Sunday 23 October 2011

Building blocks

For the second time in the books life, I have printed it out. 219 pages currently (their was some trimming). Now comes the long process of working my way through those 219 pages and making it fit together.

As good as the inspiration has been over the last while, a lot of the scenes I've been writing do not fit into any particular part of the story. With the print off, I can now start looking were they can go. And also what other scenes are required to connect everything together. It also let's me see if the characters are actually interacting right and the plot making sense. I've already located a few plot holes and filled them in.

Theirs also now the opportunity to apply the skills I've learned to older portions of the book and make them read better. Certain scenes written at the start of the year do not read as well compared to more recent work.

Still getting a fare amount of time to work on Novel but work continues to get in the way. Then again its getting in the way of all social interaction so I may get used to it.

I've a feeling now that the deadline in december is attainable BUT will be tight. Theirs still so much more to do. But, I remain confident and am grabbing every spare moment to get stuff done.

It is getting there.
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Sunday 9 October 2011

Inspirations

221 pages. Not including the 32 pages of background information, 16 pages of character bios, and 15 pages of additional short scenes that haven't found a place in the book yet (well, this book anyway).

221 pages of actual 'Novel'.

Question. Were did that come from?

For Months it was the occassional page written, or even 5 to 6 pages in a row if I got a sudden burst of inspiration. But this week and last week the ideas have been constantly appearing.

New characters. Revisions of old characters. New locations. New scenes, revised old scenes, complete rewrites of entire chapters. Politics, religion, military matters, economics.

In a very short space of time all these considerations have sudden risen to the fore and I find myself considering them during the most odd of times.

My notebook, that I keep with me at all times is now a quarter full. And instead of 6 separate microsoft word documents of story, characters etc, i have 10.

Why?

Well, I've a few theories.

I've been happier than I have been in a while. Much more settled, much less stressed. But then, that's been the case for the last year so not sure that's it.

Or maybe its just that I've 'been in the mood' for writing. But again, I've been in that state before and have been no were near as creative.

Do I have more time on my hands? Again, not really. Life's as busy as ever with wargaming, Socializing, RP games etc. I have the same demands on my time (not that that's a bad thing to any of my mates reading this blog. You guys are cool).

Thinking on it, I think the main reason is this. I'm becoming a writer.

Odd thing to say considering technically I've been writing for the last year. But I mean getting properly into the mind set of a writer. Thinking, deeply, about the book. What would character A do in situation B? Would they use item C or Item D? How would they react to character E? Suddenly, ideas cascade into each other. Forming scenes and interactions.

Suddenly I'm looking at my scenes and thinking 'that sentence is too long' or 'she wouldn't say that'. Then I'm reading over others work and thinking 'I like the way he describes that' or 'I can just picture him doing that.'

I find myself critiqing in my head others stories, both professional and amateur. Sounds aggrogant in the extreme (especially considering the two horrible spelling mistakes I've just made. Yeah, I'm dyslexic so Microsoft Spell checker is officially a gift from God in my head. Accept in this case when I'm typing this from my Blackberry. Sorry.).

But its not about thinking my work is better. Its about thinking how I can improve my work based on what I think of theirs.

Its coming together. And I'm enjoying it. I love writing this book and I have a good feeling about it. I love the characters the situations I've been able to put them in. Even if this never gets published, I'm glad I started it.

We are still on schedule to finish the 1st Draft by end of the year. I hope the inspirations will continue.
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