Seriously now?
This is a crazy business we are in, ladies and germs.
I’ve been a professional (defined as paid and paid enough to survive, at least if you’re willing to live a life of poverty in a Victorian garret) for — Dear Lord — twenty seven years.
You’d think I’d have this “thing” figured out, right?
I mean, don’t get me wrong, okay? Each book is different, which is part of what makes this job ideal for extreme ADD me. I can clean houses. I can garden. I can write books. Everything else, eventually, becomes deadly boring and I fall asleep while trying to do it.
Oh, that can also happen with books. I found that while “baby needs shoes” — or tuition — was a great motivator, after a while trying to write books I had not the slightest interest in, particularly when I did them back to back to back to back would have the same effect. It’s a weird, highly specialized form of narcolepsy: sit down to write, wake up an hour later, with a pain in your neck from being all folded. Wonder if you can short the computer by drooling on your keyboard.
But by and large, if I avoid writing “obligation” books one after the other, writing is interesting enough to keep me awake.
Because it mixes things up, see?
I always wonder about writers who loud and proud identify themselves: I’m a pantser. I’m a plotter. I’m a discovery writer. I’m a must-turn-around-three-times before writing.
Ah.
The only thing that applies to me is “it varies.” And even when I get stuck in one mode for several years — plotting. About five years — the actual workings of the thing change.
Like, I started by writing the plot, then writing to the plot. Easy, right? Okay. Then–
Then I had to write the plot, but it wouldn’t actually LET ME write to the plot. I’d sit and stare at the plot, and be afraid to actually start writing the book. What was I afraid of? No clue. To this day, after mumble mumble (don’t make me count) books I have yet to be eaten by rabid weasels because I started writing a chapter, okay?
However for a year or two the only way I could use the outline was to ADD TO THE OUTLINE. So you have say one paragraph, and you just keep adding to it, in layers, the final layer being dialogue, till you have a whole chapter. AND that’s the only way you can write the book. It’s a process somewhat akin to sculpting writhing fog, only not as much fun.
This then evolved into what I call Sarah shopping list mode. Write an outline. Never look at it again. Write to what you remember of the outline.
Which then tumbled into “Oh, you wrote the outline down? Yeah, no. Your subconscious isn’t going to let you write anything close to that outline.”
That’s where I was stuck when I wrote the first two Shifter books. I still HAD to outline. It’s just the plot would take straight angles to avoid following the plot. Probably (?) the weirdest process I’ve ever had.
This then tumbled into “Pantsing with a road map.” I don’t know the details of the story, but I have a general itinerary, and I know I’m stopping at some scenic overlooks along the way. The rest will become clearer close up.
Which had episodes — A FEW GOOD MEN — where you suddenly found yourself unable to see the scenic points. I wrote that entire d*mn book, fortunately in 2 weeks, while not knowing what came next or if there WAS a next chapter.
Right now I’m sort of in Pantsing With A Road Map, except periodically the road grows. “No, no. To get there, you need to go through the forest of dire wolves, first.” For no logical reason. Except it’s logical once you get there and look back.
HOWEVER the one thing that has been constant is that I write the book, I go over it once for plot, once for wording and it’s done.
Also, no book takes me a year or more to write, no matter how long. Unless something major happens like the cancer scare and five moves during Through Fire.
No, books get written in TOPS six months.
Another constant is that I very rarely CAN’T write less than three books at once. In fact, three books at once is how I cope with block, right. This one shut down, let me do a few chapters on that one….
And then there was No Man’s Land.
To begin with, it’s been at the back of my head for over forty years. I never wrote it, because I thought no one would buy it. (I was right too. One of the rejections, in the nineties for crying in bed, was on the pronouns I chose to use for hermaphrodites. If I used “she” they said, they would buy it, they said. (Except they don’t LOOK like she. Also I’m a stubborn b*tch.))
I finally realized I could write it, oh, five years ago, but then lockdowns and… So I had like four chapters. And then I started dreaming it. It’s always bad news when I start dreaming the damn book, and in this case, it stopped letting me sleep unless I wrote a chapter a day.
And then it slowly ate my brain. For the people on my substack, no I haven’t abandoned it. I WILL give you books, I promise, and probably 3 e-arcs in the next couple of months. I know it went totally silent three months ago, but that honestly has been health. Is still health. Next thyroid appointment in two weeks. Hopefully fixed by then.
Anyway, so, yeah, thyroid is also stupid, so everything is taking place at.a.crawl. With a lot of depression and weeping, too.
But this book colonized my brain, and made it impossible to write other books at the same time. Or think of other books. Or read much. Or–
And then last October I finished it. Yay, free at last.
Right…. except no.
I mean, probably not the book’s fault that I got very ill and it whacked my thyroid. I’m solidly blaming Portugal for that. (It deserves it.) But still. I did the first pass revision before I left. So I could send to alphas (what comes before betas.) And I was SO PROUD of myself.
Then the word revision took for GRINDING EVER. And I kept having bouts of depression where I’d stare at a paragraph and weep because it was so bad. This is NOT normal.
And then a week ago, when I was congratulating myself because I was ALMOST through on word-revision, and I could now put up the e-arc for the first third (I’m publishing it in thirds) the book grabbed me from a sound sleep in the middle of the night.
I knew what was wrong. No, wait. It knew what was wrong. I had no idea. but it was going to make me fix it.
So I’m now about 1/5th through on revision three.
What is revision three you ask? Glad you asked. Not.
No, wait. It’s okay. I’m not hostile to YOU. I’m just hostile. Because seriously, why me? Sixty two years of a nearly… very closely…. almost… well, so far as anyone knows, blameless life, and then this happens?
I’m going over each chapter slowly and carefully. Sometimes I add a word. Sometimes I realize that character just did something and context is ENTIRELY lacking. I mean, there’s enough for readers to go on with, but the reader might not fully get what’s going on. Because it is a profoundly weird world.
So I will add 20 or a thousand words there. Then another word the next twenty pages. Then…
It is a weird enough process I panicked it. I’ve now shown it to three of the alpha readers, and they all agree it’s better this way (which is not what I asked. What I asked was “tell me this is pointless, so I can stop doing it and put out the e-arc to subscribers.” BUT NOOOOOO.) They also express bafflement at what I’ve actually done, because apparently most of the ad ons are subtle enough they can’t tell where they are.
The effect, to my own mind, is like…. taking a bare pencil sketch and adding shading. Or like if you are sewing with very thin fabric putting fusible stiffener behind it. It’s just making the world and the characters and …. everything… more there.
I hope. Or I — and the alphas — could be nuts, and I could be doing this for no good reason.
I just hope this is not the new process. I hope it’s just this book. This unbelievably annoying and alien book.
Because otherwise it’s going to be exasperating. For a while.
Mad Genius Club 
42 responses to “By the Heels”
What’s happening to the guy’s left hand?? [Puzzled]
ALIENS spit acid, see…?
THIS is what you two juvenile delinquents focus on?
ARGH
What can I say, I’m a visual girl.
Sniff. You two are meaner than the book.
He threw the book with his right hand, now out of sight, and his left hand got tangled up in the old t shirt he was waving at it, which is about to become very unfortunate if the critters snaps at it . . .
No wait, the alien bites the shirt, tosses his head, flinging Our Hero . . .
I love you SO MUCH.
Now, Sarah, there’s WAY more than two…. 😇😏😁
Oh, yeah. That makes me feel better! not.
That’s not his left hand. It’s a book.
His left hand is hidden by the body.
Are you mixing up left and right again? 😀
That’s definitely his deformed left hand up there in front of the alien’s teeth. Looks like it’s merged with some sort of crab claw.
Oh, that. Who knows? Forget it Jack, it’s midjourney.
Occasionally when I was talking to the vet about my dog, I’d say “drivers side” or “passenger side”. Because, of course, any limp would disappear when we got to the vet’s office.
Oh, yeah. We had a cat who forgot which side he was limping on. And only limped when he wanted attention.
He’s about to go full Akira on the xenomorph.
Ouch, that sounds like a mess….
I sympathize. Usually I’d get a rough draft done in few months, then polish it in a year or less. But The Words of the Night has eaten my brain for the better part of 3 years. I finally got the last “needs this scene!” completed, and… the sniffle-and-hack going around locally, that everyone else seems able to work through, has flattened me like a steamroller set to thin-crust pizza.
Resting. In no shape to edit. Going to try and use what concentration I have to come up with new ideas that are solid enough to let me get them going, instead of a few characters/scenes that fizzle out and leave me hanging.
I’d say keep going. Sometimes those few words more or less really do matter. Remember Mark Twain – the difference between the right word and almost the right word is the difference between lightning and lightning bug!
…I just did a wordcount.
The draft on The Words of the Night is a bit under 169K.
Pretty sure the longest book I’d written before that was Count Taka and the Vampire Brides, which was a smidge over 115 K.
*Head. Desk. Head. Desk….*
I honestly do not know what to do now. Everything in there is important to the story.
(Worse, I’m not even sure how to format the darn thing for paperback – if that’s one volume, so many pages, I’ll have to fiddle with the internal borders on my template and – nope. Nope, can’t think about that right now.)
…I’m going to get some more aspirin. And maybe pass out for a bit.
OK – shortcut to setting up for 6×9 paperback. Format for mirrored margins. Set the top and bottom margins at 2.05, the side margins at 1.75, and the gutter left at .03. Set the spacing of lines at 1.15. (assuming font size at 12, maybe 14)
There you go. Easy peasy, lemon squeezy.
I have a template set up. I’ll have to go in and alter that with the requisite numbers, thanks.
It’s just one of those, “Oh no now what?” realizations….
Huh, Amazon KDP says 0.75 for the inside margins… my top and bottom have been 0.5, and the gutter 0.3 not 0.03…. I’ll have to look in more detail later.
That’s starting with page in MS Word that’s 8.5 by 11.
Ah! I already have a template set up for 6 by 9 inch, so… yes, different numbers. But thanks!
This thing is going to be, as I expected, at 250k words. damn it.
I feel your pain. *Rueful nod*
(Please let the next story in the setting be a bit shorter, brain….)
That’s about the length that A Diabolical Bargain is. What in particular do you think will be an issue?
I usually write things much shorter so 1) formatting and making the cover may be trickier than usual and 2) I hope I paced it all right.
That could be an issue. I don’t do wrap-around art for dead-tree editions
I had one book that I kept putting aside, half-done, for seven years … because I usually have two going at a time, since when I get stuck or bored, or just don’t feel it with one, I can work on the other. That story kept being back burnered … until I finally got it all done, but I had to finally really focus on it, and not be distra—
Oh, squirrel!
Can I point out that this is a three book size book, therefore should count as three books, even if it wrote as one book?
I suspect the reason why it took such complete hold of your brain is that the world-societies, biomes-is so complicated and plot detail necessary that you can’t hold two other worlds in your head at once with all of it. (I mean, science fiction, it’s more like fifty worlds in this one book.)
My condolences on the re-write. Sometimes that happens to me. I’ll scribble along for a while, getting farther and farther out into hyperspace, then I’ll look at it one day and say “no way Character did all that.” Then rip it all out and go find out what Character actually did.
I’ve been on a publishing kick the last month or so. It was pointed out to me that the books won’t get on amazon themselves, and I’m not going to live forever. So I published Angels Incorporated last month and Secret Empire this month. April will be The Demon Slayers, and hopefully May will be The Discarded Shoe. After that, we’ll see.
But, all this publishing has meant I must go back and re-proof all my books, to make sure I’ve got everything squared away. Re-reading the entire series has been pretty fun, on the whole, and yesterday I finished the last one.
Leading me to today, where a new book beckons. And what is this new book, one might ask? So far, it is morning. Our Hero has finished feeding the livestock, and has arrived to find breakfast being made by… well, I’m not sure yet.
And that’s it. I know what happened before, who’s who, and what might be hanging fire offstage, but beyond that I got nothing. Pretty much I’m going to go visit Character and associates, hang out and see what happens.
This does not seem to be standard practice in the industry, from what I can gather. I recall one author going REEEEEEEE!!!!!11! at me (on TheMarySue years ago, I dimly recall) for suggesting that every nuance and word choice of hers wasn’t soberly and professionally thought out, planned and executed with great deliberation. Anything else would be “self-insert trash” and therefore disgraceful, disgusting and disastrous.
But I can’t do it like that, so I remain an uncouth and deplorable ruffian, scribbling objectionable, male-oriented pulp with spaceships and robot girlfriends in it. ~:D
Go me!
It’s not a rip. It’s an “add to, and give it body.” It’s a very complicated and involved world. Sigh.
I’m not smart enough to do super-complicated worlds. ~:D
I like to keep things down to nuclear fusion, Law of Contagion, Law of Similarity, low orbit kinetic strikes, ludicrously large energy weapons… simple stuff. Anything else is “Alien Technology” or “Eldritch powers we know naught of.”
I didn’t want this one to be super-complicated, d*mn it.
Also I apologize for fighting Canadians on Twitter.
Are you fighting my fellow Canadian on Twitter, Sarah? Thank God someone is, those morons all need boot to the head to start them breathing. Please carry on at your discretion. ~:D
Incidentally, anytime you see some fool saying “elbows up!” that is #LiberalParty astroturf. Said fool is a sock puppet/paid party apparatchik. Flame on.
There are no tariffs in effect in Canada right now. I’m misinformed.
Assholes should write fantasy. They might get paid.
I took up outlining because it was easier on me when the story petered out and never ended in outline form. . . .
But if ” what might be hanging fire offstage,” means you have some idea what happened next and the story still is not moving —
Try having the exact opposite happen.
Usually I have a vague notion about who/what the opposition is, and the sorts of things they’ve done in the past. But sometimes I don’t. When I wrote The Discarded Shoe all I had was a shoe lying in an alley in Amsterdam, and my detective character from Unfair Advantage on holidays.
It started out as a comment of mine at MGC. Might have been one of these “where do you get your ideas from?” posts. ~:D
However, your advise to do the opposite of what I expect seems interesting. I’ll have a go. Stories never ending is an issue I also share, I just don’t want the adventure to be over.
I love the artwork today.
Thank you. A person of culture and kindness, who isn’t yelling at me about hands, left, right or the other one. 😀
Having spent my spare time for the last 3 months playing around with a local install of ComfyUI, I’m pretty much still at the “generate hundreds of tries of the same thing while tweaking the prompt and LORA strengths until I get something at least close to what I was trying for.” It’s heck on the electricty bill though… Next time I get enough time to think a few days I plan to wade through enough tutorials to get inpainting working in ComfyUI for hands and faces at least.
Every time I see Sabine Hossenfelder raging on that AI is going to take over the world, I think about asking Adobe Express to draw me a horse. ~:D
I don’t know whether the problem is the same, or not. But I have had pieces of this (very slowly) worked on series running around in my head for at least fifty years, if not a bit more. When something “new” pops up in my head, I’m never sure whether it is really new or a resurfacing.
I am finally giving up on trying to slog through these things in order, though. I’m creating “Fragments” folders in every story to stick those into (I think I can at least get them into the right book, hopefully). Then I’ll see if they make any sense whatsoever when I get to the appropriate places in my scene outlines.