Elysae Shar's Blog, page 6

Camp NaNo Day Eleven

~4.6k today, because I want to work on something else tomorrow. And through a bit of dialogue that never actually made it onto the page, I learned that Diomar is playing everyone. Now I get to go back and write a small scene about him hating his self-imposed role.  I’ll have to figure out how to keep him from being a completely passive character till Caden springs him. Shouldn’t be too hard what with all the people who find reason to wander into the dungeons.

But I’d really appreciate it if this story would stop throwing me loops right about now. Lest I end up with a villain who wants nothing but  to turn the world into a giant puppy paradise…

Camp NaNo Belated Day Ten

I had ~2.7k.

I’m starting to think that I need to add a POV for the overarching villain just to give him a little more presence. On the other hand, he won’t have a reason to hate Caden until much later, so it might be okay for him to be a gnat for now. Other than that, the plot is working out well enough. Though what I’d originally intended as the end of act one, has become the middle of act two.

Camp NaNo Day Nine

~3.3k today. Caden hurt himself but doesn’t know how and Diomar is about to get hurt because of Caden’s actions. This also marks the end of Act 1.I gotta admit, my brain feels a little mushy. Probably gonna cut back to closer to 2.5k over the next few days.

Really short post today, that says very little…

Camp NaNo Day Eight

Got just over 3k today, which shocked me because I wasn’t sure I’d even make it to 2k today. I woke with a headache and seriously unmotivated, but once I made myself start writing I pretty much plowed through chapter seven a large part of chapter eight. I did realise though that one of the outline diversion does make a later scene nonsensical. So, I’ve got some major changes coming at me.

I’ve also decided to give most of Diomar’s POV scenes to other characters since he spends most of his time in a cell and under the influence of a potion that numbs his mind.  Everything I intended to show from his point of view can easily be shown from other character’s, too.

Today also marks the first time, I didn’t get the second week slump. Though I’m feeling random spikes of guilt at not working on Ash Manor three. And I’m semi convinced I’ll never finish A Fool’s Errand.

Camp NaNo Day Seven

2.2k today. I’ve pretty much eaten through most of my headstart now, with only about 500 words ahead of my target. My inner overachiever hates me for it, but my less demanding self keeps pointing out that two years ago, I barely manage 600 words a day. I’m still going to aim for a complete drift, but if I end up coming out of the months with 60k+, I’ll still be happy.

Storywise today was, again, mostly character development and making Caden realize that he might have walked into a trap.

On Buying Books

The more I read and learn about self-publishing, the more I realize just how weird I seem to be. The importance of covers is one of the things the community at large agrees on. Yet, I can’t say that, as a reader, I’ve ever  bought or even looked at a book because of its cover.

A lot of this may be due to living in a small town and reading only English rather than the local language. My bookstore has one narrow shelf of English books with the spines facing the front. Only what they consider sensational gets a top row cover display. As these are almost always romance novels–a genre which bores me to tears–I’m used to ignoring whatever is flashing its cover at me. So, unless a title catches my attention, I’ll never even see the cover and even then I tend not to see” the cover until I get around to reading the book in question.

Worse yet: I don’t sample pages either. I’ll skim the blurb on the back and sometimes sniff the pages because if I have to choose I’ll always buy the book that smells newer. New book smell is too awesome to pass up. But by the time I finish my skimming, my decision’s already made and, no matter how pretty or ugly the cover, it won’t sway me.

I do the same with ebooks. Minus the sniffing, of course.And while I’ll definitely do my best to adhere to the majority here–most if not all of these people have a lot more experience than me–I carry a tiny shred of hope that I’m not the only cover ignorer out there. At least, until I can afford to buy awesome covers.

Camp NaNo Day Six

2.5k today and I finished both chapter five and chapter six though both worked mostly toward forcing Caden into a corner. Despite my characters veering off course here and there, I’m still pretty much on target according to the wordcount estimates in my outline.

I’m honestly surprised at how well finaldeadline is working for me. Especially since writeordie had the opposite effect when I tried it some time ago. The Overall writing quality of the first draft will likely suffer, but, if I’m lucky, there’ll be some buried gems that wouldn’t have come out otherwise. My Nov. ’14 project sure has them and, since I’m working with an outline, this one shouldn’t turn into a disjointed mess of plot points that go nowhere.

Camp NaNo Day Five

Called it quits at ~2.1k today. It’s not as much as I’d hoped, but I’m still above my 2.5k daily average target.

I finished chapter four and got a decent bit of five done too. How much, depends on whether Fryn wants to shove himself in there or not. Caden finally met Diomar, though they kind of got off on the wrong foot. I’m letting my characters take complete control from here on out because, at least, the writing pretty much flows right now.

 

Camp NaNo Day Four

2.8k today. I didn’t quite finish chapter four, but that’s mostly because the scene, I’d intended to be chapter four was better suited to being the second half of chapter three.

But I’ve got my inciting incident done. Diomar, the guy who kicks off the plot for the protagonist, has gotten himself trapped and captured. Now Caden just has to go find him and start hatching his plan.

Also Caden and Fryn, pro- and antagonist respectively, finally had their first on page encounter. And rather than going with my plan, they decided to be civil about it. Fortunately, that doesn’t wreck my outline and kind of provides a better starting point for the climax. So, we’re still good.

Camp NaNo Day Three

had a bit of a slower day with ~2.2k, but I’m still well on target for my overall goal of a finished draft of 70-80k. I regret nothing, though. Napping through part of my writing time was absolutely worth it.

I’ve reconnected chapter one and two with a much smoother transition, which gives the main antagonist a nice moral dilemma to get him started. It’ll require a minor rewrite of chapter two during revision and some adjustments to the rest of my outline, but  I like it far better than the physical altercation, I’d originally planned  between him and the MC to get them started. That might still happen further down the line, but I’ve learned to trust my characters to know what’s best. Even if, sometimes, they declare the entire second half of a scene unnecessary.