Category Archives: War Mage

What I didn’t do

I had hoped to have the second novel done by yesterday and off to the editor.

No such luck. My time has been distracted by work, gaming, and other methods of procrastination. I’m making some life changes, like I’m avoiding meat for the next couple of weeks because of intestinal issues that I’ve been having. I’m trying to see if that will help change things. I know that limiting milk from my diet has really helped.

I’m also working on DBT skills. In case you’re wondering what that is, it’s a type of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy that relies on “skills” or ways to think about the world. One of its central skills is something called “Mindfulness.” It’s a way of meditating, of “being in the now”. The idea is that if you practice these skills when you don’t have to, you’ll be able to use these skills when you do need them and they’ll come automatically.

So body and mind…live healtier, think healthier, and I need to work healthier. My day job is becoming stressful, mostly because, honestly, I’m doing it in a half-assed manner. This is something that I don’t usually do. I usually care deeply about my work, making sure I do it, I’m doing it right, and I’m thorough. For the past month, I’ve not cared. I’ve done stuff if asked, but as for initiating, I’m not. I don’t care. I am a simple cog in a big machine, and I don’t feel wanted or needed, just used.

This is unusual for me. It will be 10 years at this company next year, the longest I’ve ever been at a company. I don’t want to be here anymore. No matter what I do, it’s not good enough. Instead of getting pissed off about it, I just don’t care anymore.

And now…to bed.

Update

I just noticed I missed last week, so this week you’ll get two posts.

Last week was hellacious. I had a cancer scare – yes, that’s a real possibility in my life, as you’ll find out when I write my memoir of the experience. I was on eggshells all weekend, so could hardly concentrate on anything. But I’m free and clear now.

Homecoming is coming along. I’m a little miffed that the cover I had paid for is not going to be used in its entirety. It initially had a house with a hook in the clouds. The hook was meant to be a meat hook but someone pointed out that it looked like a hay-hook. It wasn’t as important to the plot. But it is a symbol of what he’s carrying into the next book. However, it won’t work for this book. So they took the hook out entirely and now it’s a house. I’m a little bummed out, but they said they’ll use the hook for the banner ads. And when I make the poster of it, I’m going to use the hook, too. It’s supposed to make the reader wonder “What’s that there for?” so that way they read the book to find out.

The book is short (184 pgs) enough to read in one sitting. I hope that people want more, which is the point of it. It’s a prequel to War Mage, where I’ve done the research and have set it in an exotic country. I’ll put the bibliography here sometime.

I’ve still been writing scenes, a couple of Champions stories based on my muse from that game (Scott the Mage’s player). He threw me a curve ball after the “Marker” story and I’ve been trying to recover ever since.  Which is a good thing! I love when I get a challenge.

Grimaulkin, when I finish that book, is going to be dedicated to those muses.

A new year, a new blog

Hello!

Real Soon Now (tm) I’ll be an actual published author. The date we’re now looking at is late February. This gives me time to have War Mage possibly read by my beta reader before going off to the editor (or should it be the other way around?).

Anyway, I have a blog right now that consists of mostly Champions Online stories. I’m going to be changing that to just Champions Online stories. I try and do other writing every day (that’s the new year’s and birthday resolution, btw), but I have no place to put it so people can see the progress.

I plan on having the webmaster create another blog for me, this time for a daily word count of 800 words, which is what the other blog was supposed to be. Thing is, most of those fans are from Champions Online, so they’re not interested in seeing stuff like Iron Butterfly or War Mage, or dips into other genres like dystopian fiction or romance, or other writing prompt exercises that I find on the web or in my many writing prompt books that I own.

I’ll link to it from this blog, of course.

Now, what else? I decided to put aside Iron Butterfly in favor of editing War Mage. I’m not doing so well with that. I find myself not editing, but reading. And although I see everything in my mind’s eye in three dimensions and with colors and smells and textures, I’m not putting it across very well on the page. Maybe I should try scriptwriting.

I’m not lyrical or flowery, it’s the journalism teaching in me. I pay attention to what people say, how they say it, not what’s around them, and that translates to the page. They’re talking heads in space. Mind you, I can keep the pace going and advance the plot, but as for the setting, or the surroundings? Not so much.

So I’m going through the manuscript, in chunks and sections, not in sequential order, to see if I’m describing everything well enough. Also doing line editing at the same time. I’ll edit for consistency on another pass.

I’m also working on trying to get together a mailing list. I’d do a newsletter once a month to let people know what I’m working on and what’s coming next down the pipeline. Maybe once I get that going, I’ll put together a Patreon account and try and get people to see if they want to patron me to write stories for them. I could do different things, like write novellas or short stories for people using characters either from Champions or from other books, Or I could do a few non-fiction pieces about the writing craft and stuff. Or I could get some artists from deviantart to do work for me. (Hmm. Anime Grim…)

This year I hope to have 3 published books, not counting Homecoming. War Mage, maybe Iron Butterfly at a different publishing house that does romance-with-a-twist, Blood From a Stone with Paper Angel…or who knows, maybe something entirely different.  What’s important this year is the marketing and getting my name out there, I think. The writing, although still daily, will be secondary.

Oh, and to blog here at least once a week, probably on my own stuff or ideas on what I’m doing to help plot/character.  Watch for my book reviews on Goodreads. This year the goal is 100 books!

Edit…2

Survived the vacation. Received my batch of second edits to Homecoming. The editor wants more description. In this, I must disagree.

I hate, hate, HATE, text blocks of description. I write like a journalist. I write dialogue, short paragraphs, rapid-fire sentences. I don’t describe in my storytelling because I feel that it drags down the story. Setting, yeah, maybe I need to describe that more, but people? I’m really not good at describing faces in detail, and I’m not good with describing people, either. My strength is the dialogue.

While I was on vacation, I came up with a pretty romance that I might do under my real name. It’s about a mermaid that doesn’t know she’s a mermaid because her father has kept her from the sea all her life. She lives in land-locked Nebraska where there is no salt water. She gets a hankering to go to the ocean and heads east, finds the son of a fishing trawler off the South Carolina coast, and they fall in love, until she falls into the ocean and becomes a mermaid. The mer-people find her and the really handsome mer-prince wants her to stay, but she feels obligated to go back to the sea captain’s son…

It’s written to a formula from a book I read. If I become a paranormal/YA romance writer, I know I can make money off that (romance readers are insatiable!). I went to the Barnes & Noble store in Florida and saw five book cases of Sci/Fi, and six book cases of YA, two with YA/Romance only. Three bookcases of magick, and I couldn’t find the writing books anywhere (Good thing. I don’t need any more of those.)

I want to write Toxicon’s story, too, flesh it out into a better short story and put it out there to introduce the Teen Guardians in a novel or novella. That would be under Jake’s name.

Well, I’m off to see what the second batch of edits is going to be.

PS, finished NaNo before I left, 50,068 words. I’ll clean it up and probably do something with it, because it’s actually pretty good.

When the outline’s too short

I outline, barely, what I need to do when I write.  I just started to outline with these past two novels.  Normally I’m a total pantser, and I write whatever the muse tells me to do.

So I did a very general outline when I first started War Mage.  It was like “Meets dragons”, “Black Lions”, “Meets <Ware>”.  Then I go off and write.

It seems, sometimes, that the characters do their own thing.  Okay, I let them, figuring that’s what rewriting is for.

I’m deep in the middle of the first draft, transcribing it as I’m going along.  Already one entire scene appeared out of nowhere (because I wasn’t utilizing a character enough) into the second draft, and a huge scene that I wrote in one 2-hour stretch disappeared.  I’m not sure if I’ll use that scene or not. Ever.

Today, I listened to a podcast that I won’t listen to anymore because the hostess takes over the entire conversation for blocks of minutes leaving her guests to say, “Oh, that’s nice.”   The hostess, of course, said that nobody makes their characters grow in romance fiction anymore.  And that got me to thinking, did I make Brent grow at all?  Because right now, War Mage reads like a series of vignettes, a bunch of scenes, where he’s reporting on what’s happening but we don’t get what he thinks.  Hell, half of the people he talks to have no names.

Like the scene I wrote last night – it’s total reporting of what happened.  No inner dialogue, no reaction on his part.  And it was supposed to be a powerful scene.

This is what I’m deathly afraid of.  I’ve made a two-dimensional main character.

So once I transcribe the first/second draft, I’ll try to make him grow.

But in the meantime, my outline is getting too short.  What does this mean?

I have to brainstorm.  This is where index cards come in handy.  Because I’m a character-driven writer, I start stories with characters, not plot (sometimes I have a Point A to Point B story, and nothing in between).

I’m going to try this:  I’ll get some index cards and write a backstory, quick and dirty.  Name, age, where they’re from, what branch/division/company they’re in, physical description.  How they interacted with MC.  I should have a nice healthy stack.

Then I’ll pull one out.  Would this character show up again?  If so, how?  What would he do next with Brent?

If nothing comes to mind, I have some writing prompt books and a couple of characterization books to help me through.

Plot will find its way out then.

Oh, by the way, I’m up to 23K words.  I do have a bare bones of a plot, but, like I said, the outline is getting too short and there’s no end in sight.

 

No plot? Big problem

13,000 words into the new novel, and I still have no idea what the plot is.

So far I have introduced:

  • Dragons
  • Marines
  • FOB Blessing
  • Black Lions

I will admit I’m swiping from some books I’m reading in addition to Fighting Season a documentary on Direct TV about the war in Afghanistan.  Unfortunately, I think, it takes place after my character is there.

A book I’m reading, Siren’s Song, is about one first lieutenant platoon leader in the Kunar Provence.  It takes place in 2008, but it mentioned FOB Blessing which I was happy to see.  FOB Blessing must have been there for quite some time by the time Siren gets there; it’s relatively new when my MC is there.

-Usually by 5K words, I have a plot.  Or at least a theme.  Here, I got nuthin’ but an outline.

It bothers me.  It bothers me that 13K words are going to be a total waste.

Cold Feet

Book One’s cover is off to the artist, and I can only  hope that he’ll have it done in time.  However, as I’m going through Book One, I’m wondering whether or not it’s actually any good.  It’s honestly not my best work in the world.

Now, Book Two…that cover’s coming out nicely and that story is flowing well (though I have no idea where it’s going).  Should I not even bother with Book One and instead try to put out Book Two?

Why did the dragons join the Americans?  Are they the only dragons?  What can an RPG do to one (we’ll find that out), and what can Brent do?

What about the press?  How come they’re not in there in force?

Some questions for my book journal, I think.

Maybe it’s the honeymoon of Book Two, that since this one’s going so well, it’s going to be better.  It is going to be better.  7000 words into it and I’m liking the outline so far.  But 7000 words of only dragons is not going to carry this – I have to think of something else.

Distractions

I’m up to 20K transcribed, probably another 5K written in longhand for War Mage.  I’m testing out my book cover person with Grim and Scott from Champions.

I have to do a pinterest board for War Mage.

Here’s Grim’s.

I wrote for three hours this whole weekend – yes, I know that’s not much, considering I wrote a whole weekend at first.  I tried to read Gentlemen Bastards to at least finish it – I’ve got about 100 pages to go – and then realized that my right eye decided to pull a double-vision on me, in addition to me being nearsighted and I can’t read normal 10 point font.  So I can’t see the words, they’re doubled (black on top, gray on the bottom).

That, along with a very scary episode in which an ambulance had to take me to the hospital in the early morning hours last week, kind of put a damper on my writing.

So I ended up mindlessly gaming, looking through builds and trying them out.  I’ve still been writing daily, but not as many words.  I need to get back into it.

I’m just afraid that after I do this plot point, I don’t have another plot point to go to until the hero meets his nemesis (at least for this book).  And then the book ends, because I don’t know what to put my hero through after that.

Pantsing is tough in that way.  It’s always scary to keep jumping from rooftop to rooftop, hoping you can get the other side, or at least land safely.  Maybe some of my plot cards/cubes/apps can give me some ideas.

War Mage – and dragons

I will admit, the war in Afghanistan seemed to be more a war of reaction.

I’m reading a book about the Green Berets in Afghanistan called Gentlemen Bastards by Kevin Maurer (he also wrote about the Navy SEALs).  This gives me a good overview of the Special Forces Army in Afghanistan.  Although the men went out on patrol, they weren’t always hit by snipers, IEDs, or RPG’s.  There was often constant fire on their bases or constant threat of fire.  However, it didn’t happen all the time.  It was always a surprise.  They were always on edge.

I can only hope that I do this book justice.  I know I’m not a war correspondent, that I’m going entirely by research, that this probably won’t pass a military sniff test.  But I’m trying to not end up like I did with WW2, and have three bookcases full of books on the Waffen-SS.

I’ve gotten back together with Al and hope that we can collaborate on more book covers.  I’m redoing Grim’s book cover to be simple purple silk with gold sigils embossed over it.  The second book is Grim looking up at an old Victorian mansion (Dottie’s house).  I haven’t finished the third book so I don’t know what I’m going to do.

I’ve also commissioned the first book of the War Mage series, the one that will take place in Afghanistan.  It will involve dragons, a female Marine dragon rider, and the first introduction of the Black Lions (Al-Asad Sud).

I’m also commissioning concept art for War Mage himself.  He will have the usual Army armor, but I want him to have specialized weaponry.  The walking stick (aka “pimp stick”) is one.  The formal “dress robes” will be necessary.

I still haven’t gotten around to a conflict.  Well, I did have a conflict when push came to shove with Sarah’s boyfriend Boz, which I have to rewrite.  And I suppose Sarah was a conflict.  I’ve set up how Brent will be captured (oops, spoiler), set up another possible conflict with a vampire.  I’m trying to figure out how to involve a shifter.

In my world, shifters and vampires could work together.  In my world, vampires can come out during the day (though they prefer the evening because they don’t have to explain their complexions).  In Massachusetts, they have legal rights to exist, but it’s not federal.  In some parts of the country, they’re hunted down.  There are some asylum cities or states, such as California, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, St. Louis and New York City.

Vampires work in different places.  Dr. Bates is a slightly unusual case in that he can be in a room full of blood and doesn’t go nuts.  He’s an old, old vampire, so the mere smell of blood doesn’t make him crazy.  Younger vampires, however, are not allowed to work in hospitals or as EMT’s, police or firemen.  That means a lot of them are entrepreneurs, managers, bouncers, you name it.

Shifters are mostly werewolves, although there are some werebears, wearleopards, or other were-creatures.  None are of less mass than the person they are shifting from.  So there are usually no were-birds or smaller were-animals.

So I’m staring at the Story Cubes that I bought, trying to see if I can shoehorn how Brent finds out Tony is a shifter…

War Mage – the muse

I’ve entitled my next (maybe) series to be War Mage.

So far I’ve done more writing than researching.  (Did you know the Afghan war is STILL going on?  Since 2001?????)  13,727 transcribed words, another 2K or so left to transcribe in my notebook.

I outlined.  God help me, I actually outlined.  Not anything major, because I knew darn well that if I detail-outlined, I’d never write the book.  I just put in one or two words of what the plot points are and put them in the outline.  The muse then takes a look at it and we write.  She knows, for instance that “Sarah” is when the main character meets his old flame.  What happens?  How does he treat him?  How does he treat her?  Do they still care?

I’ve noticed that as long as I got some semblance of an outline, that I will follow a set group of plot points or action points I want to hit.  I also need to write in my notebook the beginning of the scene, at least the first two lines.  So that when I sit down and start the writing, that I will know where I need to start and what plot point I may need to hit.

The other thing is, I’ve realized, that this book is not the first in the series.  The first in the series really needs to take place in Afghanistan.  Maybe a few of the books in the series need to take place there.  But it starts in Afghanistan, goes to the States, then ends back in Afghanistan.

I’m wondering if this character is any good.  He seems flat to me.  He’s got power and ability, doesn’t use it often unless he’s angry (“You wouldn’t like me when I’m angry.”) or passionate or has extreme emotion.  He has a short fuse, the power to back it up, and he’s got luck on his side – until…

That’s the problem.  Nothing seriously bad has happened to him yet.  I know what the big bad is.  I’ve been working on developing him as a powerful mage so much that I haven’t made bad things happen.  Or if they do, they just roll off him.

Well, something’s gotta give.  13K words, and nary a conflict.

Okay muse, let’s go to sleep and think about this.