Lost!

I'm missing a notebook.

the one with the last two short character stories...

I think it's blue...?

I'm really only posting because usually that means I'll find it....

Because I'm 30 Now

What was the hiatus for this last time?  i don't know, there always seems to be one.

I turned 30 since I last typed here.  I didn't have any sort of crisis, except for a few momentary thoughts about the Verse.  Seriously.  it's so very unfinished.

I have been moving along on Scribophile, getting the short teaser introduction stories critiqued and smoothing out the kinks.  My very first goal is to get them all compiled and publish them as an ebook on Amazon.  i finally landed on Amazon one, because it's free, and two because they have a cover designer, so i don't have to wait around for my husband to finish his cover design for me (of course the one he started is for Shade and Shadow).

 

I have a new office.  A meltdown of all hardware, software and components has stuck me permanently on the desktop for transcription, and the forthcoming Bat Falcon child has banished us from the upstairs office to the corner of the finished part of the basement.  But i took the opportunity to put a bookshelf just to my left and lined up the binders in which the novels live.

 

I even labled them because i can never really remember which one is in which binder.  And they will sit there and stare at me and beg me to complete them.  And i hope i will respond.  Because i'm 30 now, and this is getting a little ridiculous.  not a single one is completed.  the fifth one doens't even have a binder yet!

 

Just now i took a break from working and reorganized the usb with all the saved documents, as well as putting some stuff in my Google drive to work on without having to search for the touchy usb my dad had to re-solder.

 

because i'm 30 now.  that must be my  motivation.

so much to do...

I only want to get paid for writing.

not enormous amounts.

just enough to pay the bills for a little while so I can not work.

There is so much to do, and I come here, and I say it, and then I go away for a while, busy.  And then I come back and say it all again...

Puzzle Pieces

I've been copying and pasting for half an hour.  putting the pieces of Kath's story in the correct order.

Just a moment ago, i erased "Kath's story" and started to rewrite Spencer's story. but who am i kidding?  this is kath's story.

I've gotten input from several places on the gender problems, of the referring to gender for a character such as Kath, in Kath's circumstances.

I laid out an outline, in three main parts (because Spencer spends three days at the Enaj Estate recovering from his time in Kath's word, before returning to his father and his home world), and in each section i must decide how i will refer to kath.

I already know that i never want Aniste to say "he."  She, who is in posession of Kath's secret, will be the only one who never outwardly lies, only lies by omission. 

I have already written one or two moment of confusion and reflection in Spencer's own mind about how he sees Kath after he learns the truth, and after that truth becomes important.  Since it is in first person, from Spence's pov, I can always use the "he" term for Kath, because it works.

But i'm thinking i need to, at some point, write a great deal of the storyline without any gender.  And it's hard to do, but not impossible.  I think the point after Kath comes back to Oaklusa is the point where Spencer will stop referring to Kath as "he," and begin, instead, to leave Kath ungendered even in his own mind.

I'm still planning on, in some way, telling the story in fragments, and non sequentially, but the sequence in which they were written is cumbersome, and it is difficult to find what i'm looking for when i'm looking for it.

So copy and paste.  Shift the puzzle pieces around until you have something that resembles what you're working toward.  And that's why sometimes i prefer lego blocks to puzzle pieces, when i'm making this analogy.  Puzzle implies that there is only one way this picture can turn out.  If i'm playing with legos, i am able to freestyle at any moment, and change the course of events for everyone involved...

also, i gave the Seoul Sister Shade and Shadow to read.  partly because she wants to read it, and partly because i need someone with a grammatical and proofing sort of eye to give it a once over and fix only the things that NEED fixing, which i would not be able to do on scribe (and it would cost me a lot of karma to get all five of those chapters up there.  i'm not in the mood for that).

Oh, Edonith

I made some pretty harsh statements about this character a few days back. that was cruel of me. i was frustrated.  i apologize, Edonith.  i have had many issues with the character over the years.  one that sticks out the most is the many, many times that I've written the reunion-turned-attempted-abandonment between Anka and Edonith in The Prophet.  his emotions during that scene ranged from nothing to apathy. 

Then, one time, i made him mad.  And that stuck.  and it felt good.  I was finally able to yell at Anka for all the bullshit i'd allowed her to get up to, and i used her lover's voice as a speaker box.

So i had hopes for sad, quiet Edonith.  and being stuck on his childhood story for so long just sort of blew me over the edge.

But yesterday the Gator asked if we could go in her room to play.  She had the tablet, i had a notebook, and in between turns of Pudding Monsters i finally got Edonith's childhood down on paper.

it's mediocre.  and i may have broken the rules in introducing Loki into Edonith's story, where he has a story of his own.  But in doing so, i ended up writing Edonith's story so as to appear the last in the series, which had not been the plan.

but then i thought of something else.  There's this little fragment i was gonna stick at the end of The Guide, the moment of Milah choosing Daniel, to lead up into Daniel's story.  but it seemed out of place.  well, that's not where it's going anymore.  i have added it to the end of the list, after Edonith.  And i have rewritten the order so as to tell the best story.

it's going to work, i hope.  these almost quick-sketch stories of character reveals, i am hoping they will draw readers in.

if i draw them in, though, i will have to follow through with the everything else.

oh geez.  oh geez.