Category Archives: Writing

What is a novel?

So! Grimaulkin 2 is going along smashingly. 15K words so far with an average of 1000 words a day, except weekends which I can top 2K words a day.

I got my first one-star review from Homecoming. Basically, he said I had no plot. At first, I laughed it off. “You just don’t understand.” Then I thought about it, and I thought about the editing of War Mage, when the editor said, “All they’re doing is running around saying, ‘There’s dragons!'” I was so into being authentic that I didn’t develop a typical plot.

Now, I usually write toward a theme. Homecoming was “Home is where the heart is.” War Mage is “Friends are in surprising places.” Grimaulkin, I notice, doesn’t have a theme that I wrote toward, but it does have a plot (two of them, in fact). The stories in Water don’t have much of a theme or plot, because, well, it’s all sex.

Anyway, back to the one-star review and how I now think about War Mage. War Mage has no typical plot. Meaning protagonist vs. antagonist. Well, it does, but there’s garbage in between. The “oh look, there’s dragons” scenes. I could tell War Mage in a short story if I wanted to. But what is a novel if not a main plot with side plots along the way? Unless I’m looking at the construction wrong.

I’ve noticed, after reading some craft books, that novels are “protagonist in constant struggle.” Take a protagonist, throw in assorted things to block him, ratchet up the conflict as you go along, and have him succeed or fail. Thank you, Joseph Campbell.

So now, this is expected. Is this what makes a best selling story? Or is it something original? I will admit, I haven’t read a lot of fiction over the past couple of years, concentrating mostly on craft books because they’re easier to read/listen to in chunks. Fiction I have to keep the story in mind, and when I’m writing a story, I don’t want to have another story in my head to distract me. Maybe I should pick up a few short stories to get the idea of what people are looking for, and deconstruct those. Or break down a novel or two that I’ve already read.

I’m thinking Jim Butcher’s Harry Dresden series, which is what I’m basing Grim a lot on. To me, there’s a main plot with side plots. Repairman Jack has a main plot that goes through the entire novel with one or two side plots that continue through the books. One book I read two years ago had one plot throughout the entire thing, with assorted conflicts for the protagonist–the typical story that the craft books tell me to write. Until the author killed off a main character, I thought the story was boring. Then I threw it across the room in disgust, knowing that was just a ploy to make things exciting. Another story I read last year had a deus ex machina that pissed me the hell off. The last book I’m reading, which is gay erotic romance, has stalled out in the middle and I’ve put it aside not caring what happens to the main protagonist going home to his family (I expect that he’ll suddenly get a spine; I can see that coming a mile away).

What I’m going to do is let the editor take a look at War Mage. If it doesn’t have a plot, then I’ll think about what plot to put in and weave it through the story, with the authentic scenes in the middle. Grimaulkin, I feel confident in. Water, is, well, meh (except Scorpio–I’m proud of that one).  I need to drag Grimaulkin 2’s plot a little longer than it is. I have a two-week time period to play with, and a lot can happen then.

Decisions, decisions

So, at present, Water and Grimaulkin are at the editor’s. Grimaulkin Tempted is up to 10K words already and I’m in need of another subplot. So far I have:

Main plot: Scott’s ex comes back.
Subplot A: Becky, his cousin, is being followed by a mysterious person.
Subplot B: Mike is being used as the downstairs mover.

I need a magical subplot C, something to get the Rosicrucians involved again. Or a subplot D, another Satanic murder (though that’s going to be be in the third book, I think). Another minor demon involved? Not sure. Also maybe something involving Rufus, the dog.

Earth is going to be the next erotica series, I think. I need to do more research on the Earth signs to find out good places to put them, and what powers they control.

Also, I was reminded of War Mage. In my excitement over Grim, I’ve let that go to the wayside. I didn’t care much for some of the editing, and so I put it aside. I tried to rewrite it from the beginning based on my beta reader’s suggestions, but it just didn’t want to work. Jake Logan is a gay writer. L.A. Jacob can write both gay and straight, but the military has to come from Jake. L.A. Jacob reins in the sex part, which is why the sex is alluded to in War Mage, not explicit. The Dark Prison, the third book, has no sex (yet). War Mage has to be complete by July for a September release.

Man, I have so many irons in the fire. And I’m going to buy a microphone to start doing podcasts! Maybe. But I am buying a mike. The podcast will be about writing and magic. I will probably have it “sponsored” by Paper Angel Press and Zarra Knightley Publishing. In other words, I’ll shill their books. Not sure about author interviews yet. I’m not one of the best interviewers –it’s been a very long time since I’ve done interviews. There’s one podcast I listen to where the guy asks the same questions of every guest, and I don’t want to do that. You can tell he doesn’t do much research on the guests he has.

So that seems like enough for this week.

Water–Finished!

I just finished Water and sent it off to the publisher: Zarra Knightley Publishing. 48K words in total.

Grimaulkin is in editing. Hopefully that’ll be done by the end of March so I can have it by June and run with it this summer and fall.

I’m now released and working on Grimaulkin Tempted, book two of Grimaulkin’s series. I’ll write it out the way it’ll come out, and then I’ll edit for a YA audience.

Not sure what’s happening with War Mage. I think it’ll be at an editor’s at some point. Depending on how those edits come out, I might just scrap the whole series. Grimaulkin is my real baby. So’s Casey Donovan, who I think will put in an appearance during Brothers as Virgo.

What a relief!

Scorpio

So I was struggling with Scorpio. No offense, but I’ve never had good luck with Scorpios, either as friends or in a relationship. The story I first wrote was the “origin” story. It wasn’t that great, and it was way too short.

I talked with a friend who suggested I take the story and put it as a prologue, and rewrite Scorpio. Scorpios are very much into taboo subjects: incest, kinks, etc. I could have fun with him. They’re also stalkers, possessive, and easily jealous. So I’m rewriting it as a contemporary story (well, Summer 1972), just after protests for LBGT rights started.

I think it’s coming out a lot better, but it’s still kind of short. I have 8K words in it (after three days of near constant writing) and have to come up with 12K more, or at least 7K to reach the same as the other novellas. We’ve also been discussing covers. It’s going to have four covers–one for each of the signs, and one for Water, which will combine all of the signs into one omnibus. The three covers I’ve seen are pretty awesome, and I’m really happy with our cover designer.

Grimaulkin is at the editor as we speak. It’s on track to get rewritten for March as necessary. Scorpio, however, I don’t think I’ll get done by March 1. I already told the publisher and he said we’ll work with it.

Also, I’ve been having trouble with Scrivener. I have the story on my iCloud drive, which I can access on two computers: my Mac that’s located in the cellar, and my Windows computer that is located upstairs in my office. However, when I change anything on the Windows computer, it doesn’t register when I open it on the Mac. Cancer, I had rewritten a bit, but none of the changes showed up on the Mac version. It looks like I have to do all my work on the Mac, save it on the iCloud and do the compile on the iCloud drive, then hopefully open the .doc on my Windows computer. I’m wondering if Scrivener is more complicated than it’s worth, especially when I have to convert it to a .doc in order to send it to the editor. And then when the editor sends it back, I have to try and find the parts she’s talking about in Scrivener to correct. I love Scrivener as a writing tool. But as an editing tool, not so much.

Work vs. Play

35K words. That’s all Water has. I need more sex, more story in Scorpio. That’s what I’ll work on this week.

I just finished Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert. This is the second book I read that believes that creativity is magic. (The first one, The Inspired Writer by Bryan Hutchinson I thought was better.) Big Magic sounds a lot like The Artist’s Way. Between the “woe is me because of the success of Eat Pray Love” are some nuggets of interesting thought. However, I don’t care much for her Trickster vs Martyr stereotypes of the typical artist. I believe that we are combinations of the two. I don’t want to be Bugs Bunny, but she makes it seem that it’s better for the artist to be that way. Mind you, I don’t like suffering for my art, either.

Water I have been suffering for. Grimaulkin is more fun. Grimaulkin’s voice has been with me for 10 years,  Water, for three months. I have to come up with three distinct voices at that.Water has a deadline. Grimaulkin, not so much. Water stresses me out. Grimaulkin 2 is the one I really want to write. I feel like I keep getting tugged away from the “work” of Water and pushed toward the “play” of Grimaulkin. I honestly thought Water would be fun. But maybe it’s the idea that I have a genre I have to fit myself into. I have rules I have to follow.

Maybe my muse is more of a trickster than I like to believe. I never believed in flogging the muse, because that scares her and makes her retreat into a corner, never to speak again.  But maybe I should work a little bit on Grimaulkin 2, because that’s where she wants to be, and leave Water for a couple of days to let her stew over it. I have a scene in mind, but that’s all it is, a scene, no story.

I have until the end of the month for Water, but my hope was to get it done while on my vacation/recovery from surgery. Tomorrow is another snow day, so I’ll be home working on…something.

 

1/2 done

Water’s stories are done, now all I need to do is drop the sex into them. So far it’s 30K, so I have to come up with another 30K to make it worthwhile. My research thus far has been pretty sad–most of the stories are the same, and the stories are more into the story than the sex. There’s only so many ways to describe the sexual act, though I don’t normally get beyond the vanilla. Other BDSM is just weird to me.

I got the cover for Water, and it’s very nicely done. I’m not putting it up here because a couple of things still need to be changed.

Haven’t been writing much otherwise, unfortunately. Been feeling depressed and angry about my eyesight, though it has gotten better over the past couple of weeks. I go on vacation next week, so my plan is to finish Water by the end of the two weeks. 30K in two weeks? Yeah, sure.

Struggling vs worthlessness

Amazing how depressed you can feel if you can’t see.

I’m still stuck at home. You would think that I would write more. Nope. It seems the more time I have to write, the less I do write.

Water is up to 30K words, “Pisces” is 10K words. My goal is to have each sign be 20K words, but trying to get the erotica out is like pulling teeth. I’m not in the most pleasant of moods (even doing ERP online), I can’t seem to get into it. But I have a deadline of March 1.

I had a cover reveal on FB and twitter for Grimaulkin:

This is the first book in the series. Possibly three books in total.

I am going to write a short story with Grim for a giveaway or additional story. It’s mostly written, I just have to edit it a little.

Discovery writing

Merry Christmas! Yes, even though I’m an eclectic witch, I still harken back to my Roman Catholic roots and say Merry Christmas.

Pisces is coming along slowly. Very slowly. I don’t seem to be in the mood for writing about sex. I’m writing story. So it’s probably not going to be great erotica, but it might be a pretty good–and historically accurate–story. For Cancer and Scorpio, I need to add a lot more sex into them to make them erotica.

The other thing is, my erotica is pretty vanilla. Very plain, without tying people up or safe words or any BDSM stuff. Boring, maybe. I suppose I need to do some research to make vanilla exciting. Guess I’ll be lurking on the literotica website to get an idea of stories there.

Grimaulkin’s second book’s first and last line came to me overnight last night. If I have both of those in mind, then I know where I’m starting, and where I’ll end up. It’s the in between that I don’t know anything about yet, and that’s what makes me an “intuitive” or discovery writer. I don’t usually know what I’m doing until I get to the story itself. I have noticed if I plan out the story, I get bored easily. It’s not that I don’t find the story easier–it’s a lot easier if I plan it out. But not planning it actually makes it more fun, makes we want to sit at the keyboard because I want to know what happens next.

However the problem with being a discovery writer is what I’m running into with Pisces. I have a vague idea of what’s going to happen in the story, but no idea how to get there. I need to provide certain scenes for the erotica portion of the story, but, again, that’s a constraint. Discovery writers hate constraints. This is also why I’m no good at being a romance author, either. Romances have a formula. I don’t follow maps to places that I’ve been to before. I only use maps to someplace I’ve never been to. I’ve read enough “romance” within the fantasy genre to know the score. I want to dispose of the map and just see where the writing takes me. I know it seems like I’m trusting in the muses, but (most of the time) they’ve never let me down before.

So I personally think that maybe, if you’re a plotter, try letting things go and let the Universe take you on a ride. What you end up with might be trash, but it’ll be an experiment in how your mind works.

So, until the new year, keep writing!

Rewrites in progress

I received Grimaulkin back from my beta reader, who gave me some good ideas that I’m going to try in the story. As usual, my ending was too short, in his opinion, that there should be something more. In addition part of the ending is not appropriate for YA, so I have to cut it or allude to it. That will be difficult, as I’m not used to alluding to something so drastic as what Grim goes through. It’s an important part of why he does what he does and how he becomes the man he is. But this is for a YA/College aged audience. I also have to tone him down a little. Being gay in 2000 is not like being gay now.

Brothers of the Zodiac: Water is coming along slowly, which is not good for erotica. I spent 3 hours in Excel on night trying to figure out how to create a visual timeline for the different “brothers”.

I’m starting War Mage from scratch this time. My beta reader gave me another idea for the story that makes me start it from the beginning, with new ideas for conflicts and, of course, to add more women. However, my heart’s not in War Mage. It’s like a piece of work that I have to get out, a piece of work that I’ve put aside for too long and no longer have the passion for. I don’t know anyone who served at FOB Blessing; I have to take the word of a memoirist who didn’t write down the details, and find pictures on YouTube and the internet. (Like how man airstrips does Jalalabad Airfield have? When did the Pizza Hut show up? Yes, they had a Pizza Hut there.)

And to let you know, Homecoming will be on sale from December 19-26 for .99 on the Kindle, Smashwords, Nook and Kobo. All the Paper Angel Press books are going to be for that price. What a great way to load up your device! Oh, and even better–get the ebook for .99 and then the audiobook for .99.

Continuing

Still working on Water. Grimaulkin is still with the beta reader, though I have some feedback that I need to work on (add more straight characters because the story takes place in 2000, and gay people are still firmly in the closet, build up the two secondary characters).

So there isn’t much to talk about this week. I’m having trouble with Pisces in Water, mostly because I don’t know many Pisces, and I need to do more research on surgeons and doctors during the Civil War. I know they weren’t looked kindly upon, seen as butchers and cold-hearted men, but Pisces types like to help people. I have plenty of astrology books so I can look Pisces up.

Tomorrow, my son is set loose upon the world. He takes the bus for the first time to get to his new job. I’m terrified and proud at the same time. He’s autistic, so I’m afraid he’ll eventually take the wrong bus sometime and end up in some place he doesn’t know and can’t describe to me, so I won’t know where he is to find him. He is going to have a handler for the first couple of times he goes on the bus, but after that, he’s alone. I’m proud that he’s going to finally go to work.

There’s a story in there.