Monster hunters, spaceships and comedy of manners by indie author Mel Dunay
This is a tricky sequence to write in the third Hunter Healer King book, because a similar conversation foreshadowing it occurs towards the end of the second Hunter Healer King book. The bit of dialogue below was cut when I reworked the conversation in the WIP and it went in a different direction:
“I agree that Father Feuerbach is a good man to have at your back in a crisis,” Maxim went on, “But the Imperial throne does not, in its current form, attract that kind of crisis.”
Last November, I thought I had gotten Undead Flight into pretty decent shape, and looking ahead to a logistically complicated Thanksgiving, thought, “Gee, I might as well push it out the door now.” From a certain point of view: this was the correct move. My grandmother fell terminally ill in early December, I traveled out there once to see her before she passed, and once again for the funeral. It was only around Christmas time that my mother bought a copy of Undead Flight and brought me the bad news: I hadn’t made all the changes she and my father had advised. So, a week or so back, I sat down with a copy of the book loaded on kindle and my trusty notebook, made notes of what needed to be fixed, and made the fixes last weekend. Then Amazon randomly threw a hissy fit about the print cover, so I had to adjust that. (There was a violent stomach bug in between Amazon fussing about my print cover and me feeling well enough to do something about it.) Anyway, by the time you read this on Friday, Undead Flight should be…not perfect, but but improved. I apologize for any inconvenience.
I feel like there’s sometimes a tendency among writing gurus to pretend that either you systematically plot everything beat by beat, or you only write the story as it spontaneously generates in your head, with no notes or thoughts about how it’s going. As it happens, I’m reading History of the Lord of the Rings right now. Tolkien is usually described as a discovery writer, and the people who say that are not wrong, but he didn’t necessarily sit around waiting for inspiration to strike either…
Continue reading “Weird Wednesday: Discovery Writing” →When you create a space regency setting as kind of a joke about
Continue reading “That Horrifying Moment…” →I have like one line in the space regency about Longbourn having a drawing room with turquoise walls and pink furniture, but Midjourney kind of ran amok with the idea when I prompted it.
An example of me getting a bit rambly during the previous week’s dictation session. This got cut because Maxim’s cousin Victor interjected himself into the conversation earlier than I originally thought. And it’s not entirely in character for Maxim to try to shield Chloe to that extent.
Continue reading “Friday Fragments: Chloe and the Wolf” →This was originally published as a novella in a pulp magazine in 1945 before being expanded into a full-length novel and re-published in that form, and it feels somewhat padded in the middle. It’s a weird, rambly first person sort of thing that sounds like the author managed to get Raymond Chandler and Edgar Allen Poe stuck in his head simultaneously. Usually hyped as a mystery story with extra atmosphere, I would say rather that it’s a psychological horror story which uses mystery tropes to help ground itself. Above the cut, I will only say that Red Right Hand spends about a quarter of its length hinting in one particular direction, and the middle two quarters basically saying that possible solution out loud while simultaneously laying down markers for the actual resolution in the final quarter. More interesting than good, and not helped by the fact that the only truly sympathetic characters – the policemen and the damsel in distress – are pretty peripheral. But it’s very much its own thing, and if that counts for anything with you, it might be worth a try. Just remember, if you find yourself thinking that “obvious solution is obvious,” stick around to the end.
More detailed, spoilery thoughts below the cut. Leave now or be spoiled.
Continue reading “Weird Wednesday: Red Right Hand by Joel Townsley Owens” →I cut this bit during the dictation cleanup process because it’s kind of rambly, and it’s not literally true that all Chloe knows about Maxim’s cousin is his parentage. Back in Wolf’s Trail, she also had to look up stuff in a book Victor wrote.
I’d heard references once or twice to Victor. Maxim and the other Storm Crows seemed to respect him, while the Continentals—the ordinary people of Noricum with no ancient knowledge or long lifespan—seemed to fear him. The only thing I knew for certain of him was that he was Jerome’s son, and Jerome I had no particular use for.
Occasionally, I offer moral support and solutions that worked for me in the comments section of other writing blogs, but I don’t do a lot of it here. What works for me might not work for you, and vice versa. That being said, I’m seeing certain things come up over and over again in certain places on the web, and I feel like I have to put my oar in. Since nobody asked me, I can’t call them “Frequently Asked Questions,” but I feel comfortable calling this “Frequently Seen Questions…”
Continue reading “Frequently Seen Questions About Writing” →
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