R.L. LaFevers's Blog

With some books, you fumble and struggle until you hit the Mother Lode of story, then everything begins to flow with ease. Other books, not so much. Alas, this book is one of the no-so-much variety. What that means is that every scene, every story nugget must be painstakingly researched, located, then clumsily excavated, only to have to go through the exact same process five pages later. If you listen closely, you can hear my daily scream of ARGH!!! all the way from where you are.

So after tod...

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. . . it will acquire a mind of its own to go with it.

Seriously. Once you give in to this organic thing, all hell breaks loose. Mysterious elements show up out of seemingly (key word, that) nowhere, characters take on a mind of their own and refuse, refuse, to do what you've told them to. The bad guy decides he's not the bad guy any longer and strange interpersonal dynamics and heretofore unsuspected relationships that you have given no conscious thought to, begin appearing on the page.

Have I...

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It seems I have to learn this lesson at least once with every book I write:

The plot is not the story. The plot is simply (ha! nothing simple about plotting!) the device or vehicle that gets all the elements together so that the real story can happen.

The real story is the characters and relationships and growth that take place because of the plot.

I swear to god, I'm going to get that tattooed on the back of my hand where I can see it 139 times a day.

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I can't remember if I talked here about how Greasle came to take such a prominent role in Nathaniel Fludd, Beastologist. It is an important lesson that I have only begun to learn, and have certainly not yet grasped. Not if the last few weeks are any indication, anyway.

The mythology in the Beastolgist books is simply that all the mythical creatures featured in the medieval beastiaries are real. They truly exist in hidden pockets of the world and only the Fludds know the exact locations of thos...

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Just some random stuff for today. I'd had a post on the trickiness of traveling in the course of one's manuscript halfway ready, but then I got the stomach flu yesterday and nothing got done. Oy. Thank gawd it was the 24 hour variety.

The only good thing that can be said about the flu is that when it's over, you feel like you've been given a whole new lease on life.

My son and I have been watching the first season of The Wire, in no small part because Nathan Bransford has frequently declared it...

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Remember how I said that each of my manuscripts demands its own, unique plotting method? Well, this book is no exception. ::le sigh::

As I struggle with this current manuscript, I'm discovering that there are a few structural things that are forcing me to look at this book's plot in a completely different way.

For one, it is the first book in which I've changed locations this many times. It starts off in Cairo, then moves to Luxor, then the action moves to An Undisclosed Location, then back to ...

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I've already talked about the collages I do for my books, and the travel journal I'm doing for this particular Theodosia book, but I also wanted to talk about something I started doing a while back. It's similar to a collage in that it helps me access the story world in a much more, loosey-goosey creative way, without the specific writing tasks I expect to accomplish with the travel journal (voice, descriptions, travel logistics). This altered book is really more about helping me stay fully i...

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My son directed me to this clip on the Colbert Report. Must See TV for any and all writers. In it, Sherman Alexie talks about the potential impact of digitalization on the publishing industry.


The Colbert ReportMon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30cSherman Alexie<a></a>www.colbertnation.comColbert Report Full EpisodesPolitical HumorU.S. Speedskating


How impressed am I that he refuses to allow his work to be published in electronic format! And how sobering are the points he makes. That so few artists make money ...

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So, last week I ended up having to put aside the Theo Four manuscript and instead pick up my Theodosia Four journal. For the week prior to that, I had been pushing the characters around on the page and it felt just like a four year old pushing peas around the mound of mashed potatoes on his plate. Nothing pretty was happening.

I have to say, I so admire people who can fly into the mist and just write. Not knowing much about their characters or their stories, they simply begin, knowing they wil...

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I long for a simple plot. I long for the kind of plot where the protagonist wants this, but can't have it because [fill in the blank:] and so must spend the rest of the book struggling against the antagonist or antagonistic force in order to achieve her goal. And of course she'll triumph and live joyfully ever after.

But instead, my plots tend more toward: Protagonist wants this, but can't have it because of a trick within a ploy, hidden in a stratagem, deeply embedded within a subterfuge, spri...

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