Holly Lisle's Blog, page 57

The Emerald Sun: Tiny Sneak Peek of the FIRST DRAFT Story Start

Got  753 words on The Emerald Sun today. Not the thousand I was shooting for, but I’m having to step back into a world I haven’t lived in for over a decade, and finding my way is tough.

But, in FIRST DRAFT (which… DISCLAIMER: May contain bugs, which WILL change in revision, and for which I do not need any notice of typos or other errors, because first draft is not the place where you deal with those) this is how the story starts.

When you’re safe and comfortable, when you’re warm and dry and well-fed, time has a way of slipping away from you. Of drifting through a day, and then a season, and if you’re not careful, through a whole life.

 

In the Audiomaerist’s house, it was easy to feel safe. I got to eat delicious food, to listen to the dragon telling stories of the days when the skies were darkened by mighty flocks of creatures like him; to work in the garden planting and harvesting the Audiomaerist’s food; to know that the woman-shaped creature who gave shelter to Yarri the nightling, Doyati the mystery, my brother Danrith, the cat who is not a cat, and me — for the dragon needed no shelter — could keep us safe.

 

And through a span that wrapped a summer, an autumn, and a winter in it, we lived in her high house away from everyone, and earned our keep with chores and our skills — I spun yarn and knitted her a sweater as fine as any Mama could have made, Danrith tended her accounts, Yarri went out at night and brought back items she requested, and the cat killed her mice.

 

But… one spring morning I woke and smelled change.

 

The smell became a tiny dread that crawled up my spine and down into my belly, that woke me and sent me shivering out of my bed, rolled me to my bare feet on the cold floor and into my clothes, and then into silently waking the others.

 

It’s easy to fall into comfort, and hard to willingly fall out, but when Danrith started to protest that it was dark and he was sleepy, I shushed him and in his ear murmured, “Dress. Make no sound.”

 

When I shook Yarri awake, I said simply, “We have to go. Now.”

 

The Cat had been asleep on my head, so he did not need to be told. He simply waited by a wall, watching me, saying nothing.

 

My brother and Yarri dressed hurriedly, silently.

The Emerald Sun: Walking with Genna this morning

My hour (plus) this morning did not yield a massive wordcount.

556 words total.

But in that 556 words, Genna and her voice came back to me, and Genna immediately broke what I’d planned for the first chapter, and did what I did not expect her to do. 

She lied to the Audiomaerist, in whose house she and her companions had been staying, and hurried them all out without even saying goodbye, and started toward someplace I’m not sure about yet.

She did this because her gut told her she and her friends needed to get away from where they were as quickly as possible.

And the Cat, when he caught up with her, simply confirmed that something was wrong.

What’s wrong?

I don’t know. This has been my experience with writing Genna — and in the years since I wrote her last, she clearly has not changed. I plot something, she looks at my plot, and immediately does something that breaks my planning, but that still gets both of us to the right place eventually.

My path would have been cleaner, calmer, and considerably less messy.

From the perspective of adventure, however, hers is going to be a lot more interesting.

The Publisher-Devils are still out there…

So… I got this email, which wrapped up with this question:

I’ve been in contact with Christian faith publishing the past year but haven’t submitted my manuscript because I recently finished writing, reading and editing it, & wanted to know more info before doing so. They have finally informed me of production costs if my manuscript were chosen for publishing. It’s a little steep for my liking, not knowing if my book will even be successful. Could you give me a little information of what I should look for, what costs are appropriate & which companies could be suitable? I appreciate it.

And I’m beating my head on the desk, because if you’re me, you’ve already covered this on your site in a lot of places and a lot of ways, but on a really BIG site like mine, you can’t always get folks to the places they need to find.

So, because so much is on the line, I answered this one personally. As follows:

Hi,

 

You do not pay to write. Writing is a JOB, and people who work get paid.

 

If you are submitting to a legitimate commercial publisher, the publisher pays you.

 

Up front.

 

With a contract that explains your initial advance, subsequent payments, your royalty schedule, what rights you retain to sell elsewhere, AND which includes details of the reacquisition of your rights if the book does not do as well as the publisher had hoped.

 

If the publisher wants you to pay it, and the payment is large, then you are that publisher’s product, not its client. That publisher makes its money off of you, and your book will get no distribution, no promotion, and no sales, and you will never make a dime off of it.

 

It you want to publish independently, that’s a completely different conversation. You can publish your own work well for free, or very nearly free, and make pretty decent money doing it. And actually get your story into the hands of readers who want to read what you’ve written, and will benefit from it.

 

Do not pay these thieves anything. Learn more about the business part of writing fiction, including writing Christian fiction, here:

 

https://hollylisle.com/articles/

 

Starting with THIS article:

 

https://hollylisle.com/publishing/

 

DISCLAIMER: I am not a Christian, and I am not always warm and fuzzy in what I write (and while I generally don’t use profanity on my site, occasional words do creep in when I am incensed). I get incensed about seeing writers misused as this reprehensible scumbag is trying to misuse you and your work. If I whip out the wicked wango tongue in what you read, please understand that I do so because sometimes you have to call these abusive creeps what they are.

 

Holly

I want the assholes who do this to new writers to be eaten by rabid weasels one slow bite at a time.

And that’s my cheerful thought for the day.

Wishbone Conspiracy: 2176 words and some GREAT twists

Fun, fun writing day today. I ran for about two hours, and got 2176 words, a really cool twist I didn’t expect, a second twist that I did, and put Cady, Tarko, and Storm Rat in the eye of not one but TWO coming storms.

Herog is off doing other stuff in this novel, so is missing the fun — but he’s dealing with fun of his own.

And I just love the way this is clicking.

On to the next thing for today, which is putting together and posting my Patreon Rewards for my patrons, and then getting the other half dozen things in my bullet journal completed. 

But ‘fiction first’ and the ten minute timer make my mornings crazy fun. 

Wishbone Conspiracy: Excellent writing day

I got started late this morning.

Every once in a while I have a night where I can’t sleep. I went to bed around midnight, woke up at two-thirty, and couldn’t get back to sleep until seven AM. So I wasn’t back up and at work until ten AM.

And I feel a bit fried. But I set my timer, set my counter, and jumped in on finishing Chapter 5 of The Wishbone Conspiracy, and then writing out my “Interesting Fact #2” — which turned out to be as interesting as I’d hoped, and I think pretty creepy as well. And wrote for about two and a half hours.

Got 2060 words in that time.

Cady’s current job has just run sideways into something she didn’t expect. It’s unrelated… but its big, and nasty, and in her pursuit of the truth in her current investigation, she has a funny feeling she might have stirred up something ugly that should have been left sleeping.

I had a blast writing today’s thing. And tomorrow, I’ll start Chapter 6.

Moon & Sun 3: Sketching with words

I started out my workday this morning looking for (and finding) a sketchbook among my many notebooks and blank project books.

Followed by staring at the blank pages, with an array of drawing tools in front of me, and with my Muse going, “No, no, no, no, no…”

“I need to see these things,” I muttered, and Muse said, “I already see them. Let me show you.”

So I sat, pulled up my Emerald Sun Scrivener document, and opened a page in Places, and my Muse said, “Tell me about the Running forest.

So I did. Rather a lot.

And then the Muse said, “Okay. Now what’s the story with the Vault of Gears?”

And I started answering the question, and discovered SO much more story.

I didn’t have pen lines or shapes for what I was seeing, for what I was discovering — but I had a lot of words, and the words divulged secrets, and the secrets made me hungry to get started on this book.

So. 

Next Tuesday, I’ll start writing the actual novel. I might from time to time need to slow down to sit with my Muse and sketch more words…

But this story has been waiting a long time to be born, and all of a sudden, it feels like it’s in a hurry.

Outline Finished! The Emerald Sun moves forward…

Short post today. Took a couple hours, but I was on a roll, so I just stuck with it.

And I’m delighted to announce that I’ve finished the line-for-scene outline of Moon & Sun 3: The Emerald Sun.

Tomorrow I’ll take a day off from writing fiction, and instead work on building some of the locations that exist in this story so I can see them. I’ll just a sketchbook for this, not Minecraft Mapping.

Once I know I have a decent feel for the locations, I’ll do a couple of character interviews — but after that, I’ll be ready to actually start writing the book.

I thought it would take me a lot longer to get to this point than it has.  So I’m going to find myself writing on three separate novels each week for a while — and I honestly don’t know if that will work.

I’m not having any problem right now with two novels, and Dead Man’s Party is past the halfway mark, with the first draft planned for completion at the same time that I finish up the last lesson of How to Write a Novel.

I’ll confess, though, that even to me it seems excessive.

But worst case, it’ll make an interesting experiment in exploring my limitations as a writer.

Best case, I’ll get to write on three separate novels each week, and will have as much fun as I’m having writing two.

 

 

Retool of The Wishbone Conspiracy Playlist

The themes of The Wishbone Conspiracy are getting clearer for me, and I did a pretty major rip-apart of the playlist I’m using to stay focused on the novel during my two days a week, and to get myself into that place every time I write. 

I might have too many songs in the list. For some books, I’ve looped just one song (which drives people around me nuts). But this is a big story I’m telling, with secrets inside of secrets that are sneaking onto the page.

So for now, it has a pretty long list that won’t give me a lot of repetition. 

Here’s the new list. A lot more Disturbed, some instrumentals, some Chris Cornell, some old stuff that connects to this in ways I haven’t figured out yet. 

All of these are selected by the process of “Muse says so.”

Cady Drake meets the world – Sneak peek…

Becky did a gorgeous job. The book with the new cover is already showing up in a couple places, but I’ll do a check and links tomorrow, along with the cover reveal.

This is just because it took me all day to get the book done and published.

Recommending some software: Freeter Pro

I think the last software I recommended was Scrivener, back when it first came out.

MAYBE Vellum (but that’s Mac only).

So today I’m recommending some free-to-remarkably inexpensive software that has taken a helluva lot of the crazy out of my day.

Meet Freeter…
The Organizer for Folks Who DO

This is a free download, vailable for Mac & PC (and I think I read that they have a Linux version in the works). I got the paid version after trying out the free version for about fifteen minutes. INSTANTLY sold me.

Take a look at what I’ve got here.

Top left corner of the software, you have what I think of as the Process List.

Fiction is my first process of the day.

And in the first screenshot, you see DAILY FICTION.

This is pretty simple. I have access to my fiction folder (and all my project subfolders in the clickable list to the left.

The three colored icons are my active projects.

And right below them is my schedule.

If I were just dealing with fiction, it wouldn’t be so difficult.

But fiction, of course, is just a part of what I do each day.

So check out the top left corner of the next screenshot.

Right now the next Daily Process is How to Write a Novel, which is such a complicated build that it isn’t just “Write Nonfiction.”

Fleeter allows me to have JUST my How to Write a Novel folder loaded up, all the files and links I need added in the top three rows, my Weekly Per Lesson step-by-step checklist, and my daily class To Do list.

Sitting on the exact same desktop as my fiction stuff. No flipping between screen

No trying to remember where I put X.

It took me about ten minutes to set up my fiction process.

Just not that much there, but it gets me started smoothly each morning.

Took me about two hours to hunt down everything and set up the Class process, but as you can see, building just one lesson is a BIG process, and I’m doing one of those per week, and some lessons require things I don’t use all that often.

When I get finished with How to Write a Novel, I have my next nonfiction project pending…

The Canary Revisions. Going through my classes that are in Spliters version, and methodically finding and fixing and upgrading and updating each one.

When I’m ready for that, The Canary Revisions will get a build-out that looks like my HTWAN build. But for now, it’s just a list of the planned order in which I’m fixing things.

While writing a bunch more novels.

Freeter and my really ugly bullet journal are how I’m getting things done.

And you know what? Mondays are still a bitch. But I’m dealing with them. And I know I’ll get the stuff I have to get done today done.

None of the links are affiliate links, by the way. They’re just stuff I use, love, and recommend..fca_eoi_form{ margin: auto; } .fca_eoi_form p { width: auto; } #fca_eoi_form_251384 input{ max-width: 9999px; }#fca_eoi_form_251384 .fca_eoi_layout_name_field_wrapper {display: none !important;}#fca_eoi_form_251384 .fca_eoi_form_input_element::-webkit-input-placeholder {opacity:0.6;color:#919b83;}#fca_eoi_form_251384 .fca_eoi_form_input_element::-moz-placeholder {opacity:0.6;color:#919b83;}#fca_eoi_form_251384 .fca_eoi_form_input_element:-ms-input-placeholder {opacity:0.6;color:#919b83;}#fca_eoi_form_251384 .fca_eoi_form_input_element:-moz-placeholder {opacity:0.6;color:#919b83;}#fca_eoi_form_251384 .fca_eoi_layout_9.fca_eoi_layout_postbox div.fca_eoi_layout_submit_button_wrapper:hover, #fca_eoi_form_251384 .fca_eoi_layout_9.fca_eoi_layout_postbox div.fca_eoi_layout_submit_button_wrapper input:hover {background-color:#a67035 !important;}
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.fca_eoi_layout_9.fca_eoi_layout_postbox div.fca_eoi_layout_name_field_wrapper { border-color: #e1e1e1 !important; }#fca_eoi_form_251384 .fca_eoi_layout_9.fca_eoi_layout_postbox div.fca_eoi_layout_email_field_wrapper, .fca_eoi_layout_9.fca_eoi_layout_postbox div.fca_eoi_layout_email_field_wrapper input { font-size: 18px !important; }#fca_eoi_form_251384 .fca_eoi_layout_9.fca_eoi_layout_postbox div.fca_eoi_layout_email_field_wrapper, .fca_eoi_layout_9.fca_eoi_layout_postbox div.fca_eoi_layout_email_field_wrapper input { color: #919b83 !important; }#fca_eoi_form_251384 .fca_eoi_layout_9.fca_eoi_layout_postbox div.fca_eoi_layout_email_field_wrapper, .fca_eoi_layout_9.fca_eoi_layout_postbox div.fca_eoi_layout_email_field_wrapper input { background-color: #ffffff !important; }#fca_eoi_form_251384 .fca_eoi_layout_9.fca_eoi_layout_postbox div.fca_eoi_layout_email_field_wrapper { border-color: #e1e1e1 !important; }#fca_eoi_form_251384 .fca_eoi_layout_9.fca_eoi_layout_postbox div.fca_eoi_layout_submit_button_wrapper input { font-size: 18px !important; }#fca_eoi_form_251384 .fca_eoi_layout_9.fca_eoi_layout_postbox div.fca_eoi_layout_submit_button_wrapper input { color: #ffffff !important; }#fca_eoi_form_251384 .fca_eoi_layout_9.fca_eoi_layout_postbox div.fca_eoi_layout_submit_button_wrapper input { background-color: #fc9211 !important; }#fca_eoi_form_251384 .fca_eoi_layout_9.fca_eoi_layout_postbox div.fca_eoi_layout_submit_button_wrapper { background-color: #aa5336 !important; }#fca_eoi_form_251384 .fca_eoi_layout_9.fca_eoi_layout_postbox div.fca_eoi_layout_privacy_copy_wrapper div { font-size: 14px !important; }#fca_eoi_form_251384 .fca_eoi_layout_9.fca_eoi_layout_postbox div.fca_eoi_layout_privacy_copy_wrapper div { color: #597473 !important; }


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