Fantasy/Magic & Sci-Fi → The Sorcerer's Progress
I'm on the mend
Glad to hear it. It doesn't help that many uninsured in the US have to go to the hospital ER to get non-emergency medical care. The long wait time in very uncomfortable chairs in the Jersey City ER was more stressful than anything else. I finally discovered that in the middle of the night there was virtually no waiting.
This infection was ER material, period. You're not going to find IV bags of antibiotics at anything smaller.
I've spent days trying to get Merran and Pausonalie down one hillside. I've got that done. I need a few hundred more words to get them into The Rockpile and ready for the Count Lundersot episode that I'm not yet skilled enought to write and then I can start editing it--and then put it into the chapter called The Rockpile.
Well, I'm using more than a few hundred words. I fear that I will have fifteen to twenty pages of perambulation and self-discovery on Merran's part. (I'm putting 600 to 800 words on a letter-sized page in shorthand, and I've got about four pages so far and still writing.) And, lacking Tolkien's skill, my work is likely to read more like Bored of the Rings than Lord of the Rings.
So I keep plugging at it. Amy, if you say I don't have enough description, I may strip every word of description out! And if you complain I'm re-using words, I may ask you for the name of your favorite thesaurus.
Meanwhile, if you have a copy of That Hideous Strength lying about, go read the sections on the Objective Room.
Kirsey rescuing Melanesia isn't hokey, but it isn't...a surprise. You put her in a situation where she would die and had a god descend from the heavens and save her. So that said, I don't know any other way to save her better.
Stray thought...how long was Melayne unconscious? Because some of the beetles would have swarmed to get her water. She should have bites all over and eggs to pick out of her teeth or fingernails, or you get the idea. This might have protected her briefly as the bugs covered her and the water within their bodies gave her some cover.
Not long. Kirsey explains that he entered the World of the Void from another direction and saw someone manipulating all that Fire. He was hunting after her even before she left it.
Indeed. I get these unfortunate, ugly-looking moments where X appears out of nowhere to save Y and it looks like hideous deus ex machina.
Oh, c'mon! Last time we saw Kirsey he SAID he was going after Melayne. To save her.
As I work on The Rockpile I find more details to work in. I can hear the demands for description here, but if I am not careful you will have me describe not only Minas Tirith but all of Gondor.
Imagine the Fellowship sailing under the massive guardians carved into the cliffs, and all Tolkien writes is, "Boromir steered the boat to the shore."
You are writing an epic fantasy, with sundered fragments of worlds and patched dimensions. Melayne is gathering the power required to save a world. Merran's story is just beginning. Kirsey is trying to keep an educational system alive, and himself as well. The bad guy is plotting and breaking an already damaged network of badly constructed interacting power nexuses (I'd say Nexi, but the damn spell-check is changing it all the time.)
You say that adding description isn't your style. I cross my eyes. You parse your words. I point out that the best chapter you've written was the statues and monument to the Sundering. As far as I'm concerned, that is where Merran's story begins. That chapter was fucking GREAT.
Am I a nag? Yes. It is a job requirement at my workplace, where I wake up grumpy doctors at 2 AM. Consider it a skill-set for me to survive in life.
Suck it up, buttercup. Your material is stronger with a mere couple more lines of description placed in the right couple of paragraphs.
Looks like? A god flying out of nowhere to save the little people is the very definition of Deus Ex Machina.
Why am I grumpy today? Sorry. Maybe because it was a snow day and I'm overdosing on my children.
Indeed. I get these unfortunate, ugly-looking moments where X appears out of nowhere to save Y and it looks like hideous deus ex machina.
I take far too many words for description. Professor T. spent extravagently, but got his value. Even when I have a good idea, like the blood of stone, it drags for the reader.
We'll see what you think of the opening of The Rockpile, which won't go up in the next 36 hours. I keep getting all sorts of Very Good Ideas that need to be worked in to the parts already written, already sketched, and floating in my head.
You are writing an epic fantasy, with sundered fragments of worlds and patched dimensions. Melayne is gathering the power required to save a world. Merran's story is just beginning. ...
You say that adding description isn't your style. I cross my eyes. You parse your words. I point out that the best chapter you've written was the statues and monument to the Sundering. As far as I'm concerned, that is where Merran's story begins. That chapter was fucking GREAT.
Suck it up, buttercup. Your material is stronger with a mere couple more lines of description placed in the right couple of paragraphs.
Not everyone agrees with the GREAT, and you want more than a mere couple of lines. I, OTOH, am trying to get to my story, of which the elements listed are mere prelude, with the reader still following along. Heck, I'm trying to get to the prelude.
Time now to commit my prose, fragments and notes on The Rockpile to type. Putting it in order is probably four to six days work.
The chapter now called The Rockpile may become Seeming if the new stuff gets nesrly as long as I expect. Amy, I may out-wordcount your Catacombs jouney in one day of Merran's visit to The Academy.
Your muse again. Just give in and let her win:-)
Amy, I may out-wordcount your Catacombs jouney in one day of Merran's visit to The Academy.
As long as you don't write a 20-page prologue. :-)
I'm reaching for 1,800 words, and I've just got Merran off that d***ed hill.
Pausonallie must have read the doubt in Merran's voice. "It was a new district they opened up about twenty years ago. Thorodeus can give you the whole history. They called it the 'Gold Stone Plat' but that name didn't stick. Then they called it the 'Hammered Stone District'. Then they abandoned it for another area they built, and now people use it for unofficial things, clubs and stuff, and we've started calling it the Rockpile. You'll see why."
Typo before Gold. It should be it, not in. That paragraph would be right at home in LOTR (in a good way).
Fixed. Tnx. I fear it's more Bored than Lawd.
No Daylighters allowed.
Looking at the next brief part of their journey, I can see 1,000 to 1,900 words here as well. 19 short stages, estimate 55 to 100 words each. There's a huge amount of description, so Amy can come out with the machete. But remember, I don't want it to go to 3,800 words!
Imagine the Fellowship sailing under the massive guardians carved into the cliffs, and all Tolkien writes is, "Boromir steered the boat to the shore."
For the record, I could have lived my life happily without that extra fluff. Give me the toils of the character any day (Are Boromir's hands chafed on the oar? Is he getting upset at always having to row? Does he secretly have the hots for Legolas?)
LOTR is a Milieu story. MICE: Milieu, Idea, Character, Event (O.S.Card). What you describe belongs to a Character story.
3000 words to get to street level in The Rockpile. I'll put it up later and you can tell me where to cut.
Some minor edits to the new chapter, titled Dirtier than Dirt. It's a crummy title, and I'm open to suggestions. I cut a few words, combined some sentences, and managed to add about forty words. It's over 3,000 now (eeeek!) But it will be good for a few review points.
Fantasy/Magic & Sci-Fi → The Sorcerer's Progress
