Once upon a time…

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A big publisher, Del Rey, a branch of Random House, had a bright, new, shiny idea. How about gathering all the wannabe authors into an online workshop and setting up a monthly editor’s choice? The winner might get published in their brand new ebook scheme.

And so it came to pass that a multitude of us wannabe authors were gathered together in the Online Writers Workshop for Science Fiction and Fantasy. We learned a lot and we also made lifelong friends. Of course, all good things come to an end, and the publishing house decided not to continue with its ebooks at that time so had no use for sponsoring loads of wannabe writers. However, writers won’t be put down and the site was organized to operate without the publisher, although we all now had to pay. It didn’t matter. What price can a person put on the ability to talk to another genre writer about the problems on their manuscript? And so we thrived.

In the fullness of time a goodly number of the veteran members have been published, including myself. I have a special shelf for their books, signed or not. I have read them all in various stages before the paperback ever came to my hands, but it doesn’t matter. I could read these books over and over and over. They are old friends, familiar and comfortable, as well as thrilling. Looking up at this shelf I can see my author friends from all over the world. Now that is one heck of a buzz. Of course, anyone can pull up a picture of one of us from their website, or Amazon, or Goodreads, etc. This thing is we can pull up memories, conversations, trials and tribulations as well as the photo of the person. It might be a friend at distance, but this is still very much a friend. There is very little as personal as sharing a raw manuscript between fellow authors.

paperback

Magic moments.

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I suppose I am thinking of this as I have been working on a passage of magic usage today. Oh, that and working a pig into the script. Yes, a pig. I gather the Oxford University Press is banning all mention of all things porcine in case it offends anyone. The thought of Pigling Bland from the Tales of Beatrice Potter ever being on a banned list offends me greatly and inspires a sudden plethora of little piggies. But I digress.

Serious magic in a fantasy setting is not legerdemain and nor should it ever appear as such. Magic is an element and as such, must have an origin. What the origin is doesn’t really matter as long as it is well thought out and very plausible. In the case of Darkspire Reaches, which I mention as I am polishing the sequel, Serpent of the Shangrove, the magic is twofold as I have a creature of earth and water and one of fire and air. Now for the later there is incredible energy put into the making of jewel stones. What if these could be used as a source of fuel? Fire and air would be a perfect match. Water and earth are a lot easier with the raw power of nature. Consider the energy of a waterfall, or the power of a tree root splitting rock. So there it is. One answer. Now I wonder if I can justify a flying piggy? Probably not.

One for vegans

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The weather being seasonal for the Northern Hemisphere, I am on a soup kick. With me, this involves using whatever I happen to have on hand. Soup de jour was a cream of asparagus and celery. About four servings

8 spears of asparagus as that is what I happened to have left over. Chopped and the tough end bit discarded.

4 sticks of celery. This would be the tender inner bits as that is the loose celery I buy and I pick through it to get the good bits. I think it works out to about one and a half cups.

I small potato peeled and chopped.

1/2 parsnip peeled and chopped. I did say it was on hand, didn’t I?

About two teaspoon full of chopped parsley, fresh.

3 green onions chopped.

I tablespoon of margarine.

2 vegetable bullion cubes

I cup of white wine.

Sweat veggies in margarine until soft. Dump in cubes and I pint water. Purée, add pepper and wine, bring to the boil and ready to serve decorated with the leaves of the fresh celery reserved especially. Goes well with fresh bread sticks.

Health tips. Asparagus is good for the liver and celery is a mild diuretic. The wine is just nice. I am sure I could justify it if I really had to do so. Enjoy.

Looking Forward to Spring.

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Yes, I know it is not quite mid January and I know that my spring won’t get here until mid to late May, but the winter solstice has been and gone. Every day now is going to be lighter for longer. Not warmer, as January, February and March are the coldest months, but lighter. It is time to bring out the seed catalogues and start some planting.

I will admit to already having two hollyhock plants in pots that I seeded in the fall. I wanted to find out if I would get flowers this year if I did it that way. I also have a rather leggy tomato plant that I didn’t seed. It grew all by itself in my pot of chives. Whatever, I will pot it out in spring and see what happens. Right now I am thinking of more hollyhocks, some lupin, pinks and petunias. Those are the things needing to be planted right now.

Maybe I should go look in the garage to see if I have any potting compost? It will need to be thawed if I have. If not, the stores are now absolutely guaranteed to have started pushing gardening stuff. I would take a bet on racks of seeds being on display today when we go shopping. I would also be astonished if bulbs were also not available to buy, despite the minor factoid that a person would need a backhoe to be able to plant anything right now.

Shrinking world.

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Once, long ago, I adored travel and visiting other countries. I loved diving into other cultures, learning new things and meeting new friends. I made a wish list of places I would also like to visit if ever I got the money and the opportunity. The world was shrinking with the advent of reliable air travel and the introduction of package discount trips.

As the years rolled by various places on my wish list have been crossed out and not because I got to visit. I always wanted to go see the pyramids but I am the wrong sex and ethnicity to travel there and have been for years. I would prefer not to return in a bodybag, so that one is off the list. Oh well, there are those neat pyramids in South America. Um no, off the list because I am the wrong ethnicity and come from a rich country. I don’t think I would do well being held to ransom for money I do not have. Japan looked interesting right up until that disaster. I guess I would prefer not to come back from somewhere glowing in the dark.

Nevermind, I loved Europe and that is worth a revisit, or it was. I find I am probably the wrong gender and ethnicity to travel safely there, too, as a result of recent atrocities. Australia? Mmm, the cafe comes to mind. Perhaps New Zealand one day, if airlines ever become safe again and manage to stop falling out of the sky for one reason or another.

Now the world is shrinking in another way. Not because my reach has extended, but because it has contracted. Anger and fear often replace smiles and open arms. Thank the stars for National Geographic, who go boldly where others fear to tread. I will tour from my couch.

The major benefits of reading a draft multiple times.

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Benefits? Most certainly and not just for identifying mechanical errors. Imagine reading the same book for the fifteenth or twentieth time? Reckon you would glaze over? Uh huh, that is what happens and it is important to note where. Those saggy spots are the boring bits and glazing is identifying that they need to come out.

Still hate an obnoxious character? Now that is good as the feelings are working. This was not a lovely person to start with.

Basically, this is the time to sheer off all the fluff to leave a story slick and shiny. 20,000k tomes will not cut the ice if half that wordage is worthless fluff. The real story needs to emerge clean and fresh.

The art of writing and the pitfalls.

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There happens to be a lot of work between having a bright, shiny new idea and a finished product getting loaded onto platforms, all ready to sell. Whether a writer outlines a story, or is an organic writer, (pantzer), the process is, or should be much the same. There are various drafts, and this can be anywhere between three and fifty. Every time the author decides to alter something, there is a knock on effect and the the whole manuscript has to be reread to check everything is still in place and behaving how it is intended to behave. Of course, as the drafts edge towards a finished product, it is necessary to check and recheck the mechanics. Mundane little things like commas, semicolons, spelling, spacing, etc. Yes, my publishing house has the best editorial department EVER, but it is still a matter of professionalism to turn in the very best and very cleanest manuscript I can achieve.

All this goes on behind the scenes and yes, the story is thoroughly edited by the publisher. A writer can get blind to errs and accidently miss the odd one or two, or not have the correct usage on something or the other. Whatever, the now finished product is returned to the author to check over for the final time. It is now squeaky clean and fit to be distributed. Unfortunately, this takes an unexpected toll on the writer.

My personal pleasure reading has now become a lot more limited. The problem lies in error identification while I am reading to the point where the mistakes will leap off a page and do a samba on my eyeballs. This totally destroys my ability to suspend disbelief and immerse myself in the story, should the tome in question have failed to undergo editing. Sometimes, when the errs are few, it is possible to continue. Sometimes it is not and this is often, unfortunately, the case of books offered on free promo.

I was forced to give up reading a book last night as the punctuation was out of this world. The analogy I can give is that if commas represented money, then the this was a novice gambler playing with someone else’s unlimited supply of chips. Had this been a printed book and not an ebook, then the extra ink on all the wrong commas would probably have been sufficient to fill a bathtub. Bemused, and catapulted out of the story, I wondered if this was a clever play on pictures and if I stared at the page I would see a picture form from the commas. Maybe a face, or a flower, or even Mr Stay-puffed Marshmallow Man, but no, not a trace of a pattern.

This is very disappointing as the story did look interesting from the blurb, which I assume was written by someone else who didn’t have a penchant to overpopulate prose with punctuation. I am left to wonder why someone would let a precious baby out into the world in this deplorable state? So disappointed.