Working on Vacation

So this past weekend I was in Williamsburg for vacation (Yes, Williamsburg, because I’m old.) and I can still remember the stresses of the up-coming vacation. Trying to get everything done in prep (I didn’t) hoping things would be calm at work (they weren’t) not forgetting anything important (we did).

The first morning I sat down in front of my computer, entirely intent on writing something, as I usually do on vacation because I just love to write. I realized about ten minutes in that I didn’t want to write. I forced myself to anyway, because what is vacation for if not having time to get things done?

And after I had finished I looked at it. Why? Why was I forcing myself to work? Yes, I got something done. Something that wouldn’t have gotten done otherwise. I had filled my head with idea that since I had written on vacation in the past, I should do it now. Because this was time I could spend writing …why wouldn’t I?

And I think we humans do this a lot. We convince ourselves that it’s not a good time to take a vacation. That there’s more that needs to be done! Right now! Can’t wait! I was able to turn something I generally enjoy into work. (I mean and it normally is work, but I was on vacation.)

The truth of the matter is yes. There is always going to be something to do. All. The. Time. That’s never going to go away. It’s important, I think, that when you do set aside time for yourself, whether it’s a whole vacation or just relaxing in the evening, that you don’t convince yourself somehow that you should be working. Take that time to relax. Yes, you could be getting something done, but relaxing is getting something done as well. It just doesn’t always feel like it. There is a time to get the job done and there is a time to sit back and relax, and you’re never going to relax unless you make that time for yourself.

It’s Vacation Time Again

So Camp Nanowrimo was both a success and not. I easily passed my word count goal of 20k. I validated with 30k, but I didn’t finish writing all the scenes I needed in the Huntsman. I did a lot of new ones, and then I went back and rewrote a number of scenes. I am certainly further than I was at the beginning of the April, but certainly not as far as I would’ve liked to be. Of course ‘doneness’ of a novel is not an easy thing to calculate, so it’s more like, my goal of having a draft 0 done has still not been reached.

I’m still moving forward, I’m still making progress, but I really want to hit some sort of milestone. Something I can point to and say, ‘I’ve finished x.’ I mean I gave myself a reward for reaching my goal in Camp Nanowrimo, but I feel like that was a milestone for Camp Nanowrimo, and not necessarily my book.

Of course this week I’m on vacation and I’m trying to give myself a break from having to work on Huntsman. I generally write for an hour or so in the mornings even when I’m on vacation because I love writing. I just don’t give myself any time or word count goals. I write for as long as I want to, on whatever project I want to. (I spent this morning on a scene from Blessings of the Nerial.)

I’m hoping that this more lax structure will help me to gather myself and be ready to move forward again once vacation is over. Short post, I’m on vacation.

Subjective Opinions

I went to a horse show recently with my appaloosa gelding, Nick. I showed a number of classes, but one class in particular was Showmanship. Showmanship is a class where you show your horse in-hand and take them through a defined pattern, and it is a class both Nick and I are well trained in.

I ran my showmanship pattern at this show, and I knew I had done well. I hit the points I was supposed to hit, Nick stayed with me and went through the maneuvers as he should, and I was smiling as I left the ring. My coach even gave me a “good job” as I exited. Out of five participants in the class, I received 5th, 3rd, and 1st, one from each of three judges. I realized had no idea how to interpret that. One judge thought I did the best of the class and another thought I did the worst?

And so, of course, it made me think about book reviews, (of course!). While I don’t have any books of my own out there to be reviewed yet, I have read plenty of book reviews for other books. I’ve read plenty of reviews for books I haven’t read, but I have also gone back to read reviews for books that I have read. I have seen one star reviews on books that have literally changed my life for the better, and five star reviews on books that I thought were just horribly written.

The reminder here is that judging anything is so subjective. Different people put different weight on different things based on their experiences, skill/knowledge, and even current mood. Even on something as short as my two minute showmanship pattern, it’s possible that one of the judges saw Nick step out of line, or thought he was crooked, or not engaging his back. Another was impressed by a beautiful stop or a well done haunch turn. It’s possible that it was a matter of them looked down or up at different times.

After I thought about it, it just brought to light how little control I have over other people’s opinions. Even my favorite authors have people who don’t like their books. I will have my own book out there one day and I will likely get more of the same. People who laud my writing as something that spoke to them, and others who curse my name to the depths of hell.

While it is much harder for an entire book to be all good or all bad, if I can get such varying results from a two minute showmanship pattern, then it’s not surprising to get varying results from a 100k word novel. It just shone a little more light on the fact that I’d better like the book I produce, because I’m putting in far more time than anyone who reads it, and I have no control over how anyone likes it.

Review: The Cloud Roads

My Review of The Cloud Roads by Martha Wells

My summary: Moon has two forms he can shift between at will, one that looks humanish and one that is a humanoid flying reptile. He’s been on his own for a long time and uses his humanoid (groundling) form while keeping his other form a secret, and moving on whenever his secret gets out.

When his current home finds out his secret they nearly kill him, but he is saved by another of his kind who takes him back to his colony, where Moon finds out he’s more special than he thought, and his people are dying out.

Why I picked up this book: I saw the second book at World Fantasy Con, and I loved the look of the flying reptiles, but that wasn’t enough to get me to pick it up. I later read about it in an article about books the meld magic and technology. That was enough to get me to order the first book.

What I knew going in: Flying. Reptiles. (But not dragons.) Also, I was looking for the meld of magic and technology.

My response: I really liked the characters in this book, especially Moon, and the way he interacts with the other Raksura. Because they’re a different race, Martha got away with playing around with how the characters interacted with each other outside of normal gender norms in a way I found interesting and surprisingly refreshing.

The world she created also had a rather profound effect on me. It was so open and varied. It inspired me to look back at my own immense fantasy world, Feldoor, that’s been sitting in the trunk for years, and to do far better with the world building. It’s quite the book that I not only enjoy but makes me want to write more.

Do I recommend this book?: Yes. I read that this book series almost didn’t get published because it doesn’t follow normal fantasy tropes, so the publisher didn’t know how they were going to market it, and I can see why, but that in itself makes it so refreshing.

Review: Dreaming Death

My Review of Dreaming Death by J. Kathleen Cheney

My summary: Shironne is able a very powerful sensitive, someone who can feel the emotions of others, and those powers have left her blind. She is able to tap into the dreams of someone in the city who experiences people’s deaths but can’t remember them afterward. She works with the army to use what she sees to help solve the murders.

Why I picked up this book: I actually don’t remember. I must’ve heard about it somewhere.

What I knew going in: I read the first chapter before purchasing the book because I wasn’t as convinced about it as other books I’ve bought. I found the main characters very comforting, and I liked how the author portrayed her pov when she is blind.

My response: Another very rough beginning to a book. This time it was because of an immense amount of world-building info dumps. I loved the main character Shironne, and loved being in her pov, but we very quickly shift to Mikael’s pov, as a member of the army, and the Family, and one race but looks a lot like another, and all of the people he works with and their races and connections and backstories. I found myself slogging through information about which I cared very little.

Once the two main characters meet, the story is a lot more enjoyable. The characters are all written very well and feel real and distinctive. I didn’t have trouble remembering who was who (though I threw what race everyone was out the window.) except one guy who had a name that kept making me think he was a girl whenever I read it.

The plot was sufficiently intriguing and satisfying at the end. It will be interesting to see if future books will be past the fact that the female lead is still 17 for four months so she can’t have any sort of relationship with the male lead because she is a CHILD. (I very much felt like that word was being said in all caps ever time it came up.) I almost feel like I want to read the next book just so the world building I managed to get through doesn’t go to waste. (Don’t get me wrong, the world building is very intriguing, it was just not presented well.)

Do I recommend this book?: Sure. I enjoyed it well enough. It was a rather good mystery, and the world is intriguing, and once the main characters meet, they’re very cute together.

What is My Greater Goal?

I started Camp Nanowrimo at the beginning of this month with a goal of 700 words a day, and actually challenged myself to get the typical 1,667 words required to win Nanowrimo Proper, on the days I had time. Turns out that was most days in the first week and a half. I had 14,871 words before I went to a horse show this past weekend, which created four days of no time for writing.

I had great success due to, before the month started, prepping by making a list of all of the scenes, situations I still needed for my novel. Each day I would take one or somtiems two if it was short, and write it.

Now on the other side of the horse show, I’ve found that I lost some of my momentum, and I’m trying to figure out if it’s due to taking so many days off writing, or if I need to revise for a bit to organize what I have and find the path forward.

I wrote 700 words yesterday and today, but I am planning to sit down and try and organize the scenes I have written and expand my list with other scenes that I will need. Once that’s done we’ll see if my momentum comes back. Getting my goal of 20k words is not going to be a challenge, so I’m just going to push forward with however much I can get done each day and not drive myself crazy.

I’ve also been inspired by a facebook post from Gabriela of diymfa.com and as such, I’m adding a little more to my journal posts. Gabriela posed three questions as a weekly check-in. The first two I already ascribe to: “What have you accomplished this week?” and “What’s on deck for next week?” But the question she posed that got me thinking was: “How do these activities serve your greater purpose?”

For the most part, I figure my answer to that last question is “So I can finish my book.” But I think that might be a little too broad. The same way as answering: “So I can become a published author.” That’s all well and good as a goal, but there are tons of smaller steps that need to happen.

I sat down to think about what my goal is for right now with this book. I feel like finishing the book is still a ways off, so I came up with a more specific goal: “To write all the scenes that need to be written to give myself a draft 0.” After that’s done, the goal will be to turn what I have written into a rough draft (which is what can be read by a beta reader.) I hope to have that first goal of a draft 0 done by the end of this month.

Review: Assassin’s Apprentice

My Review of Assassin’s Apprentice by Robin Hobb

My summary: The bastard son of the crown prince is dropped off at the palace, causing said crown prince to give up the throne, and the bastard son is then trained as an assassin.

Why I picked up this book: Because everyone keeps *raving* about Robin Hobb and this series, so I figured ‘Sure, why not?’.

What I knew going in: Bought it on reputation alone. Yep, still doing that.

My response: Really a rather rough beginning. I had a hard time connecting with the character at all up until he meets Chade. After that the main character gets a bit of a personality and starts forming actual relationships with people. It certainly went a few places I didn’t think it was going to go, but managed to pull it off rather well.

The scene on the tower with Smithy made me cry.

As a writer I was impressed with the way she used exposition to move us past many boring bits, like learning things, while still having it feel believable that the main character had learned some certain skill that he uses later. I was also a little surprised by how the book would not mention a character for chapters, then use them again with little to no context, but for the most part I was still able to remember who they were.

Do I recommend this book?: Yes, very satisfying book, even if it takes a bit to get started. I’m interested to see where it goes from here, even if that means another two or three trilogies after this one.

Never Give Up

Okay, so bear with me for a minute, I’m going to talk about professional wrestling. John Cena is a professional wrestler who has been a top guy in the company for many years. He has recently been on TV less because he is off doing other things like making movies, as such he missed out on getting a match at the upcoming Wrestlemania.

Cena’s storyline (because wrestling is scripted) had him repeatedly fail in attempts over the past few months to earn himself a match at Wrestlemania, but true to his catch phrase he has refused to give up. When he was unable to earn a match through tournament competition he began attempts to call out the Undertaker (an older, but super popular, wrestler who *should* be retired but often shows up for Wrestlemania). For four shows, Cena has come out into the ring and called out the Undertaker before getting the crowd to cheer for how much they would love to see the Undertaker again.

And every week the Undertaker has refused to show up or acknowledge this call out, yet despite this failure, Cena comes out the next show and tries again. What I liked about the Cena storyline is that he tried winning his way into a match at Wrestlemania and when he failed at that, he went and tried another way by calling out the Undertaker. And despite the Undertaker’s apparent apathy for Cena’s call-outs, Cena went out on four different shows and repeated a similar plea.

I think it’s important sometimes to remember it’s not about just throwing yourself at a problem over and over. It’s about having a goal and working toward that goal in an intelligent way. I want an agent, and while I am querying, I am also working on improving my book’s pitch. I am also writing another book because perhaps The Law of the Prince Charming will not be the first of my books to be published. I am also continuing to learn more skills, put my writing process to the test and help it evolve. I might even, at some point, stop pursuing traditional publishing and look at self-publishing. There are lots of different paths I can take to the eventual goal of getting a book out there in the world.

Now the Cena-Taker match happened (because wrestling is scripted) and ended up being what’s called a squash match, ie, Undertaker won decisively, very fast. Now Cena’s goal was not to get beat, but he did get the match he wanted, but he strove for it all the same. I know all I can do with my writing is keep moving forward by continuing to learn and remaining flexible. So if you have a goal, aim for it, but don’t be so focused on it that you don’t see other paths that will lead you toward your goal. And who knows, it might not end up looking like what you were expecting, but it could be even better.

Review: The Diabolic

My Review of The Diabolic by S.J. Kincaid

My summary: Diabolics are genetically-created super-humans who are created to act as bodyguards to the rich. Nemesis has sworn to protect Sidonia, heir to the galactic senate. Only now the power-mad Emperor has summoned Sidonia into his court, and Nemesis must go in Sidonia’s place in order to keep her safe.

Why I picked up this book: It was suggested on Writing Excuses a while back, and I thought it sounded super interesting with SF elements as well as romance.

What I knew going in: Mostly what it says on the back of the book.

My response: I really liked the world building in this book. People living in space who then decided to worship the sun and stop teaching science, so they only have technology as long as the machines that produce and repair it keep working. They even have chat rooms with remote controlled avatars for communicating over long distances and nano-machines that can change everything about your appearance. Some fun ideas that really sparked my own creativity.
The plot wasn’t amazing, but it was satisfying. It was rather obvious that the love interest was not insane, and the antagonists are just through and through evil, but I liked how Nemesis worked through not believing she was human to believing she was capable of love. Also, the body count was really high in this book, but while it felt odd, I was not bothered by it.

Do I recommend this book?: Yes. I think it was an overall entertaining read, and I throughly enjoyed the world building.

April, the Most Productive of Months

At the beginning of last week I got a new shipment of books. Reading and I have a strange relationship. I love reading, but not only do I have a hard time attributing something so fun to something I need to do for my writing career (and thus make time for it), but when I read a book, I am generally obsessed with finishing it to the detriment of all else.

As such, I have actually avoided reading in the past, because it ‘distracts’ me from writing. Now that is silly, because in order to become a better writer, I need to read. I managed to convince myself of that enough that I read four of the five books already. (I have reviews written that will go up in the next few weeks.) However, this did cut into my writing time so while I progressed with the Huntsman, it was less than I usually do.

That brings me to my next topic. During April (Which started yesterday for you reading this, but I am writing this on March 31.), I am taking part in Camp NaNoWriMo for the first time. I was a rather religious participate of NaNoWriMo (the original) until this past year when I was in the middle of a writing project I couldn’t put off. As such I didn’t get my NaNoWriMo fix for the year and since a friend set up a cabin, I thought it might be fun to give this a try.

Unlike NaNoWriMo, Camp NaNoWriMo allows you to set your own goal and then attempt to accomplish it during the month of April. (And it can be counted in word, hours, minutes, lines, or pages.) Now I’ve been playing around with the ‘rules’ of NaNoWriMo for years. And while I always hit what I consider the ‘main’ rule (the words I authenticate are written in the month of November), the idea of giving myself my own goals is not outside of my comfort zone.

Two years ago when I had just started the Huntsman, and I gave myself the lofty goal of 90k words for NaNoWriMo. My expectation was to burn through the rough draft like I had The Law of the Prince Charming two years before that. I failed.

But of course that didn’t mean I gave up. It just took me two years to come to grips with the fact that this book won’t be as quick and easy as the first one, and that there’s nothing wrong with that. At the same time, I want to push forward this dreaded ‘muddle in the middle’ that I always have trouble with.

So I’m going to use Camp NaNoWriMo to help with that. I’ve been wibbling back and forth about what kind of goal to give myself. I’m not sure I can realistically expect to make 50k words since my weekends are spoken for all month. So I’m going to go with 20k words which is less than 700 words a day, and hopefully a number I can keep up since there will be days where I simply can’t write.

I spent part of this morning writing out a list of scenes I need to write, so hopefully I’ll just be able to bang those out. Either way, I’ll have more words written by the end of the month than I have now.

I am also participating in #WIPjoy again. Those posts will be going up on my Facebook and Twitter feeds starting today, so you’ll get some more tidbits about the Huntsman if you’re so inclined.

And this month brings the last four parts of The Aesir-Vanir War short story that has been going since the beginning of March.

It’s going to be a productive month whether I like it or not.