• Imagined Snippets,  Random Ramblings,  Unheired Prince

    Their surprise is what I need

    This evening I accomplished taking care of some boring adulting tasks. The good news is they’re done, so I don’t have to worry about fitting them into my Thanksgiving weekend. The less good news is that tomorrow after work I’ll be packing for my Thanksgiving weekend trip, so it’s a couple days of no time to work on my novel. Realistically, I won’t be doing any editing while I’m visiting family this weekend either. I’ll have to come back strong next week!

    Today, in the Unheired Prince:

    The prince comes to all at once. And since he’s floating upside down, he comes to unpleasantly. He struggles, trying to right himself, but he has nothing but air to work with for momentum. It doesn’t matter. His captors notice immediately, and their surprise is what I need.

  • Imagined Snippets,  Random Ramblings,  Unheired Prince

    Like I could shout myself hoarse

    I enjoyed a dinner / movie night with a friend this evening. It has me posting later than usual so I am very tired at this point and the words aren’t coming easily. I’m not really sure what my creative blurb of the day should be.

    (there was actually a lot of staring at the screen and looking through my various stories after I wrote that)

    Back to the Unheired Prince:

    At first when I try it’s like there’s nothing on the other end. Like I could shout myself hoarse but no one’s close enough to hear me. So I don’t shout or say anything. I pull. Softly, then with the urgency that mounts inside me.

  • Random Ramblings,  Story Excerpts

    I ignore her

    Productive and fun day, though nothing to report on the front of my novel. I quite liked today’s Doctor Who. I’ve been struggling with the non-historical episodes not quite pulling me in, so this was nice in that it takes place in the future and had me interested from beginning to end.

    Today I’m going with a snippet from my novel because I feel like it says a lot about Eyan, one of my main characters, very succinctly. Incidentally, this paragraph is immediately before the one I shared yesterday.

    Atthya tries to stop me from completing the experience. She says it will make me angrier, that I already know all the facts, that it’s pointless. I ignore her.

  • Purse
    Random Ramblings,  Story Excerpts

    A fashionable line of women’s clothing that has large pockets (no, this post is not about a real brand)

    I feel very accomplished and much more optimistic about my novel after editing Chapters 29, 30, and 31 of Part Two, and Chapters 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 of Part Three. I know I could abbreviate that Chapters 1-8 but listing them separately makes me happy.

    There are many chapters in Part Two that need a lot of work, and probably a lot that needs to be cut, but today’s relatively smooth sailing reminded me that a lot of the novel is looking really good.

    Chapter 5 is honestly one I barely remember writing, one of the many chapters I sped through to meet my June 1 goal of having a complete draft. Today I’m going to share a snippet of it that amused me to no end when I got there today:

    Markyl is entirely focused on his work. The client he met with a few days ago has commissioned a logo for a new start-up company that, among other things, is committed to providing a fashionable line of women’s clothing that has large pockets instead of assuming all women carry purses. After two frustrating days of ideas that are at best derivative, and at worst, insultingly bad, he’s finally inspired. In the last hour he’s created the first and second variations of three separate logo designs. He has definite favorites, but they’re all good.

  • Imagined Snippets,  Random Ramblings,  Unheired Prince

    What would be more distracting?

    I need to trim this novel down. That is all.

    Okay, fine, it’s not all. Chapters 24, 25, and 26 have been edited. That’s the good news. We’ll just skip the details of the bad news.

    Let’s see about the Unheired Prince (I have a frustrated headache so this will be short):

    I wonder if they know about me. Because if they don’t, well…what would be more distracting than the prince you thought you’d neutralized taunting you?

  • Imagined Snippets,  Random Ramblings,  Unheired Prince

    Creatures of the in-between

    I’m feeling deflated. Chapter 19 is a mess. Chapters 20, 21, 22, and 23 are better, but choppy, and too much is going on in this novel. Plus there’s still so much I haven’t even gotten to in this read-through, including entire subplots.

    Oh well. At least I have a warm purring cat on my stomach.

    The Unheired Prince:

    There are only four of them. Possibly witches or demons. They have him in some kind of state of suspended animation, floating upside down in the mouth of the cave.

    I have to figure out what they are so I can protect myself against them. If they can incapacitate him like this, they may be able to do the same to me. Not if they’re witches, the center of my power is all off from what they’d expect. But creatures of the in-between will be trickier to deal with. How did they find him?

  • Alone
    Imagined Snippets,  Random Ramblings,  Unheired Prince

    What possible objection could you have?

    Rather than edit specific chapters, I’ve been clicking through scenes on my computer. Not sequential scenes, just whatever I happen to land on. There was a stretch of time when I added so much so quickly that there are scenes I don’t remember the specifics of. The broad strokes, yes, but not the details. It’s an interesting feeling.

    For the Unheired Prince:

    “I’ll send in the third battalion.”

    “Pardon?”

    “The third battalion. I’ll send them to retrieve the prince.”

    “No.”

    He raises his eyebrows, barely bothering to look at me, “What possible objection could you have?”

    The speed with which he’s switched to casual disdain is remarkable. We’ve worked side by side for years, and now that he knows what I am he no longer respects me. “The soldiers in the third battalion can be killed. I can’t be. I won’t risk unnecessary loss of life.”

    “You have no idea what odds you’d face in a solo effort. Just because you can’t be killed doesn’t mean he can’t be.”

    “We have no idea the odds anyone would face. I will assess the situation covertly and then decide whether to proceed on my own or with reinforcements.”

    He shakes his head, still dismissive. “If you’re seen or caught they’d only increase security and make the battalion’s job more difficult.”

    “You seem to be under the mistaken impression that this is open to debate. It’s not. As soon as we leave this room, I am the prince and you are the prince’s

  • Foreign Dignitaries
    Imagined Snippets,  Random Ramblings,  Unheired Prince

    Just to start another one

    I edited Chapters 15, 16, 17, and 18. Chapter 18 was super short. Shhhhh. Don’t tell anyone.

    None of these chapters are bad. But there are so many of them and this part of the novel is so meandering. Very real life, where things don’t just happen in a straight line, but maybe it’s too real life to work for fiction.

    Still on the Unheired Prince lark:

    I wish I could just leave. Go get the prince, die, and be done with it all. But since they think I’m the prince, my seeming disappearance wouldn’t go over well. And with all these foreign dignitaries here, accusations would spew. I didn’t persevere through this war just to start another one. I’m going to have to tell them. My – no, the prince’s – chief advisor, to start with.

  • Can't Be Killed
    Imagined Snippets,  Random Ramblings,  Unheired Prince

    They need never know about me

    I’ve considered, on and off, changing the tone of my novel’s ending to something more hopeful. Of course, the name “The Way of Attrition” might not be as accurate then, and the ending I have has lasted all the years I’ve been writing this novel, so I guess we’ll see. I have part of the more hopeful ending written, so it’ll exist in some form either way, even if it ends up being in an alternative writer’s universe.

    More for the Unheired Prince:

    I can’t be killed. Well, I can be killed, but only by the prince. Since he’s not functional, I essentially can’t be killed. That was the whole point of this arrangement. The whole point of my existence.

    I should be able to find, rescue, and bring him home. The people can crown their true leader. Now that the war is over, there’s no reason for him to remain in isolation. No one outside the circle of royal advisers need know he was ever gone. They need never know about me.