This manuscript is really making me work to fine-tune it. I knew it was rough, but I didn't imagine it would need this much work!
Part of the delay was trying some ideas that didn't work for certain points of the subplots, so I had to change some things back. In other aspects, the smaller plot holes revealed themselves from behind the curtain that was pulled away during previous big edits. I feel like this will never end. The problem is that it's improved so much that it makes me wonder what else I'm missing. I hate that feeling.
I'm midway through round four of edits, and Book 19 is finally having the fat trimmed. I'm at the point of being ready to be done, but these changes are more than a few words here there as I had expected at this point. Unfortunately, it's still in the stage of major trimming. Copyedits will require one more round.
Help! I feel like I'm stuck in editing Groundhog Day!
I'm not as far in edits on Book 19 as I expected. I found another scene that required some major rewrites.
I was about 4/5 done in this editing pass when I hit upon a Starfire shard flashback revealed to Nya. It's an issue in which I give a description to transition faster through narrative to the important points. I realized some things were out of order and needed to provide a more logical explanation going into a full scene. That took a while to iron out, along with ideas to make the other scenes in that sequence better.
I remember thinking when I was writing the first draft that the story overall would need some big edits but didn't worry about it then because I knew after some time away it would become more clear to me. Boy, has it!
It's not like having to rewrite a whole story (like I did for Starfire Angels and Broken Wings 15-17 years ago between the two); but it is a lot of rewriting/rearranging. Every story varies. After I draft a book, I set it aside for what ends up being 6-8 months. By the time I get back to it, I have a fresh take on it. I still remember it, but I've been away enough to view it more objectively. I view it from an editor lense and rip it apart.
I add details and better transitions. (You wouldn't want to read the first draft!) I also add those in the subsequent editing rounds and end up adding quite a bit, along with rearranging sentences (ideas), taking out unnecessary narration, etc. Where the drafting stage was the setting down of most of the plot and major ideas, the editing stage fixes the issues and fills in the gaps. The last editing round is always taking out excessive words, fixing awkward phrases, correcting typos, and fixing formatting.
I'm almost done with these huge fixes in the story and am anxious to start the next round and see what I find in that to fix that might have been introduced with these big changes or that I've missed because I was editing while being tired or foggy brained. I'll have a better idea of how these changes will feel in the flow of the story in the next pass.
It's coming along, being refined and honed.
And I'm still making my way through the earlier books. I'm finishing up book 7 and have found a few fixes to make in that (usually 1-2 chapters while on the treadmill). I'll always find fixes in my books. Art is never finished, only abandoned. I write first for myself, so I do enjoy going back and rereading the books. What I don't enjoy is knowing I'll always want to fix things. I love this whole series and will be enjoying them long after it's finished, but I hope at some point that I'm happy with them as they are.
Thanks for reading.
ps - Bilbo takes any lap he can get, including my lap when I sit down, and Dargo wants his spot next to me, even overcoming his hesitations about Bilbo to be close. The other day, I had Bilbo half on me and Dargo laid next to us. To get up, I had to slide Bilbo off my lap, which meant he and Dargo were next to each other. I managed to get some pics of that moment. It was an amazing step in their relationship. No hissing or striking at each other. First one then the other got up... and went out to the kitchen thinking they would get food. Small steps.
I've been doing well to focus exclusively on Forgotten Worlds this long. Usually I'm working on one book and other ideas inundate me. That hasn't happened in a long time. I had an exclusive focus on Forgotten Worlds for six years (since I started planning and writing book 1). I had been able to squelch any spark of other ideas before they ignited into a conflagration.
Today, something came to me that is so amazing--new ideas always are--that I've had to synopsize the full story. It is incredible! Urban fantasy that starts out like it will be horror but then transforms into something much different than expected. It's still a bit dark in places, but it has a bright ending. What makes it different is the religious element of it.
This is typical for the creative mind. We'll see how I feel in a couple of years after I finish Forgotten Worlds. If I put this aside and it still has a grip on me after time away from the idea, I'll know that it's meant to be written. If I can't get it out of my head, I'll know that I need to write it immediately. I could write two books at once. That isn't easy, but with two distinctly different stories, it can be done (Forgotten Worlds and this).
I must confess that I was expecting to be done writing after Forgotten Worlds, but with this idea, I think I've found a new direction for my writing after I'm done with this series. The ideas never truly quit coming.
If you're only reading this post because of innuendo, you have a dirty mind. Now that I have your attention...
This morning just killed all my momentum. I'm more numb than mad at this point. I was leaving for work and saw the upright freezer door open in the garage.
Imagine the horror--all the hard work of two years of patient garden growing and processing the fruits of that garden (and veggies), only to find it all thawed.
I had just been in that freezer the night before, but so had someone else, after me. One of the kids took ice cream out and put it back (both garden goodies and ice cream have been kept in the same freezer... but no longer). Unfortunately, that kid wasn't careful. I made this mistake once but caught it after a few hours, so there wasn't anything to worry about. I learned to push the door shut after it was shut--it became a habit for me. My kids apparently didn't learn from that.
All we could salvage was whatever I can eat over the next week of the 18 cups of sweet peas I had stored up from this summer, not counting what I ate already (all that work picking and shelling to store up and enjoy until next summer's growing season, gone in a week instead of a year ð); and whatever of the cut bell peppers that hubby could fit in his dehydrator. Once food thaws, it's not supposed to be refrozen because of the increased risk of bacterial growth.
All the ice cream I had bought on sale just a couple of weeks ago... gone.
The freezer was a sopping mess.
I guess our freezer wanted to imitate the heavy rains we had the last couple of days that made our yard a sopping mess. (We needed the rain, but it came hard and fast, creating rivers through the valleys, refilling ponds, and flooding roads and some homes and businesses in town.)
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On writing...
On a good note, I had been making good progress on the writing. Book 20 is over 13K words (1/4-1/3 expected first draft final word count), plus when I haven't been writing, I've been working on the remainder of the series planning. Book 21 has consumed me. I think I'll stick to my original working title of ARMOR for that. It seems to fit the story outline that has filled out with ideas over this past week. I know the book 25 title too -- FOR SUCH A TIME AS THIS -- but books 22, 23, and 24 are basic ideas yet and their titles uncertain. Those will require some intensive planning since they will be the homestretch to the series climax I have planned in book 25.
I'm still working on edits for Book 16. I hope to be in the last big round of edits. It's pretty good overall, but needs just a bit more refinement.
The delay is due to a variety of issues. One of them is my age. I'm in that stage of crushing fatigue during the day and sleep disruptions at night. Mornings are good to a point, but without black tea, I'm doomed by noon. Not even a Dr. Pepper can save me, and coffee is way too strong for my tolerance (and disgusting to my tastes). This is part of the sleep disruption-daytime nap cycle I'm in. And forget supplements. Sure, they help my focus and attention, but they contribute to the sleep disruption. Once in a while nothing bothers me, but I can't count on that.
Add that to just having closed out the busiest time of year at work. I'm finally recovering a few days later. Surprisingly, my head is clear for editing. It's just the fatigue/sleep issue. It could be my thyroid, but it's most likely my stage in life, from the research I've done.
I'll find a way to make it work until hormones straighten out.
Another distraction would be book trailers. I want to create more of those, but they take away from writing/editing, so I'll have to balance that. Fortunately, up to this point, my MacBook Pro wasn't powerful enough to do too much of that. After Effects is a resource hog.
But that will be changing. I'm upgrading to a Mac Studio! ð
I did some research on what the best configuration would be for what I plan to do and did some budgeting. I have the keyboard and mouse purchased (didn't need that with a laptop). I ordered the monitor (the Samsung ViewFinity UHD monitor on sale from Best Buy currently for $229 was a fraction of the cost of an Apple monitor ($1599)) and ordered Mac Studio with the M2 Max chip (custom configured direct from Apple). I also found a case on Amazon to store the computer, mouse, and keyboard when I'm not using them. I don't have a desk, so I will need to put that away every day; the case will help. Fortunately, I have my iPad Mini for portability.
I'm looking forward one day to trying out the Unreal Engine and maybe creating some animated stories, but that would take an enormous amount of time from writing. I'll find the balance somehow. It sure would be fun to get into scripting my books into animated stories, though! Maybe when I'm finished with the Forgotten Worlds series, I'll dig into animated stories more fully, but that would be at least a couple of years in the future.
The main reason for now to upgrade is book trailers. The MacBook is a 15" with 2.3 MHz Intel Core i9 and only 16 GB RAM and 500 GB hard drive space. I wasn't planning on creating book trailers when I bought it. And when I bought it, my previous MacBook Pro stopped charging on me and I had to make an emergency purchase from what was available locally. (I was working from home at the start of Covid, so it was a true emergency.) After creating a couple of trailers using Ae templates (see below), I found I really like the visual medium. However, I'm running out of hard drive space, and the RAM and processor can't handle After Effects. Premiere Pro isn't a problem, but Ae has the best features, so it's time to upgrade (and Apple financing at 0% for 12 months is too convenient).
It's an investment that will give me the power to create in new ways.
(The 1 minute trailer below took 2 hours to render on my MacBook Pro, and it was running hot!)
I hate getting older. Keeping track of a million things is about 999,999 more than I can handle at one time. I live off lists. I always did, but now it's going completely haywire! The day job has me feeling like a chicken with its head cut off most of the time, and I've had so many things going on outside of the day job that I can hardly keep up, even with a calendar. ðĪŠ
Nevertheless, I do manage to get some writing time in. I'm working on Book 16 of Forgotten Worlds. So far, I have 6,000 words of that and a synopsis that leaves room for surprises. Since these are short novels of 40K-50K words, that's good progress.
Relationships have changed over the past few books and one character's arc is going to head down a dark path while others are resolving issues. You won't see some of it come to fruition for some time. I have to be careful how I plot those changes.
By now, you've had a chance to see something that you may have suspected, if you've read SOUL SHADOW. That book is a bit dark, because it reveals the creature that Nya has been conscripted by the Starfire entities to fight. She gets a taste of battle with the creature directly.
I have to reveal a little secret in developing that story, or at least in editing. I had been having questions about how to handle certain religious issues of this story; and shortly before I started the editing process, I found Father Chad Ripperger on YouTube (see this previous post). His lectures hooked me and explained a lot about spiritual warfare that I had some knowledge about but not to the degree that he clarified. The scariest part is that he confirmed some things I suspected, which were incorporated into SOUL SHADOW already.
Although the creature that the Issan worship isn't a true demon, it is a monster that acts like one. I focused on L'Ni, however, using the creature as a crutch and showing how he rejected it and breaks its influence on his life. This will give you the readers, like Nya and the other characters, a bigger revelation of what's at stake.
Once I finished editing and published Book 13--what a number for a book of such a dark plot (I didn't realize it until afterwards. Honest!)--I read through Book 14. That's a mess. I don't look forward to editing that one. Adding action to Nik's and Ann's wedding was a challenge--the wedding alone would have been boring--but I'm not so sure certain aspects flow well. Certain changes feel a bit abrupt. I may have to rearrange some things. ð
I won't even touch Book 15 for a while, since I had just finished that. So, for now, I'll keep working on Book 16, but I really can't wait until Book 17. I will finally get to reveal something BIG that I've been planning for a long time and hinting. In the meantime, I'm trying to stay focused on 16, returning to Seska and the results of her helping her people escape. Ann's very public marriage to Nik has created some panic in Paxon leadership, so there's a lot to unpack for book 16. This series is getting a bit more complex.
Exciting! Isn't it? ð
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I've never applied it as a reader of any particular book, but as an author, music definitely has an influence on me. There's something about music that inspires, whether it's a deep, thumping bass; a lively jig; a dramatic score; something discordant and creepy; or soft and gentle. Music can affect ones emotions and inspire ideas. Its affects are well documented in studies.
As a writer, I often hear a song that connects with a particular scene or character. It has a power all its own on my creativity, igniting a focus that I can't escape.
All of my books have at some point had songs or scores that hit the right note (pun intended) with a scene or character.
In my latest series, Starfire Angels: Forgotten Worlds, I've found some scores along the way that kept me going, but when it came to Book 10: DRAGON AND FURY, there have been two now that really struck me. Initially, Shadowlands by Revolt Music Productions struck me as the combat games entrance of each titular fighter, the Black Dragon and the Fury.
I can't help but to picture their entrance, the pause before the fight starts, and then the beginning of their fight. It first struck me at some point while writing the book. I could see it for other possibilities too.
And then, after releasing the book, I was struck by Undefeated by Skillet.
This one too, I could see for the intense action between the combatants, but I could see this in general for many parts of the series.
And long before these, when I heard Everlasting Legacy by Really Slow Motion, I saw a trailer for the series.
Similarly, there's In Ascendance, also from Revolt Production Music. (I find the whole album to have a very action-intense/science fiction feel, but this one in particular has hooked me with the trailer feel.)
Others on my playlist that inspire me in this series include music not only from the composers I mentioned but also Two Steps from Hell, Ivan Torrent, Audiomachine, and Future World Music. There are others, but I just thought I'd share something of what I like when I'm writing this series. Two Steps from Hell is soft compared to some of the others I listed, but you hear their music in many trailers and are hearing more of these others. I've listened to these so often that I'll watch a movie trailer or hear a commercial and instantly recognize the music.
There are far more songs and compositions I could go through, but this will give you an idea of what presently inspires me in my science fiction and some of the music that really grabs me with imagining particular points in the Forgotten Worlds series, up to this point in it. I'm sure there will be others as I continue to write.
Off topic, I just have two other notes... I can say that the first draft of Book 13 is two-thirds done. It will be interesting, but I hope all the books are. I also saw a first glimpse of my new website and... WOW! I can't wait until it's ready for the big reveal.
I just realized the addiction that all sff writers must have, which I am calling MSUAIG (Making Stuff Up As I Go, although the "S" could be a certain 4-letter word). I have spent this morning checking through the previous 9 books of the Forgotten Worlds series and realizing how much I didn't add to my series wiki (aka series bible) that I should have in there for when I have questions. I have also realized that I need to break it into some new categories because it has grown to be too much for simple alphabetizing. I knew this would happen but not to this degree.
Fictional worlds with your own made up stuff can get tangled with details of other fictional worlds we've enjoyed, and keeping that straight is like untangling delicate necklaces that were thrown into a box and shook up. (If you've ever experienced that, you know what a frustration it is to untangle.) It's also why I can't read much of other books or watch much television other than news/nonfiction when I'm in a project like this. I can only do that when I'm taking a break or it gets jumbled.
At some point, the MSUAIG catches up and I have too much stuff to manage easily. I need to make the time to organize it better now that it's grown so enormous. I only have half this series written and it's already a monster to manage. I hope that I can keep everything consistent, which was why I was checking through the past books. There are some small formatting inconsistencies, but nothing major, at least nothing major that jumped out at me. That's also why I make notes about certain details that don't fit neatly into any category.
Nevertheless, I am doing my best to stay on top of those details. I am a stickler for it, but I am nowhere near perfect. I would need a photographic memory to keep track of everything perfectly all the time. Since I don't have a perfect memory, I'll just have to keep making time to skim back over the series before I finish new books. This is partly why each new book is taking longer to finish...because I worry about details.
I am constantly worrying about names of people and places and numbers--did I already mention Nik's siblings besides Tatiana (Tia)? Did I mention previously how long Ann was captain or how long Simms was her first officer? I also worry about uniforms and descriptions and sayings--What expression would a Paxon use for frustration? (that I can remember pretty easily--Cursed Issan!)... and that's just a drop in the bucket of details I worry about.
You get the idea. Details like these are difficult to keep on track, but there are many minor details that worry me, perhaps even more so because they more easily slip by.
I am working hard on the final edits of Book 10 in the hopes of publishing later this month. This is but a small part of the editing process, and usually after I've managed the major factors of the story. However, it is very important to me to the point that, if you find any inconsistencies, please contact me. There may be a logical reason for something seeming to be inconsistent, but it could also be that no one else caught the mistake.
So, I've been struggling with writing Starfire Angels: Forgotten Worlds for the last month. I've been writing scenes and scrapping them. Something has been off, partly me (unfocused and foggy) and partly because of that unconscious mind trying to say something is wrong with the plan. The infamous infection of writer's block has been a scourge on me, a blight that I haven't been able to lift.
And then, when I thought I had the story moving forward, albeit at a snail's pace, I realized what I was actually writing was the end of #7 and the beginning of #8. It just occurred to me today while walking on the treadmill and watching an episode of Stargate: Atlantis. Something in that episode of Dr. Weir having to fight nanites who have been trying to make her believe she never went to Atlantis clicked for me.
Disposition of Dreams is very similar in a way, and that's the only hint anyone is getting of the plot at this point, except for the blurb on the front of the cover that is online.
If you look closely, it says "Nya's survival will depend on choosing the right reality." It was an interesting story to write and very appropriate for the series progress. You'll see why this summer.
The problem has been following that up. I am so anxious to skip right to #8, Racing the Orast Belt (or something like that for the title), that I think a part of my mind was trying to skip ahead and write that when I know I should be writing the transition between the two books. What I want to write and what I know I should be writing have been conflicting, like trying to drive a car with one foot on the gas and one on the brake.
Now, while rewatching Stargate: Atlantis, I finally became aware of the conflict that was causing this horrendous case of writer's block. With that knowledge, I think I can go forward on FW7, because it occurred to me what I needed was something else entirely than what I expected. Nya suffered greatly in 6, and 7 needs to reflect that and move her forward in healing. And I was thinking while walking that I wanted to do more with Vel's character development. That with the plot in the Atlantis episode made me realize what the series needed in a way that finally satisfied the unconscious writing mind.
I've moved what I had started for FW7 to be the opening for FW8, so I'm back to a blank page for 7; in other words, starting over (again), but I know now what I need to do. Also, I didn't know how I was going to start 8, and what I was creating under the guise of 7 works brilliantly; the general scenes will remain to get the characters to the races, figuratively and literally. However, it will require some rewriting with whatever I fill in between. I had also written a scene that I felt was more of a closing/transition scene (which are usually characters outside the main cast) and will use that at the end of 7. This will set me back, but it will move the series forward in a better way. I just needed to get that out of my head so I could clear it away for what I really needed to do.
Whew! Writing can be a mess sometimes. I took on this challenge of such a series because I had a vision to write something grand in scale and scope. I knew it would be a challenge, but I thought I had it under control. My muse loves to torment me sometimes.
To all my loyal readers, thank you! I appreciate your continued support, and I promise to do my best to entertain you.
To all readers, I have a request in exchange for the short time of reading pleasure that (I hope) my stories brought you. I don't like to ask, but my books are needing some love. Many of my books are free, so I hope you consider this a small price in exchange.
Please leave reviews, especially on Amazon. You don't know how much that helps me, especially if you liked a particular book and think others would also.
It helps others readers discern if a book/series would be for them or not.
I need a minimum number of reviews and rating to qualify for some forms of advertising. Without that, I can't hope to attract more readers.
Reviews are figured in the algorithms to make a book appear in more searches on Amazon.
If you would like to see one of my stories gain new ground so that others are more likely discover the same enjoyment that I hope you've found in my worlds, this is how you can help.
I put in countless hours on each book, developing, creating, writing, rewriting (many times!), and editing, so that you can escape from real world troubles for a short while. I only ask a few minutes of your time outside of that escape to leave some comments and a star rating.
