She isn’t posting; she must be goofing off while she’s traveling” but in fact I have been working when I could find a place to put the machine or open the notebook.

Some railroad tracks are smoother than others.

That being said, here’s the update.  During the Ninc conference, I took off at least an hour a day to write.  Usually more, sneaking away from program items I didn’t feel I needed.  I wrote on the trains (all the trains so far) and in the waiting rooms.

What this has produced is, so far, a much improved early section, with foreshadowing of troubles to come (alpha readers will note that their comments bore fruit–there’s foreshadowing, rather than just “Look, the roof fell in.”    Then there are revisions flowing from the new stuff into later chapters (not completely done yet) and a lot of “think tank” work on the deep logic that will inform the rest of the story.

Possible Spoilers Below

Read the rest of this entry »

And lo! one whole POV section has been cut, with the essential plot-moving information from it moved somewhere else.

And lo!  Alured the Black, whom you recall from Paks I, has really got a case of grandiosity on and has changed his name to suit his new stature as Duke of Immer.  This is partly due to deeper analysis of his character and motivations and partly to remove another A character name.  At least partly remove it, since people who knew him as Alured still think of him as Alured until he makes a point (pun intended) of insisting that they call him by his new name.   I’m not sure enough of  the exact form of his new name to share it yet.

Short of time, so zipping back to work.

After some 22 hours on the train, I’m in St. Louis, in the hotel, and I have a lot of comments to work into the revisions.   So I won’t be online a lot, but progress will be made.    I’ll check in when there’s something new to say.

No one person can do it all, in the alpha-reading world, which is why having a group works best for me.  Each of you is sensitive to slightly different things.

Overnight, I got more helpful comments.   And I’m seeing my way clear to some changes in mid-book that will of course impact end-book when they’re done.

Spoilers (some serious spoilers) below the line, so don’t “read more” unless spoilers don’t bother you.

Read the rest of this entry »

(Aside–it’s really hard to talk about some of this without spoilers for those who hate spoilers…so if you avsolutely hate spoilers, you might want to skip what’s below…)

Read the rest of this entry »

Page proofs are the stage of proofing where you realize what you should have done in revisions (but didn’t), and copy edits (ditto.)    And you can’t make big changes in page proofs.  Well, not without arousing the fury of everyone involved, anyway.

But there are compensations.

Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve started sending the manuscript to the alpha readers who passed the test.  If you heard from me that you did, and don’t get one by Sunday night (not Sunday morning–I have church), let me know.  My email load is big enough that I can lose things in the inbox.

Read the rest of this entry »