Think I know why I was having so much trouble with that transition in Lowborn. I’m doing what I do quite often, and scrapping the whole scene I just wrote *laugh*
I like it — don’t get me wrong — but it just doesn’t advance the plot quickly enough, introduces characters that have just enough detail to make people wonder what happened to them when they drift out of the story shortly thereafter, and the aforementioned transition issue.
When I write, I just let my characters go. Sometimes, they wander down roads of the trivial. They always seem to meet and say interesting things along the way, but it just doesn’t take them toward a destination.
I’m working the rewrite now, hoping it will provide a smooth segue into the conclusion of this chapter so I can put it to bed and take a look at some of the other stalled stories/chapters of recent days.
Meanwhile, a couple of other things are steadily building in my head. One, I believe I’ve mentioned before. It’s a Halloween story inspired by Ghostbusters, going with my own mythos on ghosts and the business of paranormal investigation and elimination. No proton packs, I’m afraid 😉
Another has been kicking around for a long time, but I’ve never really had a solid grasp on it until recently. It’s a fembot story — but then again, it isn’t. #1, it won’t be following the “rules” I’ve seen reference to quite often to this genre — mainly because I don’t know them *laugh* Saying much more about this one would spoil too much ( assuming I get around to writing it )
I’ve had a lot of (pseudo) Science Fantasy kicking around in my head lately. That may very well herald some multi-part stories as Les Lumens in the genre. I’ve even had a couple of actual Science Fiction tales sparking. I may very well have to take some time exploring some of these to get them out of my head. I’ve had that problem before, too. If I try to concentrate on something while my muse is poking me with something else, nothing gets done.
The more I think about it, the more likely it is that there will be an off-season “of the woods” story coming out. First, there are some plot bunnies that don’t really fit the Earth Day theme, but still fit into the building story of the series. Second, it’s a defiance of the Triad of Ultimate Ego and their rantings. That bunch of numbskulls needs someone to flip them the bird, and I have every intention of doing so.
Could be a story in the Summer Lovin’ contest at Lit, though I’ve had more ideas for Winter Holiday. If I have a really good spark for Summer, I’ll write it, but otherwise, I’m letting that Christmas idea percolate. It will be interesting to explore the wood in Winter ( though the climate of the undisclosed location isn’t exactly prone to a “Winter Wonderland” ) If both ideas work, I’ll probably post them both.
The winter one, if it happens, would almost certainly be titled “Gift of the Wood”, and star Xanbrina ( Daughter of the Wood ) again. Any stories in the series that I write between then and now will build up to this one, as it has a climax that I’ve been musing for quite some time now to reveal another bit of magic inherent to the family.
It’s possible that this one may even skip ahead, leaving a couple of stories between Secret and Gift that I’ll eventually write. After all, I have Glen, Xanmara, and Xannera to explore. I purposely inserted Daniel’s birth to narrow the timeline necessary to have new 18 yr. old characters to less than 18 years *laugh* I would have had to start inserting Jetson cars in a couple of years at the pace I was moving through time. Now, I can cut that in half.
Just a bit muse reporting, to show that all the missing days in the blog haven’t been completely unproductive. Even when I don’t feel like writing, I’m often mulling over stories.
I think that what I’m going to do to get SOTM moving again is to actually combine the scene I’m writing now with one I had planned for later. I’m going to introduce a minor chracter who will have an important place in the short run, and some cameo appearances later ( much like Heather and Carolyn ) and I think moving that introduction into the same scene with the one I’m writing now may be just the punch that is missing and leaving me stalled there.
The one thing I probably won’t be doing is entering the Nude Day contest. That one is just completely uninspiring to me. In order to be on theme, you almost must have public nudity and have it centered on Nude Day. There’s simply very few ways to write anything believable within those boundaries — at least for me.
Okay, back to the Lowborn rewrite. Just thought I’d put on “paper” some of the stuff that’s been going on behind the scenes with all the gaps in the blog.
