Budding

The monster chapter became two chapters. The only problem is that I need to change my plans for chapter 18 and what I'm writing about there. I think I might have to switch the OH I JUST THOUGHT OF WHAT I COULD DO. I might just be a genius at 1:30 in the morning. Of course this means I need to finish chapter 12 finally, but that's OK. Well maybe not. I haven't been so stuck on anything I've written in my life. Ugh. Regardless, I have an entire interlude to complete before that has to see the light of day. Perhaps I should begin meditating on this section a little more and it'll come to me. Anyway, I just thought I'd say I'm about a paragraph and a few lines of dialogue from finally finishing chapter 16, which is now also chapter 17. I will be moving on after tonight.

Also, current word count: 115,488 and page count: 206

We're well into the latter half now folks. For the first time ever I can see a conclusion to this work in the near future. 

Architects

Broke 200 pages a couple days ago. I think I only really realized the significance of that milestone today, especially since I've finally reached and surpassed one of the points of this story that has been playing in my mind over and over again for many years. It took a slightly different shape than I had pictured it for so long, but it works better. I still have no idea how I came to write it the way I did. My mind is...strange. Maybe I melted my brain when I got heat exhaustion in Rome.

Currently sitting at 115,000 words at the moment. I still have a couple of small gaps to fill in for the juggernaut that is chapter 16. Let's see...we have a battle, an escape, a journey, a confrontation and a consultation all in one chapter. There's a hell of a lot of information that I packed into a couple of pages with intersecting thought processes, but it really all needs to be told from one perspective. The only other option I could think of would be to put the next interlude between the escape and the latter half of the chapter. Actually...that might work. I need to refer back to this post I think. For now, I'll leave it as is.

I reread a lot of what I wrote while I was travelling and noticed that it really wasn't that bad. My writing style has evolved some, and some slight changes (that I can thankfully pick out without too much difficulty) need to be made, but for the most part, it's fairly solid. Chapter 1 needs to be rewritten and chapter 3 needs to be heavily revised, but the other chapters are easy enough to work with and edit as is. This is good considering that this version, most of it technically version 2, not 3 (in the case of the first 4 chapters and the one interlude) was written about 3 or 4 years ago. I'd have to look back at my posts to figure out how long I've taken between each chapter to determine my work ethic for the last few chapters. Based off of my past motivation levels, I have BREEZED through chapter 16, monster that it is, in less than a couple weeks (if you ignore the 5 week hiatus in the middle, where I actually continued to work on it, in my mind and in its review on my e-reader).

So theoretically, after tonight (or tomorrow based on how long this tough little part will be) I will have chapters 1-11 and 13-16 finished. Chapter 12 is still a huge problem for me, but I will need to finish it within the next couple of weeks if I am to continue the narrative. It's...a little more crucial for the final 13 or so chapters that need to come. I'd like to say I'm close to the end, but I'm really more like 60% done. A few of the chapters to come WILL be short (the only chapter that will match chapter 16 in length I believe should come much later...near the end).

Lastly, I know, almost with 100% certainty how I will end this book. I think I will be happy with this ending. I want it to be an ending that leaves it open for the second and third books I have planned open, but at the same time with enough of a conclusion that I don't have to panic too much in beginning the next step. I don't even think I SHOULD be thinking of the next step yet considering I've been working on this for EIGHT YEARS. I started this when I was 15 or 16. I'm 24 now. Granted, I needed to hone my writing skills...am still honing them in fact. Honestly, I think they will always be in a perpetual state of honing. There is no perfection in my writing. Though if I have to be egotistical, just this once, I have delivered some damn good one-liners. Well, at least I'm entertained by them.

And it's all about having fun right?


My that was long-winded.

Plodding Away

I've been trying to write Jason's chapter again. I don't know why he's so difficult to write. Maybe it's because I can deviate much from what I planned on being said and done at this point, especially with how important the information in this chapter is to the story. I have a lot of the dialogue down, a lot of the character traits and I've even developed some plot points in my traditional writing manner, but still, the chapter remains unfinished. I think my other problem is I haven't got a "feel" for Jason's character yet. I want him to be more than an arrogant and angry. He needs to be likeable enough to count as a complex character and to have the ending I am planning MEAN something.

My philosophy in writing is that both sides of conflict need to have a face, a personality, a cause and a legitimate reason for why they do what they do. I don't believe in the archetypical villain who plots away in his tower with his only motivation as "I am evil." WMRR isn't that kind of story.

As for the next two chapters, I have a good idea of how they'll go down. I also finished a lot of the dialogue for a chapter after the next interlude (Myra's), which makes me feel better about not having done as much in the last month.

My video production has been difficult as well as I have just been BUSY. October was brutal in terms of being busy and being sick. I have had stomach issues for two weeks now, so I'll hopefully be seeing a doctor next week about that. Hopefully I don't have some infectious disease that will wipe out all of humanity as we know it.

Old Memories

I can't believe what I used to write. I'm almost embarassed to read it now, but it's quite entertaining. Chapters 14, 15 and 16 are going to have a lot of elements version one had, but man am I glad I'm revamping it. It's bad. So bad. I've come a long way in six years. My writing isn't great yet, but it has improved so much. I say that time and time again, but what I used to write was so...innocent. The characters had personality, but they were all so cheerful and one-dimensional all the time. Hardly any seriousness to it. I'd like to think I kept some of that silliness in my current writing, but I have to admit that I don't lament leaving most of it behind. The story has also developed a great deal since then.

I know, that despite these improvements, I'm still extremely naive in my writing. A lot of instances follow the logic that makes sense to me, but not necessarily everyone else. What I'll need in the near future is a really good editor to tell me when I'm completely out of my mind. This will be often, but I think I can handle it. There's no way I'd give up on something I've poured over six years into.