Roderick T. Macdonald's Blog, page 11
October 17, 2023
Story Fragments #3: The Long Night
Hello, my friends and the occasional relative! It is official: this has now become a series! Of over used exclamation marks, probably. #1 here, #2 here. These are scraps of writing I have mostly probably discarded as the basis for a larger story (one I will share I still have hopes to use – will …
October 10, 2023
Continuity, Epiphany, Procrastination
Hello, my friends and the occasional relative! I had a conversation this weekend. It happens. In it I explained the boring drudgery of repeatedly going through a book you have written, making changes each time, and then going through it again to make sure that the changes are consistent with the existing text, and where …
October 3, 2023
Story Fragments #2: I grew up rich
Hello, my friends and the occasional relative! It is official: this has now become an occasional series! Of over used exclamation marks, probably. These are scraps of writing I have mostly probably discarded as the basis for a larger story (one I will share I still have hopes to use – will you guess which …
September 26, 2023
9 Problems and a new beginning
Hello, my friends and the occasional relative! A new opening has been written and integrated into the manuscript in progress. Callooh and callay and all that. No seriously. I am genuinely frabjous about it. I mean it didn’t grow unwieldy, it seems pretty elegant in terms of adding depth to character interactions and will help …
September 19, 2023
Late to the party
Hello, my friends and the occasional relative! Late on a Tuesday I post this, my weekly update. I keep the streak going! Once again I cannot lie to you, my friends, it is because it has taken until this day for me to finally break through my own resistance to rewriting the opening. Sometimes the …
September 12, 2023
17+ Problems and the corned beef conundrum
Hello my friends and the occasional relative! I come to you somewhat shame-facedly, on account of my total failure to engage in the real work facing me: rewriting the opening of the novel. I have nibbled at, then chewed on the bones of all the other available listed problems, and any that remain can all …
September 5, 2023
44 problems, or nibbling away at progress, or forest management, you decide!
Hello my friends and the occasional relative! Not the most inspiring title, eh? Fear not. While I freely admit to having failed to make the huge strides toward the completion of rewrites I would have wanted, there has been progress, and it is good. The problem is that there are some large scale projects left, …
Continue reading 44 problems, or nibbling away at progress, or forest management, you decide!
August 29, 2023
Sometimes it pays to stop, and remember
Hello My friends and the occasional relative! On a wall, in a bathroom, lived a laminate. Beneath that laminate the chipboard swelled, and grew warped with time, but for years I beheld the message that laminate traced for me, and like it or not, some of the phrases never left me, or versions of them …
August 22, 2023
53 problems and managing the cascade of consequences
Hello, my friends and the occasional relative. No exclamation point this week, because I am in the middle of it. This is the hard work. Getting down from 855 to 53 was easy. And 53 to zero would be fine if 10-15 of the 53 did not have to be solved by rewriting the opening. …
Continue reading 53 problems and managing the cascade of consequences
August 15, 2023
855 Problems
Hello, my friends and the occasional relative! So yes, I have compiled some feedback files and have 855 problems to address, aside from the need to significantly upgrade the opening chapters, which are much as they were when I first vomited them out in order to get started, and adjust some aspects of the finale …
