P. Tempest's Blog, page 2

Craft: Worldbuilding

In another one of my little Craft posts, I thought I would bring up the topic of world building. It is much discussed among authors and readers alike, but why?

See the question of why comes about because world building isn’t story. It has little to do with the characters directly, it can influence the plot but its not the narrative. In contemporary fiction world building is entirely neglected because its common knowledge. The author doesn’t need to describe what a phone is, everyone already knows.

But in fantasy, especially secondary world fantasy, which takes place in an entirely fictional world rather than something like Harry potter or The Dresden Files, which is the modern world just altered, it is vital to set the stage.

There are many writers that spend years designing their world, they have world builder’s syndrome. Some spend that time dealing with obscure history or geography because it feels like progress. It is playing with a fictional world,  but it isn’t a story. Who wants to read about the geography of Mordor? Well, I do, but only if there is a story there.

Others are like me. I built my world around my story. As I was writing, I thought about things that would be relevant to my characters. What sort of structures would be around, the organisations, customs and history. The whys.

Both approaches have pros and cons.

The builders have rich detailed backstory to draw on, but because they have so much, the tendency is to overshare on the cool thing they have built, to the detriment of the story. It gets bogged down in irrelevance.

The Me’s, too often have a world that can seem superficial. Lacking depth and history. Sometimes it can be nonsensical as different ideas clash and get lost in the mess.

Some people have an attitude that if it doesn’t serve the story it should be cut. And sometimes they are right. But fantasy readers, I’m generalising, don’t read just for the story. They read for the immersion in another world. The little asides the don’t go anywhere but are interesting. I’m not saying they want the whole story to read like an encyclopaedia, that would be horrible, but they want there to be more than just the story.

This is my opinion on it.

Feel free to comment, correct me, or shout out your own views.

Content: Plans, updates. and the like

Well, its Sunday.

When I wrote my serial, what became Magelife, it was the day I updated. And that means something to me. A chance to engage, to share, to gather opinions, and just to write something that isn’t a story. Many of you are new readers, found through Amazon, but I have a special place in my heart for those that followed me throughout the creative process. The ones that commented on every chapter, that pointed out corrections, or asked questions. So I think I may use Sundays to post something. It could be a post such as this sharing my thoughts, or a snippet, or anything really.

So to move on, my wife has just had a rather large operation. She is doing well, recovering and handling it like a real trooper. But the downside to that is my writing is stalled while I care for her. Its not a problem, it gives me a chance to really think more about the way my current project is turning out. Think about other projects. Contemplate the future. The things that many of us do in a few moments while we wait for something.

Necromancy is coming along well. The draft is done. It just needs fleshing out. The it will be on to final proofing and hiring a cover artist.

Magelife two, has even grown slightly. But most of that is yet to appear on the page. Its all thoughts and plans.

Even Demon Born has got a few new chapters. Very tentative ones, as I’m not entirely sure I like the direction it has gone in.

I will be looking for beta readers for Necromancy soon. So if you are interested in that, then drop me an email.

A big part of the reason I chose to serialise, is the contact with the reader. All that interaction that is frequently missing from the Author/Reader relationship. I find myself missing it.

Comments are welcome, even encouraged. Don’t be shy.

Not all editors are equal

Some of you may know that I recently hired a professional editor to clean up Magelife.

What most of you don’t know was how difficult that experience was.

As I mentioned in other posts, editing has different levels, and pay scales accordingly.

I was recommended to my editor by another, who is quite a big name in the indie publishing industry. He was fully booked, and very much out of my price range. But he was very helpful, and nice, way beyond anything I expected.

I contacted his recommendation, she was polite, helpful, and gave me a reasonable quote for Copy Editing.

Any sort of effort like this normally involves some back and forth, communication and discussion between author and editor, if it goes beyond simply cleaning copy.

In this case, that didn’t happen. I have no idea why.

I got very excited when I first received my edits back. But as I looked through them, my heart sank.

I didn’t get copy editing, which is what I paid for. Not in any useful format. What happened was that my editor decided to change my story without any discussion, and any cleaning of the text there was was inextricably linked to her version of my story.

I never had an objection to rewriting my story based on intelligent feedback, but I didn’t get intelligent feedback. I got a very different story that was missing all the character, all the depth, that I placed in the original. She wanted a very dumbed down version to reach the most people, which would have been fine, if that’s what I was writing or what she was paid to do.

I try to assume that the people that read my book are at least as intelligent as me, and I’m not the brightest of people. Part of that is not treating my readers like idiots. Things like violence, anger, swearing, might not appeal to all people, but I don’t write to reach the most people. I write because I want to tell a story. And sometimes that story is not all lightness and kittens.

I was angry, and it took a lot to calm me down. Spending a week trawling through her work, accepting the majority of her language changes, which were good, and using my judgement on her story alterations, taught me a lot, about myself and about my work. It also taught me that this isn’t how it is supposed to be.

There are horror stories about editors, and I think that if it had been universally bad I would have had one of those horror stories. But, I’m trying to think this is a cautionary tale.

This experience has shown me that not all editors are equal and not all professionals are professional.

I was going to keep quiet about my experiences, in the hope that it was an honest mistake. But I have thought about it more and more. Keeping this quiet helps no one. It doesn’t help me, it doesn’t help other writers that may go through similar experiences.

Craft: hand holding

This is going to be a post discussing the craft of storytelling. Not specifically writing, but in all forms of media.

 

My recent experience of being edited has made me think more about the tools of the the trade. Not the technical aspects, such as punctuation and spelling, but the tricks of delivering information, of crafting a compelling narrative.

In recent years there has been a trend of dumbing down and handholding in stories. So much is explained, handed to the reader on a platter. Exposition and info dumps. Now, there are many ways this can be done but many stories do it all at the start, for me, I find it incredibly patronising.

I could spend the first few chapters of a story explaining the magic system and the world in clear language, but who wants to read a instruction manual when they are expecting a story? I know I don’t, and I don’t want to write it either.

One of the ways I avoid it is throwaway comments and internal narrations. I scatter all the things that are needed throughout the story. You might not find out right away, but you find out as it becomes relevant.

I don’t subscribe to Sanderson’s laws. Readers don’t need to be told the rules under which the world operates any more than they need to know Newton’s laws of motion to know that things move.

Context and consistency are important when doing this. Its hard. And it may alienate reader/viewers, but I feel it is worth it. It provokes questions that keep people invested. I don’t play tricks with my worlds. Everything is there for people to find, but I won’t hold their hands.

What are your views on frontloading and handholding?

 

Clean

So, as I told you all yesterday, editing is done, well the editor’s part in it. And I have on my computer a clean version.

This is a simple refining of Magelife. Cuts and smoothing. The text flows far better and the grammar is perfect as far as I can tell.

I have uploaded this to Amazon, and it is now in their hands. Should be under 12 hours.

I will, of course, continue going through the more complex edit notes, and make adustments, but the content will remain pretty much the same, it may just give a better experience to readers going in fresh.

Editing: Go Go Go

well, its my birthday and it turns out that the editing is done.  I will have the clean documents in my hands tomorrow.

Now, before people get excited, yes you in the back, that doesn’t mean that it will be uploaded right away. I still have to read through, add bits where indicated, check that the changes match the tone I was going for.

And there is more. As I went the whole hog in getting edited it is way more than just a clean up. It’s a content edit too. So parts will change, in more ways than one. This is the part where it gets tricky.

For those of you not in the know, there are several levels of editing.

Most commonly there are three but some services offer more modular services.

Proofreading: this is just a read through, it catches typos and the like.

Copy, or line editing: this is where syntax, spelling, punctuation and grammar issues are found and corrected.

Content edit: this one has many names, but it all means the same thing. Here is where the story is played with, tweaked into better shape. It makes for a better story, rather than a cleaner copy.

 

I went for all of them. And it cost a pretty penny too, which I’m totally not crying over, at all. But I have hopes that it will be worth it in the long run.

Because I went for all of them, I have several options. I’m going to get the clean copy out as soon as I can, but the content changes need more consideration.  I want to hurry up and move on to getting the draft of ML2 done, but I can’t.

I need to do justice to Tristan’s story, and that means going back in and seeing what needs fixing. Plus if I make any changes I’m going to need to reflect them in the later novels.  It makes sense to do this now.

Stuff: Life and books

I’ve finished college, and am just waiting on my results so that I can confirm my place at university. Exciting and terrifying.

The sudden excess of time has left me with a list of things to do. Things that have been neglected while I completed my coursework and sat exams. The normal things a husband and father has to do, many of you know them, as well as the less normal things that an author has to do.

I’ve been reading, which has fallen on the back burner a bit since college started, and I’ve been writing. Writing a series grows tiresome and few can stay focused on a single thing to the exclusion of all else, so in the interests of keeping it fresh I have another project that is a side thing. It lets me have a rest and go back into Ml with fresher eyes and renewed vigor.

I managed a 20k week, which is very good for me, in recent times. And they are a good 20k.

Reading the Spellmonger Series, which has a new book, Enchanter, and the new Play to live, Inferno.

Sales are dropping, which is disappointing but not unexpected. I will make a post to announce when the editing is complete for those of you waiting.

Sample Chapters

I didn’t make any sort of announcement about the sample chapter that are in the bibliography.

Some of you won’t be interested and others will, so I thought, I would leave it up to you guys instead of cluttering up my feed with all sorts of things.

If you are interested, three of my possible future projects have samples hidden away in the links.

Magelife 2 isn’t there, as I’m still working away at it. It will be kept under wraps until it is in a less flexible state.

Feel free to comment or contact me.

Two steps forward, One back

The title should be a clue. This is an update on progress.

Editing of MageLife is proceeding well, according to my editor. Looking at the end of June/start of July for the edits to come back to me and be assessed, and approved.

Writing the sequel, has hit turbulence. Now I’m just a baby author. Magelife was my first work, ever. And my process is not one of plotting and planning, it is of writing what feels right and seeing where it takes me. I have goals in regards to the story, things that must happen, but outside of this, it is very freeform. Some authors call this gardening, and it’s a style that many serialists, and novelists, employ.  Which actually makes it sound like more of a choice than it is. Some of us just can’t do the whole planning thing. Creative stuff can be weird.

Brandon Sanderson has a collection of YouTube videos that discuss this aspect of writing, if you are interested. He has a whole range of videos and posts. Write about Dragons.

But it is not without its problems, one of them is that it is easy to start in the wrong place, which is what I did. It took 40 thousand words and a month of work to realise that that is what the problem was. I may be learning slowly, but I am learning.

I like to think my writing has come on leaps and bounds, and my grades in english have borne that out, but sometime I make mistakes.

Starting again, and scrapping what I had worked on, was painful and demotivating. Doubt and worry are constant companions for most authors.

“Is it good enough?”

“Am I wasting my time?”

These are questions that haunt us, and for me, it has gotten worse since publishing. The large amount of positive feedback, is so frequently overwhelmed by the relatively small amount of negativity. In much the same way that you can be praised all the time for things you are good at but its the small criticism that weigh on your mind. Its not rational but it feeds the doubt worm in my head.

Now, none of this means I’m giving up. I’m not that sort of person. It doesn’t even mean that I’m slowing down, just that I’m cutting far more, and second guessing, so the progress is more steady.

I hope that results in a stronger story, and a better written one.

 

 

This is a duplicate post from my original blog, I decided to transition to a dedicated author’s blog.