Paul’s Comments (group member since Jul 15, 2012)

Paul’s comments from the Q&A with Paul Vincent group.

33,000 words in now, and beginning to slip behind schedule. It's still recoverable but I need to put some work in.

I think after finishing this book and the previous one, I'm going to take a break from novel writing. I'll probably use the next 2-3 months to concentrate on marketing the 5 books I've created so far and add a few short stories to the collection.

Got the read count up to 2!

Promotion wise I've obviously got something completely wrong with this one.

Where's a good place to post science fiction short stories?

Impressive, after posting a link to my short story here, on Twitter, Google+ and Facebook, it got precisely ZERO reads! I think I would probably have got more people to take a look if I'd just said "Don't click on this link!"

lol.

I've decided to go ahead and use them as promo material, posting them free in a variety of places. You can see the first one here:

http://authspot.com/short-stories/astronomicon-boundary/

I am gradually coming around to the view that, in the long term, I would be better off using them as promo material to post on the VERY many short story/creative writing sites on the web, rather than attempting to sell them directly.

It would be nice to hear the opinion of others on this one.

Still happy with my progress. Considering I've had a few days when I've simply been too busy to do any writing, I'm not doing badly at all. Completing the 50,000 words within November should be quite achievable.

I posted a few images of the mining vessel Icarus (from which the book's title comes) on my blog.

I'm slowly building up a collection of short stories I've written within the Astronomicon universe. Each is a completely stand alone story with no prior knowledge of Astronomicon required but I'm wondering what on Earth I should do with them.

It's been suggested that I should wait until I've got a dozen or so of them, and publish a book of short stories, but at my current rate of writing them it will probably be another two years before any of them see the light of day.

They're too small to sell individually, so what's the best plan? I've wondered about giving them away free to increase general awareness of the whole Astronomicon thing, but I'm not sure if that's a good idea?

Finally got to start writing this one yesterday, with the opening on NaNoWriMo. I'm currently running ahead of schedule right now but I can't see that keeping up until the end of the month.

I spent a big chunk of yesterday building a 3D model of Icarus (the main vessel featured in the book). For some reason I didn't even consider doing that during the planning last month. So far it's proved to be an invaluable aid. I will post some pictures of it soon.

It's officially finished. Now I just need one of the major international publishers to publish it.

:)

Annoyingly I didn't finish all the alterations last night, and as I'm out all day today I can only hope I get them finished by tonight.

Phew, this is hard work!

A whole day of slog today, making the required corrections. Hoping to make all the required alterations by the end of tonight. I never really enjoy this part of the writing process, but I have to focus on the finished result. It's worth it in the end!

Well I'm still updating this thread, even though only one person so far has ready any of it (and I'm worried that I'm that person!).

Well, having completely re-written it yet again, chapter 22 is finished (pending proof-reading and editing) and I think it's okay, but I still don't feel like it rounds the book off as nicely as I would like. I nearly always find the last chapter to be the most difficult to write, but this has probably been the hardest yet.

So close to finishing now, it hurts!!!

Chapters 1-21 have been edited and proof-read. With final (hopefully!) corrections and modifications made, they are in proof-reading again. Chapter 22 is the remaining problem. It's written but I don't like it and it doesn't wind up the main plot line neatly like Chapter 21 completes the other plot line.

Maybe it's just a relative thing. Chapter 21 is one of the best things I've ever written. Every time I reread it, the thing almost brings me to tears. The bizarre mix of happy ending and sad ending works really well (or at least I think it does). Chapter 22 seems to be merely functional by comparison, and it smells too much of Star Trek for my liking. I could really use some inspiration to give it a sparkle.

So annoying! Every time I aim to type "sandbags" I end up typing "sandbangs" instead! Every time I have to go back and correct it. Maybe it's time to give in a setup autocorrect?

Almost finished now! Only 3 days writing time left so I've got to keep up the momentum. I feel confident now in saying that this is the very best book I've written to date. Excellent story, better characters, more involved plot twists, far more emotional and (I think) more unexpected turns in the plot.

I choose to step away from my usual style or protagonist in this one and I think it has really enhanced the results. It's made him more interesting and I think he's easier to empathise with.

My only reservation is that the book turned out considerably more violent than I expected, but then it is set during an invasion, so even though the protagonist isn't exactly Rambo, there is mayhem and death going on around him anyway. The sense of threat and fear plays a big role in the story anyway. The story certainly does not glamorise the violent elements. They are much more of a driving force behind the story.

Still working hard on this one. Got the proof reading results back for the first 15 chapters last night. It took me a couple of hours to go through and make all the necessary corrections. It always amazes me how many seemingly obvious errors sneak through my own proof-reading efforts. Anyone who relies entirely on their own proof-reading is most probably fooling themselves!
Just a few more chapters' writing to go now before I hand the whole lot over to the editor. Always a daunting moment.

I'm using this weekend to catch up a little. I've fallen almost 8000 words behind my schedule so I really need to put some more effort in. It's not the writing the initial draft which is the problem, it's she editing, changes and corrections which seem to be eating my time. I haven't reached Chapter 16 yet, but last night I completely changed the plan for it. The scene didn't really work but I found another location and set of characters could really relay the same information to the reader in a much more engaging and interesting way. Much happier with it now and looking forward to writing that one now.

I suddenly realised I hadn't gotten around to doing a status update here for a few days. I'm finishing off chapter 9 today, but I have a feeling I'll be going back and rewriting some of it. Sometimes bodies of writing just don't come together nicely and I believe chapter 9 is a clear example of this.
Rather than tackle it straight of, I'll probably finish the next couple of chapters and then come back to it.

Chapters 4 and 5 are now finished and I'm heading into Chapter 6. However, the big news is that I've renumbered this book. Rather than book 4, as I originally planned, it is now a prequel to the entire series so I've renumbered it '0'.

I realise that starting a series at book zero is very unusual (if not unique!) but hey! This is science fiction, why can't we have a Book Zero?!