Paksworld

Because it’s already late in the evening (nearly 11 pm) but I had a long nap (largely due to a migraine, but that’s another issue) I’m now awake at a time when I can’t first-draft  fiction and won’t sleep.  So in light of the discussion of yesterday’s post–of character stuff–I feel like rattling on about characters in fiction.    Some of this I’m sure I’ve said before; if you need to go “Yeah, yeah, know that, get ON with it” feel free to do so.    But new ideas about characters keep popping up in my head that might be useful to those of  you who want to write fiction–or, want to write nonfiction about people.

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At my friend’s daughter’s wedding,  I met my friend’s uncle, whose first name happens to be that of a character in Paksworld.    It’s a fairly unusual name in the U.S.    Naturally, she was curious why I had given that character that name, and wondered if she’d said something about her uncle, way back when.

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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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Echoes of Betrayal has a new cover for the paperback edition coming early next year.    I liked the hardcover art, but this is a very strong cover that will show up better on the smaller format.

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I really admire Sharon Lee & Steve Miller’s Liaden books, because they handle issues of register and custom so well.  For those not dragged backwards through a linguistics course at some point, “register” refers to the way people speak in reference to social roles.    Most of us learn as children that one mode of speaking is fine with another child–a friend, say–but another is needed to satisfy expectations when talking to a friend of our parents.  That’s register: everything from the choice of words to the tone of voice to the topics considered appropriate…communication changes with social situations.

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My UK editor wants an essay for their blogsite.  I’m working on it.  I’ve been working on it since it was assigned.   It should’ve been easy; I thought it would be easy.  It’s not.  And it’s even a topic I suggested.   In the weird way that Lifestuff and Writerstuff sometimes intertwine, it got tangled in a discussion here, a discussion elsewhere, and my original thoughts on the matter.

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I was reminded again this weekend of the way death comes seemingly out of nowhere to shatter relationships new and old.   A friend of mine in another state was participating in a serial transport of a rescued dog from the shelter where it was first found to its future home, some two thousand miles away.   The puppy stayed at her house overnight, and the next day she drove it to the next person in the chain.   The person set off…and she and the puppy were killed in a weather-related road accident.  You can read about it on my friend’s blog, which includes a beautiful tribute to the remarkable woman who was killed.  Please do, in fact.

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If you have over a million words of fiction set in the same world, you’re very likely going to have a lot of characters and those characters need names.   The names have to fit the world, and each other.  In real life, many people may have the same name (which is how the innocent get blamed for crimes they didn’t commit): there are dozens of Elizabeth Moons across the country, with at least one in most states and at least nine in Texas.   But in a book (as I discovered in my first one, when I didn’t know better) readers expect one name per character and one character per name.   They need those names to be easily pronounced (and “easily” varies with the reader) and distinctive.

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I am deep in chronology now, maybe halfway through, and discovering that I have duplicated some events (though the way the scenes are written varies a lot) and completely left out some very important ones.  Last night’s work session was on one such scene (a plot-mover for sure.)    Getting the others into even rough order helps a lot in seeing overlaps, duplicates, and gaps.

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Along with finding a major blooper in Book IV when I went back to it after page proofs….I’m now at 125,000+ words.    As mentioned back when (Oath or Kings, can’t now recall which) at some point Arcolin has to consider his succession.   The other dukes strongly prefer that he marry and get an heir, and that quickly; they never liked Kieri’s plan of not marrying again and letting the domain lapse.   The king feels the same way–he wants things settled.

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