Paksworld

Sometimes, especially with stories told from several viewpoints across multiple volumes, the writer needs to have a scene that establishes the relationship between this POV in this book, and a different POV in a previous book.  Particularly, in the entire Paksworld work, the temporal situation.   We are so used to knowing today what happened an hour ago 2000 miles (or more) away, so used to having simultaneous different points of view, with television cameras and interviewers able to get the reaction of four widely scattered “foreigners”  (to whatever station the news is on) and four “native” (ditto) that it’s hard to keep in mind how long it could take for information to get from one place to another.   My entire life, privileged information arrived within 24 hours (telegraphs were expensive but used for super-important stuff)  and the technology wasn’t new then.

So this snippet, early in Limits of Power,  re-connects in a way the POV of someone else somewhere else with the POV here.  Very important things have happened to someone else, and this person didn’t even know–had not a clue what was going on.   It is a slight overlap, reflecting the temporal effect of distance.    The chapter it’s in has possible snippets holding spoilers, but I’m handing you this one instead.

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Last Friday, I picked up my gift mountain bike from the bike shop where it had undergone repairs and a severe shortening of the seat post (because my legs are a lot shorter than the legs of the previous owner) and began learning how to ride it.   Since the last time I was on a bike at all was roughly twenty years ago–and only for a few months before that bike needed repairs I couldn’t afford–and before that another 25 year gap to the bike I had in college (much like the bike I’d had as a kid and teenager) there was already a learning curve.    Even if it had been the same kind of bike, there’d have been some wobbly moments early on.  But it wasn’t.

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You’ve already met Poldin M’dierra, the nephew of Aesil M’dierra, commander of Golden Company.   Aesil is presently the only woman running a mercenary company in Paksworld, and she’s very good at it.   Poldin, her nephew, came to her with the usual starry-eyed romantic-idealistic notions about being a mercenary, despite having known Aesil all his life.    He’s learned a lot, since he came–he’s spent time with Fox Company, he’s now familiar with most parts of Valdaire, he rides better, he’s learning some fighting skills.  But he’s still a boy at the age where boys shoot up fast and sometimes do foolish things.

This snippet may or may not be a spoiler, depending on whether the 2000+ words I wrote today actually do fit in the final book, or just some of them, or (worst case) none of them.

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If you’re a discovery writer, as I am,  many things appear in the course of writing a book that you didn’t expect.    I’ve talked about plot bombs before.  But there are also character appearances…I’m writing a scene, and suddenly–as if thrust up through the stage–there’s a singing, dancing, clown-faced person right there, and he or she won’t go away.  Belongs there for some reason.  (Or sometimes doesn’t. )

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Setting:  Immediately after the end of Echoes of Betrayal and the Lady’s death, there’s chaos and suspicion.  Finally, as things began to settle down and reorganize–but still in the same place and with others around, Kieri asks his uncle, the Lady’s son Amrothlin, a crucial question.

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August has been (on the publishing schedule I was on before) the month to charge ahead full speed and has been producing the most bang for the buck, wordage wise, usually on the back of a pretty solid production in July.   So far, as of August 2, this month is not holding up well.

I know I haven’t been around here much in the last week or so–just answering some comments–but the time has come to yank myself off other online venues as well.   It’s so much easier to post on websites and blogs and give other people advice on writing…and so much harder to do the same wordage on my own book.  But as Neil Gaiman said in his wonderful speech, the time comes when you realize you’re using up your professional time and energy and imagination…on something other than the work you’re here to do.

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Lots of stuff has already happened, but new stuff has now started happening at a decent rate.    I’m afraid one of the minor design elements in this volume so far is that which someone becomes comfortable with is what they realize is impermanent.   That wasn’t planned, by the way.   It’s just intruding itself into my awareness.    But not all that’s lost stays lost and sometimes what’s discarded or vanishes is replaced by something something else.

Limits of Power has many funny moments (I think you’ll agree when you get there) but so far Book V is being fairly unrelentingly serious.   I think it’s the outside world…the illnesses,  the suicides,  etc.   But a book without some leavening in it is a dull loaf of a door-stop, so it’s time I put my mind to it.   I’ve been re-reading Surtees’  Mr. Sponge’s Sporting Tour right before bedtime to raise my humor level and I think it’s working, though it’s not showing in the wordage yet.  Maybe I just need a recalcitrant horse. Either Multum in Parvo or ‘Ercules will do.

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Help, please!  I need someone with time on their hands and a copy of the books so far to hunt up a few things for me, if you would be so kind.

1> In which book (and which year of the current series–considering year one started with Oath and Kieri’s coronation)  did Dorrin take on squires?

2> Did the passage talking about that say anything about the length of the squire contract?   (I’m guessing two years, but am not sure.  If it was tied to ending at a specific age, then it’s different for each.)

3> Somewhere, in some book, I mentioned the squires’ actual ages (or some of their actual ages) and how much the age difference was.  I know Beclan is eldest, but cannot remember how much, and I need to know all three.  Again, which book, and what year of the current story.

Apologies for asking y’all to work, but I’m deep in something that needs to keep rolling and if I stop to look I’ll lose the momentum.  Am leaving square bracket spaces to fill in later.  Thanks!

Sometimes, in the past year, having some knitting to work on has helped me past story tangles.   (So far, writing has not helped me past knitting tangles at all.  Unfair!)   There are similarities.   To make progress on either knitting or writing requires putting one little thing after another: a knit stitch or a purl stitch, a word or a punctuation mark.   Untangling yarn from a badly wound ball (I wish yarn manufacturers would either make good balls or sell it in skeins) is like diving into a story that’s gone immobile and refuses to “come out.”  Read the rest of this entry »

Progress today was less than hoped, but more than feared, but unexpected in its content.   I’m fairly sure this scene won’t survive until the end.   Road-building?  Really?   Nobody’s attacked the road crew or the visitor to the road crew (yet, I say with a trickle of hope that something more interesting will happen.)   No wild animals.  No earthquakes, landslides, broken axles on the wagons, broken bones from accidents.  Nothing but sweat and dirt.    It’s not too hot, not too cold, and no storms are looming.  Yet.

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