So, I felt fairly lousy today and instead of doing market research, finished reading through Nightmare in Shining Armor, the vampire/quest fantasy mashup I mentioned yesterday. And I still don't know what to do with it. The mechanics of magic have to be worked out a little better. The contemporary culture references have to be updated. (But I really like the dwarf analog getting into Meat Loaf's "Bat Out of Hell" on a Walkman!) I have not overcome the inherent writing problems of the quest structure, which involves constant changes of scene and transitory characters.
But I like the relationship between Galen, the "vampire," and Bethany, his donor, which is controlled by her until the point, near the climax, when he admits to himself that she's "always been crazy as a bedbug." I like Hathil, the youthful queen who chews her nails and persuades Galen to accept the central quest by admitting that yes, it's inherently a bad thing to do and no, she may not be able to offer him anything he really wants in return. I like the political background and how the international situation keeps banging up against the plot as former allies quarrel over the bones of a conquered territory.
But mostly I love Galen and Bethany's guide through quest territory, Corix, variously known as "Big Brother" (Hathil's name for him), "Hathil's dog," "the queen's Right Hand," "Hathil's half-breed," "Your Efficacy," and various less complimentary things. He's the result of some pretty serious miscegenation, enough that his father's people don't like to admit he exists. He loves his husband, eats appalling amounts of garlic (which is important to the plot), and is supremely good at his job,which boils down to "Making sure Hathil gets what Hathil wants." In context, and if you have my sense of humor, his dialog, particularly with Galen and Bethany, who are veterans of the foster care system and continually pushing against him on the grounds that he's Authority, is often funny in a low-key way.
He's probably a little too perfect.
So I still don't know what, if anything, I'm going to do with this. Better sleep on it.
P.S. The sewing/laundry room has yellow dadoes now! It's gorgeous! This is really happening!
Thursday, July 14, 2011
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Less Progress
What can I say? It's hot. I had health crap this weekend. Monday was my birthday, today is my anniversary, and I've been having trouble keeping track of what day it is.
In the mornings it's pleasant to sit on the porch with the laptop, but in the afternoons it's the study with the air on or nothing; but the study with the air on isn't all that cool and I have a lot of distractions on this machine. This morning I got the hook into what I think is reasonable shape and it needs to cool. I think I took the manuscript out a little too early, because although I can't believe it's ready to go after only two passes, I don't see where the work needs to be. I was expecting to have to tweak the camel stuff, but my camel expert says not to. (Good for me.) So I'm getting someone to read through it for me and tell me where I go wrong.
Meantime I should be doing market research, which - well, let's just say I spent the morning on the porch reading an old dormant manuscript, instead. The vampire/alternate-world quest mash-up, in which there is some good stuff but I don't, so far, quite see how to salvage it. The trouble with it is, that I took two common tropes of which I am fed up and mixed them together to get something I rather like. But this is exactly the kind of thing I have the hardest time selling: It looks like this other inexplicably popular crap, but it's better. Yeah, that doesn't sound clueless or egotistical, does it?
However, the sunroom beadboard is painted bright white and the yellow will go onto the dado tomorrow, and our back steps have sturdy wooden rails, so at least somebody's making visible progress around here. Meanwhile, Happy Anniversary to Damon and Me.
In the mornings it's pleasant to sit on the porch with the laptop, but in the afternoons it's the study with the air on or nothing; but the study with the air on isn't all that cool and I have a lot of distractions on this machine. This morning I got the hook into what I think is reasonable shape and it needs to cool. I think I took the manuscript out a little too early, because although I can't believe it's ready to go after only two passes, I don't see where the work needs to be. I was expecting to have to tweak the camel stuff, but my camel expert says not to. (Good for me.) So I'm getting someone to read through it for me and tell me where I go wrong.
Meantime I should be doing market research, which - well, let's just say I spent the morning on the porch reading an old dormant manuscript, instead. The vampire/alternate-world quest mash-up, in which there is some good stuff but I don't, so far, quite see how to salvage it. The trouble with it is, that I took two common tropes of which I am fed up and mixed them together to get something I rather like. But this is exactly the kind of thing I have the hardest time selling: It looks like this other inexplicably popular crap, but it's better. Yeah, that doesn't sound clueless or egotistical, does it?
However, the sunroom beadboard is painted bright white and the yellow will go onto the dado tomorrow, and our back steps have sturdy wooden rails, so at least somebody's making visible progress around here. Meanwhile, Happy Anniversary to Damon and Me.
Friday, July 8, 2011
Thursday, July 7, 2011
And more progress
Just drafted a hook. Of course it sucks, it's a first draft; but I think the last line is a keeper.
"And what kind of man would she be if she left Miss Diana to fend for herself in a nest of vipers?"
I wonder, is A Nest of Vipers a decent title for this?
I work to the music of nail guns - the workmen are back.
"And what kind of man would she be if she left Miss Diana to fend for herself in a nest of vipers?"
I wonder, is A Nest of Vipers a decent title for this?
I work to the music of nail guns - the workmen are back.
Wednesday, July 6, 2011
More progress
Revision Pass 2 complete. 85,471 words. 338 pages. Average word length still 4, average sentence length reduced to 14. Longest sentence is now 78 words long and be damn if I know where it is. I didn't see it.
There's supposed to be all kinds of workmen here this week, but I'm not seeing them, either.
There's supposed to be all kinds of workmen here this week, but I'm not seeing them, either.
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
Titles Len's Story Will Not Have
Fistful of Specie (This phrase is used in the text; I didn't notice till I did the backward revision).
Len and Bean Go Over a Cliff.
The Trail of the American Horse.
An American Transvestite in Texas.
Secrets of the Purple Sage.
Western Disguise.
The Making of a Man, from Scratch.
Frontier Masquerade.
Found with the Wind.
Letters on the Western Wind.
Oh Western Wind, When Wilt Thou Blow?
Leaving Homestead.
Inventing Len Hausman.
Three days of insomnia reduces the inhibitions, which I suppose is a good thing. Uncomfortable, though.
Len and Bean Go Over a Cliff.
The Trail of the American Horse.
An American Transvestite in Texas.
Secrets of the Purple Sage.
Western Disguise.
The Making of a Man, from Scratch.
Frontier Masquerade.
Found with the Wind.
Letters on the Western Wind.
Oh Western Wind, When Wilt Thou Blow?
Leaving Homestead.
Inventing Len Hausman.
Three days of insomnia reduces the inhibitions, which I suppose is a good thing. Uncomfortable, though.
Sunday, July 3, 2011
Idea Garage Sale: The Alien Zoo
I conceived this as a Sims2 neighborhood I'll never have the time, dedication, and custom content to run, but it could also serve as the setting for an extended literary parody ala Silverlock or the Thursday Next books. Possibly also a shared world anthology, twisting the model established by Thieves' World and perfected in Bordertown. I don't think it'd make a very good RPG setting, though I'm willing to be proved wrong.
The aliens have set aside a series of islands in which to maintain viable populations of other intelligent (or by their standards possibly semi-intelligent) species. Their technology allows them to treat time and space very differently from what we're used to, so from our point of view they select samples from wildly disparate times and places as well as environments, and they construct the islands in some way that permits observation at will without disturbing the exhibits. Each sample, consisting of everybody they happened to find within a particular household on a particular night, is transported along with its immediate environment while sleeping and set down in a suitable location on the island.
"Suitable" is an aliencentric notion, so the March family's modest Concord home may find itself next door to a single tenement from Dickens's London, inhabited by Fagin, Sikes, Nancy, Oliver, the Artful Dodger, and assorted other folks. The Bennet family may find itself forced to consider the suitability of Sherlock Holmes, Dr. Watson, Horatio Hornblower, Babbit, and Sir Lancelot as husband material for Jane, Lizzie, Mary, Kitty, and Lydia. Scarlet O'Hara, Melanie, and Mammy may be in a burned-out Tara with a view of Dracula's castle in one direction and an Iroquois longhouse in the other. King Arthur, Guinivere, and whichever knights weren't out questing (not to mention Morgan Le Fay) would have to adjust to a life without a tax base, and the inhabitants of the Little House on the Prairie would have their movements sharply restricted.
This would be intended as a human breeding colony by the aliens, so they'd be encouraged and manipulated into mingling and developing whatever hodgepodge sort of culture they could. Probably the aliens would arrange for some kind of educational system which would enable the colony to become more or less self-supporting and self-policing, and would interfere only when their own interests are threatened. Probably policies would fluctuate with changes of management, the alien political climate, and available funding; or it's possible that the policy would be consistent, but based on principles and implemented through a space-time continuum so foreign that it would seem to fluctuate from the point of view of the people affected. I envision Sherlock Holmes spending half his days trying to work out the rules governing the place and the other half desperately trying to get more tobacco.
The problem with this is that I don't have a plot at all, just a setting and more characters than anybody needs. Throwing the characters together would generate plenty of conflicts and hence stories, but this is exactly the kind of setting which sucks one into spending the whole time worldbuilding and none of it storytelling.
It's two in the morning and I can't shut my brain off. Maybe sending this out into the ether will help. Happy Independence Weekend, and don't forget to watch 1776! (The Laserdisc version if you can possibly get it.)
The aliens have set aside a series of islands in which to maintain viable populations of other intelligent (or by their standards possibly semi-intelligent) species. Their technology allows them to treat time and space very differently from what we're used to, so from our point of view they select samples from wildly disparate times and places as well as environments, and they construct the islands in some way that permits observation at will without disturbing the exhibits. Each sample, consisting of everybody they happened to find within a particular household on a particular night, is transported along with its immediate environment while sleeping and set down in a suitable location on the island.
"Suitable" is an aliencentric notion, so the March family's modest Concord home may find itself next door to a single tenement from Dickens's London, inhabited by Fagin, Sikes, Nancy, Oliver, the Artful Dodger, and assorted other folks. The Bennet family may find itself forced to consider the suitability of Sherlock Holmes, Dr. Watson, Horatio Hornblower, Babbit, and Sir Lancelot as husband material for Jane, Lizzie, Mary, Kitty, and Lydia. Scarlet O'Hara, Melanie, and Mammy may be in a burned-out Tara with a view of Dracula's castle in one direction and an Iroquois longhouse in the other. King Arthur, Guinivere, and whichever knights weren't out questing (not to mention Morgan Le Fay) would have to adjust to a life without a tax base, and the inhabitants of the Little House on the Prairie would have their movements sharply restricted.
This would be intended as a human breeding colony by the aliens, so they'd be encouraged and manipulated into mingling and developing whatever hodgepodge sort of culture they could. Probably the aliens would arrange for some kind of educational system which would enable the colony to become more or less self-supporting and self-policing, and would interfere only when their own interests are threatened. Probably policies would fluctuate with changes of management, the alien political climate, and available funding; or it's possible that the policy would be consistent, but based on principles and implemented through a space-time continuum so foreign that it would seem to fluctuate from the point of view of the people affected. I envision Sherlock Holmes spending half his days trying to work out the rules governing the place and the other half desperately trying to get more tobacco.
The problem with this is that I don't have a plot at all, just a setting and more characters than anybody needs. Throwing the characters together would generate plenty of conflicts and hence stories, but this is exactly the kind of setting which sucks one into spending the whole time worldbuilding and none of it storytelling.
It's two in the morning and I can't shut my brain off. Maybe sending this out into the ether will help. Happy Independence Weekend, and don't forget to watch 1776! (The Laserdisc version if you can possibly get it.)
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