Funny thing about Half of Forever is that it almost wasn't published. At least, not in 2012.
After publishing Hollenguard I took a break for a month, and then I started to work on another project. This wouldn't be a sequel to my first book, but rather an exploration of what was going on in Valice while my protagonists were up in Denshire struggling to get to Hollenguard.
My primary goal in writing a sister story was to challenge myself to write about some morally grey characters. The cast of Hollenguard, as much as I love them, are mostly altruistic and good-hearted people. What was interesting, though, was how much I thoroughly enjoyed introducing the old music academy and The Empress of the Archin Thrall into the story. I knew that, before extending the books into a trilogy (it was never a guarantee that I would. Hollenguard originally had no epilogue), I would have to be able to expand the cast to incorporate characters like her. Otherwise, the cast probably would have started to bore me.
So Cheyla and Vamric were born. I actually had about a third of a book written about them before NaNoWriMo 2011 started and I moved over to Half of Forever. I've revisited it a couple of times trying to decide if I want to fix it up for publication as a novella or extend it to a fully-fledged novel in its own right. This is the reason why early on in Half of Forever these two characters are introduced, and why there is also a bit of a connection shared between Cheyla and Kamil. They meet in Chapter 2 of Cheyla's Bones.
The main reason I'm writing this blog post is that I revisited Cheyla's Bones again last night. I was so enamored with the story that I decided I would add on to it. I'm going to extend the story, do some revising, and release it as my next novel.
Wednesday, August 14, 2013
Sunday, August 4, 2013
Tripping Over Plot Holes, Dodging Inconsistensies, Keeping Sane.
Writing is hard.
Never mind trying to keep the characters straight. I won't go into detail about how Elysandria and Kitarin did a magical switch with one another when one of them fell in the water in my very first publication of Hollenguard, except to say that it got fixed very quickly and thankfully before I ordered any physical copies.
With so many battles in Veil and the Void, it was also difficult to keep straight where all of the characters were and who was wielding which weapon. This is something that seemed to crop up with every single revision where I'd realize I'd misplaced someone or something; things that even my beta readers missed in many cases. Luckily, I kept re-reading the book until my eyes felt like they would just give up and roll off to find someone with a less tiring hobby.
Minor book 1 spoilers follow:
So why do the characters keep dropping their weapons? In Kamil's case, it's because the only exciting thing he'd ever done prior to fighting the Roukon is fall off a mountain. He's a stable boy. In Nijal's case, I guess it just became a bit of a running gag. Even Basil comments on it:
"You would make a terrible Warden. You cannot seem to keep hold of your weapon."
Go easy on him, though. He did just survive a fight with an Ant Of Unusual Size (tm).
Where are the other D'wammish that Elysandria mentions when they're traveling through the Mizzlemist? All we see is Pale Sisters.
Having their own adventure? Part of a story collection I'm plotting involving Illysidyl's adventure after Kamil and co. leave the awakening and before she arrives at Hollenguard. Oh, and it isn't entirely true that all you see is Pale Sisters. The Empress is, in fact, D'wammish.
Why doesn't Elysandria use a forge in Hollenguard to make D'wammish weapons?
Right. She does mention when telling her tale to Kamil that she and her former adventuring companions forged the hammer and some knives prior to a Roukon attack on a fortress. Hollenguard, however, doesn't have a forge. Even if the characters were to construct a forge, they'd be hard pressed to safely gather materials to burn for heat. And even if they were to get enough heat for the proper forging of weapons, they wouldn't have the iron to make anything.
But, yeah. Writing is hard. There are what ifs that are bound to crop up. In revisions I found myself removing over-explanations of things several times. At the end of the day, you just have to trust that people are going to enjoy your story enough that they don't need to question every avenue the plot could have turned down. If they don't, they'll be sure to tell you about it. And that feedback can only improve your work in the future.
Never mind trying to keep the characters straight. I won't go into detail about how Elysandria and Kitarin did a magical switch with one another when one of them fell in the water in my very first publication of Hollenguard, except to say that it got fixed very quickly and thankfully before I ordered any physical copies.
With so many battles in Veil and the Void, it was also difficult to keep straight where all of the characters were and who was wielding which weapon. This is something that seemed to crop up with every single revision where I'd realize I'd misplaced someone or something; things that even my beta readers missed in many cases. Luckily, I kept re-reading the book until my eyes felt like they would just give up and roll off to find someone with a less tiring hobby.
Minor book 1 spoilers follow:
So why do the characters keep dropping their weapons? In Kamil's case, it's because the only exciting thing he'd ever done prior to fighting the Roukon is fall off a mountain. He's a stable boy. In Nijal's case, I guess it just became a bit of a running gag. Even Basil comments on it:
"You would make a terrible Warden. You cannot seem to keep hold of your weapon."
Go easy on him, though. He did just survive a fight with an Ant Of Unusual Size (tm).
Where are the other D'wammish that Elysandria mentions when they're traveling through the Mizzlemist? All we see is Pale Sisters.
Having their own adventure? Part of a story collection I'm plotting involving Illysidyl's adventure after Kamil and co. leave the awakening and before she arrives at Hollenguard. Oh, and it isn't entirely true that all you see is Pale Sisters. The Empress is, in fact, D'wammish.
Why doesn't Elysandria use a forge in Hollenguard to make D'wammish weapons?
Right. She does mention when telling her tale to Kamil that she and her former adventuring companions forged the hammer and some knives prior to a Roukon attack on a fortress. Hollenguard, however, doesn't have a forge. Even if the characters were to construct a forge, they'd be hard pressed to safely gather materials to burn for heat. And even if they were to get enough heat for the proper forging of weapons, they wouldn't have the iron to make anything.
But, yeah. Writing is hard. There are what ifs that are bound to crop up. In revisions I found myself removing over-explanations of things several times. At the end of the day, you just have to trust that people are going to enjoy your story enough that they don't need to question every avenue the plot could have turned down. If they don't, they'll be sure to tell you about it. And that feedback can only improve your work in the future.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)