Row ye’ Bastards!

Journal 99 7-13 August 2023

A little double meaning this morning.

First, encouragement to get my ass in gear and get the book done.

And secondly, I just bought and built a rowing machine. I’m desperate to keep my back in working order. So, starting today it will be 1 hour writing, ten minutes on the rower, another hour writing, ten on the row. Repeat. Same with painting, model building, and anything else that keeps me in the office chair too long.

This week was a good week for writing and I had fun again.

I know I’m repeating myself, but not everyone has read all of these posts (nor the Thesis Diary that preceded them) but I love writing. Not just thinking up ideas and world building. But the actual mechanical feel of fingers to the keyboard. It has always been a joy.

Which is why it is so funny that I avoid sitting down an actually putting my fingers to the keys. I know a lot of writers who kick and scream all the way to the desk chair. Even Danielle Steele in an interview said that she does five books at a time, an spends as much time as possible setting up the plots, making the characters, outlining, etc. Everything she can to stay away from actually writing the books themselves.

I guess I’m in pretty good company.

Write Time

I’m so happy to have words to report again and to see the novel race toward the ending.

At the same time, I’m a little mad at myself. Because I had two more chances to write this week. Extra free time and I was all set to get home from work and go straight to the keys.

I even went into the office and did a little workout for my PT and looked right at my desk and turned my back.

So, yeah, I could have had another one to two thousand words to report but I allowed myself to run away from my extra time in the office. Sigh.

In any case, I finished chapter 32 and then 33 this week. I’m in the endgame right now. The final fight is happening and the chapters are rotating through different POVs as everything devolves into chaos. I’m still throwing out most of the outline and pantsing my way through the new material. It’s all coming together.

WORDS

Let’s get to the numbers before I talk about narrative.

3 sessions, chapter and a third written, a total of 5320 words for the week. Still coming in under goal but forward momentum is great. The manuscript is sitting at 171,271. I think this will come in right along the line of the other two books at about 195k.

I still get the feeling that I’m cutting some elements short. But as each book goes by, it feels like I’m adjusting my goals and ambitions. To clarify, The Ashlands could have easily been a 300k book… and it probably should be as whole swathes of story that should have taken longer were reduced to 2-3 chapters.

Pharaoh’s Gambit… the last few chapters could have been greatly expanded… but I mostly just cut out a month of travel at the end, and shortened a few scenes in the first third of the book.

With D&N (this book) I didn’t cut too many scenes but I only outlined 38 chapters instead of 42 like the others. And actually, it was outlined at 37 and I needed to add an extra chapter at the beginning of the book mid-writing.

Storyline

We had the two sides of the story meet. They shared information but also realized they didn’t have much time to argue. They decided on a course of action and rushed off only to step directly into a trap. Explosion. Dust clouds, screams, and our POV character is alone and injured. He watches as some of his companions are knocked low or in one case perhaps killed and then thud. Unconscious and done.

Next chapter I shift POV to a character that was next to the previous and get separated by the attack. We get them trying to find the former, while also trying to survive the battle. Both of these POVs are tertiary characters. They started the B-Story, but then handed it off to new characters to carry, so here at the end of the book we get them checking out of the narrative. Giving their analysis and realizing that they started things but now its time for the experts to take over.

This is the first time I’ve actually thought about this. I like finding patterns in my narrative. I have a habit of doing a lot of things instinctively and then in hindsight realizing that I laid down some fore shadowing, themes, and other elements without planning it.

I just love telling stories.

Next Week’s Plan

Chap 34, final pov of a character from the beginning of the book. Setting the scene for the final battle and grand ritual.

Chap 35 is horror and magic fueled insanity/chaos. Possible character deaths confirmed here. Besides my normal three days of writing, I really want to get in 2 more days. Since I also plan to get on the rowing machine every day, I’m going to mix in exercise and writing.

Wish me luck. I want to get in 5 sessions next week and 8000 words… two full chapters, I hope.

Media/Hobby/PT

I figure I can add my PT and exercise to the media/hobby section of this journal.

Media first.

I’m still on a huge K-Drama binge. I moved from Netflix to Prime and now also set up the Viki Rakuten app. I was having trouble finding shows to watch… and the first obstacle is a lot of the shows explain themselves poorly. I don’t know if it’s a translation thing, or merely a way of blandly describing something. But there are a ton of shows I resisted watching because the copy sounded Blah!

But then you watch the show and its great… or sometimes it really is no good.

K-Drama Stats:

In the last 3 years I have watched about 50 shows. 4 of them were meh and I would never watch them again, 2 of them I really disliked but finished and love to hate on. And 2 of them I DNF (DID NOT FINISH) and am really pissed off about. 1 of those DNF happened this week.

I have a rant that could probably turn into a 2000-word essay with ease. Literally I could break it down episode by episode until the point where I quit the show. What really makes me mad is I loved the two main characters/actors and wanted to watch more.

You can’t advertise a show as a COMEDY and then twist it into a total downer for the last arc. I felt it coming and I had to look up the ending only to find several articles about fans outraged by sad ending, horrible last 5 episodes, etc.

So, now I sadly MUST look up every show I watch to just see if its happy or sad ending.

Hypocrite

And yes, I know I’m a horror guy. I write dark fantasy and horror. I hang out with horror writers instead of fantasy writers. I get that I sound like a hypocrite. I torture my characters and do horrible things and sometimes the monsters win. But really if you’re reading my stories my characters usually defeat (or survive) the monsters. I prefer happy endings, or hopeful ones.

When I’m watching a k-drama I usually picked it to unwind, relax and enjoy the humor. OR I pick a dark drama KNOWING it’s a dark drama. I don’t pick a comedy expecting it to turn into a fantasy and for the main character to die and be erased and the whole series to be a waste of time. Every character is left miserable.

End Rant. (Though I really could break down the show episode by episode and suggest how the story could have been changed up to fit its genre better. There are so many choices in the show that are dreadful.)

Other Media

The one problem with watching so many k-dramas is that I don’t have time for other reading. My comics have piled up to way too many and I haven’t kept up with other shows at all. I still need to watch Strange New Worlds, Secret Invasion, and a number of other movies that just got to streaming.

It’s getting to the point where I have to schedule my fun. Ha ha. But seriously, I do have to plan around everything.

PT three mornings a week, rowing daily, write sessions three days a week (and I want five next), work hours, commission painting. Three D&D games as well… groceries… world building and notes for the next book and game.

I might have to push some things aside for a little bit.

Anyway, I think I’ve gone on long enough… I have a bunch of chores piling up already and breakfast still to eat.

Thank you for reading this far and be well, see you next week with more words and more peeks behind the curtain. Also Journal 100 of this series… might have to plan something special.