Next Step

Alright so since I last posted I've done a lot of stuff, including finishing the read-through.

I have a notebook now of all my problems and even have the two problems I was most worried about kind of solved in my head. So it's a successful step in this whole beast of a project! The 'Giant List of Doom' method totally works and I maybe should have done that first. But it was easier to read now that I've gone through it all for phrasing already. So no regrets.

I'll start the actual going-back and chopping things up next week. For now I have a million other projects to get started on/work on/finish before I go back to school in a few weeks so I should do stuff with that.

Other news! I'm making a tumblr. You should all go check it out in a few days once I start posting. For further reference though the url is wilsathethief.tumblr.com! It'll be great fun. It's going to be a writing blog, but not just for my manuscript like this one is. I'm going to supplement this blog, as well as promote it on the tumblr but I'm going to do the more tumblr-esque reblogging and general writing nerdery as well. I used to have a tumblr way back when and the writing community on there is really fun.

The tumblr will also update on my other writing projects, and probably some illustration as well. So yay! more projects! and Art things!

Speaking of illustration: I have like three more painting ideas for this story, and I really want to start working on a full-cast painting, or at least a couple of different-setting casts. I've been doing more digital painting and it's beautiful to work with.

New inspiration: Wildweasel339 on deviantart, I believe his name is Lane Brown? this is a link to ONE of his beautiful paintings: http://wildweasel339.deviantart.com/art/Rooty-Tooty-196344648
but really he does the most amazing things. especially fantasy landscapes and scenes. It amazes me beyond words.

That's all for this post! More next time! (hopefully that won't be three weeks from now!)

On to Part Three

Well I'm over halfway through the story on the read-through. Now we're getting to the action.

Part Two is a little beat up, but in a good way. There's a lot I left undeveloped, and a lot I can add to make it fit even better into the story, which was a main concern from the beginning. I've got my notes and while I'm sure when I go back and fix things this part will take more time than the first, I'm not worried.

Going into Part Three I've got to look at a lot of pacing, and this is where many of my main logistical and agreement concerns lie. My notebook's about to get much busier.

So far I've had mostly local problems, and very few if any that affected larger parts of the story and plot. Going forward there's going to be bigger problems. I'm going to try my best to brainstorm solutions as I go, but also to try my best not to get overwhelmed.

It's hard changing something you spent so much time creating, and I find myself wanting to be lazy and saying that something's "good enough." But I can't allow myself to fall into that trap. You don't get better by accepting your faults, but by striving tirelessly to fix them. I have to stay vigilant, no matter how much more work I discover has to be done.

Here's hoping everyone's having an inspired week, as I am.

Reading Through the Mountains

I'm most of the way through Part Two now, still, whichever. It's been slow going this week because I've been doing a bunch of other projects as well. But I'm actually being productive, so that's good!

The Mountains section of the manuscript is as I remembered, a lot of fluff and just pretty things. I'm not going to cut any, just add a lot of information and character development that I was too lazy to put in while I was writing it. I'm going to make it a more important part of the story.

This is just a quick update, my eyes are drooping as I type this and I have a lot to do tomorrow. Sleep tight, everyone.

Wow, That Was a Month.

So this is good, instead of once a week I seem to be keeping very nicely with a monthly posting rate.

Oy.

I finally started editing again, life and being generally in a funk having kept me from it almost completely. This week has been good, though. I'm almost done with part two, and I seem to have different opinions on things than I did while anticipating problems, which is both good and bad. Good because some things don't need to be cut or completely rearranged as I had thought, but bad in that I need to add a lot, especially to part two. I also have found myself thinking things like this:

(Photo: actual note on the manuscript that I found minutes ago)

One habit I've discovered is that of making half-baked characters. Especially with fantasy stories, the cast of characters can become overwhelmingly large, and I'm not that experienced with handling that kind of responsibility. Apparently I can kill hundreds at a time, but God forbid I actually develop a minor character past a name and vague profession.

So I have a lot of that kind of thing to fix.

This weekend I'm going larping again- one of the few activities I've kept up with this summer and is keeping me relatively sane.

Or at least, as sane as someone can be when they rely on larping for a sense of normality.

So I won't be getting any editing done tomorrow through Sunday, but there are people at the event I'm going to ask about some things. I know of others who write, and certainly most everyone there is familiar with fantasy writing. (Seriously, so many there are such amazing storytellers.)

Hope everyone is having a good summer so far!
Have a safe Fourth of July!

Part One Review

I'm most of the way through Part One of the manuscript now. It took me only like, a month and a half! Not really, I only got back to working on it the other day. I've had a... chaotic past couple months. But I'm back to it now!

Now that I'm home from school and safely nestled in the backwoods of New Jersey, caught up on sleep, and have more than two days to prepare for the next larping event, I actually have time. It's a nice feeling, not having finals or papers or Macbeth taking up 20 out of my 24 hours a day.

So the progress: I'm over halfway through Part One. The writing is a bit (or a lot) iffy at some parts, especially in the very beginning so I see why I got so frustrated with it on the first edit. I'm not changing much on the read-through except for miswordings and typos every once in a while. Once I do my major edits I'm planning a third edit to go through and fix the writing more, and that should smooth everything over. I've not found anything unfixable yet, so it's not a frustrating experience [yet].

My notebook is separated by chapter, and I've run into relatively few problems so far, which I'm glad of. Most of it is just tone and writing things. But then again, Part One was never the part I was worried about for logistical inconsistencies, just writing. Hopefully the rest of the manuscript will follow this kind of predictability in what needs to be fixed.

I'm going to get back to it, now! Hope you all are having a great summer so far!

Last Weeks in Kentucky

This is one of my last weeks on campus, so though Tech Week for Macbeth is now over, now I have final projects and the like to frantically complete. Basically, I don't have a whole lot of time to sleep, much less edit and otherwise function like a normal human being.

So not a lot of editing has gotten done this week- a little has, but only a very very little. I've read enough to realize how bad the writing is in the beginning of the manuscript- and see how bad my patch job was the first time through. But once I finish the read-through and major cut/pasting, I can go back and make the writing decent. It's not so bad that I can't read it- a little distracting, but more of an incentive to get done and go back to fix it than a soul-crushing hindrance as before.

I should stop procrastinating and get some more work done, but first I'll leave you with a couple sketches I've done this week. (sketching is a good procrastinator, funny enough)

This second one is a uniform of sorts that I thought up for the scholars of the Valley castle- I thought since they're a pretty tight community they might dress differently from others, so here's an idea for a High Wizard costume.

Working on Macbeth's costumes has influence what I'm designing in my head, and now I've been watching a bit more of Game of Thrones (my friends have gotten me hooked, and I've been watching it in between classes because I have no self control) so the costumes on that are making me geek out about gowns and things. Such a pretty show.

Getting back to work now.

Have a good night, everyone!

On! To the Second Edit

Greetings!

Due to life and school interfering, I have not gotten back to editing until tonight. As it is I'm typing this from backstage of my school's rendition of Macbeth. Someone just walked by me covered head-to-thigh in fake blood; I've been braiding hair all night; it's all crazy fun.

So. Today was beautiful; Spring in Kentucky is the most beautiful season I've ever seen. My college campus is gorgeous, and it's really inspiring. I've also been doing a lot of good reading for school; Macbeth of course, Emma, Murder in Amsterdam, etc. and now that tech week is dying down for the play I'm ready to use all this momentum and good energy and imagination towards my own projects.

I'm working costumes for Macbeth, and between that and knowing I'll be back in town for the next larping event has made me super pumped about redesigning my costume and sketching characters again. I'm super rusty so no sketches to post yet, but soon.

Today I looked at my editing notes again and decided on my game plan this time around. Last edit I was mostly just fixing whatever I could and making it so I was comfortable with the size and quality of what I was really going to work with. Now I have to do the major changes and heavy cutting and pasting, as well as fixing major plot holes and character and scene inconsistencies.

Right now I have a small list beside my original outline (which turned out to be mostly accurate, besides not including the events of two full chapters and almost the whole of Elle's trip to the Mountains) but it's not very detailed and I'm sure I missed some problems. So I've decided on a three-part plan.

First I'll read through the whole manuscript, without stops. I'll write down all the problems I have and where they affect the story and just general problem areas.

Second comes a revamped outline. On Scrivener everything is set up as an outline in the left margin, which will make it much easier to outline and remember chapter names and things. This outline will concentrate on the main plot and goal of each chapter or part and the things that need fixing to accomplish the goal for that section. I'll code things that are local problems and the ones that are farther reaching-that need fixing in multiple places, such as agreement with a certain scene or character trait. This should give me a good guide to what I have to do.

The third part then should be relatively easy- it's daunting now to say "just go and fix everything" but once I have done the first two parts I'll know exactly what needs to be done and a better idea of what specifically I need to do to fix it- I will use my new outline/editing guide and do the fixes. This will involve mostly cutting and pasting and adding or deleting or tweaking scenes to make things agree.

I'm going to go continue my outline now. Wish me luck!