New Project, and a New Year

Fire Beyond the Frost is still doing well, I'm happy to report. It's fun to see what other people have highlighted!

So I did wind up starting a new project after all. And...I like it. It's fast-paced, exciting, and...dare I say it...FUN! Okay, maybe the emotional impact of this one won't be huge, but it'll make up for it in other ways, I promise. I just finished off the introductory chapter, and I think I hit the right balance of setting the scene without a giant info dump, letting the relevant details come off naturally. My original plan was to have this be a quick little novella, maybe in the range of 20K - 30K words, but more and more ideas are coming up, so it might wind up a little longer. Yay.

Not everything is going 100% smoothly. But you know what? That's fine. I'm struggling a little bit with the balance of Main Character 1, between being a badass and showing some vulnerability, but I'm sure the more I write her, the more solid she'll become. (MC2? Total badass. At least 99% so.) My current outline has some gaps and I'm still moving things around, but I'm confident it'll work out. I used to be more of a pantser than a plotter, and maybe this will help me just get the damn words onto the page.

I definitely wanted to finish this opening before the end of the year, and I'm glad I hit that goal. Next week will be the usual holiday season craziness. I'm hosting Christmas Eve for my side of the family. (My mother claims I'm getting off easy because there will *only* be 17 people. Only. <_< ) Then Christmas Day at the in-laws, which is going to be kind of small and low key this year. (As low key as my mother-in-law gets, anyway.) Then the buffer day I insisted on, and then we're taking the girls to Disney World for the first time! One of the reasons I planned this trip was because I was practically on death's door this time last year, so everyone's super excited, and even though I know it'll be insane, I'm looking forward to it. I doubt I'll get any serious writing done during those five days, but I might slip a notebook into my backpack just in case the girls crash early one night and I need something quiet to do in the hotel room.

On that note, this will likely be my last post for the year, so I wish you all a wonderful holiday season, and here's to a great 2020!

Brand new tag for the new project being created in 3...2...1....

So Dramatic

Soooo...that chapter I was working on at the time of my last blog post, which was a month ago? (Oops.) Still not finished. (Oops again.) But! I have a good reason, I promise! I've been working on a short story for submission to an anthology instead, and THAT has been going well. I came up with a fitting idea right away, and both the word count range and the deadline were reasonable. I even thought of the perfect title right off the bat! And we all know that only happens about half the time, if I'm lucky!

The theme of this anthology is romance in a dystopian/post-apocalyptic/whatever you want to call it setting. Since it's a short story and has to be less than 7,000 words, I couldn't spend too much time on worldbuilding, but I'd like to think I established something compelling in the limited space I had. It occurred to me while I was writing that it's been a while since the setting has been a source of drama and conflict in one of my stories. Granted, I've been writing a lot of contemporary lately, so in a way, it's been fun to have my two main characters band together against outside forces in their environment, rather than just deal with interpersonal issues.

Fiction needs conflict to drive the plot forward. Luckily, that conflict can come from all sorts of places. I'm sure I've mentioned here before that I do have a fondness for what my college friends would call "fuck the pain away" tropes, and I similarly enjoy "the two of us vs. the world!" storylines. And since it's romance, everything has to be wrapped up with a neat little bow by the end. Hey, even if it's a crapsack world, there's got to be some good in it, right?

Out of Orbit - The Writing Playlist

Happy New Year! I hope everybody had a fantastic holiday season, no matter what you celebrate, and may we all have a satisfying and productive 2016! Me, I got a niiiiiiice chunk of writing done on Out of Orbit while Mr. Landen and I were both off from work for over a week and I have high hopes for keeping the momentum going. I'll admit I struggled with the last little bit of worldbuilding I wanted to work in, but I've finally reached the point where my universe is established and now I can just have fun within it.

Though I don't have a really firm estimate of what the final word count is going to be (I think it's going to fall somewhere in "short novel" territory), this is definitely a lengthier and more detailed project than the 20K-word novellas I've been doing recently. As such, I've compiled a list of more than one or two songs to help me get into the right frame of mind. I'm sure I'll be adding more as I go along, but for now, here's my writing playlist for Out of Orbit:

#1, Space Oddity, and #2, Rocket Man, are pretty self-explanatory. They're my usual go-to songs for when events take place in outer space.

#3, Han Solo and the Princess - I know Star Wars is all the rage right now. This still remains one of my favorite love themes. Bonus points for the space/sci-fi connection! Lucky me! :D

#4, One Second and a Million Miles - I'm still a little disappointed that I didn't get to see The Bridges of Madison County on Broadway, as its run was short-lived. I'm a sucker for a killer duet, and I love this one. I can't say the lyrics match the story I'm writing 100%, but there are enough similarities to OoO that this song has been getting a lot of airtime.

#5, This Nearly Was Mine - I'm not going to give away too many plot details yet, but this fits in, I promise. And ooooooh, did I struggle with which version to include on my playlist. I love Brian Stokes Mitchell to death and I would follow him to the ends of the earth, but -- and I can't believe I'm about to write this -- sometimes I think he may have overdone it juuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuust a smidge here. Oh well, it's still fantastic. And fun fact: I was in the audience for the performance! Probably the worst seats in the entire theater, but I was there nonetheless!

Plop!

Almost a month since my last post? How'd that happen?

At least I can report that Out of Orbit is underway. I'm not going to lie and say I have an astronomical word count I can brag about, but it's coming along. Really.

It's been quite some time since I've done serious sci-fi and the extensive world-building that goes along with it. (And to be fair, The Fall of the Midnight Scorpions is a sequel, so when I was writing that, I was working within an established universe.) In the beginning of this book, I'm facing the expected challenge: walking the fine line between world-building and info dumping.

It's not easy, and since I'm still in the early stages, I don't even know yet if I've been successful. I'm going with my usual technique of "assume the reader already knows everything and doesn't need to be spoonfed all the information, and it'll eventually make sense". I've got all my notes on the way things work in this world, and they'll come out when necessary. Even so, I'm still stressing about the pacing in the first couple chapters.

I'm confident everything will eventually come together. If I have to cut later on, so be it. I feel strongly about this project, enough that it bumped several other ideas that have been bouncing around for a while down the to-do list. I just need to make sure readers will love the story as much as I do and not get bogged down in all the details.

Ducks in a Row

It's that time. My writing fingers are getting itchy and I think I'm ready to start a new project. It's an exciting moment - opening up MS Word, seeing that beautiful blank page, and going to "Save As". But am I really ready?

I don't have a formal checklist of tasks I need to complete before I decide that an idea is developed enough to become its own story. However, some things I need to have in place before I'm willing to start. Here's a random list in no particular order:

Character Names: The main characters MUST have first names picked out before I will even write the first word. Names can say a lot about a character right off the bat, and I want to make sure they're a good fit. Last names, though, I'm willing to be flexible on. They don't come up as often, and as such, I've used placeholders before if I just want to get down to it. And actually, when I finished the first draft of Elysium, I decided to change the male lead's surname for various reasons. (Thanks, search & replace!) I'll usually run a google search on the name combinations to make sure I'm not inadvertently naming a character after someone well-known.

Place Names: UGH. I HATE coming up with fictional place names for sci-fi/fantasy. Haaaaaate. Again, I've used placeholders here before just so I'm not sitting here, staring at the screen for an hour trying to find a name that doesn't sound stupid.

Title: Ha. Hahahahaha. Hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha. The issues I've sometimes had in the past with coming up with the perfect title have already been well-documented on this blog, so I'm just gonna leave that there.

Plot: Since I primarily write romance, 99% of the time the endgame is going to be "happily ever after", so that's taken care of. Getting there is, of course, a much different story. In thinking it over, I guess I don't really have any hard and fast rules here for what needs to be in place before I start writing. Although I write in order, sometimes I get going and realize that where I've decided to start the story is not the best place, and changes have to be made. Other times I think I've reached the end, only to learn that nope, there's more story in there somewhere. I usually have a basic framework in mind, but any outlines I make don't take a firm shape until I get started.

So where am I now? My two leads have first names. When I first started composing this post, my heroine didn't have a surname, but as I was climbing into bed last night to go to sleep, the perfect name popped into my mind, so yay? (Google has confirmed it is a good choice.) I don't have a name for the fictional planet most of the story will take place on. I know how I want to start the story, I know what the climax will be, but I haven't quite figured out the denouement. Bits and pieces of the middle are fleshed out, and I have some specific scenes and character development in mind. I think I'm good to go.

The title, though? Ha. Hahahahaha. Watch this space in a couple months for the usual freakout about how NOTHING SOUNDS RIGHT. I suppose I'll have to name that new Word document something vague.

(Spoiler-Free) Thoughts on Dragon Age: Inquisition (and how they relate to writing)

I'm nearing the end of my second playthrough of Dragon Age: Inquisition. This time, obviously, I've been taking my time and not blazing through to get to the end, letting the game consume every moment of my free time. Also (and I'll elaborate on this throughout), I was able to almost halve the number of hours spent on this playthrough, and not all of that was due to efficiency.

First, I need to preface this with my overall, general feelings: The game is excellent. I feel like the designers took the best parts of the two previous games without necessarily favoring one over the other. Perhaps most importantly for a game, it's fun, and I look forward to replaying it. HOWEVER (we all knew that was coming), there were definitely aspects that could have been better. A lot better. I'm not going to say I was disappointed, because I wasn't, and paying for the pre-order and immersing myself in the game as soon as possible was worthwhile. But it's not perfect.

Boobulon, who hasn't played yet, summed up my feelings perfectly when I told him of my impressions after I first beat the game. It's a short game, but very wide. Now at first, that statement may sound a little ridiculous - I spent over 100 hours (111 to be exact) just playing through the game once. How can that possibly be a short game?

Without going into too much detail about the mechanics, there are certain mandatory plot points you have to hit. While there's an order to them (except for two which are available simultaneously), you can pretty much do them whenever you want. As is typical for Bioware games, there are a crapload of side quests and companion quests available, along with many areas to explore. (For those of you familiar with the first Mass Effect, it's structured similarly.)

Ultimately, I think it's that lack of set pacing that drags the game down a little. And unfortunately, most of those little side quests did nothing to enhance the overall plot, in my opinion. Also unfortunately, it made me feel like a lot of the game was filler and the designers were having fun playing around with the new game engine while not focusing enough on tying all the elements together.

Gorgeous, right? I didn't even bother coming here the second time through, because it was unnecessary.

The actual plot stuff? EXCELLENT. FANTASTIC. LOVED. Like, "shit, it's 1:00 in the morning but I have to know what happens next but it's 1:00 in the morning but I have to know what happens next!" There just wasn't enough of it, and I was left wanting more. So for me, that's my biggest qualm. Yes, the world was incredibly detailed and amazing and expansive, but some of the storytelling was lacking.


So I'm going to use that to segue into talking about writing. (Smooth, right?) We all know by now that style is subjective and readers are often picky about the prose they enjoy. There are writers out there who use their words to paint pictures and spend pages and pages describing scenes in achingly beautiful detail. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.

But it's not me. I don't like to write that way, and I don't particularly like reading that style either. I prefer well-developed characters who do and feel, which again, isn't everyone's cup of tea. There's no one method of telling a story that's better than the others, and it really does just come down to personal preference. And I personally would have preferred more characters doing and feeling in those initial 111 hours, but hey, you can't make everyone happy all the time.

I could probably write another novel about my feelings on the game, but I'll leave off here. Also on the topic of my own writing, I just miiiiight have a cover to reveal soon-ish, so stay tuned!

This Post is Totally About Writing

Haha, no it isn't. It's about video games. But I'll bring it around to storytelling, I promise.

So I'm taking my little writing break. I read some books I wanted to read, and I've finally embarked on playing Dragon Age: Origins. From what I've heard from friends and the internet in general is that Origins and Dragon Age 2 (which I loved) are different enough in style that whichever you play first, you'll like that one better.

Truth be told, I'm not finding them to be THAT different style-wise and gameplay-wise. Then again, I heard a lot of people complained about the changes in battle controls between Mass Effect 2 and Mass Effect 3, and I found them virtually identical. As I don't consider myself a hardcore gamer, maybe there's just some nuance there that's above my head. Either way, I'm getting by, and after spending a year making my way through the ME series, returning to the DA universe was a pleasant change of pace. Also, in DA, the screenshot function exists!

This is what my butt looks like when I stab an ogre in the eye.

I'm not done with the game yet (my rough estimate has me around halfway to two thirds through, not including the extra content), so I reserve the right to change my mind, of course. Right now, I think it's a great game, highly entertaining and difficult to put down. That said, I don't totally love it yet, and I've been trying to put my finger on why.

The universe is as detailed and complex as one would expect to find in a Bioware game, and I always have to marvel at the sheer amount of effort that went into worldbuilding. Also, there are a lot of innovative things going on with the plot that I really enjoyed. One section involves navigating through a dream-like world and having to shapeshift into different forms to complete the maze of puzzles, and while it was pretty trippy a la Alice in Wonderland, I thought that part was fantastic. Then there's a forest that has werewolves and sentient trees (most of which try to attack you). Currently, I'm exploring the dwarf kingdoms.

This tree asked a favor of me. Also, it only speaks in rhyme.

I've realized, though, that where the game is falling short for me is the characters, unfortunately. I'm not saying that they're bad or poorly-conceived. They're just not really doing anything for me. I LOVED the companions in DA2 (LOVED), some right off the bat and some with time. For example, I was kind of meh on Aveline for a while, but by the end of my first playthrough (and in subsequent playthroughs), I really grew to appreciate her. And while I spend 99% of the time wanting to slap Merrill across her stupid naive face, she's still got some great lines. (And wanting to slap someone is some form of emotional attachment, right?) The DAO cast isn't inspiring strong feelings in me either way. Most of them are just kind of...there.

And then there's the romance. When a friend of mine played the game a while ago, she told me that she wasn't really crazy about any of the romance options and she just went with the most obvious choice. I've wound up doing the same. It's cute and there are some sweet and funny dialogue exchanges, but again, I'm just not feeling the passion there (unlike with Anders my DA2 boyfriend ;) ).

You think I'm pretty? Eh, good enough.

In tying this into the writing process (aha! I told you I'd get there!), what it really boils down to is that characters can really make or break a story. You can have the most fantastic plot in a rich tapestry of a universe, but unless you have a fabulous cast to act it out, there's going to be a little something missing. Obviously this is subjective, and I know everyone has their own preferences in whatever media entertains them. But even as I think of my favorite books that are classified as more plot-driven than character-driven, they still have those complex characters to shape the story.

The number of times I used the word "character" in the above paragraph should indicate just how important they are. Crucial, even!

There Are No Small Characters, Only Small People?

(Or something? Yeah, I screwed that title up.)

Not every character in a story is going to have a starring role. One aspect of writing that's frequently on my mind is how to flesh out the minor characters and bring them to life, ranging from the secondary characters who tag along with the main group for a lot of the action to the people who just pop up for a scene or two. The latter is where I really make myself crazy: Is this person really crucial to the story? Are they significant enough to be named? How do I give them dimension so they're just not a cardboard cut-out?

I second guess myself all the time when it comes to this. (Okay, maybe not as much as I used to, but still.) Hell, Geneva's father in the Skies series doesn't even have a name, and I don't think he's actually spoken a line despite being mentioned a fair number of times. While the main plot and its characters are at the top of my list of priorities, I still want to fill out my fictional worlds with "real" people, but I don't want to dwell on unnecessary details.

What got me thinking about this is a chapter in The Fall of the Midnight Scorpions* I finished up the other night. In this chapter, Ro meets a woman named Lesley. Lesley only appears in this one scene. If I counted up the number of words she speaks, I'm not sure I'd break into double digits. However, without giving away too many plot points, she is important to the story.

You can tell a lot about Lesley just in the handful of pages she appears in. For one thing, it is obvious from the get-go that she and Ro are not, nor will ever be friends. A protagonist's strong opinion on a character goes a long way in shaping the reader's perception. Now, since I'm biased towards my beloved heroine, within a few short paragraphs I already dislike Lesley, even though she didn't really do anything to warrant such feelings. (And I CREATED her. How unfair is that?) If it were a real-life situation, I'd probably side with her point of view, to tell you the truth. As the deliciously awkward scene rolls on, dislike morphs into sympathy, pity, and envy at various points. So in the space of what's probably less than 2000 words, poor Lesley is evoking all sorts of conflict in me-the-reader, and she's never even going to be mentioned by name again!

I'm sorry, Lesley. I wish good things for you since the little snippet we got probably isn't the most fair and accurate representation. At least it's implied you survive until the end of the book and live somewhat happily ever after?

(*HaHA! I remembered to use the working title instead of just calling it the Disintegration sequel!)

Immersion

Ah, here's that promised blog post a week later. Better late than never!

So here's what happened: Almost three weeks ago, I finally sat down to play Mass Effect 3. And it was amazing and addictive and I didn't want to do anything else. I went to work, I fed myself on occasion, I pulled my hair out when some home improvement projects made a giant mess in my house, and I played the game. That's really it.

I actually finished the game last Saturday night (well, I've seen 3 out of 4 endings, and more on that later). Now that I'm done and I don't have to worry about spoilers, I can truly jump into the fandom with both feet. I've been reading trivia, perusing fanfic, looking at artwork...all that stuff you do when you don't want your experience with a story to end. I'm not sure if that really counts as being productive, but I don't mind the little mental break. We all deserve that every now and then, right?

And what a story it was. Yeah, yeah, I knew going in about the controversy over the ending. Truth be told, I was initially disappointed, but after a little time passed, I grew to appreciate some aspects of it. Is it perfect? Wait, scratch that...is it satisfying? Eh. Mileage varies. While I'll never condone some of the behavior that immediately followed the game's release (sending death threats over a video game? really?), I'm also not rolling my eyes at the people who are in the "well, THAT sucked" camp. Amusingly enough, I've done some guest blog posts on this very topic before - how important is a stereotypical happy ending?

Regardless, the game was still fantastic. Since this is supposed to be a writing blog after all, I might as well pontificate a bit about the storytelling aspects. The worldbuilding is rich and complex, and the characters that inhabit said world are varied and compelling. The romantic in me was satisfied with the love story on the side, especially since the relationship I chose seemed so realistic. I both laughed my ass off and cried my eyes out, and it's rare that something can elicit both those reactions. Even if you're not really a fan of games, I highly recommend the series because it's such a vibrant fictional universe.

And yeah, there are fanfics coming out of my keyboard. I've already knocked out a quick one, and I'm collaborating with Boobulon to write a humorous tale about late nights aboard the ship. Don't judge me.